A GREAT REVOLUTION.
Notwithstanding the directness of this questioning, it was by no means a
direct reply which Mr. Beresford got from Mrs. Meredith. It was not a
refusal, but neither was it a consent. ‘Let us not do anything rashly,’
and ‘I think we are very well as we are,’ was what she said, and yet the
change was certainly a step nearer accomplishment now that the
possibility of it had been mentioned between them. He had grown rather
earnest in pressing the expediency of this step as soon as the ice was
fairly broken, and had been piqued by her reluctance into more warmth
than he had expected himself to feel. Nevertheless, when he came back to
his own house, uncomfortable matters of detail came into Mr. Beresford’s
mind, and annoyed him more than he could have believed, more than they
were worth. About the houses, for instance; if this happened, they could
not go on living next door to each other. Would she come to his, or
should he go to hers?--if indeed the matter came to anything. This
bothered him, and suggested many other details--changes of habit which
would bother him still more. Altogether it was a troublesome business.
He liked her best in her own drawing-room; but then he liked himself
much best in his own library, and there were moments in which he felt
disposed to denounce the fool who had first thought of any change. All
things considered, how much better it would have been that they should
remain as they were! but that was no longer to be thought of. How was he
to tell Cara? How was she to tell her boys, upon whom she was so much
more dependent than he was upon Cara? If the boys disapproved
strenuously, then Mr. Beresford felt it would come to nothing after all;
and in that case how much better to have said nothing! for he felt that
he would not like to stand in the position of a man refused. So that
altogether this middle-aged romance was not without its troubles;
troubles--as, for instance, that about the houses--which you may laugh
at if you please, but which involved much more personal embarrassment
and inconvenience, you will allow, than many of the sentimental
difficulties which you are ready to weep over in the romances of the
young.
Mrs. Meredith was kept in some uneasiness also by the fact that Oswald
did not return that night. The servants sat up for him, and lights
burned all night in the house, affronting the dawn which came so early;
but he did not appear. This was not at all usual; for Oswald, though he
liked his own way, and was frivolous enough, had never been dissipated
in the ordinary sense of that word; and what made it more unpleasant
still was the fact that next day was Sunday, and that no communication
either by telegram or letter was possible. This fact drove everything
else out of Mrs. Meredith’s head. When James Beresford went to her, she
could talk of nothing but Oswald; where he could have gone, how he might
have been detained. That he had not sent them any news of his movements
was easily explained. Sunday! ‘I would not say a word against Sunday,’
said poor Mrs. Meredith, who went to church dutifully as Sunday came;
‘but, oh! when one is anxious, when there is no post and no telegraph,
what a day!’ They were all telling her how easily explainable Oswald’s
absence was; and when they stopped explaining it to her, she herself
would take up the parable, and protest that she knew exactly how it must
have happened. It was all as clear as daylight. He had been detained by
his friends whoever they might happen to be, or he had lost the last
train. It was Oswald’s way to lose the last train, and no one had asked
where he was going when he said he was going to the country. And, of
course, it had been too late to telegraph on Saturday night, and how was
he to know, a boy of his late habits, that the telegraph offices were
open early on Sunday morning? All these explanations were most
plausible--the worst of such things, however, is that, plausible as
they are, they satisfy nobody. But it annoyed Mr. Beresford immensely
to find that Oswald’s unexpected absence took up all Mrs. Meredith’s
thoughts. She had no leisure for him, though surely he ought to have
been at least as important as Oswald. Whatever he talked to her about,
she replied to him with something about her boy. As if her boy could
have come to any harm! as if it was not all his own levity and
selfishness! Mr. Beresford, having an object of his own to pursue, was
quite indignant with and impatient of Oswald. What was he, a frivolous
do-nothing unsatisfactory young man, that so much fuss should be made
about _him_? He was one of ‘the boys’--what more could be said? and how
unsatisfactory the best of women were when this motive came into play!
Cara never thus distracted her father’s mind; he did not think of her.
To be sure she was a girl, and girls never get into scrapes. He did not
quite like, it is true, the task of opening this question, of which his
mind was full, to Cara. He thought, perhaps, that when all was settled,
_she_ (meaning Mrs. Meredith) might do it. Women know best how to deal
with girls; but to make Cara, whatever might happen to her, into a
hindrance of other intercourse, into an obstacle which stopped
everything, that was not a weakness of which he would be capable. Mr.
Beresford did not scoff at women; it was not a sentiment congenial to
him; but still he had a feeling that in this respect the comparative
strength and weakness of male and female character was certainly shown.
But he would not say so rudely. He was obliged to submit.
On Monday morning a telegram did come from Oswald. He had been detained;
would write to explain, but did not expect to get home till Thursday or
Friday; please send portmanteau to Cloak-room, Clapham Junction. ‘Do any
of his friends live in that quarter?’ Mrs. Meredith asked Edward, with
astonishment. ‘He has friends everywhere,’ said Edward, with a half
sigh. This pleased the mother, though he had not said it with such an
intention. Yes, he had friends everywhere. He was a harum-scarum boy,
too careless perhaps, but everywhere, wherever he went, he had friends;
and the portmanteau was sent, and the letter of explanation waited
for--but it did not come. In short, the week had nearly run round again
without any news of him, and everything else was arrested, waited for
Oswald’s reappearance. Mrs. Meredith evaded all recurrence to the more
important subject by constantly falling back upon Oswald--perhaps she
was rather glad of the chance of escape it gave her--and Mr. Beresford
was no nearer a settlement than ever. This fretted him, and put him in a
sort of secondary position which he did not like, but which it was
useless to struggle against; and so the days and the hours went on.
It was the Friday when two visitors almost at the same moment approached
the two adjoining houses in the Square, both of them with faces full of
seriousness, and even anxiety. One of them was Mr. Maxwell in his
brougham, who sprang out with a kind of nervous alacrity unusual to him,
and knocked at Mrs. Meredith’s door. The other was a solid and portly
clergyman, who got out of a four-wheeled cab, paying his fare with a
careful calculation of the distance which produced bad language from his
driver, and knocked at Mr. Beresford’s. They were admitted about the
same moment, and received in the two corresponding rooms with nothing
but a wall between them; and both of them had very serious business in
hand. Cara’s visitor was Mr. Burchell, from the Rectory, who asked, with
a countenance full of strange things, and with many apologies, whether
Miss Beresford had lately seen ‘our Agnes.’ Agnes! the name made Cara
start.
‘I have not seen anyone but Roger since I left the Hill. I hope he--I
mean all, are well. Is Agnes in town, Mr. Burchell?’ Agnes was four or
five years older than Cara, and therefore out of her sphere.
‘I thought your aunt would certainly have mentioned it to you; indeed,
Mrs. Burchell was much surprised that she did not see her when she was
in town. Agnes has been in--an educational establishment for some time.
We are a little anxious about her,’ said the Rector, with a quaver in
his voice.
‘Is she ill?’ Cara did not love the clergyman under whom she had sat for
ten years, but her heart was touched by that unmistakable trembling in
his commonplace voice.
‘I don’t suppose she is ill; we--don’t know. The fact is she left--the
House last Saturday--and has never come back. We don’t know what has
become of her,’ he said, with real trouble. ‘You won’t mention it to
anyone. Oh, I suppose it is nothing, or something quite easily
explainable; but her mother is anxious--and I thought you might have
seen her. It is nothing, nothing of any real consequence,’ he added,
trying to smile, but with a quiver in his lips. He was stout and
commonplace and indeed disagreeable, but emotion had its effect upon him
as well as another, and he was anxious about his child. He looked Cara
wistfully in the face, as if trying to read in the lines of it something
more than she would allow.
‘Agnes! the House--O Mr. Burchell!’ said Cara, waking up suddenly to a
full sense of all that was in the communication. ‘Do you mean to say
that it was Agnes--_Agnes!_ that was the Agnes in the House?’
Mr. Maxwell was more uncertain how to open the object of his visit. He
sat for some time talking of _la pluie et le beau temps_. He did not
know how to begin. Then he contrived little traps for Mrs. Meredith,
hoping to bring her to betray herself, and open a way for him. He asked
about Cara, then about Mr. Beresford, and how he heard he had given up
all ideas of going away. But, with all this, he did not produce the
desired result, and it was necessary at last, unless he meant to lose
his time altogether, to introduce his subject broadly without preface.
He did so with much clearing of his throat.
‘I have taken rather a bold thing upon me,’ he said. ‘I have thought it
my duty--I hope you will forgive me, Mrs. Meredith. I have come to speak
to you on this subject.’
‘On what subject?’ she said simply, with a smile.
This made it more difficult than ever. ‘About you and Mr. Beresford,’ he
said, abruptly blurting it out. ‘Don’t be offended, for heaven’s sake!
You ought to have known from the first; but I can’t let you walk blindly
into--other relations--without letting you know.’
‘Doctor, I hope you are not going to say anything that will make a
breach between us,’ said Mrs. Meredith. ‘You have no right to suppose
that I am about to form other relations--I only a few months a widow! I
hope I have done nothing to forfeit my friends’ respect.’
‘Then I am not too late,’ he said, with an air of relief. ‘There is
still time! I am very glad of that. Respect--forfeit your friends’
respect? who could suppose such a thing? You have only too much of your
friends’ respect. We would all go through fire and water for you.’
‘Thanks, thanks,’ she said; ‘but you must not let me be gossiped about,’
she added, after a moment, which made the doctor, though he was not of a
delicate countenance, blush.
‘That is all very well,’ he said, ‘but those who have so many friends,
and friends so warmly interested, must expect a little talk. It has been
spoken of, that there was something, that there might be--in short, that
Mr. Beresford and you--forgive me! I don’t mean to say that it would not
be most suitable. Everybody knows how fond he is of you--and not much
wonder.’
‘Indeed, indeed you must not talk to me so,’ cried Mrs. Meredith,
distressed; ‘my affairs are not public business, Mr. Maxwell.’
‘I came to tell you,’ he said, doggedly, ‘something you ought to know. I
have no dislike to James Beresford. On the contrary, we are old friends;
we were boys together. I did my best to shelter him from any reproach at
the time. Everything I could do I did, and I think I succeeded. Perhaps
now when one comes to reflect, it would have been better if I had not
succeeded so well. But I could not stand by and see him ruined, see his
peace of mind destroyed.’
‘Are you talking of Mr. Beresford? Have you lost your senses, doctor?
what do you mean?’
‘You remember all that happened when Mrs. Beresford died?’
‘I remember--oh yes--poor Annie! how she suffered, poor soul, and how
truly he mourned for her--how heart-broken he was.’
‘He had occasion,’ said the doctor, grimly.
‘Had occasion! I cannot imagine what you mean--there was never a better
husband,’ said Mrs. Meredith, with some fervour; ‘never one who loved a
woman better, or was more tender with her.’
‘Too tender. I am not saying that I condemn him absolutely. There are
cases in which in one’s heart one might approve. Perhaps his was one of
these cases; but anyhow, Mrs. Meredith, you ought to know.’
She got impatient, for she, too, had the feeling that to see her
friend’s faults herself was one thing, but to have him found fault with
quite another. ‘I should have thought that I knew Mr. Beresford quite as
well as you did, doctor,’ she said, trying to give a lighter tone to the
conversation. ‘I have certainly seen a great deal more of him for all
these years.’
‘You could not know this,’ said Mr. Maxwell, ‘nor would I have told you
but for the extremity of the case. Listen! She might have lingered I
cannot tell how long--weeks, months--it was even possible years.’
‘Yes!’ the assent was no assent, but an exclamation of excitement and
wonder.
‘I believe he meant it for the best. She was mad about having something
given to her to put her out of her misery, as soon as we knew that she
was past hope. Mrs. Meredith, I feel bound to tell you--when you know
you can judge for yourself. He must have given her something that day
after the consultation. It is no use mincing words--he must have given
her--her death.’
‘Doctor! do you know what you are saying?’ She rose up from her
chair--then sank back in it looking as if she were about to faint.
‘I know too well what I am saying. I huddled it up that there might be
no inquiry. I don’t doubt she insisted upon it, and I don’t blame him.
No, I should not have had the courage to do it, but I don’t blame
him--altogether. It is a very difficult question. But you ought not to
marry him--to be allowed to marry him in ignorance.’
She made no answer. The shock came upon her with all the more force that
her mind was already weakened by anxiety. Given her her death! what did
that mean? Did it mean that he had killed poor Annie, this man who was
her dearest friend? A shiver shook all her frame. ‘I think you must be
wrong. I hope you are wrong,’ she said. It was all she could do to keep
her teeth from chattering. The sudden horror chilled and froze her. ‘Oh,
Mr. Maxwell, he never could have done it! No, no, I will never believe
it,’ she said.
‘But I know it,’ said the doctor; ‘there could be no doubt of it; I
could not have been deceived, and it was no crime in my eyes. He did it
in love and kindness--he did it to serve her. But still no woman should
marry him, without knowing at least----’
‘There was never any question of that,’ she said, hurriedly, in the
commotion of her mind. Then it seemed cowardly of her to forsake him.
She paused. ‘He is worthy of any woman’s confidence. I will not hear a
word against him. He did not do it. I am sure he did not do it! or, if
he did, he was not to blame.’
The words had not left her lips when the door was opened, and the
subject of this strange conversation, Mr. Beresford himself, came into
the room. They were both too agitated for concealment. She looked at the
doctor with sudden terror. She was afraid of a quarrel, as women so
often are. But Maxwell himself was too much moved to make any pretences.
He rose up suddenly, with an involuntary start; but he was shaken out of
ordinary caution by the excitement of what he had done. He went up to
the new comer, who regarded him with quiet surprise, without any
salutation or form of politeness. ‘Beresford,’ he said, ‘I will not
deceive you. I have been telling her what it is right she should know. I
don’t judge you; I don’t condemn you; but whatever happens, she has a
right to know.’
It is one of the penalties or privileges of excitement that it ignores
ignorance so to speak, and expects all the world to understand its
position at a glance. James Beresford gazed with calm though quiet
astonishment upon the man who advanced to meet him with tragedy in his
tone. ‘What is the matter?’ he said, with the simplicity of surprise.
Then seeing how pale Mrs. Meredith was, he went on with some anxiety,
‘Not anything wrong with Oswald? I trust not that?’
Mrs. Meredith stirred in her chair and held out her hand to him. She
could not rise. She looked at him with an agitated smile. ‘I put perfect
faith in you, perfect faith!’ she said, ‘notwithstanding what anyone may
say.’
‘In me!’ he said, looking from one to another. He could not imagine what
they meant.
‘Beresford,’ said Maxwell again, ‘I will not hide it from you. It has
been in my mind all this time. I have never been able to look upon you
as I did before; at a crisis like this I could hold my tongue no longer.
I have been telling all that happened at the death of your first poor
wife.’
‘My _first_--!’ the exclamation was under his breath, and Maxwell
thought he was overcome with horror by the recollection; but that was
not what he was thinking of: his first wife!--there was something
sickening in the words. Was this his Annie that was meant? It seemed
profanation, sacrilege. He heard nothing but that word. Maxwell did not
understand him, but there was another who did. The doctor went on,
‘I have never said a word about it till this day, and never would but
for what was coming. You know that I took the responsibility, and kept
you free from question at the time.’
‘What does he mean?’ This question, after a wondering gaze at the other,
Beresford addressed to Mrs. Meredith behind him. ‘All this is a puzzle
to me, and not a pleasant one; what does he mean?’
‘This is too much,’ said the doctor. ‘Be a man, and stand to it now at
least. I have not blamed you, though I would not have done it myself. I
have told her that you consented--to what I have no doubt was poor Mrs.
Beresford’s prayer--and gave her--her death----’
‘I--gave her her death--you are mad, Maxwell! I, who would have died a
dozen times over to save her!’
‘There is no inconsistency in that. You could not save her, and you gave
her--what? I never inquired. Anyhow it killed her, poor girl! It was
what she wanted. Am I blaming you? But, James Beresford, whatever may
have been in the past, it is your duty to be open now, and she ought to
know.’
‘My God, will you not listen to me?’ cried Beresford, driven to despair.
He had tried to stop him, to interrupt him, but in vain. Maxwell had
only spoken out louder and stronger. He had determined to do it. He was
absolutely without doubts on the matter, and he was resolute not to be
silenced. ‘She ought to know,’ he went on saying under his breath to
himself.
‘But it is not true. It is an invention, it is a mistake! _I_ do
anything against her dear life!--even in suffering, even in misery, was
she not everything to me?’
‘That is all very well to say. You did it in love, not in hatred, I
acknowledge that. Beresford, no one here will betray you. Why not be
bold and own to what you did? I could not be deceived; it was from your
hand and no other your wife got her death. How could I, her doctor, be
deceived?’
‘Dr. Maxwell,’ said a low voice from the door; and they all started with
a violent shock, as if it had been Annie Beresford herself come back
from the grave. Mrs. Meredith rose hastily and went towards this strange
apparition. It was Cara, with cheeks perfectly colourless, with blue
eyes dilated, standing as she had entered, transfixed by those terrible
words. But the girl took no notice of her friend’s rush towards her.
She put out her hand to put Mrs. Meredith away, and kept her eyes fixed
on the doctor, as if there was no one else in the room.
‘Dr. Maxwell,’ said Cara, her young bosom heaving, ‘I have come just in
time. You are making a great, great mistake, for that is not true.’
‘Cara, child, go away, go away; I never meant this for you.’
‘No one knows but me,’ she said; ‘I was in the room all the time. I have
never forgotten one thing, nor a word she said. She wanted him to do it,
but he would not. He rushed away. I did not understand then what it
meant.’
The girl stood trembling, without any support, so slight, so young, so
fragile, with her pale face. Her father had scarcely thought of Cara
before since she was the plaything of his younger life. All at once his
eyes seemed to be opened, and his heart. He went to her by an
irresistible impulse, and put his arm round her. Love seemed to come to
life in him with very terror of what he was about to hear.
‘It was not you!’ he said, with a low cry of anguish; ‘it was not you!’
‘She would not let me,’ said Cara. ‘I asked to do it, but she would not
let me. She looked up--to God,’ cried the girl, the tears rushing to her
eyes, ‘and took it. Did not He know everything? _You_ would not be
angry, papa? you would not have cast me away if I had taken something to
get free of pain? Would He? He was her father too.’
‘O, Cara, no one blames her--no one blames her!’ said Mrs. Meredith,
with unrestrained tears.
‘She looked up to God,’ said the girl, with her voice full of awe. ‘She
said I was to tell you; but I did not understand what it meant then, and
afterwards I could not speak. It has always seemed to stand between us,
papa, that I had this to tell you and could not speak.’
‘My child,’ said the father, his lips trembling, ‘it has been my fault;
but nothing shall stand between us any more.’
The two others looked on for a moment with conflicting feelings. Mrs.
Meredith looked at them with generous tears and satisfaction, yet with a
faint pang. _That_ was over now. She had always intended it should end
thus; but yet for the moment, such is the strange constitution of the
heart, it gave her a passing pang. As for the doctor, he gathered his
gloves and his hat together with great confusion. He had made a fool of
himself. Whatever the others might do, how could he contemplate this
solemn disclosure he had come to make, which had been turned into the
officious interference of a busybody? He took no leave of anyone; but
when they were all engaged with each other, made a bolt for the door of
the back drawing-room, and got out, very red, very uncomfortable, and
full of self-disgust. He was touched too by the scene which had been so
unexpectedly brought before him, and felt tears, very unusual to him,
tingling in the corners of his eyes. He met Edward on the stairs; but
Edward was too much preoccupied to observe how Maxwell was looking.
‘Do you know,’ he said, ‘if Miss Beresford is in the drawing-room? There
is a gentleman waiting for her downstairs.’
‘If you mean Cara,’ said the doctor, ‘she is there, and the mistress of
the situation, I can tell you. Oh, never mind; I can let myself out.
You’ll find them all there.’
Edward stared a little, but went on to deliver his message. ‘I hope I am
not disturbing anyone,’ he said, in the formal manner which he had put
on; ‘but there is someone, very impatient, waiting for Miss Beresford--I
mean Cara,’ he added, half ashamed of himself, ‘downstairs.’
Cara roused herself from her father’s arm. It revived her more than
anything else to see that Edward was turning away again to leave the
room. She shook the tears from her eyes, and roused herself into sudden
energy. ‘That was why I came,’ she said. ‘O, Mrs. Meredith, where is
Oswald? We must find him, or they will all break their hearts.’
‘Who--you, Cara, my darling? no one shall break your heart.’
‘No, no,’ she cried, with a little start of impatience. ‘It is time this
was over. He never would tell you the truth. Oh, we must find him,
wherever he is, for Agnes has gone too.’
They all gathered about with looks of wonder, Edward making but one step
from the door where he stood. His countenance gleamed over with a sudden
light; he put out his hands to her unawares.
‘Agnes--who is Agnes!’ said Mrs. Meredith. ‘O, Cara, what does it all
mean? I know nothing about him--where he is. He was to come back
to-day.’
‘Agnes is Agnes Burchell,’ said Cara. ‘He has been telling me of her
all this time. He has been spending his whole time going after her. And
she is gone too, and it is her father who is downstairs. Oh, think how
we can find them! Her father is very anxious. Oswald should not have
done it,’ said Cara, with the solemnity of her age. ‘I always begged
him, and he always promised, to ask you to go.’
‘This is extraordinary news,’ said Mrs. Meredith, dropping into the
nearest chair. She was trembling with this renewed agitation. ‘And you
knew it, Cara; you have been his confidante? Oh, what a strange mistake
we have all made!’
‘It was not my fault,’ said Cara, softly. She gave a furtive glance at
Edward as she spoke, and his mother looked at him too. Edward’s
countenance was transformed, his eyes were lit up, smiles trembling like
an illumination over his face. Mrs. Meredith’s heart gave a leap in her
motherly bosom. She might have been wounded that it was none of her
doing; but she was too generous for so poor a thought. He will not go to
India now, she said to herself in her heart. The pang which Cara had
given her unwittingly was nothing to the compensation thus received from
her equally unconscious hands.