THE LOOSE BOARD IN THE GARRET.
Hester Floyd was sick. Exposure to a heavy rain had brought on an attack
of fever, which confined her to her bed, where she lay helpless and
cross, and sometimes delirious. She would have no one with her but
Magdalen. Every other person made her nervous, she said. Magdalen’s
hands were soft; Magdalen’s step was light; Magdalen knew what to do;
and so Magdalen stayed by her constantly, glad of an excuse to keep away
from Frank, with whom she had held but little intercourse since that
night in the library, which she remembered with so much regret. Hester’s
illness she looked upon as a godsend, and stayed all day by the fretful
old woman’s bedside, only leaving the room at meal time, or to make a
feint of watching Mrs. Walter Scott, for whom Hester evinced a strong
dislike or dread.
“Snoopin’, pryin’ thing,” she said to Magdalen. “She’ll be up to all
sorts of capers now that I’m laid up and can’t head her off. I’ve found
her there more than once; I knew what she was after, and took it away,
and then like a fool lugged it back again, and it’s there now, and you
must get it, and put it—put it—oh, for the dear Lord’s sake what
nonsense be I talkin’. What was I sayin’, Magdalen?”
Hester came to herself with a start, and stared wildly at Magdalen, who
was bending over her, wondering what she meant, and what it was which
she must bring from the garret and hide. Whatever it was, it troubled
Hester Floyd greatly, and when she was delirious, as was often the case,
she was sure to talk of it, and beg of Magdalen to get it, and put it
beyond the reach of Mrs. Walter Scott.
“How am I to get it when I don’t know what it is nor where it is,”
Magdalen said to her one night when she sat watching by her, and Hester
had insisted that she should go to the garret, and “head off that woman.
She’s there, and by and by she’ll find that loose board in the floor
under the rafters where I bumped my head so hard. Go, Magdalen, for
Heaven’s sake, if you care for _Roger_.”
Magdalen’s face was very white now, and her eyes like burning coals as
she questioned Hester. At the mention of Roger a sudden suspicion had
flashed upon her, making her grow faint and cold as she grasped the high
post of the bedstead and asked, “How she could get it when she did not
know what it was, nor where it was.”
The sound of her voice roused the old woman a little, but she soon
relapsed into her dreamy, talkative mood, and insisted that Mrs. Walter
Scott was in the garret and Magdalen must “head her off.”
“I’ll go,” Magdalen said at last, taking the candle which Hester always
used for going about the house. “Hush!” she continued, as Hester began
to grow very restless; “I’m going to the garret. Be quiet till I come
back.”
“I will, yes,” was Hester’s reply, her eyes wide open now, and staring
wildly at Magdalen, whose dress she tried to clutch with her hand as she
whispered, “The loose board, way down under the eaves. You must get on
your knees. Bring it to me, and never tell.”
The house was very quiet, for the family had long since retired, and the
pale spring moonlight came struggling through the windows, and lighting
up the halls through which Magdalen went on her strange errand to the
garret. The stairs which led to it were away from the main portion of
the building, and she felt a thrill of something like fear as she passed
into the dark, narrow hall, and paused a moment by the door of the
stairway. What should she find,—was Mrs. Walter Scott there, as Hester
had averred; and if so, what was she doing, and what excuse could
Magdalen make for being there herself?
“I’ll wait, and let matters take their course,” she thought; and then
summoning all her courage, she opened the door, and began the ascent of
the steep narrow way, every stair of which creaked with her tread, for
Magdalen did not try to be cautious. “If any one is there, they shall
know I am coming,” she thought; and she held her candle high above her
head, so that its light might shine to the farthest crevice of the
garret and give warning of her approach.
But there was no one there, and only the accumulated rubbish of the
house met her view, as she came fully into the garret and cast her eyes
from corner to corner and beam to beam. Through the dingy window at the
north the moon was looking in, and lighting up that end of the garret
with a weird, ghostly kind of light, which made Magdalen shiver more
than utter darkness would have done. She knew she was alone; there was
no sign of life around her, except the huge rat, which, frightened at
this unlooked-for visitation, sprang from Magdalen knew not where, and
running past her disappeared in a hole low down under the eaves,
reminding Magdalen of what Hester had said of “the loose plank under the
rafters where you have to stoop.”
At sight of the rat Magdalen had uttered a cry, which she quickly
suppressed, and then stood watching the frightened animal, until it
disappeared from sight.
“There can be no harm in seeing if there _is_ a loose board there,”
Magdalen thought; and setting her candle upon a little table she groped
her way after the rat, bumping her head once as old Hester had bumped
hers; and then crouching down upon her knees, she examined the floor in
that part of the garret, growing faint and cold and frightened when she
found that far back under the roof there _was_ a board, shorter than the
others, which looked as if it might with a little trouble be lifted from
its place.
It fitted perfectly, and, but for what old Hester had said, might never
have been discovered to be loose and capable of being moved from its
position. Magdalen was not quite sure, even now, that she could raise
it, and if she could, did she wish to, and for what reason? “Was there
anything hidden under it, and if so, _was it_—?”
Magdalen did not dare repeat the last word even to herself, and, as she
thought it, there came rushing over her a feeling as if she were already
guilty of making Roger Irving a beggar.
“No, no, I can’t do that. If there is anything under there,—which I do
not believe,—it may remain there for all of me,” she said; and her face
was very pale as she drew back from beneath the roof, and took the
candle in her hand.
The moon had passed under a cloud, leaving the garret in darkness, and
Magdalen heard the rising wind sweeping past the windows as she went
down the stairs and out again into the hall, where she breathed more
freely, and felt less as if there were a nightmare’s spell upon her.
Mrs. Walter Scott’s door stood ajar just as it had done when Magdalen
passed it on her way to the garret, and, impelled by a feeling she could
not resist, she looked cautiously in. The lady was sleeping soundly,
with her hair in the hideous curl papers, and her white hands resting
peacefully outside the counterpane. She had not been near the garret.
She knew nothing of the loose plank under the roof, and with a feeling
that injustice had been done to the sleeper, Magdalen passed on toward
Hester’s room, her heart beating rapidly and the blood rushing in
torrents to her face and neck as she heard Hester’s sharp, querulous
tones mingled with another voice which seemed trying to quiet her. It
was a man’s voice,—Roger’s voice,—and Roger himself was bending over the
restless woman and telling her that Magdalen would soon be back, and
that nobody was going to harm him.
“Here she is now,” he continued, as Magdalen glided into the room,
looking like some ghost, for the blood which had crimsoned her face a
moment before had receded from it, leaving it white as marble, and
making her dark eyes seem larger and brighter and blacker than their
wont. “Why, Magda,” Roger exclaimed, coming quickly to her side, “what
is the matter? Have you, too, been hearing burglars?”
“Burglars!” Magdalen repeated, trying to smile as she put her candle
upon the table and hastened to Hester, who was sitting up in bed, and
who demanded of her, “Did you find it? Was she there?”
“No, no. There was nobody there,” Magdalen said, soothingly; and then as
Hester became quiet, and seemed falling away to sleep as suddenly as she
sometimes awoke, Magdalen turned to Roger, who was looking curiously at
her, and as she fancied with a troubled expression on his face. “You
spoke of burglars. What did you mean?” she asked.
“Nothing,” he replied, laughingly. “Only I have been restless all
night,—too strong coffee for dinner, I dare say. Suppose you see to it
yourself to-morrow. I remember a cup you made me once, and I never
tasted better.”
“Yes; but what of the burglars, and why are you up?” Magdalen continued.
She knew there was some reason for Roger’s being there at that hour of
the night, and she wished to get at it.
“I could not sleep,” he replied, “and I thought I heard some one about
the house. The post-office was entered last week, and as it would not be
a very improbable thing for the robbers to come here, I dressed, and
fearing that you might be alarmed at any unusual sound about the house,
I came directly here, and learned from Hester that you were
_rummaging_,—you or somebody. I could hardly understand what she did
mean, she was so excited.”
“I rummaging!” Magdalen stammered. “Hester has queer fancies. She took
it into her head that Mrs. Irving was rummaging, as she calls it, and
insisted that I should go and see; so I went, to quiet her.”
“And got a cobweb in your hair,” Roger added, playfully brushing from
her hair the cobweb which she had gotten under the roof, and which he
held up before her.
“Oh, Mr. Irving!” Magdalen exclaimed, in real distress, for she did not
like the expression of the eyes fastened upon her. “I don’t know what
Hester may have said to you, but she has such queer ideas, and she would
make me go where she said Mrs. Irving was, and I went; but I meant no
harm, believe me, won’t you?”
Her cheeks were scarlet, and her eyes were filling with tears as they
looked up to Roger, who laughed merrily, and said:
“Of course I believe you; for what possible harm could there be in your
going to the garret after Mrs. Irving, or what could Hester think she
was there for?”
He knew then where she had been. Hester had let that out, but had she
told him anything further? Magdalen did not know. She was resolved,
however, that she would tell him nothing herself, so she merely replied:
“Hester is often out of her head, and when she is she seems to think
that Mrs. Irving meditates some harm to you.”
“I discovered that from what she said while you were gone,” Roger
rejoined; and then, looking at the clock, he saw it was nearly one, and
asked Magdalen if she would not like him to watch while she slept.
If he knew of the loose plank, or had a thought of the will, he gave no
sign of his knowledge; he only seemed anxious about Magdalen, and afraid
that she would over-exert herself, and when she refused to sleep, he
insisted upon sitting with her and sharing her vigils.
“It must be tedious to watch alone,” he said, and then he brought the
large chair he was accustomed to read in, and made Magdalen sit in it,
and found a pillow for her head, and bade her keep quiet and try to
rest.
It was pleasant to be cared for, especially as she was tired and worn,
and Magdalen sat very still, with her head upon the pillow and her face
in the shadow, until her eyelids began to droop and her hands to slide
down into her lap, and when Roger asked if it was time for the medicine,
he received no answer, for Magdalen was asleep.
“Poor child,” he said, as he stood looking at her. “She has grown pale
and thin with nursing Hester. I must get some one to take her place, and
persuade Hester to be reasonable for once. Magda must not be allowed to
get sick if I can help it. How very beautiful she is, with the long
eyelashes on her cheek and her hair rippling away from her forehead! I
wonder are all young girls as beautiful in their sleep as Magda.”
Roger was strangely moved as he stood looking at the tired sleeping
girl. Little by little, day by day, week by week, she had been growing
into his heart, until now she filled every niche and corner of it, and
filled it so completely, that to have torn her from it would have left
it bleeding and desolate. She was not his daughter now, nor his ward,
nor his sister. She was _Magda_, his princess, his queen, whose bright
eyes and clear, ringing voice thrilled him with a new sense of
happiness, and made him long to clasp her in his arms and claim her for
his own in the only way she could ever satisfy him now. And he did not
greatly fear what her answer might be, for he had noted the bright flush
which always came to her cheek, and the kindling light in her starry
eyes when he appeared suddenly before her. He did not believe he was
indifferent to her, and as he sat by her until the gray dawn broke, he
resolved that ere long he would end his suspense, and know from her own
lips if she could love him enough to be his wife. Gradually, as her
slumber grew more profound, the pillow slipped, and her head dropped
into a position which looked so uncomfortable, that Roger ventured to
lift it up and place it more easily against the back of the chair. An
hour later and Magdalen woke with a start, exclaiming when she saw the
daylight through the shutters and Hester’s medicine untouched upon the
table, “Why didn’t you wake me? Hester has not taken her medicine, and
the doctor will blame me.”
“Hester is just as well without it,” Roger answered. “She has slept
quietly every moment, and sleep will do her more good than drugs. My
word for it she will be better when she wakes; but, Magda, I shall get
her a nurse to-day, and relieve you. I cannot let you grow pale and
thin. You are looking like a ghost now. Come with me into the open air,
which you need after this close room.”
He wrapped a shawl around her, and taking her hood from the table in the
hall tied it upon her head and then led her out upon the wide piazza,
where the fresh breeze from the river was blowing, and where he walked
up and down, with her hand on his arm, until the color came back to her
cheeks, and her eyes had in them their old, restless brightness, as she
stood by him and looked off upon the hills just growing red in the light
of the rising sun.
It was too early yet for many flowers, but the April winds had melted
the snow from off the Millbank grounds, and here and there patches of
green grass were beginning to show, and the golden daffodil was just
opening its leaves upon the borders of the garden walk. Millbank was
nothing to what it would be a few weeks later, but it was handsome even
now, and both Roger and Magdalen commented upon its beauty, while the
former spoke of some improvements he had in contemplation, and should
commence as soon as the ground was settled. A fountain here, and a
terrace there for autumn flowers, and another winding walk leading to
the grove toward the mill he meant to have, he said, and a pretty little
summer-house down by the brook, like one he had seen in England.
And as he talked of the summer-house by the brook, with its rustic seats
and stands, the sun passed into a bank of clouds, the wind began to
freshen and blow up from the river in raw, chilling gusts, which made
Magdalen shiver, and brought to her mind last night’s adventure in the
garret where the loose plank was. And with thoughts of that plank there
crept over her a deeper chill,—a feeling of depression, as if the
brightness of Millbank was passing away forever, and that the change was
somehow being wrought by herself.