A DARKENED MIND.
As soon as Catherine King heard of Mary's illness, she hurried to the
hospital in her great anxiety. She loved the girl with the intensity
which characterised all her passions--loved her far more dearly than her
own life and happiness--almost as much as she loved the "cause" itself.
Pale and trembling with fear for her darling, the usually cold, stern
woman appeared before Dr. Duncan.
"Let me see her," she said, in a choking voice.
"Dear Mrs. King," he replied, "I think it will be better for her if you
do not see her just yet. Sit down and I will tell you all about her.
Pray do not alarm yourself."
"Is it dangerous?" she interrupted in the same tones, seemingly not
having heard what he said.
"We cannot tell yet; she has received a severe shock. It may prove to be
merely a passing attack, or it may be--"
"May be what?"
"Brain fever."
Catherine looked down on the ground, and thought a little before she
spoke again. "You say she received a shock. Who gave her a shock?--what
was it?--who was it?" and the look of a wild beast that has been robbed
of its young came into her eyes, as she waited for his answer.
The doctor knew that she could easily acquire the information from
other sources, so thought it best to tell her all that had occurred at
once.
"The poor girl has appeared to me to have been unwell for some time,
Mrs. King--to have had something on her mind, some great worry that has
been destroying her peace and undermining her health."
"Oh, yes! I know all about that," exclaimed Catherine, impatiently; "but
the _shock_--what do you mean by that?"
"The shock would not have affected her in the way it did, if she had not
been in the unstrung condition I speak of, Mrs. King." Then he told her
how a patient suffering from delirium tremens had been brought into the
hospital, how his attendants had heard him call out the name of Mary
Grimm several times in his delirium, how Mary had been brought into his
ward to see if she could identify him, and how she had fainted away on
seeing him.
After he had completed his narrative, Catherine rose from the chair and
paced up and down the room several times, a deep frown on her brow. Then
she stopped, and facing the doctor commenced to question him in a calm
but abrupt manner.
"_Did_ she recognise him?"
"I don't know; she is not in a state to explain anything yet."
"Was anybody by when she saw him?"
"Yes, one of our nurses--a Miss Riley."
"Ah!"
After a pause she spoke again:
"Then the man has not been identified."
"Oh yes, he has! I recognised him. He is a barrister; his name is
Hudson."
Catherine turned her face away that the doctor might not read the
terrible expression that had come to it, and which she could not hide.
She asked one more question:
"You say he was heard to call out the name of Mary Grimm several
times--who heard him?"
"I believe it was Miss Riley."
"Ah!"
Any man who has ever been possessed by a mad love for a woman, and
suddenly has certain proof brought before him that she has deceived him,
that there is another man whom she loves as she never loved him, can to
some extent realise what were the feelings of Catherine King, as she
listened to the doctor's narrative.
For the love she felt for Mary was of a kind not very uncommon among
women, especially when one of the two is of a more masculine nature than
the other. It was as the deep tender love of a strong man for a weak
timid girl. It was a love accompanied by passionate jealousy. This demon
of jealousy now possessed Catherine. She choked with rage and vexation.
"What!" she reflected, "this man, this miserable drunkard, has robbed me
of Mary's affections! The gross ingratitude of the girl too, and her
deceit!" She remembered Mary's story about the barrister's kindness to
her when she first ran away from home. Doubtlessly she had been holding
clandestine meetings ever since. This accounted for the treacherous
girl's melancholy of late.
As all these thoughts and erroneous though not unnatural suspicions
flashed across her brain, she felt so bitter a hatred against the viper
she had cherished to her breast, that she could have choked her there
and then; but she concealed these emotions as much as possible, and said
to the doctor in a calm voice:
"Let me see this man."
A jealous curiosity seized her to discover what this rival of hers was
like.
"Certainly! you may see him if you wish to do so," Dr. Duncan replied;
and he took her into the special ward where Hudson was lying, insensible
just then, enjoying a respite between the horrible visions.
She stood by the bed and looked at the miserable man with an expression
of indescribable loathing and hatred which she could not conceal. The
doctor observed it.
"Will he live?" she asked turning suddenly to him.
"I think so. It is a bad attack; but then he is a comparatively young
man," he replied.
She turned away from the bed with a gesture of disgust.
"Take me out, doctor. I won't see Mary to-day, as you think it better
for her to be quiet. Besides, I don't feel well; I am rather dizzy, I
should like a glass of water, if you please."
After her glass of water, she left the hospital and walked home rapidly,
as miserable, as savage, as all the pangs of jealousy could make her.
For several days she endeavoured to come to some resolution concerning
Mary. To love, perhaps to marry this barrister, must of course
altogether cut the girl off from the Secret Society. Why, there was but
one thing to do--Mary must be removed, must be killed. Yes, Mary, the
only thing that she loved must be killed--she was a traitor to the
Cause!
Catherine's mind was distraught by the conflicting passions her
discovery had excited in her.
She nearly went mad with them.
At one moment she felt that she hated Mary with the greatest of hates,
that she could laugh to see her suffer and die before her sight; at
another moment, the woman would lie on her solitary bed moaning in
despair over her lost love.
And even when her mind was calmer, it was so miserable to sit in the
dark little parlour all alone; there was no Mary there now to caress and
converse with.
One day she collected all the girl's little effects, her work-box, her
two or three books, and after kissing them each passionately a dozen
times, put them away together in a cupboard in her own bed-room, where
she could visit and kiss them again privately at intervals.
But the next day, the remembrance of the girl's perfidy, of her love for
a man, so excited her jealous hatred again, that she turned all the
treasures out of the cupboard, tore them up and threw them in the fire,
feeling a grim satisfaction in so doing.
But an hour after she repented again with moans and tears for what she
had done.
She felt as if she had been tearing her own heart strings out. She hated
herself for her cruelty in having destroyed all her darling's little
favourite things.
The ruthless Nihilist, in short, acted generally in much the same silly
fashion as the greenest school-girl would have acted under similar
circumstances.
Dr. Duncan was very surprised to find that day after day passed, and yet
Catherine King did not call at the hospital to make inquiries about her
niece.
At last he wrote to her. He informed her that Mary's illness had taken
the form of brain fever, but that she would in all probability recover.
He also incidentally conveyed to her the same bit of news which had so
relieved the fears of Susan Riley--the death of the barrister.
This letter caused a revulsion in the woman's feelings and greatly
excited her. She started for the hospital as soon as she received it,
and on arriving there asked for Dr. Duncan.
She was shown into a waiting-room and the doctor soon appeared.
"Well, doctor, so she is much better?"
"Not exactly that, Mrs. King, but progressing favourably."
"Can I see her?"
"I think she is asleep. Sleep of course is of the greatest importance
just now, but I think if you desire it you might see her without
disturbing her."
"Is she in her right mind? can she recognize people?"
"Hardly yet; the fever is still on her, but she does not exhibit much
delirium."
"So the 'shock' is dead?"
"The unfortunate Mr. Hudson, if that is what you mean, is dead, but I
don't consider the shock of seeing him was the real cause of your
niece's illness. It would have come sooner or later without that."
"Indeed! Then what do you consider was the cause, Dr. Duncan?"
"As I told you the last time you were here, Mrs. King, there is
something on her mind."
"There is," said Catherine, "and I think I know what it is." She spoke
irritably, as the thought of the love which she imagined existed between
Mary and the barrister rose to her mind.
"And until that something is taken off her mind she will never recover,"
continued the doctor.
"The something is gone now, Dr. Duncan," she said, looking straight into
his eyes.
"I hope that is so," he replied doubtfully.
"What a fool the man must be not to understand me," thought Catherine;
but the doctor had very good reasons to know that it was not love for
Tom Hudson that weighed on the young girl's mind.
"Well! let us go and see Mary now," she said.
The girl had been placed in a small private room by herself. When they
came to it the door was opened by the nurse who was in charge of the
patient.
Catherine looked keenly at the young woman, then turning to Dr. Duncan,
exclaimed:
"I thought you told me the other day that Miss Riley was nursing my
niece."
"She has been nursing her," replied the doctor, "but we have sent her
away for a holiday. She has been much overworked lately, and is far from
well."
"Indeed!" exclaimed Catherine.
"Yes, she is not at all well, and her anxiety about your niece, who is a
great friend of hers, seems to have upset her very much."
This information very much puzzled Catherine. "Susan is not the person
to get overworked and ill," she reflected, "and still less the person to
get anxious about a friend, and she's gone off without giving me any
notice. There is some mystery in all this, but I will get to the bottom
of it."
She entered the room and walked softly up to the side of the bed.
The room was darkened, but there was sufficient light to enable her to
clearly distinguish the features of the sick girl.
Mary was lying there sleeping peacefully. She had been in this condition
for some hours. It was the first natural and refreshing sleep that had
come to her fevered brain since her attack. Nature was working her
remedy in her own fashion.
Catherine stooped and looked intently at the quiet face. She saw that it
was pinched and white and that a circle of dark purple surrounded the
closed eyelids.
She also noticed how thin had become the arm on which the head was
lying, the poor head off which all the beautiful hair had been shorn
close.
But there was a happy smile on the half-parted lips of the sleeping
girl, her dreams were sweet.
Catherine looked at her for several minutes without moving or speaking.
All her anger and jealousy melted away now, before her great pity and
her great love. She asked herself reproachfully how she could have
harboured one hard thought about her darling. The poor child could not
help loving the man who had befriended her, and now he was dead. It was
all the more incumbent on herself to cherish and console the poor girl
in her affliction.
At last she made a sign to the doctor that she was ready to go, and they
left the room with silent tread.
She did not speak till they were once more in the waiting-room, then she
asked, simply:
"How often may I see her?"
"Every day," he replied.
"Then I will come every day, and oh, Dr. Duncan!"--she seized his hand
passionately--"I can see you are a good man. She is all the world to me.
Do your best to make her well again, spare no pains, I implore you! But
of course you will do all that; pardon my folly, but I love her so much,
I forget what I am saying."
"You can rely on me to do my best I think, Mrs. King," he replied, as he
pressed her hand.
So Catherine came every day to the hospital, sitting by and ministering
to the sick girl when she happened to be awake, or if that was not the
case, contenting herself with one long, yearning look at her sleeping
form.
The fever left Mary in a very weak and precarious condition.
Her reason did not wholly return to her. Her memory of everything that
had passed was very imperfect, and came only in flashes. She seemed to
have forgotten all about the Secret Society. She had no remembrance of
having stood by the barrister's death-bed and heard Susan's cold-blooded
confession. She even could only recognize in a vague way the friends she
had known before her illness.
But all that occurred around her during her convalescence was written
indelibly on her memory. She did not forget the slightest incident.
So, as all that did occur around her at this period, as all her
experiences consisted merely of the kind attentions of her friends,
doctors, and nurses, her mind was occupied entirely by the consciousness
of all this sympathetic care. A sense of boundless gratitude possessed
her; it was the one idea or emotion of the poor feeble intellect.
It moved to tears the most callous of her nurses, hardened to pitiful
sights, to see how grateful the girl was for every little attention. In
an imbecile way, she would fondle and stroke with her thin hand anyone
who performed some slight service for her. Her eyes swam with love as
they followed the movements of all those kind people. All the passions
and sorrows and fears seemed to have departed from the weakened mind,
leaving only this gentle love.
Sometimes, but rarely, her expression would suddenly change; a look of
terror would come to her eyes; she would start up in her bed, staring
wildly and pointing at some imaginary object. It seemed to always assume
the same form; for she would cry whenever it appeared to her: "Oh! there
is the shadow again--the black shadow!" or words to the same effect.
For days after one of these attacks, she would be silent and sullen, and
pay no heed whatever to the events and people around her.
Dr. Duncan noticed that these painful relapses would nearly always
originate when Catherine King was by her. Mary seemed to be fonder of
her adopted aunt than of any other of the people that she saw. She would
shower her caresses on her as she would on no one else, though she only
half recognized the woman as one who had known her and been kind to her
before her illness.
But it happened sometimes that she would gaze fixedly into the stern,
pale face, as if trying to recall to mind some forgotten association;
she would look puzzled, draw her hand across her forehead, turn her eyes
away with a sad and pensive expression, and at last be seized by the
imaginary horror of the shadow that I have described.
Sometimes, too, the sight of Dr. Duncan seemed to awake in her some
dormant memories; but in this case, after gazing at him in the same
earnest, puzzled way, not a look of horror but a wonderful smile of love
would come to her face; and she would stroke his hand caressingly, in a
simple, artless fashion, making the strong man himself feel as if he
could scarce prevent himself from bursting into passionate tears over
her.
But Catherine King, led off the scent by the episode of Tom Hudson,
never for a moment suspected that any tender relations had existed
between Mary and Dr. Duncan, though she was rather surprised on one
occasion to hear the crazy girl--who was in one of her affectionate
moods--call him "Harry," which, by the way, she had never done when in
her right senses.
Seeing how Mrs. King's presence occasionally produced an injurious
effect on his patient, Dr. Duncan persuaded her to diminish the
frequency of her visits.
Mary's strength gradually returned, till at last, after she had been
laid up for two months, it was decided that she could leave the hospital
with safety.
So one afternoon, Dr. Duncan called on Mrs. King to inform her of this,
and was shown into the little parlour where the heads of the Secret
Society were wont to hold their councils.
As he waited for her to come into the room, he picked up a book from the
table and read a page or two of it to while away the time. It was a
pamphlet on some social question published by the "Free Thought
Association." He threw it down in disgust. "Yes! I must get Mary out of
this house," he said to himself. "This is no fit place for her."
As soon as Catherine came in, he communicated to her the object of his
visit.
"Mrs. King, I have brought you some good news. Your niece is now so much
better that I think we ought to get her out of town as soon as we can.
That is all she wants now. She will quickly recover her health in the
country."
Catherine's face brightened up with the great joy she felt; she had been
so eagerly looking forward to the time when she should have her darling
all to herself again.
"I am so glad to hear this, Dr. Duncan," she said. "It is very kind of
you to bring this news to me in person. I will take her to the sea-side
without delay. When do you think she could start?"
"Very soon. But, Mrs. King, if you have no place in view to which you
would like to take her, I have a suggestion to make. The sea-side is
very well if you have really good lodgings; but, as a rule, you can't
get the care and cooking in sea-side lodgings that I should like Miss
King to have. It will not do to risk anything with her at present. Now
my sister, who is a widow with two little children, lives in a cottage
near Farnham, in the prettiest and healthiest part of Surrey. I have
talked to her on the subject, and she would be so pleased if Mary would
pay her a visit. She would get pure air and good country food there. I
believe it would do her a great deal of good, far more so, indeed, than
going to some strange lodging in a sea-side place. She would have
pleasant society there, too, and I know that she and my sister would get
on well together. Farnham is only about an hour from London, so you
could easily run down and see her, and stay a few days occasionally.
Now, Mrs. King, let me persuade you, as you love your niece, to agree to
this."
Catherine first frowned, then the picture of that poor thin face rose to
her mind.
"It would do her good, you think?"
"I am sure of it, and I have yet another reason for her going down
there: after attacks like those your niece has suffered from, it is
often advisable to change all the associations of the patient for a
time. It is better, sometimes, that there should be a complete
separation from old intimates, especially relatives I think it would be
unwise if you lived entirely with Miss King for the present. To see her
occasionally, though, would of course do her good."
The woman was grievously disappointed, but she said:
"Yes, I have heard that. It is hard for me to be separated from Mary;
but I know it will be good for her. I will accept this kind offer of
yours. You are a good man, Dr. Duncan," she added, as he rose to shake
hands with her before going. "I am very grateful to you; and what is
more, I admire and respect you. Excuse my eccentric way of putting
things, but I always mean what I say, and, alas! there are very few
people to whom I would say those words."