Mrs. Kingsward’s opening speech was a wonder to hear. She sat and looked
at them all for a moment, trying to steady herself, but there was
nothing to steady her in what she saw before her--Aubrey and Bee, the
pair who had been so sweet to see, such a diversion in all
circumstances, so amusing in their mutual absorption, so delightful in
their romance. It all flashed back to her mind; the excitement of Bee’s
first proposal, the pleasure of seeing “her bairn respected like the
lave,” though Mrs. Kingsward might not have understood what these words
meant, the little triumph it was to see her child engaged at nineteen,
when everybody said there was nobody for the girls to marry--and now to
have that triumph turned into humiliation and dismay! And to think of
Bee’s bright face overcast, and her happiness over, and poor Aubrey
thrown out into the uttermost darkness. Had she seen Charlie it might
have given her some support, for Charlie was the impersonation of
immovable severity; but Betty’s wistful little face behind the other
pair, coming out from Aubrey’s shadow by moments to fix an appealing
look upon her mother, was not calculated to make her any stronger. She
cleared her throat--she tried hard to steady her voice. She said, “Oh,
my dear children,” faltering, and then the poor lady ended in a burst of
sobbing and tears. It gave her a little sting and stimulant to see
through her weeping that though little Betty ran towards her with kisses
and soothing, Bee took no notice, but stood hard and unaffected in her
opposition, holding close to Aubrey’s arm. Mrs. Kingsward indeed got no
sympathy except from little Betty. Charlie put his hand imperatively
upon her shoulder, recalling her to herself, and Bee never moved,
standing by the side of Aubrey Leigh. The mother, thus deserted,
plucked up a little spirit in the midst of her weakness.
“Bee,” she said, “I do not think it is quite nice of you to stand there
as if your own people were against you. We are not against you. There
has been, I fear, a great mistake made, which Colonel Kingsward”--here
she turned her eyes to Aubrey--“has found out in--in time; though it is
a pity, a sad pity, that it was not found out before. If Mr. Aubrey had
only been frank and said at once--but I don’t see what difference that
would have made. Papa says that from what he has heard and discovered
things must not go any further. He is sorry, and so am I, that they have
gone so far, and the engagement must be broken off at once. You hear
what I say, Bee?”
“I heard you say so last night, mamma, but I say it is my engagement,
and I have a right to know why. I do not mean to break it off----”
“Oh, how can I make explanations--how can I enter into such a question?
I appeal to you, Mr. Aubrey--tell her.”
“She ought not to ask any explanations. She is a minor, under age. My
father has a right to do whatever he pleases--and she has none to ask
why.”
This was how Charlie reasoned on the height of his one-and-twenty years.
Charlie was the intolerable element in all this question. Aubrey cast a
look at him, and forcibly closed his own lips to keep in something that
was bursting forth. Bee defied him, as was natural, on the spot. “I will
not have Charlie put in his opinion,” she cried. “He has nothing to do
with me. Even if I obeyed papa, I certainly should not obey him.”
“Let Aubrey say, himself,” said Mrs. Kingsward, “whether you ought to be
told everything, Bee.”
“It is cruel to ask me,” said Aubrey, speaking for the first time. “If
Bee could know all--if you could know all, Mrs. Kingsward! But how could
I tell you all? Part of this is true, and part is not true. I could
speak to Colonel Kingsward more freely. I am going off to-night to
London to see him. It will free you from embarrassment, and it will give
me perhaps a chance. I did not want to put you to this trial. I am ready
to put myself unreservedly in Colonel Kingsward’s hands.”
“Then,” said Bee, hastily, “it seems I am of no sort of importance at
all to anyone. I am told my engagement is broken off, and then I am told
I am not to know why, and then----. Go, then, Aubrey, as that is your
choice, and fight it out with papa, if you please.” She loosed her arm
from his, with a slight impulse, pushing him away. “But just mind
this--everybody,” she cried; “you may think little of Bee--but my
engagement shall not be broken by anybody but me, and it shall not be
kept on by anybody but me; and I will neither give it up nor will I hold
to it, neither one nor the other, until I know why.”
Then the judge and the defendant looked each other in the face. They
were, as may be supposed, on opposite sides, but they were the only two
to consult each other in this emergency. Aubrey responded by a movement
of his head, by a slight throwing up of his hand, to the question in
Mrs. Kingsward’s eyes.
“Then you shall know as much as I can tell you, Bee. Your father had a
letter last week, from a lady, telling him that she had a revelation to
make. The letter alarmed your father. He felt that he must know what it
meant. He could not go himself, but he sent Mr. Passavant, the lawyer.
The lady said that she had lived in Mr. Leigh’s house for years, in the
time of his late wife. She said Mr. Leigh had--had behaved very badly to
her.”
“That I do not believe,” said Bee.
The words flashed out like a knife. They made a stir in the air, as if a
sudden gleam had come into it. And then all was still again, a strange
dead quiet coming after, in which Bee perceived Aubrey silent, covering
his face with his hand. It came across her with a sudden pang that she
had heard somebody say this morning or last night--“He did not deny it.”
“And that he had promised her--marriage--that he was engaged to her, as
good as--as good as married to her--when he had the cruelty--oh, my dear
child, my dear child!--to come to you.”
Aubrey took his hand away from his white face. “That,” he said, in a
strange, dead, tuneless voice, “is not true.”
“Oh, more shame to you, Aubrey, more shame to you,” cried Mrs.
Kingsward, forgetting her judicial character in her indignation as a
woman, “if it is not true!--” She paused a moment to draw her breath,
then added, “But indeed you were not so wicked as you say, for it is
true. And here is the evidence. Oh!” she cried, with tears in her eyes,
“it makes your conduct to my child worse; but it shows that you were not
then, not then, as bad as you say.”
Bee had dropped into the chair that was next to her, and there sat, for
her limbs had so trembled that she could not stand, watching him, never
taking her eyes from him, as if he were a book in which the
interpretation of this mystery was----
“Never mind about me,” he said, hoarsely. “I say nothing for myself.
Allow me to be as bad as a man can be, but that is not true. And what is
the evidence? You never told me there was any evidence.”
“Sir,” said Mrs. Kingsward, fully roused, “I told you all that was in my
husband’s letter last night.”
“Yes--that she,” a sort of shudder seemed to run over him, to the keen
sight of the watchers--“that she--said so. You don’t know, as I do, that
_that_ is no evidence. But you speak now as if there was something
more.”
She took a piece of folded paper from her lap. “There is this,” she
said, “a letter you wrote to her the morning you went away.”
“I did write her a letter,” he said.
Mrs. Kingsward held it out to him, but was stopped by Charlie, who put
his hand on her arm. “Keep this document, mother. Don’t put the evidence
against him into a man’s power. I’ll read it if Mr. Leigh thinks
proper.”
Once more Aubrey and Bee together, with a simultaneous impulse, looked
at this intruder into their story.
“Mamma! send him away. I should like to kill him!” said Bee within her
clenched teeth.
“Be quiet, Charlie. Mr. Leigh, I am ready to put this or any other
evidence against you into your hands.”
He bowed very gravely, and then stood once more as if he were made of
stone. Mrs. Kingsward faltered very much, her agitated face flushed. “It
begins,” she said, in a low fluttering voice, “My dear little wife----”
Then there came a very strange sound into the agitated silence, for
Aubrey Leigh, on trial for more than his life, here laughed. “What more,
what more?” he said.
“No, it is not that. It is--‘I don’t want my dear little wife to be
troubled about anything. It can all be done quite easily and quietly,
without giving an occasion for people to talk; a settlement made and
everything you could desire. I shall make arrangements about everything
to-day.’ It is signed A. L., and it is in your handwriting. Bee, you can
see it is in his handwriting; look for yourself.”
Bee would not turn her head. She thought she saw the writing written in
fire upon the air--all his familiar turns in it. How well she knew the
A. L.; but she did not look at it--would not look. She had enough to do
looking at his face, which was the letter--the book she was studying
now.
“No doubt it is my handwriting,” he said, “only it was addressed not to
any other woman, but to my wife.”
“Your wife died two years ago, Mr. Leigh; and that is dated
Christmas--this year.”
“That is a lie!” he cried; then restrained himself painfully. “You know
I don’t mean you--but the date and the assumption is entirely a lie.
Give me time, and I will tell you exactly when it was written. I
remember the letter. It was when I had promised Amy to provide for her
friend on condition that she should be sent away--for she made my house
miserable.”
“And yet--and yet, Mr. Leigh----. Oh, don’t you see how things
contradict each other? She made your house miserable, and yet---- when
your wife was dead, and you were free----”
He looked at her, growing paler and paler. “And yet!” he said. “I know
what you mean. That is the infernal art of it. My own folly has cut the
ground from beneath my feet, and put weapons into every hand against me.
I know--I know.”
Again there came into Bee’s mind the words she had heard last night--“He
does not deny it.” And yet he was denying it with all his might!
Denying, and not denying--what? The girl’s brain was all in a maze, and
she could not tell.
“You see?” said Mrs. Kingsward, gently. “Oh, I am sorry for you in my
heart. Perhaps you were led into--a connection that you feel not to
be--desirable. That I can understand. But that you should think you
could save yourself by means of an innocent girl, almost a child, and
impose yourself on a family that had no suspicions!--oh, Mr. Leigh, Mr.
Leigh! you ought to have died sooner than have done that!”
He looked at her piteously for a moment, and then a dreadful sort of
smile came upon his face. “I allow,” he said, “that that would have been
the best.”
And there fell a silence upon the room. The sun was shining outside, and
the sound of the water gurgling against the sides of boats, and of all
the commotion of the landing place, and of the hundreds of voices in the
air, and of the chiming of the clocks, came in and filled the place.
And just then there burst out a carillon from one of the steeples
setting the whole to music, harmonising all the discords, and sweeping
into this silence with a sudden rush of sound as if some bodily presence
had come in. It was the touch too much for all these excited and
troubled people. Mrs. Kingsward lay back in her chair and began to weep
silently. Aubrey Leigh turned away from where he was standing and leant
his head against the wall. As for Bee, she sat quite still, dazed, not
able to understand, but crushed out of all her youthful self-assertion
and determination to clear it all up. She to clear it up!--who did not
even understand it, who could not fathom what was meant. That there was
something more than met the eye, something that was not put into words,
seemed to show vaguely through the words that were said. But what it was
Bee could not tell. She could not understand it all. And yet that there
was a fatal obstacle rising up between her and her lover, something
which no one could disperse or clear away, not a mistake, not a
falsehood, not a thing that could be passed over triumphantly and
forgotten--not as youth is so quick to believe a mere severity, tyranny,
arbitrary conclusion of papa--she felt in every fibre of her frame. She
could not deny it or struggle against it; her very being seemed
paralysed. The meaning went out of her face, the absolute, certain,
imperious youthfulness died out of her. She who loved to have her own
way, who had just protested that she would neither give up nor hold fast
except by her own will and understanding, now sat dumb, vaguely staring,
seeing shadows pass before her and hearing of things which were
undeniable, mighty things, far more powerful than her little hot
resolutions and determinations. Bee had never yet come face to face with
any trouble which could not be smoothed away. There was her own
naughtiness, there were Charlie’s escapades at school and college--some
of which she had known were serious. But in a little while they had been
passed over and forgotten, and everything had been as before. One time
she remembered papa had threatened not to let Charlie go back to Harrow,
which was a dreadful thing, exposing him and his naughtiness to all the
world. But after a while papa had changed his mind, and everything had
gone smoothly as before. Could papa change his mind now? Would time make
it, even if he did, as it was before? Bee had not mental power enough to
think these things, or ask these questions of her own will. But they
went through her mind as people come in and go out by an open door.
It was Aubrey who was the first to speak. The carillon stopped, or else
they got used to the sound and took no further notice of it, and he
collected himself and came forward again to the middle of the room. He
said, “I know it will be a relief that I should go away. There is an
afternoon train which I shall take. It is slow, but it does not matter.
I shall be as well there as anywhere--or as ill. I shall go direct to
Colonel Kingsward and lay my whole case before him. He will perhaps
confront me with my accuser--I hope so--if not, he will at least hear
what I have to say for myself.”
“Oh, Mr. Leigh! Oh, Aubrey! I can’t wish you anything but well,
whatever--whatever may be done!”
“Thank you, Mrs. Kingsward, I looked for nothing less from your kind
heart. Will you give me that letter?”
She put it into his hands without the least hesitation, and he examined
it--with a sort of strained smile upon his face. “I should like to take
this back to Colonel Kingsward,” he said. Then added quickly with a
short laugh, “No, I forgot; there might be suspicions. Send it back to
him, please, by the first post, that he may have it when I get there.”
He gave the letter back, and then he looked round wistfully. “May I say
good-bye to Bee?”
She got up at the words, feeling herself vaguely called upon--yet quite
dull, dumb, with all sorts of thoughts going and coming through those
wide-open doors of her mind--thoughts like strays which she seemed to
see as they passed. Even Aubrey himself appeared a ghost. She got up and
stood awaiting him when he approached her, not putting out a finger.
Nobody interfered, not even Charlie, who was fuming internally yet
somehow did not move. Aubrey went up to her and put his hands upon her
shoulders. Her unresponsiveness sent a chill to his heart.
“Have you given me up, Bee?” he cried, “Already, already!” with anguish
in his voice.
She could not say a word. She shook her head like a mute, looking at him
with her dazed eyes.
“She does not understand it--not a word!” he said.
Bee shook her head again. It was all she could do. No, she did not
understand, except that it was a kind of dying, something against which
nobody could struggle. And then he kissed her on her forehead as gravely
as though he had been her father; and the next moment was gone--was it
only out of the room, or out of the world, out of life?