HOW TALBOT BULSTRODE SPENT HIS CHRISTMAS.
There was no more happiness for Talbot Bulstrode that day. He wandered
from room to room, till he was as weary of that exercise as the young
lady in Monk Lewis's 'Castle Spectre;' he roamed forlornly hither and
thither, hoping to find Aurora, now in the billiard-room, now in the
drawing-room. He loitered in the hall, upon the shallow pretence of
looking at barometers and thermometers, in order to listen for the
opening and shutting of Aurora's door. All the doors at Felden Woods
were perpetually opening and shutting that afternoon, as it seemed to
Talbot Bulstrode.
He had no excuse for passing the doors of Miss Floyd's apartments, for
his own rooms lay at the opposite angle of the house; but he lingered
on the broad staircase, looking at the furniture-pictures upon the
walls, and not seeing one line in these Wardour-Street productions. He
had hoped that Aurora would appear at luncheon; but that dismal meal
had been eaten without her; and the merry laughter and pleasant talk
of the family assembly had sounded far away to Talbot's ears--far away
across some wide ocean of doubt and confusion.
He passed the afternoon in this wretched manner, unobserved by any
one but Lucy, who watched him furtively from her distant seat, as he
roamed in and out of the drawing-room. Ah, how many a man is watched by
loving eyes whose light he never sees! How many a man is cared for by a
tender heart whose secret he never learns! A little after dusk, Talbot
Bulstrode went to his room to dress. It was some time before the bell
would ring; but he would dress early, he thought, so as to make sure of
being in the drawing-room when Aurora came down.
He took no light with him, for there were always wax-candles upon the
chimney-piece in his room.
It was almost dark in that pleasant chintz chamber, for the fire
had been lately replenished, and there was no blaze; but he could
just distinguish a white patch upon the green-cloth cover of the
writing-table. The white patch was a letter. He stirred the black mass
of coal in the grate, and a bright flame went dancing up the chimney,
making the room as light as day. He took the letter in one hand, while
he lighted one of the candles on the chimney-piece with the other.
The letter was from his mother. Aurora Floyd had told him that he
would receive such a letter. What did it all mean? The gay flowers
and birds upon the papered walls spun round him as he tore open the
envelope. I firmly believe that we have a semi-supernatural prescience
of the coming of all misfortune; a prophetic instinct, which tells us
that such a letter, or such a messenger, carries evil tidings. Talbot
Bulstrode had that prescience as he unfolded the paper in his hands.
The horrible trouble was before him; a brooding shadow, with a veiled
face, ghastly and undefined; but it was _there._
"My dear Talbot,--I know that the letter I am about to write will
distress and perplex you; but my duty lies not the less plainly before
me. I fear that your heart is much involved in your engagement to Miss
Floyd." The evil tidings concerned Aurora, then; the brooding shadow
was slowly lifting its dark veil, and the face of her he loved best
on earth appeared behind it. "But I know," continued that pitiless
letter, "that the sense of honour is the strongest part of your nature,
and that, however you may have loved this girl" (O God, she spoke of
his love in the past!), "you will not suffer yourself to be entrapped
into a false position through any weakness of affection. There is some
mystery about the life of Aurora Floyd."
This sentence was at the bottom of the first page; and before Talbot
Bulstrode's shaking hand could turn the leaf, every doubt, every
fear, every presentiment he had ever felt, flashed back upon him with
preternatural distinctness.
"Constance Trevyllian came here yesterday; and you may imagine that
in the course of the evening you were spoken of, and your engagement
discussed."
A curse upon their frivolous women's gossip! Talbot crushed the letter
in his hand, and was about to fling it from him; but, no, it _must_
be read. The shadow of doubt must be faced, and wrestled with, and
vanquished, or there was no more peace upon this earth for him. He
went on reading the letter.
"I told Constance that Miss Floyd had been educated in the Rue
St.-Dominique, and asked if she remembered her. 'What!' she said,
'is it the Miss Floyd whom there was such a fuss about? the Miss
Floyd who ran away from school?' And she told me, Talbot, that a Miss
Floyd was brought to the Desmoiselles Lespard by her father last June
twelvemonth, and that less than a fortnight after arriving at the
school she disappeared; her disappearance of course causing a great
sensation and an immense deal of talk among the other pupils, as it was
said she had _run away_. The matter was hushed up as much as possible;
but you know that girls will talk, and from what Constance tells me,
I imagine that very unpleasant things were said about Miss Floyd. Now
you say that the banker's daughter only returned to Felden Woods in
September last. _Where was she in the interval?_"
He read no more. One glance told him that the rest of the letter
consisted of motherly cautions, and admonitions as to how he was to act
in this perplexing business.
He thrust the crumpled paper into his bosom, and dropped into a chair
by the hearth.
It was so, then! There was a mystery in the life of this woman. The
doubts and suspicions, the undefined fears and perplexities, which
had held him back at the first, and caused him to wrestle against his
love, had not been unfounded. There was good reason for them all, ample
reason for them; as there is for every instinct which Providence puts
into our hearts. A black wall rose up round about him, and shut him for
ever from the woman he loved; this woman whom he loved, so far from
wisely, so fearfully well; this woman, for whom he had thanked God in
the church only a few hours before. And she was to have been his wife;
the mother of his children, perhaps. He clasped his cold hands over his
face and sobbed aloud. Do not despise him for those drops of anguish:
they were the virgin tears of his manhood. Never since infancy had his
eyes been wet before. God forbid that such tears as those should be
shed more than once in a lifetime! The agony of that moment was not to
be lived through twice. The hoarse sobs rent and tore his breast as if
his flesh had been hacked by a rusty sword; and when he took his wet
hands from his face, he wondered that they were not red; for it seemed
to him as if he had been weeping blood. What should he do?
Go to Aurora, and ask her the meaning of that letter? Yes; the course
was plain enough. A tumult of hope rushed back upon him, and swept away
his terror. Why was he so ready to doubt her? What a pitiful coward he
was to suspect her--to suspect this girl, whose transparent soul had
been so freely unveiled to him; whose every accent was truth! For in
his intercourse with Aurora, the quality which he had learned most to
reverence in her nature was its sublime candour. He almost laughed at
the recollection of his mother's solemn letter. It was so like these
simple country people, whose lives had been bounded by the narrow
limits of a Cornish village--it was so like them to make mountains out
of the veriest mole-hills. What was there so wonderful in that which
had occurred? The spoiled child, the wilful heiress, had grown tired of
a foreign school, and had run away. Her father, not wishing the girlish
escapade to be known, had placed her somewhere else, and had kept
her folly a secret. What was there from first to last in the whole
affair that was not perfectly natural and probable, the exceptional
circumstances of the case duly considered?
He could fancy Aurora, with her cheeks in a flame, and her eyes
flashing lightning, flinging a page of blotted exercises into the face
of her French master, and running out of the schoolroom, amid a tumult
of ejaculatory babble. The beautiful, impetuous creature! There is
nothing a man cannot admire in the woman he loves, and Talbot was half
inclined to admire Aurora for having run away from school.
The first dinner-bell had rung during Captain Bulstrode's agony; so the
corridors and rooms were deserted when he went to look for Aurora, with
his mother's letter in his breast.
She was not in the billiard-room or the drawing-room, but he found
her at last in a little inner chamber at the end of the house, with a
bay-window looking out over the park. The room was dimly lighted by a
shaded lamp, and Miss Floyd was seated in the uncurtained window, with
her elbow resting on a cushioned ledge, looking out at the steel-cold
wintry sky and the whitened landscape. She was dressed in black; her
face, neck, and arms gleaming marble-white against the sombre hue of
her dress; and her attitude was as still as that of a statue.
She neither stirred nor looked round when Talbot entered the room.
"My dear Aurora," he said, "I have been looking for you everywhere."
She shivered at the sound of his voice.
"You wanted to see me?"
"Yes, dearest. I want you to explain something to me. A foolish
business enough, no doubt, my darling, and, of course, very easily
explained; but, as your future husband, I have a right to ask for an
explanation; and I know, I know, Aurora, that you will give it in all
candour."
She did not speak, although Talbot paused for some moments, awaiting
her answer. He could only see her profile, dimly lighted by the wintry
sky. He could not see the mute pain, the white anguish, in that
youthful face.
"I have had a letter from my mother, and there is something in that
letter which I wish you to explain. Shall I read it to you, dearest?"
His voice faltered upon the endearing expression, and he remembered
afterwards that it was the last time he had ever addressed her with a
lover's tenderness. The day came when she had need of his compassion,
and when he gave it freely; but that moment sounded the death-knell of
Love. In that moment the gulf yawned, and the cliffs were rent asunder.
"Shall I read you the letter, Aurora?"
"If you please."
He took the crumpled epistle from his bosom, and, bending over the
lamp, read it aloud to Aurora. He fully expected at every sentence that
she would interrupt him with some eager explanation; but she was silent
until he had finished, and even then she did not speak.
"Aurora, Aurora, is this true?"
"Perfectly true."
"But why did you run away from the Rue St.-Dominique?"
"I cannot tell you."
"And where were you between the month of June in the year fifty-six and
last September?"
"I cannot tell you, Talbot Bulstrode. This is my secret, which I cannot
tell you."
"You cannot tell me! There is upwards of a year missing from your life;
and you cannot tell me, your betrothed husband, what you did with that
year?"
"I cannot."
"Then, Aurora Floyd, you can never be my wife."
He thought that she would turn upon him, sublime in her indignation and
fury, and that the explanation he longed for would burst from her lips
in a passionate torrent of angry words; but she rose from her chair,
and, tottering towards him, fell upon her knees at his feet. No other
action could have struck such terror to his heart. It seemed to him
a confession of guilt. But what guilt? what guilt? What was the dark
secret of this young creature's brief life?
"Talbot Bulstrode," she said, in a tremulous voice, which cut him
to the soul,--"Talbot Bulstrode, Heaven knows how often I have
foreseen and dreaded this hour. Had I not been a coward, I should
have anticipated this explanation. But I thought--I thought the
occasion might never come; or that when it did come you would be
generous--and--trust me. If you can trust me, Talbot; if you can
believe that this secret is not utterly shameful----"
"Not utterly shameful!" he cried. "O God! Aurora, that I should ever
hear you talk like this! Do you think there are any degrees in these
things? There must be _no_ secret between my wife and me; and the day
that a secret, or the shadow of one, arises between us, must see us
part for ever. Rise from your knees, Aurora; you are killing me with
this shame and humiliation. Rise from your knees; and if we are to part
this moment, tell me, tell me, for pity's sake, that I have no need
to despise myself for having loved you with an intensity which has
scarcely been manly."
She did not obey him, but sank lower in her half-kneeling,
half-crouching attitude, her face buried in her hands, and only the
coils of her black hair visible to Captain Bulstrode.
"I was motherless from my cradle, Talbot," she said, in a half-stifled
voice. "Have pity upon me."
"Pity!" echoed the captain; "_pity!_ Why do you not ask me for
_justice?_ One question, Aurora Floyd; one more question; perhaps the
last I ever may ask of you. Does your father know why you left that
school, and where you were during that twelvemonth?"
"He does."
"Thank God, at least, for that! Tell me, Aurora, then--only tell me
this, and I will believe your simple word as I would the oath of
another woman. Tell me if he approved of your motive in leaving that
school; if he approved of the manner in which your life was spent
during that twelvemonth. If you can say yes, Aurora, there shall be no
more questions between us, and I can make you without fear my loved and
honoured wife."
"I cannot," she answered. "I am only nineteen; but within the two last
years of my life I have done enough to break my father's heart; to
break the heart of the dearest father that ever breathed the breath of
life."
"Then all is over between us. God forgive you, Aurora Floyd; but by
your own confession you are no fit wife for an honourable man. I shut
my mind against all foul suspicions; but the past life of my wife must
be a white unblemished page, which all the world may be free to read."
He walked towards the door, and then, returning, assisted the wretched
girl to rise, and led her back to her seat by the window, courteously,
as if she had been his partner at a ball. Their hands met with as icy
a touch as the hands of two corpses. Ah, how much there was of death
in that touch! How much had died between those two within the last few
hours!--hope, confidence, security, love, happiness; all that makes
life worth the holding.
Talbot Bulstrode paused upon the threshold of the little chamber, and
spoke once more.
"I shall have left Felden in half an hour, Miss Floyd," he said; "it
will be better to allow your father to suppose that the disagreement
between us has arisen from something of a trifling nature, and that my
dismissal has come from you. I shall write to Mr. Floyd from London,
and, if you please, I will so word my letter as to lead him to think
this."
"You are very good," she answered. "Yes, I would rather he should think
that. It may spare him pain. Heaven knows I have cause to be grateful
for anything that will do that."
Talbot bowed and left the room, closing the door behind him. The
closing of that door had a dismal sound to his ear. He thought of some
frail young creature abandoned by her sister nuns in a living tomb. He
thought that he would rather have left Aurora lying rigidly beautiful
in her coffin than as he was leaving her to-day.
The jangling, jarring sound of the second dinner-bell clanged out,
as he went from the semi-obscurity of the corridor into the glaring
gaslight of the billiard-room. He met Lucy Floyd coming towards him
in her rustling silk dinner-dress, with fringes and laces and ribbons
and jewels fluttering and sparkling about her; and he almost hated
her for looking so bright and radiant, remembering, as he did, the
ghastly face of the stricken creature he had just left. We are apt to
be horribly unjust in the hour of supreme trouble; and I fear that if
any one had had the temerity to ask Talbot Bulstrode's opinion of Lucy
Floyd just at that moment, the captain would have declared her to be a
mass of frivolity and affectation. If you discover the worthlessness
of the only woman you love upon earth, you will perhaps be apt to feel
maliciously disposed towards the many estimable people about you. You
are savagely inclined, when you remember that they for whom you care
nothing are so good, while she on whom you set your soul is so wicked.
The vessel which you freighted with every hope of your heart has gone
down; and you are angry at the very sight of those other ships riding
so gallantly before the breeze. Lucy recoiled at the aspect of the
young man's face.
"What is it?" she asked; "what has happened, Captain Bulstrode?"
"Nothing--I have received a letter from Cornwall which obliges me
to----"
His hollow voice died away into a hoarse whisper before he could finish
the sentence.
"Lady Bulstrode--or Sir John--is ill perhaps?" hazarded Lucy.
Talbot pointed to his white lips and shook his head. The gesture might
mean anything. He could not speak. The hall was full of visitors and
children going into dinner. The little people were to dine with their
seniors that day, as an especial treat and privilege of the season.
The door of the dining-room was open, and Talbot saw the gray head of
Archibald Floyd dimly visible at the end of a long vista of lights
and silver and glass and evergreens. The old man had his nephews and
nieces and their children grouped about him; but the place at his right
hand, the place Aurora was meant to fill, was vacant. Captain Bulstrode
turned away from that gaily-lighted scene and ran up the staircase to
his room, where he found his servant waiting with his master's clothes
laid out, wondering why he had not come to dress.
The man fell back at the sight of Talbot's face, ghastly in the light
of the wax-candles on the dressing-table.
"I am going away, Philman," said the captain, speaking very fast,
and in a thick indistinct voice. "I am going down to Cornwall by the
express to-night, if I can get to Town in time to catch the train.
Pack my clothes and come after me. You can join me at the Paddington
Station. I shall walk up to Beckenham, and take the first train for
Town. Here, give this to the servants for me, will you?"
He took a confused heap of gold and silver from his pocket, and dropped
it into the man's hand.
"Nothing wrong at Bulstrode, I hope, sir?" said the servant. "Is Sir
John ill?"
"No, no; I've had a letter from my mother--I--you'll find me at the
Great Western."
He snatched up his hat, and was hurrying from the room; but the man
followed him with his greatcoat.
"You'll catch your death, sir, on such a night as this," the servant
said, in a tone of respectful remonstrance.
The banker was standing at the door of the dining-room when Talbot
crossed the hall. He was telling a servant to look for his daughter.
"We are all waiting for Miss Floyd," the old man said; "we cannot begin
dinner without Miss Floyd."
Unobserved in the confusion, Talbot opened the great door softly, and
let himself out into the cold winter's night. The long terrace was
all ablaze with the lights in the high narrow windows, as upon the
night when he had first come to Felden; and before him lay the park,
the trees bare and leafless, the ground white with a thin coating of
snow, the sky above gray and starless,--a cold and desolate expanse,
in dreary contrast with the warmth and brightness behind. All this was
typical of the crisis of his life. He was leaving warm love and hope,
for cold resignation or icy despair. He went down the terrace-steps,
across the trim garden-walks and out into that wide, mysterious
park. The long avenue was ghostly in the gray light, the tracery of
the interlacing branches above his head making black shadows, that
flickered to and fro upon the whitened ground beneath his feet. He
walked for a quarter of a mile before he looked back at the lighted
windows behind him. He did not turn, until a bend in the avenue had
brought him to a spot from which he could see the dimly lighted
bay-window of the room in which he had left Aurora. He stood for some
time looking at this feeble glimmer, and thinking--thinking of all he
had lost, or all he had perhaps escaped--thinking of what his life was
to be henceforth without that woman--thinking that he would rather
have been the poorest ploughboy in Beckenham parish than the heir of
Bulstrode, if he could have taken the girl he loved to his heart, and
believed in her truth.