A MISHAP TO THE BLUE SPECTACLES.
Mr. Carlyle and Barbara were seated at breakfast, when, somewhat to
their surprise, Mr. Dill was shown in. Following close upon his heels
came Justice Hare; and close upon his heels came Squire Pinner; while
bringing up the rear was Colonel Bethel. All the four had come up
separately, not together, and all four were out of breath, as if it had
been a race which should arrive soonest.
Quite impossible was it for Mr. Carlyle, at first, to understand the
news they brought. All were talking at once, in the utmost excitement;
and the fury of Justice Hare alone was sufficient to produce temporary
deafness. Mr. Carlyle caught a word of the case presently.
“A second man? Opposition? Well, let him come on,” he good-humoredly
cried. “We shall have the satisfaction of ascertaining who wins in the
end.”
“But you have not heard who it is, Mr. Archibald,” cried Old Dill, “It--
“
“Stand a contest with him?” raved Justice Hare. “He--”
“The fellow wants hanging,” interjected Colonel Bethel.
“Couldn’t he be ducked?” suggested Squire Pinner.
Now all these sentences were ranted out together, and their respective
utterers were fain to stop till the noise subsided a little. Barbara
could only look from one to the other in astonishment.
“Who is this formidable opponent?” asked Mr. Carlyle.
There was a pause. Not one of them but had the delicacy to shrink from
naming that man to Mr. Carlyle. The information came at last from Old
Dill, who dropped his voice while he spoke it.
“Mr. Archibald, the candidate who has come forward, is that man
Levison.”
“Of course, Carlyle, you’ll go into it now, neck and crop,” cried
Justice Hare.
Mr. Carlyle was silent.
“You won’t let the beast frighten you from the contest!” uttered Colonel
Bethel in a loud tone.
“There’s a meeting at the Buck’s Head at ten,” said Mr. Carlyle, not
replying to the immediate question. “I will be with you there.”
“Did you not say, Mr. Dill, that was where the scoundrel Levison is--at
the Buck’s Head?”
“He was there,” answered Mr. Dill. “I expect he is ousted by this time.
I asked the landlord what he thought of himself, for taking in such a
character, and what he supposed the justice would say to him. He vowed
with tears in his eyes that the fellow should not be there another hour,
and that he should never have entered it, had he known who he was.”
A little more conversation, and the visitors filed off. Mr. Carlyle sat
down calmly to finish his breakfast. Barbara approached him.
“Archibald, you will not suffer this man’s insolent doings to deter you
from your plans--you will not withdraw?” she whispered.
“I think not, Barbara. He has thrust himself offensively upon me in this
measure; I believe my better plan will be to take no more heed of him
than I should of the dirt under my feet.”
“Right--right,” she answered, a proud flush deepening the rose on her
cheeks.
Mr. Carlyle was walking into West Lynne. There were the placards, sure
enough, side by side with his own, bearing the name of that wicked
coward who had done him the greatest injury one man can do to another.
Verily, he must possess a face of brass to venture there.
“Archibald, have you heard the disgraceful news?”
The speaker was Miss Carlyle, who had come down upon her brother like a
ship with all sails set. Her cheeks wore a flush; her eyes glistened;
her tall form was drawn up to its most haughty height.
“I have heard it, Cornelia, and, had I not, the walls would have
enlightened me.”
“Is he out of his mind?”
“Out of his reckoning, I fancy,” replied Mr. Carlyle.
“You will carry on the contest now,” she continued, her countenance
flashing. “I was averse to it before, but I now withdraw all my
objection. You will be no brother of mine if you yield the field to
him.”
“I do not intend to yield it.”
“Good. You bear on upon your course, and let him crawl on upon his. Take
no more heed of him than if he were a viper. Archibald, you must canvass
now.”
“No,” said Mr. Carlyle, “I shall be elected without canvass. You’ll see,
Cornelia.”
“There will be plenty canvassing for you, if you don’t condescend to
take the trouble, my indifferent brother. I’ll give a thousand pounds
myself, for ale, to the electors.”
“Take care,” laughed Mr. Carlyle. “Keep your thousand pounds in your
pocket, Cornelia. I have no mind to be unseated, on the plea of ‘bribery
and corruption.’ Here’s Sir John Dobede galloping in, with a face as red
as the sun in a fog.”
“Well, it may be he has heard the news. I can tell you, Archibald, West
Lynne is in a state of excitement that has not been its lot for many a
day.”
Miss Carlyle was right. Excitement and indignation had taken possession
of West Lynne. How the people rallied around Mr. Carlyle! Town and
country were alike up in arms. But government interest was rife at West
Lynne, and, whatever the private and public feeling might be,
collectively or individually, many votes should be recorded for Sir
Francis Levison.
One of the first to become cognizant of the affair was Lord Mount
Severn. He was at his club one evening in London, poring over an evening
paper, when the names “Carlyle,” “West Lynne,” caught his view. Knowing
that Mr. Carlyle had been named as the probable member, and heartily
wishing that he might become such, the earl naturally read the
paragraph.
He read it, and read it again; he rubbed his eyes, he rubbed his
glasses, he pinched himself, to see whether he was awake or dreaming.
For believe what that paper asserted--that Sir Francis Levison had
entered the lists in opposition to Mr. Carlyle, and was at West Lynne,
busily canvassing--he could not.
“Do you know anything of this infamous assertion?” he inquired of an
intimate friend--“infamous, whether true or false.”
“It’s true, I heard of it an hour ago. Plenty of cheek that Levison must
have.”
“Cheek!” repeated the dismayed earl, feeling as if every part of him,
body and mind, were outraged by the news, “don’t speak of it in that
way. The hound deserves to be gibbeted.”
He threw aside the paper, quitted the club, returned home for a carpet
bag, and went shrieking and whistling down to West Lynne, taking his son
with him. Or, if he did not whistle and shriek the engine did. Fully
determined was the earl of Mount Severn to show his opinion of the
affair.
On these fine spring mornings, their breakfast over, Lady Isabel was in
the habit of going into the grounds with the children. They were on the
lawn before the house, when two gentlemen came walking up the avenue;
or, rather, one gentleman, and a handsome young stripling growing into
another. Lady Isabel thought she should have dropped, for she stood face
to face with Lord Mount Severn. The earl stopped to salute the children,
and raised his hat to the strange lady.
“It is my governess, Madame Vine,” said Lucy.
A silent courtesy from Madame Vine. She turned away her head and gasped
for breath.
“Is your papa at home, Lucy?” cried the earl.
“Yes; I think he is at breakfast. I’m so glad you are come!”
Lord Mount Severn walked on, holding William by the hand, who had
eagerly offered to “take him” to papa. Lord Vane bent over Lucy to kiss
her. A little while, a very few more years, and my young lady would not
hold up her rosy lips so boldly.
“You have grown a dearer girl than ever, Lucy. Have you forgotten our
compact?”
“No,” laughed she.
“And you will not forget it?”
“Never,” said the child, shaking her head. “You shall see if I do.”
“Lucy is to be my wife,” cried he, turning to Madame Vine. “It is a
bargain, and we have both promised. I mean to wait for her till she is
old enough. I like her better than anybody else in the world.”
“And I like him,” spoke up Miss Lucy. “And it’s all true.”
Lucy was a child--it may almost be said an infant--and the viscount was
not of an age to render important such avowed passions. Nevertheless,
the words did thrill through the veins of the hearer. She spoke, she
thought, not as Madame Vine would have spoken and thought, but as the
unhappy mother, the ill-fated Lady Isabel.
“You must not say these things to Lucy. It could never be.”
Lord Vane laughed.
“Why?” asked he.
“Your father and mother would not approve.”
“My father would--I know he would. He likes Lucy. As to my mother--oh,
well, she can’t expect to be master and mistress too. You be off for a
minute, Lucy; I want to say some thing to Madame Vine. Has Carlyle shot
that fellow?” he continued, as Lucy sprung away. “My father is so stiff,
especially when he’s put up, that he would not sully his lips with the
name, or make a single inquiry when we arrived; neither would he let me,
and I walked up here with my tongue burning.”
She would have responded, what fellow? But she suspected too well, and
the words died away on her unwilling lips.
“That brute, Levison. If Carlyle riddled his body with shots for this
move, and then kicked him till he died, he’d only get his deserts, and
the world would applaud. He oppose Carlyle! I wish I had been a man a
few years ago, he’d have got a shot through his heart then. I say,”
dropping his voice, “did you know Lady Isabel?”
“Yes--no--yes.”
She was at a loss what to say--almost as unconscious what she did say.
“She was Lucy’s mother, you know, and I loved her. I think that’s why I
love Lucy, for she is the very image of her. Where did you know her?
Here?”
“I knew her by hearsay,” murmured Lady Isabel, arousing to recollection.
“Oh, hearsay! Has Carlyle shot the beast, or is he on his legs yet? By
Jove! To think that he should sneak himself up, in this way, at West
Lynne!”
“You must apply elsewhere for information,” she gasped. “I know nothing
of these things.”
She turned away with a beating heart, and took Lucy’s hand, and
departed. Lord Vane set off on a run toward the house, his heels flying
behind him.
And now the contest began in earnest--that is, the canvass. Sir Francis
Levison, his agent, and a friend from town, who, as it turned out,
instead of being some great gun of the government, was a private chum of
the baronet’s by name Drake, sneaked about the town like dogs with their
tails burnt, for they were entirely alive to the color in which they
were held, their only attendants being a few young gentlemen and ladies
in rags, who commonly brought up the rear. The other party presented a
stately crowd--county gentry, magistrates, Lord Mount Severn. Sometimes
Mr. Carlyle would be with them, arm-and-arm with the latter. If the
contesting groups came within view of each other, and were likely to
meet, the brave Sir Francis would disappear down an entry, behind a
hedge, any place convenient; with all his “face of brass,” he could not
meet Mr. Carlyle and that condemning jury around him.
One afternoon it pleased Mrs. Carlyle to summon Lucy and the governess
to accompany her into West Lynne. She was going shopping. Lady Isabel
had a dread and horror of appearing in there while that man was in town,
but she could not help herself. There was no pleading illness, for she
was quite well; there must be no saying, “I will not go,” for she was
only a dependant. They started, and had walked as far as Mrs. Hare’s
gate, when Miss Carlyle turned out of it.
“Your mamma’s not well, Barbara.”
“Is she not?” cried Barbara, with quick concern. “I must go and see
her.”
“She has had one of those ridiculous dreams again,” pursued Miss
Carlyle, ignoring the presence of the governess and Lucy. “I was sure of
it by her very look when I got in, shivering and shaking, and glancing
fearfully around, as if she feared a dozen spectres were about to burst
out of the walls. So I taxed her with it, and she could make no denial.
Richard is in some jeopardy, she protests, or will be. And there she is,
shaking still, although I told her that people who put faith in dreams
were only fit for a lunatic asylum.”
Barbara looked distressed. She did not believe in dreams any more than
Miss Carlyle, but she could not forget how strangely peril to Richard
had supervened upon some of these dreams.
“I will go in now and see mamma,” she said. “If you are returning home,
Cornelia, Madame Vine can walk with you, and wait for me there.”
“Let me go in with you, mamma!” pleaded Lucy.
Barbara mechanically took the child’s hand. The gates closed on them,
and Miss Carlyle and Lady Isabel proceeded in the direction of the town.
But not far had they gone when, in turning a corner, the wind, which was
high, blew away with the veil of Lady Isabel, and, in raising her hand
in trepidation to save it before it was finally gone, she contrived to
knock off her blue spectacles. They fell to the ground, and were broken.
“How did you manage that?” uttered Miss Carlyle.
How, indeed? She bent her face on the ground, looking at the damage.
What should she do? The veil was over the hedge, the spectacles were
broken--how could she dare show her naked face? That face was rosy just
then, as in former days, the eyes were bright, and Miss Carlyle caught
their expression, and stared in very amazement.
“Good heavens above,” she uttered, “what an extraordinary likeness!” And
Lady Isabel’s heart turned faint and sick within her.
Well it might. And, to make matters worse, bearing down right upon them,
but a few paces distant, came Sir Francis Levison.
Would he recognize her?
Standing blowing in the wind at the turning of the road were Miss
Carlyle and Lady Isabel Vane. The latter, confused and perplexed, was
picking up the remnant of her damaged spectacles; the former, little
less perplexed, gazed at the face which struck upon her memory as being
so familiar. Her attention, however, was called off the face to the
apparition of Sir Francis Levison.
He was close upon them, Mr. Drake and the other comrade being with him,
and some tagrag in attendance, as usual. It was the first time he and
Miss Carlyle had met face to face. She bent her condemning brow, haughty
in its bitter scorn, full upon him, for it was not in the nature of Miss
Carlyle to conceal her sentiments, especially when they were rather of
the strongest. Sir Francis, when he arrived opposite, raised his hat to
her. Whether it was done in courtesy, in confused unconsciousness, or in
mockery, cannot be told. Miss Carlyle assumed it to have been the
latter, and her lips, in their anger grew almost as pale as those of the
unhappy woman who was cowering behind her.
“Did you intend that insult for me, Francis Levison?”
“As you please to take it,” returned he, calling up insolence to his
aid.
“You dare to lift off your hat to me! Have you forgotten that I am Miss
Carlyle?”
“It would be difficult for you to be forgotten, once seen.”
Now this answer was given in mockery; his tone and manner were redolent
of it, insolently so. The two gentlemen looked on in discomfort,
wondering what it meant; Lady Isabel hid her face as best she could,
terrified to death lest his eyes should fall on it: while the
spectators, several of whom had collected now, listened with interest,
especially some farm laborers of Squire Pinner’s who had happened to be
passing.
“You contemptible worm!” cried Miss Carlyle, “do you think you can
outrage me with impunity as you, by your presence in it, are outraging
West Lynne? Out upon you for a bold, bad man!”
Now Miss Corny, in so speaking, had certainly no thought of present and
immediate punishment for the gentleman; but it appeared that the mob
around had. The motion was commented by those stout-shouldered laborers.
Whether excited thereto by the words of Miss Carlyle--who, whatever may
have been her faults of manner, held the respect of the neighborhood,
and was looked up to only in a less degree than her brother; whether
Squire Pinner, their master, had let drop, in their hearing, a word of
the ducking he had hinted at, when at East Lynne, or whether their own
feelings alone spurred them on, was best known to the men themselves.
Certain it is, that the ominous sound of “Duck him,” was breathed forth
by a voice, and it was caught up and echoed around.
“Duck him! Duck him! The pond be close at hand. Let’s give him a taste
of his deservings! What do he the scum, turn himself up at West Lynne
for, bearding Mr. Carlyle? What have he done with Lady Isabel? Him put
up for others at West Lynne! West Lynne’s respectable, it don’t want
him; it have got a better man; it won’t have a villain. Now, lads!”
His face turned white, and he trembled in his shoes--worthless men are
frequently cowards. Lady Isabel trembled in hers; and well she might,
hearing that one allusion. They set upon him, twenty pairs of hands at
least, strong, rough, determined hands; not to speak of the tagrag’s
help, who went in with cuffs, and kicks, and pokes, and taunts, and
cheers, and a demoniac dance.
They dragged him through a gap in the hedge, a gap that no baby could
have got through in a cool moment; but most of us know the difference
between coolness and excitement. The hedge was extensively damaged, but
Justice Hare, to whom it belonged, would forgive that. Mr. Drake and the
lawyer--for the other was a lawyer--were utterly powerless to stop the
catastrophe. “If they didn’t mind their own business, and keep
themselves clear, they’d get served the same,” was the promise held out
in reply to their remonstrances; and the lawyer, who was short and fat,
and could not have knocked a man down, had it been to save his life,
backed out of the melee, and contented himself with issuing forth
confused threatenings of the terrors of the law. Miss Carlyle stood her
ground majestically, and looked on with a grim countenance. Had she
interfered for his protection, she could not have been heard; and if she
could have been, there’s no knowing whether she would have done it.
On, to the brink of the pond--a green, dank, dark, slimy sour, stinking
pond. His coat-tails were gone by this time, and sundry rents and
damages appeared in--in another useful garment. One pulled him, another
pushed him, a third shook him by the collar, half a dozen buffeted him,
and all abused him.
“In with him, boys!”
“Mercy! Mercy!” shrieked the victim, his knees bending and his teeth
chattering--“a little mercy for the love of Heaven!”
“Heaven! Much he knows of Heaven!”
A souse, a splash, a wild cry, a gurgle, and Sir Francis Levison was
floundering in the water, its green poison, not to mention its adders
and toads and frogs, going down his throat by bucketfuls. A hoarse,
derisive laugh, and a hip, hip, hurrah! broke from the actors; while the
juvenile ragtag, in wild delight, joined their hands round the pool, and
danced the demon’s dance, like so many red Indians. They had never had
such a play acted for them before.
Out of the pea-soup before he was quite dead, quite senseless. Of all
drowned rats, he looked the worst, as he stood there with his white,
rueful face, his shivery limbs, and his dilapidated garments, shaking
the wet off him. The laborers, their duty done, walked coolly away; the
tagrag withdrew to a safe distance, waiting for what might come next;
and Miss Carlyle moved away also. Not more shivery was that wretched man
than Lady Isabel, as she walked by her side. A sorry figure to cut,
that, for her once chosen cavalier. What did she think of his beauty
now? I know what she thought of her past folly.
Miss Carlyle never spoke a word. She sailed on, with her head up, though
it was turned occasionally to look at the face of Madame Vine, at the
deep distressing blush which this gaze called into her cheeks. “It’s
very odd,” thought Miss Corny. “The likeness, especially in the eyes,
is--Where are you going, madame?”
They were passing a spectacle shop, and Madame Vine had halted at the
door, one foot on its step. “I must have my glasses to be mended, if you
please.”
Miss Carlyle followed her in. She pointed out what she wanted done to
the old glasses, and said she would buy a pair of new ones to wear while
the job was about. The man had no blue ones, no green; plenty of white.
One ugly, old pair of green things he had, with tortoise-shell rims,
left by some stranger, ages and ages ago, to be mended, and never called
for again. This very pair of ugly old green things was chosen by Lady
Isabel. She put them on, there and then, Miss Carlyle’s eyes searching
her face inquisitively all the time.
“Why do you wear glasses?” began Miss Corny, abruptly as soon as they
were indoors.
Another deep flush, and an imperceptible hesitation.
“My eyes are not strong.”
“They look as strong as eyes can look. But why wear colored glasses?
White ones would answer every purpose, I should suppose.”
“I am accustomed to colored ones. I should not like white ones now.”
Miss Corny paused.
“What is your Christian name, madame?” began she, again.
“Jane,” replied madame, popping out an unflinching story in her alarm.
“Here! Here! What’s up? What’s this?”
It was a crowd in the street, and rather a noisy one. Miss Corny flew to
the window, Lady Isabel in her wake. Two crowds, it may almost be said;
for, from the opposite way, the scarlet-and-purple party--as Mr.
Carlyle’s was called, in allusion to his colors--came in view. Quite a
collection of gentlemen--Mr. Carlyle and Lord Mount Severn heading them.
What could it mean, the mob they were encountering? The yellow party,
doubtless, but in a disreputable condition. Who or what was that object
in advance of it, supported between Drake and the lawyer, and looking
like a drowned rat, hair hanging, legs tottering, cheeks shaking, and
clothes in tatters, while the mob, behind, had swollen to the length of
the street, and was keeping up a perpetual fire of derisive shouts,
groans, and hisses. The scarlet-and-purple halted in consternation, and
Lord Mount Severn, whose sight was not as good as it had been twenty
years back, stuck his pendent eye glasses astride on the bridge of his
nose.
Sir Francis Levison? Could it be? Yes, it actually was! What on earth
had put him into that state? Mr. Carlyle’s lip curled; he continued his
way and drew the peer with him.
“What the deuce is a-gate now?” called out the followers of Mr. Carlyle.
“That’s Levison! Has he been in a railway smash, and got drenched by the
engine?”
“He has been ducked!” grinned the yellows, in answer. “They have been
and ducked him in the rush pool on Mr. Justice Hare’s land.”
The soaked and miserable man increased his speed as much as his cold and
trembling legs would allow him; he would have borne on without legs at
all, rather than remain under the enemy’s gaze. The enemy loftily
continued their way, their heads in the air, and scorning further
notice, all, save young Lord Vane. He hovered round the ranks of the
unwashed, and looked vastly inclined to enter upon an Indian jig, on his
own account.
“What a thundering ass I was to try it on at West Lynne!” was the
enraged comment of the sufferer.
Miss Carlyle laid her hand upon the shrinking arm of her pale companion.
“You see him--my brother Archibald?”
“I see him,” faltered Lady Isabel.
“And you see him, that pitiful outcast, who is too contemptible to live?
Look at the two, and contrast them. Look well.”
“Yes!” was the gaping answer.
“The woman who called him, that noble man, husband, quitted him for the
other! Did she come to repentance, think you?”
You may wonder that the submerged gentleman should be walking through
the streets, on his way to his quarters, the Raven Inn--for he had been
ejected from the Buck’s Head--but he could not help himself. As he was
dripping and swearing on the brink of the pond, wondering how he should
get to the Raven, an empty fly drove past, and Mr. Drake immediately
stopped it; but when the driver saw that he was expected to convey not
only a passenger, but a tolerable quantity of water as well, and that
the passenger, moreover, was Sir Francis Levison, he refused the job.
His fly was fresh lined with red velvet, and he “weren’t a going to have
it spoilt,” he called out, as he whipped his horse and drove away,
leaving the three in wrathful despair. Sir Francis wanted another
conveyance procured; his friends urged that if he waited for that he
might catch his death, and that the shortest way would be to hasten to
the inn on foot. He objected. But his jaws were chattering, his limbs
were quaking, so they seized him between them, and made off, but never
bargained for the meeting of Mr. Carlyle and his party. Francis Levison
would have stopped in the pond, of his own accord, head downward, rather
than face them.
Miss Carlyle went that day to dine at East Lynne, walking back with Mrs.
Carlyle, Madame Vine and Lucy. Lord Vane found them out, and returned at
the same time; of course East Lynne was the headquarters of himself and
his father. He was in the seventh heaven, and had been ever since the
encounter with the yellows.
“You’d have gone into laughing convulsions, Lucy had you seen the
drowned cur. I’d give all my tin for six months to come to have a
photograph of him as he looked then!”
Lucy laughed in glee; she was unconscious, poor child, how deeply the
“drowned cur” had injured her.
When Miss Carlyle was in her dressing-room taking her things off--the
room where once had slept Richard Hare--she rang for Joyce. These two
rooms were still kept for Miss Carlyle--for she did sometimes visit them
for a few days--and were distinguished by her name--“Miss Carlyle’s
rooms.”
“A fine row we have had in the town, Joyce, this afternoon.”
“I have heard of it, ma’am. Served him right, if they had let him drown!
Bill White, Squire Pinner’s plowman, called in here and told us the
news. He’d have burst with it, if he hadn’t, I expect; I never saw a
chap so excited. Peter cried.”
“Cried?” echoed Miss Carlyle.
“Well, ma’am, you know he was very fond of Lady Isabel, was Peter, and
somehow his feelings overcame him. He said he had not heard anything to
please him so much for many a day; and with that he burst out crying,
and gave Bill White half a crown out of his pocket. Bill White said it
was he who held one leg when they soused him in. Afy saw it--if you’ll
excuse me mentioning her name to you, ma’am, for I know you don’t think
well of her--and when she got in here, she fell into hysterics.”
“How did she see it?” snapped Miss Carlyle, her equanimity upset by the
sound of the name. “I didn’t see her, and I was present.”
“She was coming here with a message from Mrs. Latimer to the governess.”
“What did she go into hysterics for?” again snapped Miss Carlyle.
“It upset her so, she said,” returned Joyce.
“It wouldn’t have done her harm had they ducked her too,” was the angry
response.
Joyce was silent. To contradict Miss Corny brought triumph to nobody.
And she was conscious, in her innermost heart, that Afy merited a little
wholesome correction, not perhaps to the extent of a ducking.
“Joyce,” resumed Miss Carlyle, abruptly changing the subject, “who does
the governess put you in mind of?”
“Ma’am?” repeated Joyce, in some surprise, as it appeared. “The
governess? Do you mean Madame Vine?”
“Do I mean you, or do I mean me? Are we governesses?” irascibly cried
Miss Corny. “Who should I mean, but Madame Vine?”
She turned herself round from the looking-glass, and gazed full in
Joyce’s face, waiting for the answer. Joyce lowered her voice as she
gave it.
“There are times when she puts me in mind of my late lady both in her
face and manner. But I have never said so, ma’am; for you know Lady
Isabel’s name must be an interdicted one in this house.”
“Have you seen her without her glasses?”
“No; never,” said Joyce.
“I did to-day,” returned Miss Carlyle. “And I can tell you, Joyce, that
I was confounded at the likeness. It is an extraordinary likeness. One
would think it was a ghost of Lady Isabel Vane come into the world
again.”
That evening after dinner, Miss Carlyle and Lord Mount Severn sat side
by side on the same sofa, coffee cups in hand. Miss Carlyle turned to
the earl.
“Was it a positively ascertained fact that Lady Isabel died?”
The earl stared with all his might; he thought it the strangest question
that ever was asked him. “I scarcely understand you, Miss Carlyle. Died?
Certainly she died.”
“When the result of the accident was communicated to you, you made
inquiry yourself into its truth, its details, I believe?”
“It was my duty to do so. There was no one else to undertake it.”
“Did you ascertain positively, beyond all doubt, that she did die?”
“Of a surety I did. She died in the course of the same night. Terribly
injured she was.”
A pause. Miss Carlyle was ruminating. But she returned to the charge, as
if difficult to be convinced.
“You deem that there could be no possibility of an error? You are sure
that she is dead?”
“I am as sure that she is dead as that we are living,” decisively
replied the earl: and he spoke but according to his belief. “Wherefore
should you be inquiring this?”
“A thought came over me--only to-day--to wonder whether she was really
dead.”
“Had any error occurred at that time, any false report of her death, I
should soon have found it out by her drawing the annuity I settled upon
her. It has never been drawn since. Besides, she would have written to
me, as agreed upon. No, poor thing, she is gone beyond all doubt, and
has taken her sins with her.”
Convincing proofs; and Miss Carlyle lent her ear to them.
The following morning while Madame Vine was at breakfast, Mr. Carlyle
entered.
“Do you admit intruders here Madame Vine?” cried he, with his sweet
smile, and attractive manner.
She arose; her face burning, her heart throbbing.
“Keep your seat, pray; I have but a moment to stay,” said Mr. Carlyle.
“I have come to ask you how William seems?”
“There was no difference,” she murmured, and then she took courage and
spoke more openly. “I understood you to say the other night, sir, that
he should have further advice.”
“Ay; I wish him to go over to Lynneborough, to Dr. Martin; the drive, I
think, will do him good,” replied Mr. Carlyle. “And I would like you to
accompany him, if you do not mind the trouble. You can have the pony
carriage, it will be better to go in that than boxed up in the railway
carriage. You can remind Dr. Martin that the child’s constitution is
precisely what his mother’s was,” continued Mr. Carlyle, a tinge
lightening his face. “It may be a guide to his treatment; he said
himself it was, when he attended him for an illness a year or two ago.”
“Yes, sir.”
He crossed the hall on his entrance to the breakfast-room. She tore
upstairs to her chamber, and sank down in an agony of tears and despair.
Oh, to love him as she did now! To yearn after his affection with this
passionate, jealous longing, and to know that they were separated for
ever and ever; that she was worse to him than nothing!
Softly, my lady. This is not bearing your cross.