"Life, believe, is not a dream
So dark as sages say;
Oft a little morning rain
Foretells a pleasant day."
Charlotte Bronte.
About a week before the cold evening of Arthur's drive with the old
farmer in his cart to Greenwell, late one afternoon, a young lady in
deep mourning might have been seen getting out of the train at a certain
station in London. She was alone, and she had no luggage, except a
little bag which she carried; and yet, as the train was an express one,
not stopping at stations near at hand, it was clear that she had come
from some distance. A porter, on the alert for embarrassed lady
travellers, quickly called a cab for her, looking disappointed at no
trunks being forthcoming, but needlessly so, as he received a liberal
amount of coppers for the small service he had rendered. This rather
unusual generosity made him give more attention than he generally had
time to bestow on travellers, to the tall, slight, black-shrouded
figure. The thick veil which she wore blew aside for an instant as she
got into the cab, and he saw that she was very young, very pretty, and
evidently in trouble, for her eyes showed traces of recent tears.
"Poor thing!" said the porter to himself. "A suddint summins, no
doubt--wired for--started at onst--no luggage--no time to think of
nothink;" and being a rather tender-hearted porter, he could hardly
refrain, as he stood with his hand on the cab door waiting for the
address, from adding paternally, "Hope you won't find things so bad as
you anticerpate, miss;" but before he had time to make up his mind
whether he should or should not express these kindly feelings, he was
startled by her saying rapidly, though in a low voice--
"Ask him to drive quickly, please, as quickly as possible;" and then she
gave the address, which, rather to the porter's surprise, was in that
part of London where no one but lawyers, and lawyers in their official
capacity solely, are to be heard of, which circumstance gave the porter
matter for reflection for fully one minute and a half, till the next
train came in or went out, and he relapsed into his normal condition.
Whether the cabman drove quickly or not, it did not appear so to the
unhappy girl seated in his cab. It seemed hours to her, till he at last
drew up, in a dingy, smoke-dried, but respectable locality, where she
had never been before in her life. She jumped out of the cab, hardly
replying to the driver's inquiry as to whether he was to wait--which,
however, as she had not paid him, he naturally decided to do--and only
stopping to read the lists of names inscribed at each side of the open
doorway, leading to the staircase common to all the tenants of the
house, she hurried in, and was lost to sight in its solemnly gloomy
recesses. Five minutes later she was back again, extreme dejection
visible in her whole bearing to any one observing her with attention,
even without the sight of the pale, agitated face which her veil
concealed. But the cabman was not observing her; he was tired, and
inclined to be drowsy, in spite of the cold weather, and Lettice stood
still for a moment or two before getting into the cab again.
"Godfrey away, for a fortnight, at least. What _shall_ I do?--oh, what
_shall_ I do?" she said to herself, pressing her hands together in
agony. "If I only knew where he was!" But at his chambers they had
refused, though quite civilly, to give her his address, contenting
themselves with assuring her that any letters would be forwarded to him
at once. "He may be abroad; he may be ever so far away. He _might_
have let us know he was going;" but here her conscience reproached her.
How could she expect him to have done anything of the sort when she
remembered how they had last parted the cold contempt with which she had
received his kind and reasonable remonstrances, till at last, stung into
indignation, he had declared that henceforth he would leave her to
herself, merely interfering with advice and direction when he saw it
absolutely necessary to do so? And that was now three or four months
ago. Since then he had only written on strictly business matters--about
having taken on Faxleham Cottage for six months longer, directions about
Auriol's schooling, and so on. And these three or four months had been
among the dreariest and most anxious Lettice had ever known. Nina was
pale and drooping; Arthur's letters were rare and unsatisfactory; the
autumn had been an unusually rainy and depressing season, and they had
absolutely no friends. But for Miss Branksome's unfailing cheerfulness,
Nina and the younger ones would, indeed, have been to be pitied, though
less than Lettice herself.
For, far as she was from owning herself to be the cause of all this
unhappiness, her conscience was not at rest, and misgivings from time to
time made themselves felt, though she stifled them by exaggerating to
herself the soundness of her motives. And this very exaggeration made
her write to poor Arthur the letters which, in his overstrained state,
had had so disastrous a result.
Towards Nina, too, she knew, at the bottom of her heart, that she had
not acted fairly, though the reserve that had gradually grown up between
them, had prevented her thoroughly understanding her younger sister.
For what--for whom, rather--was poor Nina pining?
"_Does_ she care for Godfrey?" Lettice asked herself, feeling that if
Nina had learnt to do so it was thanks to _her_ influence, and no other.
And as time went on, and Lettice began to own to herself that it did
_not_ seem as if Godfrey were in love with Nina--"had it been so," she
reflected, "he is far too resolute to have been kept back by his quarrel
with _me_,"--she almost came to hope that on both sides the dream had
been the creation of her own fancy--her own self-will she would not call
it.
Though even in this hope she found small rest for her troubled spirit.
If it were not about Godfrey that Nina was fretting away, though
patiently and uncomplainingly, the brightness from her pretty eyes, the
roses from her young cheeks, about whom and what was it? And a certain
afternoon last August, and a certain conversation with a fair-faced,
honest young gentleman, who had come to plead his cause with manly
straightforwardness; who had gone away looking ten years older, though
with courteous and grateful words to herself on his lips, rose up before
Lettice's remembrance with reproachful eyes.
And all these memories--as in the so often quoted case of a drowning
person--rushed through Lettice's mind in the half-minute during which
she stood there in her distress and desolation, while her lips repeated
the same murmur--"What shall--oh, what _shall_ I do? Every moment of
time that I am losing here may be of the most vital importance."
Once she turned and made a step or two towards the door again, in a
half-formed resolution to inquire if Mr Auriol's clerk could give her
the address of Philip Dexter. But from this she shrank with the
strongest feelings of her nature.
"To go to _him_--to appeal to _him_ to help me," she reflected. "It
would be like begging him on again for Nina. It would be owning that it
was all nonsense about Godfrey's caring for her--and for Arthur's sake,
too. Why should I publish his humiliation to any but those who _must_
know it?"
And again she stood irresolute and altogether wretched. And cabby,
beginning to wake up and giving signs of being about to begin wondering
what queer sort of a "fare, as didn't know its own mind, he had got hold
of," doubled and trebled the girl's embarrassment.
"I must go to some hotel for the night, I suppose," she said to herself.
"And oh! the horror of sitting there all the evening doing nothing, and
lying there all night doing nothing--and Arthur, my darling brother,
setting sail for America, before we can stop him; or perhaps--worse and
worse--tossing in some miserable place among strangers, in a brain
fever, where he may die--_die_, without having forgiven me!"
Nearly driven frantic by her own imaginings, she looked round her with a
vague, altogether unreasonable appeal for help or guidance.
"What _shall_ I do?" she ejaculated for the twentieth time, when just at
that moment a carriage drew up--cabby rousing himself to move on so as
to make room for it, for it was an unmistakable carriage, a small but
thoroughly well-appointed brougham, quite capable of commanding his
respectful deference--before the door where Lettice was standing, and a
gentleman got out and came slowly over the pavement towards the house.
The pavement, or the space between the houses and the real pavement, was
wide there. It looked as if in far-off times there might have been a
grass-plot or a flowerbed or two in front; and as the new-comer
approached, Lettice had time to see him clearly. She looked at him--at
the first glance a wild idea had struck her that possibly he might be
Godfrey Auriol returned unexpectedly--with a sort of half-bewildered
curiosity, but gradually a vague feeling came over her that he was not
altogether unknown to her, that somewhere she had seen him before, or
else that he resembled some one she had once known. But as he passed
by, she recollected herself and turned sharply away. What was it to her
what or who this stranger was? What was she made of to be standing
there losing the precious moments in idle conjecture? And again the
whole force of her mind became concentrated on the absorbing question--
what _was_ she to do?
She was turning at last to the cab, in a desperate resolution to go
_somewhere_, when a quick step behind her made her look round. To her
surprise there stood facing her the gentleman who a moment before had
passed her to enter the house. He raised his hat, and she, looking at
him, was again struck by his strange indefinite likeness to _some one_.
He was slightly above the middle height, his dark hair already a very
little hazed with grey. He looked a man of about forty, though in
reality he was some years younger; his expression was gentle but rather
piercing. There was great power, moral and intellectual, in his
well-shaped forehead.
"Excuse me for addressing you," he said. "But you seemed to me to be at
a loss. Perhaps you are inquiring for some one you cannot find? I know
this neighbourhood well. Can I help you?"
Lettice looked at him again. The gentleman's tone was so respectful as
well as kind, that the most timorous of maidens could scarcely have
failed to feel confidence in him. And Lettice was the reverse of
timorous; she was fearless to a fault, and her inexperience suggested no
misgiving.
"Do you perhaps," she began, "do you happen to know any one here--in
this house? I am so disappointed at finding the friend, the gentleman I
came to see, on _most_ urgent business, away from home. And they won't
even give me his address?" she added girlishly, the tears welling up
again as she spoke.
A curious look came into the kindly eyes that were regarding her, and
the stranger made a very slight involuntary movement, almost as if he
were going to lay his hand on her arm to console her as one would do to
a troubled child. But he checked himself.
"I know Mr Auriol, Mr Godfrey Auriol, whose office is in this house,"
he said.
"That is he," exclaimed Lettice with delighted eagerness. "Oh, how
fortunate that I should have met you! If you could, oh, if you could
but get them to give me his address, I might telegraph to him. It would
save ever so much time. Perhaps, I should tell you," she went on, "I
have a right to ask for his address; he is my--our guardian. My name is
Morison."
There was no visible change of expression in the stranger's face, but
one knowing him well would have seen a light in his eyes that was not
there before. And his lips moved, though no sound was heard. "Thank
God for this," were the inaudible words.
"I can easily get you his address," he said. "I was just going in to
ask if they had any definite news of his return. I want to see him as
soon as he comes back. Will you wait here a moment? It is very cold,"
he added, looking round. "Is that your cab waiting?"
"Yes," said Lettice.
The gentleman glanced at the cab, with its ill-fitting doors and
windows, and the inevitable damp and chilly straw on the floor.
"I doubt if you would be much warmer there," he said with a smile.
"Would you--will you do me the favour to get into my brougham while I go
upstairs? There is a hot-water footstool--and rugs--for I have just
taken my wife home. You don't think me very presuming?" he added.
"Remember, I am a friend of Godfrey's."
There was something reassuring in the simple way in which he spoke of
Mr Auriol by his Christian name, even had Lettice wanted reassuring,
which she did not. She looked up again in the stranger's face and said,
with an abruptness that sometimes characterised her--
"Are you a doctor?"
He smiled. "No, I am not. I am sorry for it if it would have given you
more confidence in me. Though I hope," he added with real anxiety,
"that it is not to hear of a doctor that you are here. None of you are
ill? _That_ isn't the urgent business, I trust?"
"No," replied Lettice, surprised at his way of speaking. "He must have
heard about us from Godfrey," she decided. "At least, I hope not," she
added, as her terrible picture of Arthur in a brain fever came before
her eyes. "I _hope_ not. But I don't know what I think or fear. You
won't be long?" she said appealingly, for by this time her new friend
had handed her into the snug little carriage.
"Two minutes at most," he replied.
And Lettice sat there, grateful in a sort of childish way for the
cushioned warmth and comfort, though till then she had thought nothing
about how cold she was, gazing before her in a vague, half-dazed way,
feeling almost as if she would fall asleep if she were left there long,
but in some indefinite way undoubtedly many degrees less miserable and
desolate than before the apparition of the brougham.
Its owner was as good as his word Two minutes had barely elapsed before
he was back again.
"I have his present address," he said. "But he is a long way off. He
is in Scotland, and is not expected back for a fortnight. He is away on
professional business, but he had hoped not to have to go so far. He
had hoped to be back to spend Christmas with us down in the country.
Now," he continued, "what is to be done? You can telegraph to him, but
I doubt if it would be _possible_ for him to come back, and it is an
out-of-the-way place where he is. You said there was no time to be
lost? Have you no one else, no other friend or--or relative?" Here his
voice faltered as he looked anxiously into the girl's face, so pale and
drawn and careworn as it had again become.
She roused herself with a sort of effort.
"I don't know what to do," she repeated.
"Can you not, though I am a stranger, can you not make up your mind--we
have been brought together so strangely--can you not tell me what is the
matter?" he said, beseechingly almost.
All this time he was standing with his hand on the carriage door.
"If you would let me take you home--to my wife," he continued, "you
would see how kind and sympathising she is. Could you tell _her_,
better?"
"Oh no, thank you," said Lettice. "I could tell you just as well. The
trouble is about--my brother."
"Your brother--Arthur? God forbid!" he exclaimed. "Is it anything very
serious?"
"I fear so, but I don't know," she replied, shaking her head. And at
the moment it did not strike her, so impressed was she with the
magnitude of her overwhelming anxiety, how curious it was that a
complete stranger should be so affected by her troubles! Yet his naming
her brother by name caught her attention. "You know about us. I
suppose from Mr Auriol?" she said.
"Yes," he replied, but in an absent way.
And still Lettice sat gazing before her, as if she were half-stunned.
Then suddenly, raising her eyes--
"Arthur has run away," she said. "At least, he has _gone_ away. He
wrote that he would try to go to America, but we were afraid, Nina and
I--we got his letter last night, and I came off by the first train this
morning. Nina and Miss Branksome wanted me to wait and to telegraph
first, so I came away without telling them. I could not bear waiting--
we were afraid that he might have fallen ill somewhere. He has not been
well lately, and the shock of his disgrace--"
"Disgrace! What disgrace?" exclaimed the gentleman.
"He has failed--at least, he saw that he was going to fail--in his
examination, and he would not face the rest of it," said Lettice, the
crimson rising to her face.
The stranger could hardly repress a smile.
"But why use such terribly strong words about it? Failing in his
examination a disgrace! You startled me," he said with evident and
immense relief.
"_He_ took it so," said Lettice, a little nettled.
"And I--I used to think I would feel it so too, but I don't seem to mind
now. I would mind nothing if we could find him."
"Have you any trace? Can you tell me all the particulars?"
"Yes," said Lettice, feeling in her pocket for Arthur's letter. But the
stranger interrupted her.
"Now that you have told me so much, you will not refuse to let me tell
you something--make some explanations to you. You will let me send away
your cab, and take you home to my wife? I think I can promise to help
you, but you must give me all particulars, and in a circumstantial
manner. That will take time. But first, Lettice, it is not fair to you
not to tell you who I am. I am not only Godfrey Auriol's friend; I am--
do not be startled, my child--I am your uncle, Ingram Morison."
He turned away after saying these words. He would not look at her face,
half out of pity for her, half out of an almost childish terror of the
deep disappointment to himself, should he see its expression turn into
hard resentment. He walked up and down in the cold for a moment or two,
then hearing, or fancying he heard, a low, half-stifled call--to his
ears it took the sound of the words he had so often longed to hear,
"Uncle Ingram"--he turned back again. She was looking out of the
brougham window, the glass was down, her face was paler than one could
almost believe it possible for a young, healthy face to be, her lips
were quivering, there was a look of suffering and humiliation almost,
but there was no hardness or resentment.
"Lettice," he said gently. "_May_ I send away your cab?"
There was great tact in the tone and manner of the simple question.
Lettice's eyes filled with tears. She did not speak, but she bent her
head in assent.