Dolff blotted himself out against the wall, under the tree which bent
over the wall of his own garden, and threw a rugged shadow on the
pavement. He was invisible in the gloom of the wintry night. They went
up in their boldness almost to the very door, and stood there
whispering, yet starting at every noise. Dolff could scarcely hear
Janet’s hesitating little voice, but he drank in every sound of
Meredith’s.
“No, no; there will be nobody out at this hour. Don’t be afraid. Ah!
there might be Dolff. No; Dolff’s waiting for you to come in to teach
him his new song, Janet. Little daring! to train a lout like that.
Well, you’ll keep your eyes open, and if you hear or see anything
further, report to me at once. It’s very important. What do you say?
Don’t be in such a fright, dearest; nobody will see us.”
Then there came a murmur from Janet, too low to be heard.
“Yes, there you’re right. There might be Vicars, the everlasting Vicars
whose occupation will be gone, and who will have to return to be a
butler, like the others. Oh, no, I’ve no pity for Vicars. I daresay it
was he who put his mistress up to it. Mind you keep a good look-out. You
don’t know how important it may be for me. Yes, I know I must go. It
will be droll after this, won’t it, to meet solemnly, as if we had not
seen each other for ages, and didn’t care if we never met again? Eh? To
be sure, I’m going to dinner, and you are never seen on those occasions.
Poor little Janet, eating her morsel up in the nursery, like a naughty
child, and knowing there’s some one downstairs. Never mind, I shall only
think of you the more.”
“And make fun of me with her?” said Janet, in a sharper, more audible
tone.
“With Gussy, bless her! No, she never lets me make fun. She don’t
understand it. You needn’t be jealous, little one, though I avow it’s
droll enough, the position altogether: to keep her in good humor--and
then you, you little spitfire.”
Janet was not audible but in the movement of her figure, the twist of
her shoulders, the poise of her head, there was a question and
remonstrance as clear as words.
“Why do I do it? Oh, it’s all very complicated, very difficult to
understand. I couldn’t explain unless I had time. Unfair! no; there’s
nothing unfair, don’t you know, in love or in war. Don’t be afraid;
she’s of the careless kind, it will do her no harm. I ought not? Well,
perhaps not, strictly speaking. But when does one do everything one
ought? This is not right--perhaps not; but it’s all the more sweet, eh,
little one? And as for Gussy!” he laughed, that triumphant laugh which,
even to Janet’s bewildered ears, was not without offence, “for
Gussy----” with a gurgle of mirth in the words.
Janet could never understand how that horrible moment went, nor how it
all happened. Something seemed suddenly to hurtle through the air, a
dark, swift, rapid thing, like a thunderbolt. She had scarcely felt the
sensation of being pushed away when she was conscious of Meredith lying
at her feet, his white face upturned to the faint light, and of that
dark thing over him seizing him, dashing his head against the pavement.
Janet uttered a cry, but it was not her cry that brought flying feet
along the road in both directions, and evoked a little tumult round the
insensible figure. She mingled with it instinctively; she could not tell
why, keeping silent, partly that she was struck dumb with terror, partly
with an instinct of self-preservation, which seized her in this strange,
sudden, awful emergency. When the door was opened--and her senses were
so acute that she saw it was Vicars who had rushed to see what the
commotion was--she managed to steal in unseen, to fly upstairs, and
shelter herself in her room. What did it matter where she went? He had
been killed before her eyes, with the laugh on his lips. Killed--struck
dead at a blow! And she had seen it done, and knew who had done it, and
was all mixed up and involved in the horrible, horrible catastrophe. It
may seem cruel that this was Janet’s first thought, but she was so
young. She had done her share of all this wrong so carelessly, with no
particular meaning, thinking not much harm.
“Not much harm,” she said to herself, piteously.
No harm, no harm--only to amuse herself; and lo! it had come to murder,
to sudden, swift fate. She was all one throb from head to foot, of
horror and panic and wild excitement. Had any one seen her? Would she be
mixed up in it? Would she have to stand forward and avow it all before
the world in the light of day! Oh, what could Janet do? Where could she
fly? How escape the dreadful revelation, the story which would be spread
over all the world, the horrible fact of being mixed up in a murder? For
the second time, when he seized Meredith by the shoulders, and dashed
his head against the stones, she had recognized Dolff’s face, distorted,
almost beyond recognition, by passion. What could be more dreadful than
to be the witness of it all, the only one who could tell--mixed up in it
as no one else in the world could be?
By and by she heard sounds of men tramping, and a great commotion below.
They were bringing him in here--him--it--the body. Janet’s head went
round, she was on the verge of fainting, but called back her senses by a
supreme effort, saying to herself that if she were found fainting she
would be betrayed, and that nothing but her own self-possession and
courage could now save her. She dipped her head into a basin of water,
put off her outdoor things, even her shoes, on which there were signs of
her walk, and stole out to the gallery to look over the banisters. She
was pale, and there was horror in her face, but that was no more than
the circumstances called forth.
He was lying on a couch which had been wheeled into the hall, and round
him there was a little crowd, a doctor, who seemed to have sprung out of
the earth, as everybody did, and who stood over the prostrate figure
examining it. What was the use? Janet could scarcely keep herself from
crying out, when she had seen him killed. Killed! Oh, what was the use?
Gussy, very pale, but with all her wits about her, stood at the foot of
the sofa. There was a policeman in the hall, and an eager crowd filling
up the doorway with a ring of staring heads. And there he lay killed,
killed! And Janet, horror-stricken, speechless, mixed up in it! the only
witness of what had been done. That dreadful instinct of
self-preservation presently impelled her to further steps; that and the
anxiety she felt to know everything, to know especially how far it was
known that she was mixed up in it.
“What is it? what is it?” she whispered to Gussy, feeling herself by
Miss Harwood’s side; “is it an accident?”
“We can’t tell what it is: it is Mr. Meredith,” said Gussy, in a low,
stern tone.
Janet uttered a cry--what more natural?--and, stealing one glance at the
white upturned face, hid her own in her hands. It was only what an
inexperienced girl would naturally do brought suddenly into such a
presence. Nobody noticed her or thought of her. In the dark she had
escaped entirely unseen.
Then there stole a little balm into her despairing soul. The doctor,
after a hurried examination, turned round to say that the man was still
alive, and begged that a well-known surgeon in the neighborhood should
be immediately sent for. Gussy, who was very pale but perfectly calm,
and complete mistress of the situation, herself superintended the
removal of the couch into the dining-room, which was spacious and well
aired, and had everything removed which was out of place.
The table was already spread for the dinner at which Meredith was to
have been one of the chief guests and Dolff to have occupied the place
of master of the house. Fortunately Gussy did not as yet know the double
misery involved. It was dreadful enough to have this calamity fall so
suddenly without warning upon the domestic happiness and calm. The
dinner-table, with all its pretty arrangements of flowers and shining
crystal and plate, was such a mockery of the sudden, unexplained,
incomprehensible catastrophe, that this touch of the familiar and
commonplace almost broke down Gussy’s composure. She dismantled it
noiselessly with her own hands, assisted eagerly, as she remembered
afterwards with compunction and gratitude, by Janet, who clung closely
to her like her shadow, following where she went with an anxious
endeavor to be of use, which went to Gussy’s heart. They removed the
incongruous ornaments in less time than half-a-dozen housemaids would
have done, and pushed the table aside.
When the surgeon arrived, Janet was ready to be sent on any errand, and
did everything with noiseless rapidity, looking not at the figure on the
sofa, which she seemed incapable of regarding, but at Gussy for her
orders. She was like an obedient, docile slave. When the ladies were
sent out of the room she still clung to Miss Harwood like her shadow,
moving only when she moved. In the hall the policeman still held his
place, with several of the people who had surged in after him and who
were giving their several accounts of the transaction.
“I see it all,” said one. “I was on the other side of the road, and I
see it all. There was a woman with the poor gentleman. I can’t tell you
what kind of a woman; not much good, I shouldn’t think--or perhaps she
was a-begging. There wasn’t light enough to see. And all in a moment
some one made a spring upon him. I don’t know where he came from,
officer. I see him dash on the gentleman as if he had fallen out of the
sky. And down he went like a nine-pin, and afore I could get across the
road the other lifts him up again and down with his head upon the
ground.”
Gussy was standing by, listening intently, and Janet behind, half-hidden
in her shadow, listening too, with such wild yet paralyzing sensation,
wondering would he know her if he saw her--this man who had seen it
all--shrinking behind her protectress faint and sick with the unreality,
the fact and falsehood mingled in which her feet were caught.
Gussy’s voice so close to her even made her start, “Have they got the
man? Is he known?”
The witness turned to her with an instinctive transfer of his attention.
“He just disappeared, mum, as he came. Afore I could come up to them he
was gone.”
“I saw a man running round the corner,” said another, “but I took no
notice, for I didn’t know then what was up.”
“I’ll tell you what, miss,” said another, “the fellow’s in your garden
if he’s anywhere. I see some one dart in when your man-servant came out.
I’ll take my oath he did.”
“In our garden! Has there been any search? Have you done anything to
secure the man? Can anyone identify him? What are you standing there
for,” cried Gussy, “doing nothing, if that wretch is within reach?
Policeman----”
“I’m a-looking after the murdered man, miss,” said the policeman. “I did
sound my rattle, and there’s two of my mates about. I shouldn’t say but
it might be a good chance to search the garden, unless they’ve got him
outside.”
“Go then, go, for heaven’s sake, and do it,” cried Gussy. “He may have
escaped by this time. Mr. Meredith’s friends will give a reward. I
myself--” she suddenly faltered and grew pale, leaning back upon Janet
for support. “Go, go,” she cried, faintly, “go and find the murderer.”
Janet had to put her arms round her to support her. Oh, what things were
beating in the breast that afforded that support. The murderer! was not
she too the murderer? she, whom no one would recognize, who would never
be punished, save by the consciousness which would be her inheritance
forever. Horror and trouble, and the dreadful fear of betraying herself,
of being mixed up in it, kept Janet upright as if in a frame of iron.
The murderer! Oh, heaven! if they should find him, and if he should
point her out and let all the world know how deeply she was mixed up in
it! She supported Gussy, yet clung to her, looking with eyes of anguish
at the policeman who got out his lantern and prepared to go.
“I think Mr. Harwood is in the garden,” she said, “he was--walking
there--a little while ago.”
“Dolff!” said Gussy, recovering herself; then she added, “I hear my
brother is in the garden; he will help you. Oh, do not lose any more
time; go! go!”
Was it to save Dolff that Janet said this, or to betray him? Oh, not to
betray him certainly, for that would be to betray herself. It seemed to
her that the sight of him would kill her; yet could she but warn him by
a word--only a word! If he had the presence of mind to be calm, to make
that rabble understand that he was the son of the house.
Her heart sank within her as they trooped out into the dark garden; the
policeman with his lantern, a few of the boldest of the men following
him, the rest hanging about in the front of the house talking over this
wonderful adventure, which was so terrible, an unthinking, unoffending
man struck down in a moment; but a godsend to all the idle loiterers who
spring out of the earth whenever such an excitement is to be had.
The hall was cleared of all the intruders that pushed into it; the
servants who had been hanging about retired; Gussy went into the
drawing-room to carry the dreadful news to her mother: and Janet, who
could not rest, to whom some outlet for her overwhelming excitement was
necessary, went out into the porch, and, raising her voice, told the
spectators to go away.
“Don’t you see that the noise you make will do harm?” she cried. “It may
hurt the--the poor gentleman who is--so ill. It will warn the--the man
who did it if he should be here. Oh, go away, go away, for God’s sake.
What do you want here? Go away! oh, go away!”
She went out in her excitement, moving them towards the garden door,
which still stood open, haunted by some mere lookers-on to whom the news
had been carried by the extraordinary rapidity of rumor, which would
call forth a crowd in the midst of a desert. Though she was so slight
and young, so little able to influence them, yet they yielded before
her, moving out, indistinguishable in the darkness, obeying the natural
right of a member of the household to clear its precincts, though with a
little grumbling and remonstrance.
“We want to get hold on the murderer.” “We want to see as he doesn’t
escape.” “He’s far enough off by this,” cried a sceptic. “The police get
hold on a fellow like that! not as I ever heard tell on.”
“Oh, go away, go away,” cried Janet, following them to the door.
She pushed it close after them, shutting it with a sharp snap, comforted
a little to have got rid of so many at least; but not, it seemed of all.
As she turned back some one caught her by the arm. All Janet’s
composure, her courage, her over-mastering resolution not to betray
herself, could not withstand this new shock. She gave a cry. It seemed
to her in her dreadful agitation as if the next thing would be that some
one would thunder, “You are the woman who was with him” in her ear.
It seemed almost tame to her that the tragic whisper she heard, hoarse
and miserable, emphasized by another crushing pressure of her arm, was
“Is he dead? Is he dead?” and no more.