The evening passed, however, without any further revelations. Miss
Bethune explained to the young man, with all the lucidity of a man of
business, the situation and requirements of that “property in the
North,” which would give returns, she believed, of various kinds, not
always calculated in balance sheets, if it was looked after by a man who
would deal with it “as if it were his own.” The return would be
something in money and rents, but much more in human comfort and
happiness. She had never had the courage to tackle that problem, she
said, and the place had been terrible to her, full of associations which
would be thought of no more if he were there. The result was, that young
Gordon went away thoughtful, somewhat touched by the feeling with which
Miss Bethune had spoken of her poor crofters, somewhat roused by the
thought of “the North,” that vague and unknown country which was the
country of his fathers, the land of brown heath and shaggy wood, the
country of Scott, which is, after all, distinction enough for any
well-conditioned stranger. Should he try that strange new opening of
life suddenly put before him? The unknown of itself has a charm--
If the pass were dangerous known,
The danger’s self were lure alone.
He went back to his hotel with at least a new project fully occupying
all his thoughts.
On the next evening, in the dusk of the summer night, Miss Bethune was
in her bed-chamber alone. She had no light, though she was a lover of
the light, and had drawn up the blinds as soon as the young physician
who prescribed a darkened room had disappeared. She had a habit of
watching out the last departing rays of daylight, and loved to sit in
the gloaming, as she called it, reposing from all the cares of the day
in that meditative moment. It was a bad sign of Miss Bethune’s state of
mind when she called early for her lamp. She was seated thus in the
dark, when young Gordon came in audibly to the sitting-room, introduced
by Gilchrist, who told him her mistress would be with him directly; but,
knowing Miss Bethune would hear what she said, did not come to call her.
The lamps were lighted in that room, and showed a little outline of
light through the chinks of the door. She smiled to herself in the dark,
with a beatitude that ought to have lighted it up, as she listened to
the big movements of the young man in the lighted room next door. He had
seated himself under Gilchrist’s ministrations; but when she went away
he got up and moved about, looking, as Miss Bethune divined, at the
pictures on the walls and the books and little silver toys on the
tables.
He made more noise, she thought to herself proudly, than a woman does:
filled the space more, seemed to occupy and fill out everything. Her
countenance and her heart expanded in the dark; she would have liked to
peep at him through the crevice of light round the door, or even the
keyhole, to see him when he did not know she was looking, to read the
secrets of his heart in his face. There were none there, she said to
herself with an effusion of happiness which brought the tears to her
eyes, none there which a mother should be afraid to discover. The luxury
of sitting there, holding her breath, hearing him move, knowing him so
near, was so sweet and so great, that she sat, too blessed to move,
taking all the good out of that happy moment before it should fleet
away.
Suddenly, however, there came a dead silence. Had he sat down again? Had
he gone out on the balcony? What had become of him? She sat breathless,
wondering, listening for the next sound. Surely he had stepped outside
the window to look out upon the Bloomsbury street, and the waving of the
trees in the Square, and the stars shining overhead. Not a sound--yet,
yes, there was something. What was it? A faint, stealthy rustling, not
to be called a sound at all, rather some stealthy movement to annihilate
sound--the strangest contrast to the light firm step that had come into
the room, and the free movements which she had felt to be bigger than a
woman’s.
Miss Bethune in the dark held her breath; fear seized possession of her,
she knew not why; her heart sank, she knew not why. Oh, his father--his
father was not a good man!
The rustling continued, very faint; it might have been a small animal
rubbing against the door. She sat bolt upright in her chair,
motionless, silent as a waxen image, listening. If perhaps, after all,
it should be only one of the little girls, or even the cat rubbing
against the wall idly on the way downstairs! A troubled smile came over
her face, her heart gave a throb of relief. But then the sound changed,
and Miss Bethune’s face again grew rigid, her heart stood still.
Some one was trying very cautiously, without noise, to open the door; to
turn the handle without making any sound required some time; it creaked
a little, and then there was silence--guilty silence, the pause of
stealth alarmed by the faintest noise; then it began again. Slowly,
slowly the handle turned round, the door opened, a hair’s breadth at a
time. O Lord above! his father--his father was an ill man.
There was some one with her in the room--some one unseen, as she was,
swallowed up in the darkness, veiled by the curtains at the windows,
which showed faintly a pale streak of sky only, letting in no light.
Unseen, but not inaudible; a hurried, fluttering breath betraying him,
and that faint sound of cautious, uneasy movement, now and then
instantly, guiltily silenced, and then resumed. She could feel the
stealthy step thrill the flooring, making a jar, which was followed by
one of those complete silences in which the intruder too held his
breath, then another stealthy step.
A thousand thoughts, a very avalanche, precipitated themselves through
her mind. A man did not steal into a dark room like that if he were
doing it for the first time. And his words last night, “How do you know
even that I am honest?” And then his father--his father--oh, God help
him, God forgive him!--that was an ill man! And his upbringing in a
country where lies were common, with a guardian that did him no justice,
and the woman that cut him off. And not to know that he had a creature
belonging to him in the world to be made glad or sorry whatever
happened! Oh, God forgive him, God help him! the unfortunate, the
miserable boy! “Mine all the same--mine all the same!” her heart said,
bleeding--oh, that was no metaphor! bleeding with the anguish, the
awful, immeasurable blow.
If there was any light at all in the room, it was a faint greyness, just
showing in the midst of the dark the vague form of a little table
against the wall, and a box in a brown cover--a box--no, no, the shape
of a box, but only something standing there, something, the accursed
thing for which life and love were to be wrecked once more. Oh, his
father--his father! But his father would not have done that. Yet it was
honester to take the trinkets, the miserable stones that would bring in
money, than to wring a woman’s heart. And what did the boy know? He had
never been taught, never had any example, God help him, God forgive him!
and mine--mine all the time!
Then out of the complete darkness came into that faint grey where the
box was, an arm, a hand. It touched, not calculating the distance, the
solid substance with a faint jar, and retired like a ghost, while she
sat rigid, looking on; then more cautiously, more slowly still, it stole
forth again, and grasped the box. Miss Bethune had settled nothing what
to do, she had thought of nothing but the misery of it, she had
intended, so far as she had any intention, to watch while the tragedy
was played out, the dreadful act accomplished. But she was a woman of
sudden impulses, moved by flashes of resolution almost independent of
her will.
Suddenly, more ghostlike still than the arm of the thief, she made a
swift movement forward, and put her hand upon his. Her grasp seemed to
crush through the quivering clammy fingers, and she felt under her own
the leap of the pulses; but the criminal was prepared for every
emergency, and uttered no cry. She felt the quick noiseless change of
attitude, and then the free arm swing to strike her--heaven and earth!
to strike her, a woman twice his age, to strike her, his friend, his----
She was a strong woman, in the fulness of health and courage. As quick
as lightning, she seized the arm as it descended, and held him as in a
grip of iron. Was it guilt that made him like a child in her hold? He
had a stick in his hand, shortened, with a heavy head, ready to deal a
blow. Oh, the coward, the wretched coward! She held him panting for a
moment, unable to say a word; and then she called out with a voice that
was no voice, but a kind of roar of misery, for “Gilchrist, Gilchrist!”
Gilchrist, who was never far off, who always had her ear open for her
mistress, heard, and came flying from up or down stairs with her candle:
and some one else heard it, who was standing pensive on the balcony,
looking out, and wondering what fate had now in store for him, and
mingling his thoughts with the waving of the trees and the nameless
noises of the street. Which of them arrived first was never known, he
from the other room throwing wide the door of communication, or she from
the stairs with the impish, malicious light of that candle throwing in
its sudden illumination as with a pleasure in the deed.
The spectators were startled beyond measure to see the lady in apparent
conflict with a man, but they had no time to make any remarks. The
moment the light flashed upon her, Miss Bethune gave a great cry. “It’s
you, ye vermin!” she cried, flinging the furtive creature in her grasp
from her against the wall, which half stunned him for the moment. And
then she stood for a moment, her head bent back, her face without a
trace of colour, confronting the eager figure in the doorway, surrounded
by the glow of the light, flying forward to help her.
“O God, forgive me!” she cried, “God, forgive me, for I am an ill woman:
but I will never forgive myself!”
The man who lay against the wall, having dropped there on the floor with
the vehemence of her action, perhaps exaggerating the force that had
been used against him, to excite pity--for Gilchrist, no mean opponent,
held one door, and that unexpected dreadful apparition of the young man
out of the lighted room bearing down upon him, filled the other--was
Alfred Hesketh, white, miserable, and cowardly, huddled up in a wretched
heap, with furtive eyes gleaming, and the heavy-headed stick furtively
grasped, still ready to deal an unexpected blow, had he the opportunity,
though he was at the same time rubbing the wrist that held it, as if in
pain.
Young Gordon had made a hurried step towards him, when Miss Bethune put
out her hand. She had dropped into a chair, where she sat panting for
breath.
“Wait,” she said, “wait till I can speak.”
“You brute!” cried Harry; “how dare you come in here? What have you done
to frighten the lady?”
He was interrupted by a strange chuckle of a laugh from Miss Bethune’s
panting throat.
“It’s rather me, I’m thinking, that’s frightened him,” she said. “Ye
wretched vermin of a creature, how did ye know? What told ye in your
meeserable mind that there was something here to steal? And ye would
have struck me--me that am dealing out to ye your daily bread! No, my
dear, you’re not to touch him; don’t lay a finger on him. The Lord be
thanked--though God forgive me for thanking Him for the wickedness of
any man!”
How enigmatical this all was to Harry Gordon, and how little he could
imagine any clue to the mystery, it is needless to say. Gilchrist
herself thought her mistress was temporarily out of her mind. She was
quicker, however, to realise what had happened than the young man, who
did not think of the jewels, nor remember anything about them. Gilchrist
looked with anxiety at her lady’s white face and gleaming eyes.
“Take her into the parlour, Master Harry,” she said: “she’s just done
out. And I’ll send for the police.”
“You’ll do nothing of the kind, Gilchrist,” said Miss Bethune. “Get up,
ye creature. You’re not worth either man’s or woman’s while; you have no
more fusion than a cat. Get up, and begone, ye poor, weak, wretched,
cowardly vermin, for that’s what ye are: and I thank the Lord with all
my heart that it was only you! Gilchrist, stand away from the door, and
let the creature go.”
He rose, dragging himself up by degrees, with a furtive look at Gordon,
who, indeed, looked a still less easy opponent than Miss Bethune.
“I take that gentleman to witness,” he said, “as there’s no evidence
against me but just a lady’s fancy: and I’ve been treated very bad, and
my wrist broken, for aught I know, and bruised all over, and I----”
Miss Bethune stamped her foot on the floor. “Begone, ye born liar and
robber!” she said. “Gilchrist will see ye off the premises; and mind,
you never come within my sight again. Now, Mr. Harry, as she calls ye,
I’ll go into the parlour, as she says; and the Lord, that only knows the
wickedness that has been in my mind, forgive me this night! and it would
be a comfort to my heart, my bonnie man, if you would say Amen.”
“Amen with all my heart,” said the young man, with a smile, “but, so far
as I can make out, your wickedness is to be far too good and forgiving.
What did the fellow do? I confess I should not like to be called a
vermin, as you called him freely--but if he came with intent to steal,
he should have been handed over to the police, indeed he should.”
“I am more worthy of the police than him, if ye but knew: but, heaven be
praised, you’ll never know. I mind now, he came with a message when I
was playing with these wretched diamonds, like an old fool: and he must
have seen or scented them with the creeminal instinct Dr. Roland speaks
about.”
She drew a long breath, for she had not yet recovered from the panting
of excitement, and then told her story, the rustling without, the
opening of the door, the hand extended to the box. When she had told all
this with much vividness, Miss Bethune suddenly stopped, drew another
long breath, and dropped back upon the sofa where she was sitting. It
was not her way; the lights had been dazzling and confusing her ever
since they blazed upon her by the opening of the two doors, and the
overwhelming horror, and blessed but tremendous revulsion of feeling,
which had passed in succession over her, had been more than her
strength, already undermined by excitement, could bear. Her breath, her
consciousness, her life, seemed to ebb away in a moment, leaving only a
pale shadow of her, fallen back upon the cushions.
Once more Harry was the master of the situation. He had seen a woman
faint before, which was almost more than Gilchrist, with all her
experience, had done, and he had the usual remedies at his fingers’
ends. But this was not like the usual easy faints, over in a minute, to
which young Gordon had been accustomed, and Dr. Roland had to be
summoned from below, and a thrill of alarm had run through the house,
Mrs. Simcox herself coming up from the kitchen, with strong salts and
feathers to burn, before Miss Bethune came to herself. The house was
frightened, and so at last was the experienced Harry; but Dr. Roland’s
interest and excitement may be said to have been pleasurable. “I have
always thought this was what was likely. I’ve been prepared for it,” he
said to himself, as he hovered round the sofa. It would be wrong to
suppose that he lengthened, or at least did nothing to shorten, this
faint for his own base purposes, that he might the better make out
certain signs which he thought he had recognised. But the fact was, that
not only Dora had come from abovestairs, but even Mr. Mannering had
dragged himself down, on the alarm that Miss Bethune was dead or dying;
and that the whole household had gathered in her room, or on the landing
outside; while she lay, in complicity (or not) with the doctor, in that
long-continued swoon, which the spectators afterwards said lasted an
hour, or two, or even three hours, according to their temperaments.
When she came to herself at last, the scene upon which she opened her
eyes was one which helped her recovery greatly, by filling her with
wrath and indignation. She lay in the middle of her room, in a strong
draught, the night air blowing from window to window across her, the
lamp even under its shade, much more the candles on the mantelpiece,
blown about, and throwing a wavering glare upon the agitated group,
Gilchrist in the foreground with her apron at her eyes, and behind her
Dora, red with restrained emotions, and Janie and Molly crying freely,
while Mrs. Simcox brandished a bunch of fuming feathers, and Mr.
Mannering peered over the landlady’s head with his “pince-nez”
insecurely balanced on his nose, and his legs trembling under him in a
harmony of unsteadiness, but anxiety. Miss Bethune’s wrist was in the
grasp of the doctor; and Harry stood behind with a fan, which, in the
strong wind blowing across her from window to window, struck the patient
as ludicrously unnecessary. “What is all this fuss about?” she cried,
trying to raise herself up.
“There’s no fuss, my dear lady,” said the doctor; “but you must keep
perfectly quiet.”
“Oh, you’re there, Dr. Roland? Then there’s one sane person. But, for
goodness’ sake, make Mr. Mannering sit down, and send all these idiots
away. What’s the matter with me, that I’ve to get my death of cold, and
be murdered with that awful smell, and even Harry Gordon behaving like a
fool, making an air with a fan, when there’s a gale blowing? Go away, go
away.”
“You see that our friend has come to herself,” said the doctor. “Shut
that window, somebody, the other will be enough; and, my dear woman, for
the sake of all that’s good, take those horrid feathers away.”
“I am murdered with the smell!” cried Miss Bethune, placing her hands
over her face. “But make Mr. Mannering sit down, he’s not fit to stand
after his illness; and Harry, boy, sit down, too, and don’t drive me out
of my senses. Go away, go all of you away.”
The last to be got rid of was Dr. Roland, who assured everybody that the
patient was now quite well, but languid. “You want to get rid of me too,
I know,” he said, “and I’m going; but I should like to see you in bed
first.”
“You shall not see me in bed, nor no other man,” said Miss Bethune. “I
will go to bed when I am disposed, doctor. I’m not your patient, mind,
at all events, now.”
“You were half an hour since: but I’m not going to pretend to any
authority,” said the doctor. “I hope I know better. Don’t agitate
yourself any more, if you’ll be guided by me. You have been screwing up
that heart of yours far too tight.”
“How do you know,” she said, “that I have got a heart at all?”
“Probably not from the sentimental point of view,” he replied, with a
little fling of sarcasm: “but I know you couldn’t live without the
physical organ, and it’s over-strained. Good-night, since I see you want
to get rid of me. But I’ll be handy downstairs, and mind you come for
me, Gilchrist, on the moment if she should show any signs again.”
This was said to Gilchrist in an undertone as the doctor went away.
Miss Bethune sat up on her sofa, still very pale, still with a singing
in her ears, and the glitter of fever in her eyes. “You are not to go
away, Harry,” she said. “I have something to tell you before you go.”
“Oh, mem,” said Gilchrist, “for any sake, not to-night.”
“Go away, and bide away till I send for you,” cried the mistress. “And,
Harry, sit you down here by me. I am going to tell you a story. This
night has taught me many things. I might die, or I might be murdered for
the sake of a few gewgaws that are nothing to me, and go down to my
grave with a burden on my heart. I want to speak before I die.”
“Not to-night,” he cried. “You are in no danger. I’ll sleep here on the
sofa by way of guard, and to-morrow you will send them to your bankers.
Don’t tire yourself any more to-night.”
“You are like all the rest, and understand nothing about it,” she cried
impatiently. “It is just precisely now that I will speak, and no other
time. Harry, I am going to tell you a story. It is like most women’s
stories--about a young creature that was beguiled and loved a man. He
was a man that had a fine outside, and looked as good as he was bonnie,
or at least this misfortunate thing thought so. He had nothing, and she
had nothing. But she was the last of her family, and would come into a
good fortune if she pleased her uncle that was the head of the name. But
the uncle could not abide this man. Are you listening to me? Mind, it is
a story, but not an idle story, and every word tells. Well, she was sent
away to a lonely country place, an old house, with two old servants in
it, to keep her free of the man. But the man followed; and in that
solitude who was to hinder them seeing each other? They did for a while
every day. And then the two married each other, as two can do in
Scotland that make up their minds to risk it, and were living together
in secret in the depths of the Highlands, as I told you, nobody knowing
but the old servants that had been far fonder of her father than of the
uncle that was head of the house, and were faithful to her in life and
death. And then there came terrible news that the master was coming
back. That poor young woman--oh, she was a fool, and I do not defend
her!--had just been delivered in secret, in trouble and misery--for she
dared not seek help or nursing but what she got at home--of a bonnie
bairn,"--she put out her hand and grasped him by the arm,--“a boy, a
darling, though she had him but for two or three days. Think if you can
what that was. The master coming that had, so to speak, the power of
life and death in his hands, and the young, subdued girl that he had put
there to be in safety, the mother of a son----” Miss Bethune drew a long
breath. She silenced the remonstrance on the lips of her hearer by a
gesture, and went on:--
“It was the man, her husband, that she thought loved her, that brought
the news. He said everything was lost if it should be known. He bid her
to be brave and put a good face upon it, for his sake and the boy’s.
Keep her fortune and cling to her inheritance she must, whatever
happened, for their sake. And while she was dazed in her weakness, and
could not tell what to think, he took the baby out of her arms, and
carried him away.
“Harry Gordon, that’s five and twenty years ago, and man or bairn I have
never seen since, though I did that for them. I dreed my weird for ten
long years--ten years of mortal trouble--and never said a word, and
nobody knew. Then my uncle died, and the money, the terrible money,
bought with my life’s blood, became mine. And I looked for him then to
come back. But he never came back nor word nor sign of him. And my
son--the father, I had discovered what he was, I wanted never to hear
his name again--but my son--Harry Gordon, that’s you! They may say what
they will, but I know better. Who should know, if not the mother who
bore you? My heart went out to you when I saw you first, and yours to
me. You’ll not tell me that your heart did not speak for your mother? It
is you, my darling, it is you!”
He had staggered to his feet, pale, trembling, and awe-stricken. The
sight of her emotion, the pity of her story, the revolt and resistance
in his own heart were too much for him. “I!” he cried.