CONSULTATION.
The paper which caused James Dugdale such painful emotion was a
certificate of the identification and burial of the body of Godfrey
Hungerford, and was dated rather more than a year after the marriage
of his supposed widow with Fitzwilliam Meriton Baldwin, and two years
and five months later than the period at which his death in the bush
had been reported to Margaret.
In reply to the eager questions which James asked him, when he had
somewhat recovered his composure, Hayes Meredith told his companion
that he had the best of all confirmation of the truth of the statement
which that document set forth--that of his own eyes. There was not the
faintest hope of error, not the slightest chance that in this matter
any trick, any design to extort money was concerned. That such might
be the case had been Hayes Meredith's first idea, when, as he told
James Dugdale, he had received a mysterious communication from a "pal"
of Hungerford's, who was anything but favourably known to the
Melbourne police, to the effect that the supposed murdered man was
alive, and might be found, under an assumed name, in a wretched hovel
in one of the poorest and least reputable quarters of the town.
"It was necessary to satisfy myself about the thing without delay,"
said Meredith; "and I did not lose an hour. I met the messenger at the
place appointed in the note, and told him, if any one had formed the
goodly scheme of deceiving me by personating Hungerford, it would
signally fail. I could not be deceived on such a point, and should
simply expose the fraud at once. On the other hand, if this man, who
appeared, from the other fellow's report, to be in a rapidly dying
state, should really prove to be Hungerford, I could not understand
his applying to me, on whom he had no claim whatever, and should
certainly not get the chance of establishing one. The man, a seedy
gambler, whom I remembered having seen with Hungerford,--his name was
Oakley,--said he had no intention to deceive me. They were 'pals' in
misfortune and misery, Hungerford and himself, and wanted nothing but
a little help from me. Hungerford had been saved from murder by a
black woman, and had wandered for months, enduring an amazing amount
of suffering. How so self-indulgent a dog as he was ever bore it, I
can't understand; but he had a love of life in him I have never seen
equalled; he clung to life, and fought for it madly, when his agonies
in the hospital were perfectly unbearable to see. After some time,
they struck the trail of such civilisation as is going in the remoter
districts of our part of the world; and Hungerford got away, and one
of the first persons he fell in with was this Oakley. He did not give
me a very clear account of what they did, and, as you may suppose, I
was not very anxious to know; it was very likely all the harm in their
power, at all events; they both made cause for themselves to be chary
of recognition, and afraid of the strong arm of the law."
"Did this Oakley mention Margaret?"
"Only cursorily. He said they had been forced to venture into
Melbourne, and he had 'asked about' and discovered that Mrs.
Hungerford had lived quietly and respectably, presumably by my
assistance, after her husband left her, and had sailed for England
when the news of his death was spread in Melbourne. He said Hungerford
was glad when he found his wife had got away safely; he could never
hope to rise in this world any more, and he did not wish her to suffer
any farther."
"The ruffian acknowledged his wickedness, then?" said James.
"Well, yes, he did; I must say he did. I went on to the hospital with
Oakley, and saw in a moment there was no mistake about it. The man
lying there, in the last stage of destitution, and of that peculiar
depth of loathsome disease which only comes from drink, was certainly
Godfrey Hungerford. I need not tell you what I felt, as I looked at
him and thought of his unconscious wife. I had your letter, telling me
about her being at Chayleigh, in my pocket-book at the time."
"No, you need not tell me," said James; "it must have been most
horrible."
"It was just that," said Meredith, with a rueful look and a shake of
the head; "such a miserable creature as he was to see, I hope I never
may have to look at again. I said very little to him--nothing about
Margaret. He did thank me in a rough kind of way, and said he knew if
he could get me communicated with I would help him."
"Did he not ask you if you knew anything of Margaret after she left
Melbourne? Did he show no anxiety for her fate?"
"No; I think in addition to his natural heartlessness and selfishness
his mind was much enfeebled by disease at this time, and he was
sinking fast. He had no friend, no acquaintance, he told me, but
Oakley; and I was careful to ask him whether Oakley was the only
person who knew that he was still alive, and then in Melbourne. He
declared to me that such was the case. I told him I asked in case he
should recover, when, if he knew any other persons, I might try to
interest them in his case. But I am certain that in this instance he
told the truth. He was entered on the books of the hospital as John
Perry, and had not borne his own name during all the months of his
wandering life. He went off into a short slumber while I sat by him,
and strange thoughts came into my mind as I looked at his wretched,
vice-worn, poverty-stricken face, and thought of what he must have
been when he first came across that fine young creature's path, and
even what he was when I went to see them at your request. I assure you
he had even then good looks and a pleasant manner, and scoundrel as I
knew him to be, greater scoundrel as I afterwards found him, I could
not altogether wonder that that woman had cared for him once."
"Poor girl, poor girl," said James. His elbows were on the table, and
his face rested on his clasped hands. His hollow eyes looked out
eagerly at Hayes Meredith, whose strength and composure formed a
touching contrast to his nervous weakness.
"To go on with my story," Meredith continued; "I told Hungerford I
should see him again, and left money for his use; Oakley was to let me
know how he was; and when I left him I took a long walk, as my way is
when I am puzzled, so as to get time to think it out. My first impulse
was to write to you at once, but I discarded the suggestion on more
mature consideration. Everything must, of course, depend on whether
the man lived or died. The one was almost too bad to fear, the other
was almost too good to hope for. Among your letters there was one in
which I recollected you had told me all the particulars of Margaret's
marriage, and the peculiar circumstances of Mr. Baldwin's property. I
went home, after a long and anxious cogitation, during which I made up
my mind, at all events, not to write; and read this letter. Here are
the memoranda I made from it."
He laid a long slip of paper on the table before James, who glanced
anxiously at it, but did not take it up.
"You see, Dugdale," continued Meredith, after he had mended the fire,
and thrown himself back in his chair, with his hands extended, and the
finger tips joined in an attitude of demonstration, "this matter has
more than one side to it; more than the side I can see you are
dwelling on, very painfully, and very naturally--Margaret's feelings.
As for that part of it, it is dreadful, of course; but then she need
never know any of the particulars."
"I hope not--I trust not," said Dugdale in a low constrained voice.
"If I know anything of her, the idea of the scene you describe taking
place while she was in the midst of happiness and luxury would make
her wretched for many a day. Think of her having to endure that, after
having already lived through the horror of believing that the man she
had loved, and sacrificed herself for, was murdered."
Meredith looked at James, closely and inquiringly, for a moment. This
intense comprehension, this almost painful, truth and excess of
sympathy, puzzled him. While the external consequences of the
discovery which had been made, the results to Mrs. Baldwin herself,
her husband, and her child pressed upon his own attention, James was
lost in the sentimental bearing of the matter, in the retrospective
personal grief which it must cause to Margaret, estimating her
feelings at a high degree of refinement and intensity. Meredith could
not make this out very clearly, but thinking "it is just like him; he
always was a strange dreamy creature, who never looked at anything
like other people," he went on to discuss the subject from his own
point of view.
"That is all very true, Dugdale," he continued, "and, as I said
before, I really do not see that she need ever know more than the fact
stated in that paper. But what you and I have got to consider, without
unnecessary delay, and to act upon with all possible promptitude, is
this fact: at the present moment Margaret is not Mr. Baldwin's wife,
and her daughter, who, if I understand your statement aright, is
heiress to all her father's property, is illegitimate."
"The child would inherit all if there were no son," said James.
"Precisely so. Now, you see, Dugdale, this is the great question. If
we can contrive to inform Mr. Baldwin of what has happened, and get
him to break it as gently as possible to Margaret, and then have them
married privately, of course there need not be any difficulty about
that; and without an hour's unnecessary delay things may be all right,
and no one in the world but ourselves and themselves a bit the wiser.
If the first child had been a son, it would indeed have been a bad, a
hopeless business; but the little girl will be no worse off if her
mother has a son, and I daresay she will have half-a-dozen. Cheer up,
Dugdale; you see it is not so black as it looked at first; there is
some unpleasantness to be gone through, and then you will see all will
come right."
"Perhaps," said Dugdale dubiously. The expression of pain and
foreboding deepened in his face with every moment. "But it is a
dreadful misfortune. Margaret lives for that child; she loves it
wonderfully; she will break her heart over the knowledge that little
Gerty is illegitimate, though no one in the world but herself should
ever know it."
"Nonsense," said Meredith, "she will do nothing of the kind; or, if
she does, she must be a very different woman from the Mrs. Hungerford
I knew; she must be much softer both of head and of heart."
"She _is_ a very different woman," said James, "and her heart is
softer. I never saw anything like the influence happiness has had upon
her, and I dread, more than I can express, the change which such a
blow as this falling upon her in the midst of her joy, and when her
health is delicate too, may produce."
"Her health delicate, is it?" said Meredith. "Ah, by the bye, you said
so when you mentioned her being abroad. Another child expected?"
"I believe so."
"By Jove, that's good news! Why, don't you see, Dugdale, that sets it
all right. Ten chances to one this will be a boy, and there's the
rightful heir to the Deane for you! Look here"--he took the memorandum
from the table--"all landed property entailed--just so--provision for
younger children to be made out of funded property, and the very large
savings of Baldwin's minority and also the savings from their income,
which are likely to be considerable, as the estates are rising rapidly
in value--a coal-mine having been discovered on the Deane"--he laid
the paper down, rose, and walked briskly about the room. "The little
girl's position will not be in the least altered. Baldwin must settle
the money upon her in some special way; whatever her share of the
provision made for younger children may be, the boy would naturally
succeed, and all the difficulty be thus gotten over."
"How would it be if there were no other child?" said James.
"Ah! that would, indeed, be difficult," replied Meredith; "I don't
know what could be done then. Mr. Baldwin is not the sort of man to do
a thing which certainly would be wrong in the abstract, though I
cannot see the practical injustice of it; in the case of there being
no other child, of course the rightful heir is the individual who
would inherit in case Baldwin should die without heirs."
"Lady Davyntry then," said James.
"Baldwin's sister? Yes--then she is the heir. She is not likely to
marry, is she?
"Quite certain not to do so, I should say."
"I fancy she would consent to anything that should be proposed in her
brother's interests--if any proposal on the subject should ever become
necessary. And after her?
"I don't know. It must be some very distant relative, for I never
heard the name mentioned, or the contingency alluded to."
"Well, well, we need not think about it. In fact we are wandering away
altogether from the only subjects we have to discuss: the best means
of getting the Baldwins home without alarming them, and the most
expeditious way of having them married privately, but with all legal
security, so that if ever any clue to this unfortunate occurrence
should be obtained by any one interested, the rights of the heir may
be secured beyond the possibility of injury."
"Yes; we must be careful of that," said James; but his tone was
absent, and he was evidently unable to take any comfort from
Meredith's cheerful view of the circumstances. Then, after a short
pause, he said, "I am very ignorant of law, but I have a kind of
notion that we may be tormenting ourselves unnecessarily. I have heard
that in Scotland the marriage of parents subsequent to the birth of
children renders them legitimate. Would not this marriage legitimatise
little Gerty?"
"Certainly not," said Meredith, and he almost smiled; "this is a very
different case. The truth is, Margaret has unconsciously committed
bigamy, and when Gertrude Baldwin was born, not only was Margaret not
Mr. Baldwin's wife, but she actually was Godfrey Hungerford's."
James Dugdale shrunk from the words as though they had been blows.
What was this but the truth which he had known from the moment he cast
his eyes upon the paper which Meredith had put into his hands? and
yet, set thus broadly before him, it seemed far more awful. What had
become of all the arguments he had addressed to himself now? Where was
the assurance he had felt that fate could not harm Margaret? that evil
or calumny, or the dead and gone disgraces of her dark days, could not
touch Mrs. Baldwin, in her pride of place, and in her perfect
happiness? Where were the plausibilities with which he had striven to
lull his fears to rest? All gone, vanished, as dead as the exultant
pleasure with which he had read Margaret's letter on that bright
morning, which might have been a hundred years ago, so distant, so out
of his sight, did it now appear. He covered his face with his hands,
and kept silence for some time.
During the interval Meredith paced the room thoughtfully. When at
length James spoke, it was not in continuation of the last subject.
"How long did he--Hungerford, I mean--live after you saw him?"
"Only a few days. Oakley came to me one morning, and told me he was
dying, and wished to see me. I went, but he was not sensible, and he
never rallied again. Then I had him buried, rather more decently than
in hospital style, under his assumed name. Oakley signed this paper,
as you see. He had no notion I attached any specific value or interest
to its contents--I believe he thought it an oddity of mine, one of my
business-like ways, to have everything in black and white. But I
considered that I might not live to tell you this by word of mouth,
and in that case I should have forwarded the evidence to you, or you
might not live to hear from me, and in that case I must have proof to
put before Mr. Baldwin."
"You did quite right," said James. "Where is Oakley?"
"I gave him a trifle to get up a decent appearance, and he was trying
to get employment as a clerk or bookkeeper in some of the third-rate
places of business, when I left," said Meredith; "he was rather a
clever fellow, though a great scamp. Perhaps poverty has steadied him,
and he may get on. At all events, I have seen too much of successful
blackguardism, I suppose--one sees a deal of it in colonial life, to
be sure--to condemn unsuccessful blackguardism to starving."
"He is positively the only person in possession of this lamentable
secret on your side of the world?"
"Positively the only person, and as he knows nothing whatever
concerning Margaret--not whether she is still alive, indeed--and, I
presume, never heard her maiden name or her father's place of abode, I
should not think the slightest danger is ever to be, at any time,
apprehended from him. And now, Dugdale, let us be practical. I am
getting tired, and yet I don't want to leave you to-night until we
have finally arranged what is to be done. Mrs. Baldwin would have good
reason to complain of us, if we left her in her present position an
hour longer than we can possibly avoid."
At this most true observation James winced. His heart and his fancy
were alike busy, realising every element of pain in Margaret's
position.
After some more discussion, it was arranged between the friends that a
letter should be written to Mr. Baldwin of a strictly confidential
nature, in which he should be urged to bring his wife to England
without delay--the pretext being left to him to assign--and that
James and Meredith should meet Mr. and Mrs. Baldwin in London. No
explanation of their movements would be required by Mr. Carteret, and
the whole affair of the revelation and the marriage could then be
quietly managed without exciting suspicion in any quarter.
"Well, that's settled, old fellow," said Meredith, as he shook
Dugdale's hand heartily, "and we will bring Margaret back here as
surely Baldwin's wife as she now believes herself to be, and nothing
more will ever come out of this business. It looked much uglier at a
distance than it does near, I assure you."
But James made no reply to his friend's cheery speech. He went sadly
to his room, and sat before the fire pondering. The flames flickered
and danced, and sent odd reflections over his face, but the
thoughtful, painful gaze never relaxed, the abstraction of the hollow
eyes never lessened, and the slow coming dawn of the wintry day found
him still there, and still thinking, sadly and painfully.