It had been arranged by Captain Lumley that he was to go to London,
where, by a certain train and on a certain day, he would be joined by
Mrs. Blagdon. In this short breathing-space Letty had much to think
of, and accomplish. She collected, sorted, and packed some clothes,
and a few treasured personal belongings; but abandoned all her
jewellery, except one or two trifling ornaments, a string of pearls,
and her uncle’s diamond heart, destroyed the whole of her innocent
correspondence, put the photograph of her wedding group into the
waste-paper basket in four pieces, and, heaviest task of all, set about
writing letters to her aunt, to Frances, and to Maude Hesketh. To her
she said:
“I know that you alone realise the awful life I have led since my
marriage, and will pity and forgive me. I never see you now, and I am
shut away from all the world--not a wife, but a prisoner. Sometimes
last winter when Frances and her father were at Bournemouth, I was
afraid that my mind would have given way; the loneliness and monotony
seemed to deaden my brain. Dear Cousin Maudie, do not think too badly
of me, and love me still.”
The leave-taking epistle destined for her husband, was a more
difficult task; how many sheets of paper were destroyed, before she had
succeeded to her satisfaction!
Waggett the nurse had an inarticulate understanding with her master,
and all this packing, letter-writing, and hours of weeping in the
nursery, excited her suspicions,--and could mean but one thing. When
Cara was asleep, Miss Waggett slipped down to the village post office
and sent a telegram to Mr. Blagdon’s London address, which said, ‘Your
presence required urgently.’
Blagdon, who was on the eve of a trip to Paris, returned by the first
train--actually passing his wife on her flight to London. When, in a
ferocious temper, he arrived at Sharsley, he was informed that Mrs.
Blagdon was not at home, had left at twelve o’clock in the village fly,
taking luggage with her. Then a letter addressed to him was produced;
it had been placed in a conspicuous position on the smoking-room
chimney-piece.
He snatched this from the old man-servant’s hand, tearing it open as
he walked away; then, glancing over it, he slapped his great thigh and
exclaimed exultantly:
“By Gad, she’s done it! She’s done it!”
The letter began:
“HUGO,
“I am to-day leaving this house for ever. To me it has been a
miserable home. I can no longer endure your neglect and cruelty. I
am going to Lancelot Lumley, and you are free to take any steps
you please. I shall be thankful to be released from you, and you, I
know, will be glad to be rid of me, since you have so often told me
that you wished I were dead. Well, in future we shall be dead to one
another. I need not ask you to be good to Cara; it breaks my heart to
leave her, but it breaks my heart to stay.
“LETTY.”
“By Gad!” he repeated, “this is great news! Dead to me--I should say
so, the little puling fool!”
In a condition of supreme satisfaction he went to his writing-table and
filled a number of telegraph forms: one of these was a long one to his
lawyer, others were addressed to his mother, his sister, and to several
of his chief friends. In short, a dozen wires carrying the startling
news were promptly despatched from Sharsley Post Office.
(The intelligence was received in various fashions. Mrs. Blagdon wept
and kept her room: she was growing old and feeble; Lady Rashleigh said,
“Hullo! here is a nice business! Letty has bolted with Captain Lumley.
I wouldn’t have believed she had it in her!” and Lord Robert who was
present, shouted his usual ejaculation, ‘My hat!’)
When this task had been accomplished, Mr. Blagdon drained a four-finger
whisky and soda, and summoned the housekeeper to his presence.
Bates appeared, was much on the _qui vive_, the impression that
something had happened was obvious to the whole household.
“Bates,” he began, “Mrs. Blagdon has--er--left here, and is never to be
admitted to this house again. I shall probably close it before long.
You can put away all the linen and china and that sort of thing, and
pack off the cook.”
“Yes, sir, excuse me, but it’s not a cook we have, but a kitchenmaid.
We are terribly short-handed, only old Jenkins for man-servant, a boy
for the knives, and one housemaid. The big rooms are all in an awful
state of dust, and with them old tapestries and pictures, and moth and
damp, I expect there’s a lot of damage already. We had no fires last
winter--and----”
At this point, the voice of her complaint was interrupted by a
succession of piercing screams immediately on the other side of the
door.
“It’s only Miss Cara,” explained Bates reassuringly; “she is just in
from her walk.”
Miss Cara’s papa rose from his chair and hastily entered the hall,
where he beheld Waggett, struggling with an animated bundle of white
embroidery and bare legs, which had cast itself down upon the marble
flags, and was rending the air with uncontrolled shrieks, and even
squeals of passion.
“What’s all this?” he demanded peremptorily.
The child ceased her cries, raised her tearless face, and stared at him
threateningly.
“I want my mummy!” she shouted. “I want my own mummy!”
“Your mummy isn’t here--be quiet this moment.”
A defiant yell was Cara’s sole answer.
“Shut up--shut up at once, you little devil! Do you hear me?” and her
father reached down, and shook her roughly by the arm.
Cara surveyed him with a pair of rebellious blue eyes, then drew in her
breath and screamed with a deafening increase of shrill and reckless
fury. Such were her efforts, that her little face was actually purple
and congested, as she drummed on the marble pavement with the heels of
her best shoes.
“Go ’way!” she panted. “Go ’way--ugly man--I want my mummy!”
“_I_ know what you want, and what you’ll get!” cried her father, beside
himself with anger, and snatching her up, he proceeded to administer
to the astonished Cara, a first and ruthless chastisement: carrying
out the punishment with the broad palm of a powerful hand in loud and
resounding smacks.
The subject was so completely dazed by the experience she had almost
ceased to cry, merely ejaculating:
“Bad man! Bad man! Bad man!”
Meanwhile Nurse Waggett stood by, the embodiment of complacent
satisfaction, till, at a sign from the executioner, she took over her
gasping, sobbing, bewildered charge, and carried her off to her own
apartments. Subsequently the threat, “I’ll bring your _father_!” had a
magical effect upon Miss Caroline Blagdon: he remained an ineffaceable
impression of awe and terror, for many and many a day.
The news of ‘the break-up at the Court,’ as it was called, was all
over the village by eight o’clock that night; women ran into one
another’s houses with ‘Have you heard?’ Men discussed the matter over
their half-pints at the ‘New Plough,’ and the general verdict was, that
“the poor young lady had led a worse than dog’s life, and _he_ had been
rightly served.”