Nine o'clock the next--or rather, by the way in which we calculate time,
calling by the same title the hours of obscurity and those of sunshine,
the same--morning, Mr and Mrs Marter were not down, nor likely to be
for some time; but Ella was just rising from the schoolroom
breakfast-table, where she had partaken of a pleasant meal of extremely
weak tea, sweetened with moist sugar of a fine treacley odour, and thick
bread, plastered with rank, tubby, salt butter. The meal had gone off
more quietly than usual,--no one had upset any tea, neither had the
youngest child turned her delicate hand and arm, as was much her custom,
into a catapult, for the purpose of hurling bread-and-butter at her
sisters. Certainly, this young lady had made one snatch at the butter,
lying lumpy and yellow upon a plate, and had succeeded in grasping it,
as was shown by the traces of her fingers; but when admonished therefor,
and threatened with long tasks, she had only howled for five minutes,
and had not, as was her wont, thrown herself upon her back upon the
floor, and screamed until she was black in the face.
"Mr Bray wants to see you, miss," said a housemaid, entering the
schoolroom, the footman not being dressed at so early an hour.
"To see me?" ejaculated Ella.
"Yes, miss; he says he wants to see _you_ pertickler, and he's now
waiting in the dining-room."
"Is Mrs Marter down yet?" said Ella, troubled at this unusual call, and
at such a strange hour.
"No, miss; nor won't be for long enough."
"Ask Mr Bray if he would be kind enough to call again at twelve," said
Ella, after a few moments' thought. "I am engaged now with the
children."
"Yes, miss," said the girl; and she departed, to return at the end of
five minutes, with a card bearing in pencil:
"_If you value your peace of mind, come to me. I have a letter for you
from the country. A case of life or death_!"
"Mrs Brandon must be ill," thought Ella; and hurriedly leaving the
room, she stood the next minute face to face with Max, who was very
pale, as he respectfully held out his hand, which was, however,
unnoticed.
"Miss Bedford," he said softly, "I fear that my visits have always been
associated with that which was to you unpleasant, from the fact, though,
that you did not know my real nature. This visit will, I fear, be only
another that shall add to the dislike you entertain for me, but which of
late you have so kindly disguised."
Ella did not speak, but stood watching him eagerly.
"You know I was late home last night. I found there this letter,
delivered evidently by the late post, and you will guess my emotion when
you read it. I came back here; but I could not get a cab, and it was
half-past two when I reached the house. If I had roused you, nothing
could have been done, while now a calm night's rest has made you better
prepared. So I returned to lie down upon the sofa for a few hours'
rest, meaning to be here as soon as the house was opened; but--I am
almost ashamed to tell it--I slept heavily from the effects of my long
walk, and did not wake till eight. Can you bear to read it?" he said
gently.
"Yes, yes," cried Ella huskily; and she took a formal-looking letter,
that had evidently been hurriedly torn open. She glanced at the
address--to "Maximilian Bray, Esq., 109 Bury-street, Saint James's,
London." The postmark, two days old, Penzance, while the London mark
was of the day before. "Am I to read this?" she said, without raising
her eyes.
"Yes," he said gently; and he turned away from her, but only to go to
the mantelpiece and cover his eyes with his hands, where it was quite
possible that he might have been able to see, by means of the mirror,
every act of the trembling girl.
Ella drew out a folded letter from the envelope, when a smaller one fell
to the ground, addressed to her in the same hand as that in which the
larger letter was written.
The characters seemed to run together as she opened this second
envelope, took out a little folded note in another hand, read it, and
then for a few moments the room seemed to swim round. But by an effort
she mastered her emotion, re-read the note, and then hastily perused the
letter through and through before doubling both together, and standing
white and trembling, clutching the papers tightly as she gazed straight
before her at vacancy.
There was no cry, no display of wild excitement; nothing but those white
quivering lips and the drawn despairing look, to show the agony suffered
by that heart, till she started back, as it were, into life, when Max
turned softly and stood before her.
"Miss Bedford," he said gently, "I will not trouble you with words of
commiseration. I must go now to make preparations."
"Preparations?" she said, as if not understanding his remark.
"Yes; preparations. I telegraphed to Lexville as I came; and now I must
go, for I shall run down by the express. There will be no time saved if
I start earlier."
"You are going?" said Ella dreamily.
"Yes," he said almost angrily, "of course! Do you take me to be utterly
devoid of feeling? But you will write, and I will be the bearer."
"Write!" said Ella, with a wild hysterical sob--"write!"
"Yes. Surely you will do that," he said anxiously.
"Heaven help me!" cried Ella. "I must go."
"You will go?" he said excitedly.
"Yes," she said, with a strange dreamy look; "it is my fate. I must
go."
"Ella--Miss Bedford--will you trust me?" said Max in an earnest voice.
"Leave matters to me, and I will arrange all. But Mrs Marter will
object to your leaving."
"I must go," said Ella, who seemed to be speaking as if under some
strange influence.
"You will go in spite of her wishes?" said Max.
"Yes, yes; I must go," said Ella huskily; and raising her hands to her
face, she would have left the room.
Volume 3, Chapter XV.