'THAT FELL ARREST, WITHOUT ALL BAIL.'
It was the beginning of August before Lesbia was pronounced equal to the
fatigue of a long journey; and even then it was but the shadow of her
former self which returned to Fellside, the pale spectre of joys
departed, of trust deceived.
Maulevrier had been very good to her, patient, unselfish as a woman, in
his ministering to the broken-hearted girl. That broken heart would be
whole again, no doubt, in the future, as many other broken hearts have
been; but the grief, the despair, the sense of hopelessness and
aimlessness in life were very real in the present. If the picturesque
seclusion of Fellside had seemed dull and joyless to Lesbia in days gone
by, it was much duller to her now. She was shocked at the change in her
grandmother, and she showed a good deal of feeling and affection in her
intercourse with the invalid; but once out of her presence Lady
Maulevrier was forgotten, and Lesbia's thoughts drifted back into the
old current. They dwelt obstinately, unceasingly upon Montesma, the man
whose influence had awakened the slumbering soul from its torpor, had
stirred the deeps of a passionate nature.
Slave-dealer, gambler, adventurer, liar--his name blackened by the
suspicion of a still darker crime. She shuddered at the thought of the
villain from whose snare she had been rescued: and yet, his image as he
had been to her in the brief golden time when she believed him noble,
and chivalrous, and true, haunted her lonely days, mixed itself with her
troubled dreams, came between her and every other thought.
Everybody was good to her. That pale and joyless face, that look of
patient, hopeless suffering which she tried to disguise every now and
then with a faint forced smile, and silvery little ripple of society
laughter, seemed unconsciously to implore pity and pardon. Lady
Maulevrier uttered no word of reproach. 'My dearest, Fate has not been
kind to you,' she said, gently, after telling Lesbia of Lady Kirkbank's
visit. 'The handsomest women are seldom the happiest. Destiny seems to
have a grudge against them. And if things have gone amiss it is I who am
most to blame. I ought never to have entrusted you with such a woman as
Georgina Kirkbank. But you will be happier next season, I hope, dearest.
You can live with Mary and Hartfield. They will take care of you.'
Lesbia shuddered.
'Do you think I am going back to the society treadmill?' she exclaimed.
'No, I have done with the world. I shall end my days here, or in a
convent.'
'You think so now, dear, but you will change your mind by-and-by. A
fancy that has lasted only a few weeks cannot alter your life. It will
pass as other dreams have passed. At your age you have the future before
you.'
'No, it is the past that is always before me,' answered Lesbia. 'My
future is a blank.'
The bills came pouring in; dressmaker, milliner, glover, bootmaker,
tailor, stationer, perfumer; awful bills which made Lady Maulevrier's
blood run cold, so degrading was their story of selfish self-indulgence,
of senseless extravagance. But she paid them all without a word. She
took upon her shoulders the chief burden of Lesbia's wrongdoing. It was
her indulgence, her weak preference which had fostered her
granddaughter's selfishness, trained her to vanity and worldly pride.
The result was ignominious, humiliating, bitter beyond all common
bitterness; but the cup was of her own brewing, and she drank it without
a murmur.
Parliament was prorogued; the season was over; and Lord Hartfield was
established at Fellside for the autumn--he and his wife utterly happy in
their affection for each other, but not without care as to their
surroundings, which were full of trouble. First there was Lesbia's
sorrow. Granted that it was a grief which would inevitably wear itself
out, as other such griefs have done from time immemorial; but still the
sorrow was there, at their doors. Next, there was the state of Lady
Maulevrier's health, which gave her old medical adviser the gravest
fears. At Lord Hartfield's earnest desire a famous doctor was summoned
from London; but the great man could only confirm Mr. Horton's verdict.
The thread of life was wearing thinner every day. It might snap at any
hour. In the meantime the only regime was repose of body and mind, an
all-pervading calm, the avoidance of all exciting topics. One moment of
violent agitation might prove fatal.
Knowing this, how could Lord Hartfield call her ladyship to account for
the presence of that mysterious old man under Steadman's charge?--how
venture to touch upon a topic which, by Mary's showing, had exercised a
most disturbing influence upon her ladyship's mind on that solitary
occasion when the girl ventured to approach the subject?
He felt that any attempt at an explanation was impossible. It was not
for him to precipitate Lady Maulevrier's end by prying into her secrets.
Granted that shame and dishonour of some kind were involved in the
existence of that strange old man, he, Lord Hartfield, must endure his
portion in that shame--must be content to leave the dark riddle
unsolved.
He resigned himself to this state of things, and tried to forget the
cloud that hung over the house of Haselden; but the sense of a mystery,
a fatal family secret, which must come to light sooner or later--since
all such secrets are known at last--known, sifted, and bandied about
from lip to lip, and published in a thousand different newspapers, and
cried aloud in the streets--the sense of such a secret, the dread of
such a revelation weighed upon him heavily.
Maulevrier, the restless, was off to Argyleshire for the grouse shooting
as soon as he had deposited Lady Lesbia comfortably at Fellside.
'I should only be in your way if I stopped,' he said, 'for you and Molly
have hardly got over the honeymoon stage yet, though you put on the airs
of Darby and Joan. I shall be back in a week or ten days.'
'In Lady Maulevrier's state of health I don't think you ought to stay
away very long,' said Hartfield.
'Poor Lady Maulevrier! She never cared much for me, don't you know. But
I suppose it would seem unkind if I were to be out of the way when the
end comes. The end! Good heavens! how coolly I talk of it; and a year
ago I thought she was as immortal as Fairfield yonder.'
He went away, his spirits dashed by that awful thought of death, and
Lord and Lady Hartfield had the house to themselves, since Lesbia hardly
counted. She seldom left her own rooms, except to sit with her
grandmother for an hour. She lay on her sofa--or sat in a low arm-chair
by the window, reading Keats or Shelley--or only dreaming--dreaming over
the brief golden time of her life, with its fond delusions, its false
brightness. Mr. Horton went to see her every day--felt the feeble little
pulse which seemed hardly to have force enough to beat--urged her to
struggle against apathy and inertia, to walk a little, to go for a long
drive every day, to live in the open air--to which instructions she paid
not the slightest attention. The desire for life was gone. Disappointed
in her ambition, betrayed in her love, humiliated, duped, degraded--a
social failure. What had she to live for? She felt as if it would have
been a good thing, quite the best thing that could happen, if she could
turn her face to the wall and die. All that past season, its triumphs,
its pleasures, its varieties, was like a garish dream, a horror to look
back upon, hateful to remember.
In vain did Mary and Hartfield urge Lesbia to join in their simple
pleasures, their walks and rides and drives, and boating excursions. She
always refused.
'You know I never cared much for roaming about these everlasting hills,'
she told Mary. 'I never had your passion for Lakeland. It is very good
of you to wish to have me, but it is quite impossible. I have hardly
strength enough for a little walk in the garden.'
'You would have more strength if you went out more,' pleaded Mary,
almost with tears. 'Mr. Horton says sun and wind are the best doctors
for you. Lesbia, you frighten me sometimes. You are just letting
yourself fade away.'
'If you knew how I hate the world and the sky, Mary, you wouldn't urge
me to go out of doors,' Lesbia answered, moodily. 'Indoors I can read,
and get away from my own thoughts somehow, for a little while. But out
yonder, face to face with the hills and the lake--the scenes I have
known all my life--I feel a heart-sickness that is worse than death. It
maddens me to see that old, old picture of mountain and water, the same
for ever and ever, no matter what hearts are breaking.'
Mary crept close beside her sister's couch, put her arm round her neck,
laid her cheek--rich in the ruddy bloom of health--against Lesbia's
pallid and sunken cheek, and comforted her as much as she could with
tender murmurs and loving kisses. Other comfort, she could give none.
All the wisdom in the world will not cure a girl's heart-sickness when
she has flung away the treasures of her love upon a worthless object.
And so the days went by, peacefully, but sadly; for the shadow of doom
hung heavily over the house upon the Fell. Nobody who looked upon Lady
Maulevrier could doubt that her days were numbered, that the oil was
waxing low in the lamp of life. The end, the awful, mysterious end, was
drawing near; and she who was called was making no such preparations as
the Christian makes to answer the dread summons. As she had lived, she
meant to die--an avowed unbeliever. More than once Mary had taken
courage, and had talked to her grandmother of the world beyond, the
blessed hope of re-union with the friends we have lost, in a new and
brighter life, only to be met by the sceptic's cynical smile, the
materialist's barren creed.
'My dearest, we know nothing except the immutable laws of material life.
All the rest is a dream--a beautiful dream, if you like--a consolation
to that kind of temperament which can take comfort from dreams; but for
anyone who has read much, and thought much, and kept as far as possible
on a level with the scientific intellect of the age--for such an one,
Mary, these old fables are too idle. I shall die as I have lived, the
victim of an inscrutable destiny, working blindly, evil to some, good to
others. Ah! love, life has begun very fairly for you. May the fates be
kind always to my gentle and loving girl!'
There was more talk between them on this dark mystery of life and death.
Mary brought out her poor little arguments, glorified by the light of
perfect faith; but they were of no avail against opinions which had been
the gradual growth of a long and joyless life. Time had attuned Lady
Maulevrier's mind to the gospel of Schopenhauer and the Pessimists, and
she was contented to see the mystery of life as they had seen it. She
had no fear, but she had some anxiety as to the things that were to
happen after she was gone. She had taken upon herself a heavy burden,
and she had not yet come to the end of the road where her burden might
be laid quietly down, her task accomplished. If she fell by the wayside
under her load the consequences for the survivors might be full of
trouble.
Her anxieties were increased by the fact that her faithful servant and
adviser, James Steadman, was no longer the man he had been. The change
in him was painfully evident--memory failing, energy gone. He came to
his mistress's room every morning, received her orders, answered her
questions; but Lady Maulevrier felt that he went through the old duties
in a mechanical way, and that his dull brain but half understood their
importance.
One evening at dusk, just as Hartfield and Mary were leaving Lady
Maulevrier's room, after dinner, an appalling shriek ran through the
house--a cry almost as terrible as that which Lord Hartfield heard in
the summer midnight just a year ago. But this time the sound came from
the old part of the house.
'Something has happened,' exclaimed Hartfield, rushing to the door of
communication.
It was bolted inside. He knocked vehemently; but there was no answer. He
ran downstairs, followed by Mary, breathless, in an agony of fear. Just
as they approached the lower door, leading to the old house, it was
flung open, and Steadman's wife stood before them pale with terror.
'The doctor,' she cried; 'send for Mr. Horton, somebody, for God's sake.
Oh, my lord,' with a sudden burst of sobbing, 'I'm afraid he's dead.'
'Mary, despatch some one for Horton,' said Lord Hartfield. Keeping his
wife back with one hand, he closed the door against her, and then
followed Mrs. Steadman through the long low corridor to her husband's
sitting-room.
James Steadman was lying upon his back upon the hearth, near the spot
were Lord Hartfield had seen him sleeping in his arm-chair a month ago.
One look at the distorted face, dark with injected blood, the dreadful
glassy glare of the eyes, the foam-stained lips, told that all was over.
The faithful servant had died at his post. Whatever his charge had been,
his term of service was ended. There was a vacancy in Lady Maulevrier's
household.