'and, by the way, if you are going to expire in my state-room, I ought
to know a little more about you than I do. There is time still before
the tender goes; you might do worse than spend it in coaching me in your
life's history.'
He gave me a few leading facts, and supplied me with several documents
for study on the voyage; he even abandoned to me the whole of his
travelling arrangements, which proved far more complete and serviceable
than my own.
And then the 'All-ashore' bell rang, and McFadden, as he bade me
farewell, took from his pocket a bulky packet. 'You have saved me,' he
said. 'Now I can banish every recollection of this miserable episode. I
need no longer preserve my poor aunt's directions; let them go, then.'
Before I could say anything, he had fastened something heavy to the
parcel and dropped it through the cabin-light into the sea, after which
he went ashore, and I have never seen nor heard of him since.
During the voyage I had leisure to think seriously over the affair, and
the more I thought of the task I had undertaken, the less I liked it.
No man with the instincts of a gentleman can feel any satisfaction at
rinding himself on the way to harrow up a poor young lady's feelings by
a perfectly fictitious account of the death of a poor-spirited suitor
who could selfishly save his reputation at her expense.
And so strong was my feeling about this from the very first, that I
doubt whether, if McFadden's terms had been a shade less liberal, I
could ever have brought myself to consent.
But it struck me that, under judiciously sympathetic treatment, the lady
might prove not inconsolable, and that I myself might be able to heal
the wound I was about to inflict.
I found a subtle pleasure in the thought of this, for, unless McFadden
had misinformed me, Chlorine's fortune was considerable, and did not
depend upon any marriage she might or might not make. On the other hand,
_I_ was penniless, and it seemed to me only too likely that her parents
might seek to found some objection to me on that ground.
I studied the photograph McFadden had left with me; it was that of a
pensive but distinctly pretty face, with an absence of firmness in it
that betrayed a plastic nature. I felt certain that if I only had the
recommendation, as McFadden had, of an aunt's dying wishes, it would not
take me long to effect a complete conquest.
And then, as naturally as possible, came the thought--why should not I
procure myself the advantages of this recommendation? Nothing could be
easier; I had merely to present myself as Augustus McFadden, who was
hitherto a mere name to them; the information I already possessed as to
his past life would enable me to support the character, and as it seemed
that the baronet lived in great seclusion, I could easily contrive to
keep out of the way of the few friends and relations I had in London
until my position was secure.
What harm would this innocent deception do to anyone? McFadden, even if
he ever knew, would have no right to complain--he had given up all
pretentions himself and if he was merely anxious to preserve his
reputation, his wishes would be more than carried out, for I flattered
myself that whatever ideal Chlorine might have formed of her destined
suitor, I should come much nearer to it than poor McFadden could ever
have done. No, he would gain, positively gain, by my assumption. He
could not have counted upon arousing more than a mild regret as it was;
_now_ he would be fondly, it might be madly, loved. By proxy, it is
true, but that was far more than he deserved.
Chlorine was not injured--far from it; she would have a suitor to
welcome, not weep over, and his mere surname could make no possible
difference to her. And lastly, it was a distinct benefit to _me_, for
with a new name and an excellent reputation success would be an absolute
certainty. What wonder, then, that the scheme, which opened out a far
more manly and honourable means of obtaining a livelihood than any I had
previously contemplated, should have grown more attractively feasible
each day, until I resolved at last to carry it out? Let rigid moralists
blame me if they will; I have never pretended to be better than the
average run of mankind (though I am certainly no worse), and no one who
really knows what human nature is will reproach me very keenly for
obeying what was almost an instinct. And I may say this, that if ever an
unfortunate man was bitterly punished for a fraud which was harmless, if
not actually pious, by a visitation of intense and protracted terror,
that person was I!
II.
After arriving in England, and before presenting myself at Parson's
Green in my assumed character, I took one precaution against any danger
there might be of my throwing away my liberty in a fit of youthful
impulsiveness. I went to Somerset House, and carefully examined the
probate copy of the late Miss Petronia McFadden's last will and
testament.
Nothing could have been more satisfactory; a sum of between forty and
fifty thousand pounds was Chlorine's unconditionally, just as McFadden
had said. I searched, but could find nothing in the will whatever to
prevent her property, under the then existing state of the law, from
passing under the entire control of a future husband.
After this, then, I could no longer restrain my ardour, and so, one
foggy afternoon about the middle of December, I found myself driving
towards the house in which I reckoned upon achieving a comfortable
independence.
Parson's Green was reached at last; a small triangular open space
bordered on two of its sides by mean and modern erections, but on the
third by some ancient mansions, gloomy and neglected-looking indeed, but
with traces on them still of their former consequence.
My cab stopped before the gloomiest of them all--a square grim house
with dull and small-paned windows, flanked by two narrow and projecting
wings, and built of dingy brick, faced with yellow-stone. Some old
scroll-work railings, with a corroded frame in the middle for a long
departed oil-lamp, separated the house from the road; inside was a
semicircular patch of rank grass, and a damp gravel sweep led from the
heavy gate to a square portico supported by two wasted black wooden
pillars.
As I stood there, after pulling the pear-shaped bell-handle, and heard
the bell tinkling and jangling fretfully within, and as I glanced up at
the dull house-front looming cheerless out of the fog-laden December
twilight, I felt my confidence beginning to abandon me for the first
time, and I really was almost inclined to give the whole thing up and
run away.
Before I could make up my mind, a mouldy and melancholy butler had come
slowly down the sweep and opened the gate--and my opportunity had fled.
Later I remembered how, as I walked along the gravel, a wild and
wailing scream pierced the heavy silence--it seemed at once a
lamentation and a warning. But as the District Railway was quite near, I
did not attach any particular importance to the sound at the time.
I followed the butler through a dank and chilly hall, where an antique
lamp hung glimmering feebly through its panes of dusty stained glass, up
a broad carved staircase, and along some tortuous panelled passages,
until at length I was ushered into a long and rather low reception room,
scantily furnished with the tarnished mirrors and spindle-legged
brocaded furniture of a bygone century.
A tall and meagre old man, with a long white beard, and haggard, sunken
black eyes, was seated at one side of the high chimney-piece, while
opposite him sat a little limp old lady with a nervous expression, and
dressed in trailing black robes relieved by a little yellow lace about
the head and throat. As I saw them, I recognised at once that I was in
the presence of Sir Paul Catafalque and his wife.
They both rose slowly, and advanced arm-in-arm in their old-fashioned
way, and met me with a stately solemnity. 'You are indeed welcome,' they
said in faint hollow voices. 'We thank you for this proof of your
chivalry and devotion. It cannot be but that such courage and such
self-sacrifice will meet with their reward!'
And although I did not quite understand how they could have discerned,
as yet, that I was chivalrous and devoted, I was too glad to have made a
good impression to do anything but beg them not to mention it.
And then a slender figure, with a drooping head, a wan face, and large
sad eyes, came softly down the dimly-lighted room towards me, and I and
my destined bride met for the first time.
As I had expected, after she had once anxiously raised her eyes, and
allowed them to rest upon me, her face was lighted up by an evident
relief, as she discovered that the fulfilment of my aunt's wishes would
not be so distasteful to her, personally, as it might have been.
For myself, I was upon the whole rather disappointed in her; the
portrait had flattered her considerably--the real Chlorine was thinner
and paler than I had been led to anticipate, while there was a settled
melancholy in her manner which I felt would prevent her from being an
exhilarating companion.
And I must say I prefer a touch of archness and animation in womankind,
and, if I had been free to consult my own tastes, should have greatly
preferred to become a member of a more cheerful family. Under the
circumstances, however, I was not entitled to be too particular, and I
put up with it.
From the moment of my arrival I fell easily and naturally into the
position of an honoured guest, who might be expected in time to form
nearer and dearer relations with the family, and certainly I was
afforded every opportunity of doing so.
I made no mistakes, for the diligence with which I had got up McFadden's
antecedents enabled me to give perfectly satisfactory replies to most of
the few allusions or questions that were addressed to me, and I drew
upon my imagination for the rest.
But those days I spent in the baronet's family were far from lively: the
Catafalques went nowhere; they seemed to know nobody; at least no
visitors ever called or dined there while I was with them, and the time
dragged slowly on in a terrible monotony in that dim tomb of a house,
which I was not expected to leave except for very brief periods, for Sir
Paul would grow uneasy if I walked out alone--even to Putney.
There was something, indeed, about the attitude of both the old people
towards myself which I could only consider as extremely puzzling. They
would follow me about with a jealous care, blended with anxious alarm,
and their faces as they looked at me wore an expression of tearful
admiration, touched with something of pity, as for some youthful martyr;
at times, too, they spoke of the gratitude they felt, and professed a
determined hopefulness as to my ultimate success.
Now I was well aware that this is not the ordinary bearing of the
parents of an heiress to a suitor who, however deserving in other
respects, is both obscure and penniless, and the only way in which I
could account for it was by the supposition that there was some latent
defect in Chlorine's temper or constitution, which entitled the man who
won her to commiseration, and which would also explain their evident
anxiety to get her off their hands.
But although anything of this kind would be, of course, a drawback, I
felt that forty or fifty thousand pounds would be a fair set-off--and I
could not expect _everything_.
When the time came at which I felt that I could safely speak to Chlorine
of what lay nearest my heart, I found an unforeseen difficulty in
bringing her to confess that she reciprocated my passion.
She seemed to shrink unaccountably from speaking the word which gave me
the right to claim her, confessing that she dreaded it not for her own
sake, but for mine alone, which struck me as an unpleasantly morbid
trait in so young a girl.
Again and again I protested that I was willing to run all risks--as I
was--and again and again she resisted, though always more faintly, until
at last my efforts were successful, and I forced from her lips the
assent which was of so much importance to me.
But it cost her a great effort, and I believe she even swooned
immediately afterwards; but this is only conjecture, as I lost no time
in seeking Sir Paul and clenching the matter before Chlorine had time to
retract.
He heard what I had to tell him with a strange light of triumph and
relief in his weary eyes. 'You have made an old man very happy and
hopeful,' he said. 'I ought, even now to deter you, but I am too selfish
for that. And you are young and brave and ardent; why need we despair? I
suppose,' he added, looking keenly at me, 'you would prefer as little
delay as possible?'
'I should indeed,' I replied. I was pleased, for I had not expected to
find him so sensible as that.
'Then leave all preliminaries to me; when the day and time have been
settled, I will let you know. As you are aware, it will be necessary to
have your signature to this document; and here, my boy, I must in
conscience warn you solemnly that by signing you make your decision
irrevocable--_irrevocable_, you understand?'
When I had heard this, I need scarcely say that I was all eagerness to
sign; so great was my haste that I did not even try to decipher the
somewhat crabbed and antiquated writing in which the terms of the
agreement were set out.
I was anxious to impress the baronet with a sense of my gentlemanly
feeling and the confidence I had in him, while I naturally presumed
that, since the contract was binding upon me, the baronet would, as a
man of honour, hold it equally conclusive on his own side.
As I look back upon it now, it seems simply extraordinary that I should
have been so easily satisfied, have taken so little pains to find out
the exact position in which I was placing myself; but, with the
ingenuous confidence of youth, I fell an easy victim, as I was to
realise later with terrible enlightenment.
'Say nothing of this to Chlorine,' said Sir Paul, as I handed him the
document signed, 'until the final arrangements are made; it will only
distress her unnecessarily.'
I wondered why at the time, but I promised to obey, supposing that he
knew best, and for some days after that I made no mention to Chlorine of
the approaching day which was to witness our union.
As we were continually together, I began to regard her with an esteem
which I had not thought possible at first. Her looks improved
considerably under the influence of happiness, and I found she could
converse intelligently enough upon several topics, and did not bore me
nearly as much as I was fully prepared for.
And so the time passed less heavily, until one afternoon the baronet
took me aside mysteriously. 'Prepare yourself, Augustus' (they had all
learned to call me Augustus), he said; 'all is arranged. The event upon
which our dearest hopes depend is fixed for to-morrow--in the Grey
Chamber of course, and at midnight.'
I thought this a curious time and place for the ceremony, but I had
divined his eccentric passion for privacy and retirement, and only
imagined that he had procured some very special form of licence.
'But you do not know the Grey Chamber,' he added. 'Come with me, and I
will show you where it is.' And he led me up the broad staircase, and,
stopping at the end of a passage before an immense door covered with
black baize and studded with brass nails, which gave it a hideous
resemblance to a gigantic coffin lid, he pressed a spring, and it fell
slowly back.
I saw a long dim gallery, whose very existence nothing in the external
appearance of the mansion had led me to suspect; it led to a heavy oaken
door with cumbrous plates and fastenings of metal.
'To-morrow night is Christmas Eve, as you are doubtless aware,' he said
in a hushed voice. 'At twelve, then, you will present yourself at yonder
door--the door of the Grey Chamber--where you must fulfil the engagement
you have made.'
I was surprised at his choosing such a place for the ceremony; it would
have been more cheerful in the long drawing room; but it was evidently a
whim of his, and I was too happy to think of opposing it. I hastened at
once to Chlorine, with her father's sanction, and told her that the
crowning moment of both our lives was fixed at last.
The effect of my announcement was astonishing: she fainted, for which I
remonstrated with her as soon as she came to herself. 'Such extreme
sensitiveness, my love,' I could not help saying, 'may be highly
creditable to your sense of maidenly propriety, but allow me to say that
I can scarcely regard it as a compliment.'
'Augustus,' she said, 'you must not think I doubt you; and yet--and
yet--the ordeal will be a severe one for you.'
'I will steel my nerves,' I said grimly (for I was annoyed with her);
'and, after all, Chlorine, the ceremony is not invariably fatal; I have
heard of the victim surviving it--occasionally.'
'How brave you are!' she said earnestly. 'I will imitate you, Augustus;
I too will hope.'
I really thought her insane, which alarmed me for the validity of the
marriage. 'Yes, I am weak, foolish, I know,' she continued; 'but oh, I
shudder so when I think of you, away in that gloomy Grey Chamber, going
through it all alone!'
This confirmed my worst fears. No wonder her parents felt grateful to me
for relieving them of such a responsibility! 'May I ask where _you_
intend to be at the time?' I inquired very quietly.
'You will not think us unfeeling,' she replied, 'but dear papa
considered that such anxiety as ours would be scarcely endurable did we
not seek some distraction from it; and so, as a special favour, he has
procured evening orders for Sir John Soane's Museum in Lincoln's Inn
Fields, where we shall drive immediately after dinner.'
I knew that the proper way to treat the insane was by reasoning with
them gently, so as to place their own absurdity clearly before them. 'If
you are forgetting your anxiety in Sir John Soane's Museum, while I cool
my heels in the Grey Chamber,' I said, 'is it probable that any
clergyman will be induced to perform the marriage ceremony? Did you
really think two people can be united separately?'
_She_ was astonished this time. 'You are joking!' she cried; 'you cannot
really believe that we are to be married in--in the Grey Chamber?'
'Then will you tell me where we _are_ to be married?' I asked. 'I think
I have the right to know--it can hardly be at the Museum!'
She turned upon me with a sudden misgiving; 'I could almost fancy,' she
said anxiously, 'that this is no feigned ignorance. Augustus, your aunt
sent you a message--tell me, have you _read_ it?'
Now, owing to McFadden's want of consideration, this was my one weak
point--I had _not_ read it, and thus I felt myself upon delicate ground.
The message evidently related to business of importance which was to be
transacted in this Grey Chamber, and as the genuine McFadden clearly
knew all about it, it would have been simply suicidal to confess my own
ignorance.
'Why of course, darling, of course,' I said hastily. 'You must think no
more of my silly joke; there _is_ something I have to arrange in the
Grey Chamber before I can call you mine. But, tell me, why does it make
you so uneasy?' I added, thinking it might be prudent to find out
beforehand what formality was expected from me.
'I cannot help it--no, I cannot!' she cried, 'the test is so
searching--are you sure that you are prepared at all points? I overheard
my father say that no precaution could safely be neglected. I have such
a terrible foreboding that, after all, this may come between us.'
It was clear enough to me now; the baronet was by no means so simple and
confiding in his choice of a son-in-law as I had imagined, and had no
intention, after all, of accepting me without some inquiry into my past
life, my habits, and my prospects.
That he should seek to make this examination more impressive by
appointing this ridiculous midnight interview for it, was only what
might have been expected from an old man of his confirmed eccentricity.
But I knew I could easily contrive to satisfy the baronet, and with the
idea of consoling Chlorine, I said as much. 'Why will you persist in
treating me like a child, Augustus?' she broke out almost petulantly.
'They have tried to hide it all from me, but do you suppose I do not
know that in the Grey Chamber you will have to encounter one far more
formidable, far more difficult to satisfy, than poor dear papa?'
'I see you know more than I--more than I thought you did,' I said. 'Let
us understand one another, Chlorine--tell me exactly how much you know.'
'I have told you all I know,' she said; 'it is your turn to confide in
me.'
'Not even for your sweet sake, my dearest,' I was obliged to say, 'can I
break the seal that is set upon my tongue. You must not press me. Come,
let us talk of other things.'
But I now saw that matters were worse than I had thought; instead of the
feeble old baronet I should have to deal with a stranger, some exacting
and officious friend or relation perhaps, or, more probably, a keen
family solicitor who would put questions I should not care about
answering, and even be capable of insisting upon strict settlements.
It was that, of course; they would try to tie my hands by a strict
settlement, with a brace of cautious trustees; unless I was very
careful, all I should get by my marriage would be a paltry
life-interest, contingent upon my surviving my wife.
This revolted me; it seems to me that when law comes in with its
offensively suspicious restraints upon the husband and its indelicately
premature provisions for the offspring, all the poetry of love is gone
at once. By allowing the wife to receive the income 'for her separate
use and free from the control of her husband,' as the phrase runs, you
infallibly brush the bloom from the peach, and implant the 'little
speck within the fruit' which, as Tennyson beautifully says, will widen
by-and-by and make the music mute.
This may be overstrained on my part, but it represents my honest
conviction; I was determined to have nothing to do with law. If it was
necessary, I felt quite sure enough of Chlorine to defy Sir Paul. I
would refuse to meet a family solicitor anywhere, and I intended to say
so plainly at the first convenient opportunity.
III.
The opportunity came after dinner that evening when we were all in the
drawing-room, Lady Catafalque dozing uneasily in her arm-chair behind a
firescreen, and Chlorine, in the further room, playing funereal dirges
in the darkness, and pressing the stiff keys of the old piano with a
languid uncertain touch.
Drawing a chair up to Sir Paul's, I began to broach the subject calmly
and temperately. 'I find,' I said, 'that we have not quite understood
one another over this affair in the Grey Chamber. When I agreed to an
appointment there, I thought--well, it doesn't matter _what_ I thought,
I was a little too premature. What I want to say now is, that while I
have no objection to you, as Chlorine's father, asking me any questions
(in reason) about myself, I feel a delicacy in discussing my private
affairs with a perfect stranger.'
His burning eyes looked me through and through; 'I don't understand,' he
said. 'Tell me what you are talking about.'
I began all over again, telling him exactly what I felt about solicitors
and settlements. 'Are you well?' he asked sternly. 'What have I ever
said about settlements or solicitors?
I saw that I was wrong again, and could only stammer something to the
effect that a remark of Chlorine's had given me this impression.
'What she could have said to convey such an idea passes my
comprehension,' he said gravely; 'but she knows nothing--she's a mere
child. I have felt from the first, my boy, that your aunt's intention
was to benefit you quite as much as my own daughter. Believe me, I shall
not attempt to restrict you in any way; I shall be too rejoiced to see
you come forth in safety from the Grey Chamber.'
All the relief I had begun to feel respecting the settlements was
poisoned by these last words. _Why_ did he talk of that confounded Grey
Chamber as if it were a fiery furnace, or a cage of lions? What mystery
was there concealed beneath all this, and how, since I was obviously
supposed to be thoroughly acquainted with it, could I manage to
penetrate the secret of this perplexing appointment?