Mrs Kingsworth remained near the library fire by herself. Her tears
soon ceased, and she sat still and silent, in the grasp of a conviction
from which she could not free herself. Every word that George had said
might be true, and yet she knew, she felt that all his wishes had worked
in his own favour, that a "covetous desire" had been granted perhaps
even in spite of weak and inadequate words and actions telling the other
way. An intense feeling of shame seized on her. What in all the world,
she thought, was worth the loss of self-respect? She heard, without
heeding, loud and angry voices, and the sudden shutting of the front
door; but she never moved till Canon Kingsworth came into the room.
"Well," he said, "James has told me the whole story. It was very
foolish, he had no right to marry in the relations in which he stood
towards his father; but the whole thing has been much misrepresented. I
take blame to myself for my hasty account of it."
"It ought to be set right," said Mrs Kingsworth, steadily.
"Set right? do you mean reverse the will? Ah, my dear, that is
impossible: but I think that though my brother might in any case have
made the same will in the main, had he known the facts, he would not
have left James penniless."
"He would not have made any new will at all, but for that false report,"
said Mrs Kingsworth. Her tone was so marked and so miserable that
Canon Kingsworth turned away from the subject at once.
"I shall take an opportunity of talking to George," he said, "to-morrow,
when our minds are quieter. I am very anxious to avoid further
discussion to-night. James is very angry, and I am afraid unforgetable
words passed as he went out."
"Has he gone out?"
"Yes; I think George did so too, afterwards."
Mrs Kingsworth sat on by the fire, she felt no impulse to move, to talk
the matter over, or to try to gain any new lights upon it. She was
absolutely silent; while the Canon took up a book from the table, and
read, or feigned to read it, till the butler looked in and said, "Will
the gentlemen be in to dinner, ma'am?"
"To dinner? Is it dinner-time? Are they still out? Oh yes, we will
wait for them."
They waited, till the Canon grew impatient, and went to look out of the
window.
"Why, there is a dense fog," he said, "what can induce either of them to
stay out in it?"
Mrs Kingsworth roused herself with a start. "It is close upon eight
o'clock," she said, "what can keep them?"
"The fog is thick enough to make them lose their way. I'll have the
dinner bell rung outside the door."
They hardly knew how impatience gradually melted into uneasiness, and
uneasiness into alarm; but before the next two hours were over, every
man-servant in the place was shouting and searching, ringing the great
bell in every direction, losing themselves and each other in the
blinding mist, and with one conviction growing stronger every moment in
their minds.
"The cliffs!" That whisper was in every one's mind long before it found
its way to their lips; but the first sound of it terrified Mrs
Kingsworth almost out of her senses. She had been very slow to take
alarm; but her fears once excited, all hope was gone from her. As for
the Canon, he instituted every possible search and said nothing; but his
mind was filled with terrible possibilities, which he would not put into
words.
The night passed in perplexity and alarm, and even the dawn brought no
relief; for the heavy sea-fog still hung thick over the cliffs and the
shore; till, suddenly, as it seemed almost in a moment, it rolled back
and left the white cliffs and the glittering waves bright in the morning
sun.
The tide was low, and on the beach beneath the cliffs were found the
bodies of James and George Kingsworth, clasped in each other's arms as
if each had tried to rescue the other, or--But there was nothing to
justify any other interpretation.
From the moment when James' passionate words to his brother as he
hurried out of the house had been dimly overheard in the hall, till the
bodies were found on the beach, nothing was known of him. George had
gone out a few minutes later, with a cigar, quietly and by himself.
They had gone out into the mist and darkness, and mist and darkness hung
impenetrably over their memories.
Among all the painful duties that devolved upon Canon Kingsworth that of
disclosing what had passed to James' wife weighed on him by far the most
heavily.
It was due to her that the family should now recognise her claims. She
had, according to James' story, been living at Dinan, and there the
Canon went to fetch her, leaving the other poor young widow in a strange
state of silent stunned grief. As soon as might be he returned,
bringing Mrs James Kingsworth and her baby with him. She was a pretty
young woman, and her reception of him before she knew the sad news he
had come to tell had impressed him favourably; but now she was in a
state of anger and half-realised grief, speaking of James as if he had
been in all respects perfection in her eyes, and only now and then
rousing herself from her distress, to remember that her child was
disinherited. Canon Kingsworth was very glad to see her safely in her
room and under charge of the housekeeper, and as he turned into the
library to consider the situation, his other niece stood before him,
with a letter in her hand.
"Uncle, I have found it. Here is James' letter. I found it in the
writing-case George always used. Now there is but one thing to be done.
My baby shall not profit by this injustice. Let James' child take it
all. It is not Katharine's."
"Hush, you do not know what you are saying. Let me look at the letter."
He glanced it over, and said gravely, "Yes, it concurs in all respects
with what James told me. Mary, it is impossible now to judge. The past
must be laid to rest. The will is valid, and secures this property to
your child. Nothing that you can do can alter it. Some provision it is
no doubt necessary should be made for James' daughter out of the estate,
and I need not ask you to show kindness to one as bitterly afflicted as
yourself."
"It is a burden that I cannot bear," she said, passionately. "How can
Katharine prosper under it! At least there must be full confession."
"Stop, Mary, what is it that you want to confess? Remember you _know_
nothing."
"I know that Mr Kingsworth did not get that letter. I know that my
child has her cousin's right. If he--if George had no _time_ to do
justice, I must do it for him."
"Recognise and receive her kindly, that is the first thing to do."
That was a strange interview between the two young widows, widowed so
suddenly and so recently, that neither bore any token in her dress of
her condition--both suffering under the same loss; both with the same
comfort left to them.
Mary approached with reverence for her sister-in-law's grief, with a
sense, keen in her soul, of standing in her place--but the other was shy
and hard; till the mention of her husband's name broke down her reserve,
and she sobbed out her misery at his loss, in such evident ignorance of
his character and himself, that any attempt to explain the state of the
case, any apology offered, only seemed an additional injury. Mary made
her statement, notwithstanding all the tears with which it was met.
"This letter was not given to our father-in-law. He never knew the
truth about your marriage. I can but ask you to forgive," she said,
with a bitter proud humility. "I am afraid that your husband's errors
were not put in the best light before his father."
"My husband's errors! How dare any one say he had errors! If he had, I
will never hear a whisper of them _now_! now that I have lost him,"
sobbed Ellen Kingsworth, while Mary stood silenced by a view of wifely
duty so unlike her own.
Ellen turned away from her with manifest suspicion and dislike, and Mary
having relieved her conscience was too much absorbed in her own shame
and dread--in the terrible fear of she knew not what, to show sufficient
tenderness to overcome the repulsion.
In a day or two, however, Mrs James Kingsworth's mother, Mrs Bury,
arrived on the scene: a gentle ladylike woman, who had worked hard at
school-keeping for her living, and who avowed that her daughter's secret
marriage had been made without her knowledge, and afterwards concealed
greatly against her will.
She expressed much less surprise than Ellen had done at the
disinheritance of her son-in-law, of whom she evidently had formed no
good opinion, refused at first with some quiet pride the offers of
assistance for Emberance's education, saying that she and her daughter
were far from being unable to support her; but perceiving how earnestly
and sincerely the Kingsworths wished to make this arrangement, she
replied that it was an acknowledgment of her daughter's position, and as
such she accepted the allowance offered--a small one--for the affairs of
Kingsworth had been much hampered by James' debts. Katharine Kingsworth
must owe to her long minority, or to her mother's wealth, the means of
supporting her inheritance.
These matters settled, and the sad double funeral over, Mrs James
Kingsworth and her mother and child went away from Kingsworth, doubtless
with much sense of injury and disappointment; while Mary was left,
feeling as if a burden had been laid upon her, that would crush the
brightness out of her life for ever--the brightness, not the energy nor
the resolution. She looked forward through the years, and set one aim
before her--to undo the injustice which she believed her husband to have
done, and to free her child from her unlawful possessions.
How she succeeded, the sequel will tell.