MARY
My sister took me by one arm and the nurse by the other, and assisted
me to rise. I found myself a little stronger than I had imagined. I
felt, indeed, fully equal to returning to the hotel, if my sister sent
for a cab; but my bedroom was ready, I was now being helped upstairs,
and, moreover, I had settled a plan which I did not intend to disturb.
I looked neither to the right nor to the left, as I ascended the
stairs, supported by my sister and the nurse. I feared the effect upon
me of the familiar objects which my sight must encounter--the shield
and stag’s head in the hall, the pictures on the staircase, the
barometer, and other such details--in all which I had taken a young
wife’s pride, choosing places for them, dusting them with my own hands.
We mounted the stairs in silence. I was taken to a room over the
dining-room, an apartment at the back of the house. This room had been
the spare room with us ever since we had occupied the house. A cheerful
fire burnt in the grate, and on a chair near it were my jacket, hat,
and veil. Lighted candles stood upon the dressing-table; the curtains
were drawn; the bed, draped with a new eider-down quilt, was open ready
for my reception; there was a smell of flowers in the atmosphere, and
the whole chamber was spotless and the picture of comfort.
‘A long night’s rest will do you all the good in the world,’ said Mary.
‘Do not hurry to rise in the morning.’
I could not thank her; I could not feel grateful for hospitality shown
to me in my own house; I could not bring my tongue to utter to my
sister words which my heart would pronounce ironical. But I could have
thrown my arms round her neck, I could have wept upon her breast, I
could have poured forth the story of my life; and all this, too, my
heart denied me.
She sent Barclay, the nurse, for some hot spirits and water, and for
another plate of sandwiches; but I refused to eat or drink. I said I
was weary and would get into bed and rest. She asked me at what hour I
wished to leave by train next day.
‘If I can reach my destination by five or six o’clock in the evening I
shall be satisfied,’ I answered.
She looked around as though there was something, unremembered by her,
that would add to my comfort, then softly said, ‘Good-night,’ and left
the room, closing the door after her.
I thanked God when she went out, for another few minutes must have
betrayed me. No sooner, indeed, had she closed the door than my heart
gave way, and I cried with a dreadful grief, burying my face upon
the bed that the sound of my sobs might be unheard. My children, I
knew, were sleeping on the same floor. I say I _knew_, because the
disposition of the rooms would not admit of a day and night nursery on
the floor above. My bedroom--the bedroom I had occupied--had been over
the room in which I now was; it was the best room in the house, with a
bath-room and dressing-room adjoining it, and this apartment I might be
sure my husband still used. Therefore, knowing that my children were
within a few yards of me, my yearning to visit them, to behold and
kiss my baby--my little baby girl--to kiss my darling boy, to view
them even for a moment only--this yearning was anguish inexpressible.
But I dared not leave my room. I could not think of any excuse to make
should I be found looking at my children. Indeed, my being found in
their room, bending over them, would infallibly lead to my husband
and sister making conjectures, and putting one thing and another
together--for my husband was a lawyer and my sister a clever woman of
quick intellect--and so discovering who I was.
I partially unclothed, extinguished the lights, and got into bed--not
to sleep, but that I should be found in bed if my sister visited me
before she herself retired. I heard a distant clock strike nine. A few
minutes later a child cried. I sat up, straining my ear to catch the
precious voice of my baby girl. It was the cry of a sleeping child,
and was not repeated; but, even if that cry of my child had found me
drowsy, it would have awakened me to the very full of all my senses and
held me sleepless for the rest of the night.
All was quiet below. I heard no sound of my husband and sister
conversing, though I supposed that they continued to occupy the
dining-room beneath me. The distant church clock struck ten. The
hall-door was then bolted, and the noise was followed by a faint
tapping on my bedroom door. I made no answer. I knew by the character
of the knocking that it was my sister, and wished her to think that
I was asleep. I held my face to the wall, and kept my eyes closed
and drew my breath regularly, as though I slumbered; but, though my
eyes were closed, I was sensible of the presence of my sister at the
bedside. The light she held dimly flushed my sealed vision, and I knew
by the radiance that she held the candle close to my face, whence I
might conclude she was inspecting me. That she had not recognised me I
was sure, but I now dreaded this minute scrutiny. Some feature, some
point of resemblance to our mother or to herself, some expression which
I could not control, she might witness, and by it know me.
I sighed and stirred, without opening my eyes, on which the light
vanished; and when, after waiting a little, I stealthily lifted my
eyelids, I found myself alone and the room in darkness.
I was able to follow the flight of the hours by hearing the distant
church-clock strike. Midnight rang out, and then one o’clock, and then
two o’clock. The wind had risen. It made a noise in the chimney and
hissed about the windows; otherwise the house was buried in silence,
saving that at intervals I seemed to hear a sound of footsteps, a very
soft movement, as of naked or slippered feet restlessly pacing. But,
listen as I might, I could not imagine in what room the person, whoever
it might be, was pacing; it was not overhead, and it did not sound as
though it were on the floor where the room I occupied was. I therefore
supposed it a deception of the ear, though it held me in check until
after three o’clock had struck, at which hour it ceased.
I waited until somewhat after four o’clock, then noiselessly rose,
very softly lighted a candle, and completely dressed myself, with the
exception of my veil, which I folded and put in my pocket. The fire had
long ago gone out. A small pair of scissors lay upon the toilet-table,
and on a chest of drawers was an Old Testament, with illustrations
protected by sheets of tissue paper. The book had been my mother’s. I
tore out several sheets of the tissue-paper, picked up the scissors,
and, putting the candle in the grate, where it would be safe--I dared
not move without a light, lest I should make a noise--I opened the
door, crept forth on to the landing, and stood listening.
All was silent, save the noise of the wind. At the extremity of the
landing a door stood ajar, and a faint light shone through it. I knew
that my children slept in that room, that the faint illumination
proceeded from a night-light, and that the door was left ajar in
pursuance of a custom established by myself, for I always required that
my children should have air, but would not permit their bedroom window
to be left open during the night. I put my boots on the landing-carpet,
and crept on noiseless feet to the door where the light shone, and,
looking into the room, saw the two little brass bedsteads side by side.
I stood listening, and plainly heard the deep breathing of the nurse,
who slept in a small room adjoining this bedroom.
I crept to the side of one of the beds, and in it lay my little girl,
Mary. I stood looking down upon her sleeping face, then cut off a
little piece of her hair, and breathlessly pressed my lips to her
cheek. Afterwards I stepped round to the bedside of my little boy,
and, when I had looked down upon him for awhile, I cut off a little
piece of his hair, and, with trembling but noiseless hands, placed the
two curls in the tissue-paper and slipped them into my pocket. I then
kissed my boy, and, going to the foot of the bedstead, knelt so that
my posture might embrace both little forms, and, lifting up my eyes to
God, I asked Him to look down and bless my children, and to give them
to me soon, and to watch over them and preserve them whilst I continued
absent from them.
I then rose, and, with a weeping heart and one long, lingering look
at the two faces, I soundlessly descended the staircase, and, being
intimately acquainted with the house, as you will suppose, knowing
exactly how the house-door was bolted and locked, I opened it without
more noise than would have scared a mouse, gently pulled it to after
me, so that it would have been impossible upstairs to have heard the
click of the latch, so gradually did I draw the door to; then, seating
myself on the step, I put on my boots, and, rising again, hurried away
down the hill.
It was snowing slightly, and the ground was thinly whitened. The
wind blew piercingly cold. I had learnt that the railway-station was
closed all night, and that the earliest train to London, which was the
directest way to Newcastle from Bath, did not leave until eight o’clock
or thereabouts. There was nothing for me to do but to walk about the
cold, windy streets until the hotel where I had left my bag was opened.
This I did. I met nobody. Bath seemed as silent and as deserted as
though the old plague that had visited London two hundred years ago
had attacked and desolated this city of the Abbey Church. At last, at
about a quarter to seven, on passing the hotel for the tenth or twelfth
time, I saw a man sweeping in front of the door, which stood a little
way open. I entered and passed into the coffee-room, and found a large
fire, newly lighted, burning in the grate, before which sat a man
reading a paper by the gas-light, for the sky was dark with cloud and
there was no daylight as yet. The man did not lift his head nor make
room for me; he was probably a commercial traveller. I rang the bell,
ordered some breakfast, desired that my bag should be brought from my
bedroom, and, whilst I waited, I drew as close to the fire as the
commercial traveller would suffer me, and warmed myself.
I was very cold and very weary, but the rest I had taken at my
husband’s house had given me strength enough to walk about the streets,
and when I had warmed myself and breakfasted I found that my sense of
exhaustion was considerably less than I had dreaded to find it. All the
while that I had walked, and all the while that I was warming myself
and eating my breakfast, I was thinking, ‘What will my sister say, or
what will my husband suppose, when they find that their visitor, whom
they so hospitably received, has fled from their house in the darkness
of the night? Their first suspicion will be that my falling into a
fit was a trick, and they will look over the house to see what I have
stolen; then, on discovering that nothing whatever is missing, they
will conjecture that my fit was epileptic, and that in an hour of
madness I rose in the night and wandered from the house.’
This notion made me hurry, lest my husband should come to the hotel
to inquire after me; for though, if he came, he would know no more
about me this morning than he did last night, yet he might agitate
and confuse me with questions--perhaps cause me to be detained for
inquiries, as it is called--and this apprehension, as I have said,
made me hurry. As soon, then, as I had breakfasted, I paid the bill,
took my bag, and told a porter who stood in the hall to call a cab. An
hour later I was safe in a railway-carriage, gliding out of the Great
Western Railway station at Bath on my way to London.
I reached Newcastle at seven o’clock in the evening, and drove at once
to Jesmond. I had telegraphed to Mrs. Lee from London, and I found her
awaiting me, with a table cheerfully set forth and a great Newcastle
coal fire roaring. She kissed me again and again; had I been her own
child she could not have given me a gladder, more affectionate welcome.
She saw exhaustion in my looks and the marks of much bitter weeping in
my eyes, and asked no questions until after I had eaten and drunk and
was resting upon the sofa before the fire, with my feet in comfortable
slippers, and the dress in which I had travelled replaced by a warm
dressing-gown.
I then told her everything that had happened to me; but when I opened
the travelling-bag, which I had kept at my side, and took from it the
two little locks of hair and showed them to her, I broke down, and
could not speak again for a long time for weeping.
‘Well,’ said she, when my sobs had ceased, ‘your adventure has
certainly been an extraordinary one. To think of neither your husband
nor your sister knowing you! Surely that can only be accounted for by
their conviction that you are dead? Your white hair, and the structural
change of the shape of your nose, and the change in the shape of your
right brow, coupled with other changes which they might be able to
point out, have, of course, created a new face for you--a face such
as friends, people whom you may have known for a few years but met at
intervals only, would not recognise; but that the alteration should be
so complete that your own sister and husband----no, it is because they
believe you dead.’
‘The light was dim when my husband saw me,’ said I.
‘Ay, but your sister? She saw you when you were brought in from the
street in daylight. No; I am sure that nothing could have saved you
from recognition but their belief that you are dead--a belief that is
now a habit of mind with them, not to be disturbed by the apparition
of a white-haired woman, who, to be sure, looks some years older than
the mere passage of three years only could have made her.’
She then asked me what I meant to do, and I replied that the sight
of my sister had hardened my resolution to leave her in undisturbed
possession of her home and her peace of mind.
‘But your children, dear?’
‘I am in God’s hands,’ I cried. ‘I have left it to Him to bring them to
me in His own good time.’
She looked at me, shook her head, and fell into a fit of musing.
I was so exhausted, however, that I was unable to maintain a
conversation even on this subject of my children--a subject which so
wholly occupied my heart that I could think of nothing else. I went to
bed, and scarcely was my head upon the pillow when I fell asleep, and
slept without moving the whole night through, without the disturbance
of the least dream that I can remember. In fact, nature could support
the burthen I had imposed upon her no longer; I had, in truth, scarcely
closed my eyes for above a few hours from the time of the restoration
of my memory, and this night I lay as one that had died. Next morning,
when I awoke, I found my limbs so stiff that I was unable to rise,
and I kept my bed all that day. Mrs. Lee came and sat by my side,
and we talked long and gravely upon the subject of my future--what
was best to be done; whether I had a right to divorce myself from my
husband and remain as dead to him out of a sentimental tenderness for
my sister, whose claims were not those of a mother’s, as mine were;
whose claims were not those even of a wife’s, as mine were--because it
would be all the same whether I was living or dead: she could not be
my husband’s wife; the law did not suffer a man to marry the sister of
his dead wife. In this way Mrs. Lee reasoned; and, after asking me some
questions about my sister--as to her habits, tastes, appearance, and so
forth--she said:
‘Why will you not let me write to her, gently break the news of your
being alive, ask her to come and see us here, and bring your children
with her; then the three of us can talk the matter over? Her sensations
on hearing the news of your being alive will soon pass; you will find
that she will agree in my views and consent to come and live with me,
taking your place, often seeing you and the children--for, of course,
dear Agnes, you will be a regular visitor. I can imagine no other
way of your regaining possession of your children. Whilst you have
been away I have thought and thought, and I cannot imagine what Mr.
----’ (naming the clergyman), ‘will be able to suggest beyond what
we ourselves are quite capable of conceiving--namely, that, in order
to obtain your children, you must make your existence known to your
husband and sister. Since, therefore, _that_ is certain, the rest is
inevitable. I mean that your sister, on hearing that you are alive,
must at once quit your husband.’
I lay in my bed listening to her, and often answering and agreeing with
her in many points of her argument, but all the time perfectly resolved
to remain dead to my husband, that my sister’s peace should not be
ruined and her life wrecked. The problem of how I was to regain my
children was indeed fearful, and, as I did think, insoluble; but I had
seen them, I had kissed them in their sleep, they were alive and well.
All this greatly comforted me, and though I was almost crazy with a
mother’s yearning for them, I felt better capable of waiting, now that
I had seen them, than before--better capable of exercising patience
for my sister’s sake, looking to God to reward me for my sacrifice by
uniting me with my children without desolating my sister’s life.
When the night came I again slept well, and was awakened next morning
by a knock on the door. The servant entered, and handed me a letter in
deep mourning. I was startled by the deep black edge upon the envelope,
and told the maid to open the curtains. She did so, flooding the room
with light, and withdrew. I looked at the envelope, and instantly
recognised the handwriting as that of my sister. It was addressed
to Mrs. John Campbell, care of Mrs. Lee. In fact, the address was
precisely the same as that which I had written upon the cards I had
taken to Bath with me, one of which, as you will remember, Mrs. Lee had
stitched inside of the back of my jacket, the only difference being
that the envelope bore my name, Mrs. John Campbell.
I trembled violently, and for some few minutes felt so faint that the
letter drooped in my hand on to the coverlet, whilst I lay back for
the support of the pillow. Then I looked at the letter again; it was
in Mary’s writing. I knew the writing as well as though I had seen her
with a pen in her hand addressing the envelope. For a long time I could
not summon courage to open the letter. It was not only the handwriting
and the seeing my name plain upon the envelope; it was the mourning
also that terrified me, so significant was it of the character of the
enclosure. At last I opened the letter, and read this:
‘My own darling Sister,--When, after fainting at the sight of your
boy, you were brought into your house, and your hat and veil were
removed, I knew you. Beloved sister, I knew you instantly. Your
white hair, your changed appearance, could not disguise you from
the eyes of my love. They had told me that during a great part of
the day a woman in black, thickly veiled, had several times passed
this house, and when your veil was removed, and I saw that it was
you, Agnes, _then_ I knew all, I understood all. I knew that you
had come to catch a sight of your children, that you knew I had
become your husband’s wife, and I understood that your secret visit
meant that when you returned to your home you would never come here
again. And why? That your husband and I might think you dead, as we
have long believed you dead, and that I might be left to live as I
have lived since you were mourned as lost to us for ever.
‘My darling sister! It was because I knew you that I insisted upon
your remaining in the house all night, for then you would have
rested, sleep would have given you strength, I should have been
able to see you in the morning, have heard your story, and have
told you mine. Oh! what has kept you from us for three years? What
sufferings have you undergone to change you so? I have loved and
tended your little ones as though they had been my own. You will
find them well, and very beautiful children. You saw but little of
Johnny. You fell whilst he was looking at you. I have been wakeful
all night, pacing the floor of a room that was above the one in
which you slept--not thinking over what I should do; no! what I was
to do I knew very well; but thinking about you, your three years’
absence, the meeting of two sisters who knew each other and loved
each other, and yet dared not speak to each other.
‘And why did not I speak to you, Agnes? Because, my beloved, I
desired the morning to come, when, after having sat and conversed
with you in your bedroom, I should have been able to depart from
your house, leaving it to you to tell your husband the story of
your return, and of my going, when he came back to his home in the
evening.
‘You know that I was married to him fourteen weeks ago. Your secret
visit convinced me that _that_ news had reached you. Oh! had the
gentle and all-merciful God brought you home to us but four months
earlier! I can write to you that I was married to John, but I could
not look at you and say so.
‘Yet I believed you dead, dear sister, and your husband believed
you dead. The body of the man who attended you in the boat was
washed ashore, and the boat was afterwards found drifting about,
upside down. How could we doubt that you had perished? But I have
not come between you and your husband’s heart. Your memory is sweet
and sacred to him. Often does he talk of you. It is a subject that
he never wearies of. One to take the place of you was needed for
Johnny and little Mary, and who fitter than I? But oh! but oh! that
you had returned but four months earlier!
‘And now with the tears standing in my eyes, and my heart aching as
though it must break, I am going to bid you farewell for ever. Do
not fear for me. God’s love will stay my hand. I will do nothing
that is rash or sinful. I shall hear of you and always in spirit
be with you, and my prayers shall ever be for you and for your
husband, and your little ones. By the time this letter reaches
your hands, your husband will have known all, and will in all
probability be on his way to Newcastle-on-Tyne.
‘As for me, I go where no inquiries can ever reach me. It will be
useless to seek for me; not the utmost strength of our love, Agnes,
would ever be able to court me from my concealment. You may hear of
me in my death, but in no wise else, and some day you will know why
I have chosen to hide myself until the grave closes over me.
‘But I could wish to receive one last letter from you, telling me
what has befallen you, and where you have been during these three
years, and sending me your blessing and your love, and a kiss.
Therefore write to me at the ---- Hotel, Leicester. Address me
there by return of post, that I may receive the letter as I pass
through that town. My beloved sister, farewell. Forgive me! Love me
with the strength of your old sweet love.
‘MARY.’
I read this letter twice over, realising its full import. There
then followed such a tumult of feelings in my mind that I cannot
recollect even a little of my thoughts. I was struck to the heart by
the knowledge that Mary had known me from the beginning, and had not
spoken, and then horror fell upon me when I reflected that she had left
her home; that she had as good as vowed never to be heard of until her
death should come; that, despite her assurance, grief, misery, shame,
homelessness, the remembrance of what she had lost, the fear of, as I
could read in her letter, of what was yet to befall her, might tempt
her to end her life!
I hastily rose, dressed myself, and went downstairs. Mrs. Lee had not
yet left her bed. I took pen and paper, and wrote to Mary. I wrote page
after page, for I had much to relate and also to implore, to persuade,
and to command. On the top of the third or fourth sheet of paper I
began to tell her that it was my unalterable resolution never to live
with my husband, or speak of him, or think of him as my husband whilst
she was living; and I was going on to say that I asked for nothing but
my children, when it flashed upon me that if I told her I would never
have anything more to do with my husband _while she was alive_, her
love for me, her determination to reinstate me might cause her to take
her life! so that by making a widower of my husband, so far as she was
concerned, there could be no longer any excuse remaining to keep me
away from my home. This fear I say flashed upon me, and I tore that
part of the letter up, and went on writing till I had said all that
was in my heart; but even as I addressed the envelope I seemed to feel
that this letter, full as it was of love and piteous pleadings to her
to return to her home, would be no more than as a wreath laid upon a
grave, and that my sister and I would never meet again in this world.
I desired a servant to immediately post the letter, and then walked
about the room, as was my habit when deeply agitated, waiting for the
arrival of Mrs. Lee. She entered at last, kissed me, and looking at me
affectionately, exclaimed: ‘You have heard from your sister, I am sure.
The letter was brought to me in error, and I sent it immediately to
you.’
I put it into her hand in silence. She read it through, and then said:
‘So she knew you, and yet made no sign! She must be a girl of great
nobility of mind, of wonderful strength of character.’ She read the
letter through again, and exclaimed: ‘And now, Agnes, you will return
with your husband?’
‘No,’ I answered. ‘I cannot, and will not, think of him as my husband
whilst my sister lives.’
She said much to dissuade me from this resolution, pointing out that
great as might be my love for my sister, my husband must be first of
all with me. Did I remember my marriage vows? Did I remember saying
that I would forsake all others, and keep only to my husband? This was
a vow solemnly uttered at the altar, and God was a witness to it, and
I should be grievously sinning if I were false to that vow. I answered
that I loved my husband, and that I remembered my marriage vows, but
that my husband had married my sister, believing me dead, that she was
his wife and must remain his wife. I asked for my children, I said; and
when I had them--and here I broke into a passion of weeping, for God
knows I spoke truly when I said that I loved my husband; and yet my
love for my sister, my determination that she should not be dishonoured
by my reappearing, after I was supposed dead, must certainly divorce
me from my husband; and then there was the thought of my sister hiding
for the remainder of her days alone, knowing no other happiness than
such as would flow from the belief that I was happy--I say all these
thoughts broke in upon me, and extinguished my speech in a passion of
tears.