Wednesday. Young women, bringing in huge band-boxes, were perpetually
ringing at the door, and by-and-by we were treated to a sight of the
finery. Sufficient gowns and bonnets to set up a shop were spread out in
Helen's room. The wedding-dress lay on the bed: a glistening white silk,
with a veil and wreath beside it. Near to it was the dress she would go
away in to Dover, the first halting-place on their trip to Paris: a
quiet shot-silk, Lady Whitney called it, blue one way, pink another.
Shot, or not shot, it was uncommonly pretty. Straw bonnets were the mode
in those days, and Helen's, perched above her travelling-dress, had
white ribbons on it and a white veil--which was the mode for brides
also. I am sure Helen, in her vanity, thought more of the things than
of the bridegroom.
But she thought of him also. Especially when the morning went on and did
not bring him. Twelve o'clock struck, and Sir John Whitney's solicitor,
Mr. Hill, who had come up on purpose, was punctual to his appointment.
Sir John had thought it right that his own solicitor should be present
at the reading and signing of the settlements, to see that they were
drawn up properly.
So there they sat in the back-parlour, which had been converted into
a business room for the occasion, waiting for Captain Foliott and the
deed with what patience they had. At one o'clock, when they came in to
luncheon, Sir John was looking a little blue; and he remarked that
Captain Foliott, however busy he might have been, should have stretched
a point to get off in time. Appointments, especially important ones,
ought to be kept.
For it was conclusively thought that the delay was caused by the
captain's having been unable to leave the previous day, and that he was
travelling up now.
So Mr. Hill waited, and Sir John waited, and the rest of us waited,
Helen especially; and thus the afternoon passed in waiting. Helen was
more fidgety than a hen with one chick: darting to the window every
instant, peeping down the staircase at the sound of every ring.
Dinner-time; and no appearance of Captain Foliott. After dinner; and
still the same. Mary Seabright, a merry girl, told Helen that her lover
was like the knight in the old ballad--he loved and he rode away. There
was a good deal of laughing, and somebody called for the song, "The
Mistletoe Bough." Of course it was all in jest: as each minute passed,
we expected the next would bring Captain Foliott.
Not until ten o'clock did Mr. Hill leave, with the understanding that
he should return the next morning at the same hour. The servants were
beginning to lay the breakfast-table in the dining-room, for a lot of
sweet dishes had been brought in from the pastry-cook's, and Lady
Whitney thought they had better be put on the table at once. In the
afternoon we had tied the cards together--"Mr. and Mrs. Richard
Foliott"--with white satin ribbon, sealed them up in their envelopes
with white wax, and directed them ready for the post on the morrow.
At twelve o'clock a move was made to go upstairs to bed; and until that
hour we had still been expecting Captain Foliott.
"I feel positive some dreadful accident has happened," whispered Helen
to me as she said good-night, her usually bright colour faded to
paleness. "If I thought it was carelessness that is causing the delay,
as they are cruelly saying, I--I should never forgive him."
"Wait a minute," said Bill to me aside, touching Tod also. "Let them go
on."
"Are you not coming, William?" said Lady Whitney.
"In two minutes, mother."
"I don't like this," began Bill, speaking to us both over our
bed-candles, for the other lights were out. "I'll be hanged if I think
he means to turn up at all!"
"But why should he not?"
"Who is to know? Why has he not turned up already? I can tell you that
it seems to me uncommonly strange. Half-a-dozen times to-night I had a
great mind to call my father out and tell him about what you heard in
the train, Tod. It is so extraordinary for a man, coming up to his
wedding, not to appear: especially when he is bringing the settlements
with him."
Neither of us spoke. What, indeed, could we say to so unpleasant a
topic? Bill went on again.
"If he were a man in business, as his uncle, old Foliott, is, I could
readily understand that interests connected with it might detain him
till the last moment. But he is not; he has not an earthly thing to do."
"Perhaps his lawyers are in fault," cried Tod. "If they are backward
with the deeds of settlement----"
"The deeds were ready a week ago. Foliott said so in writing to my
father."
A silence ensued, rendering the street noises more audible. Suddenly
there came a sound of a horse and cab dashing along, and it pulled up
at our door. Foliott, of course.
Down we went, helter-skelter, out on the pavement. The servants, busy in
the dining-room still, came running to the steps. A gentleman, getting
out of the cab with a portmanteau, stared, first at us, then at the
house.
"This is not right," said he to the driver, after looking about him.
"It's next door but one."
"This is the number you told me, sir."
"Ah, yes. Made a mistake."
But so sure did it seem to us that this late and hurried traveller must
be, at least, some one connected with Captain Foliott, if not himself,
that it was only when he and his luggage had disappeared within the next
house but one, and the door was shut, and the cab gone away, that we
realized the disappointment, and the vague feeling of discomfort it left
behind. The servants went in. We strolled to the opposite side of the
street, unconsciously hoping that luck might bring another cab with the
right man in it.
"Look there!" whispered Bill, pointing upwards.
The room over the drawing-room was Lady Whitney's; the room above that,
the girls'. Leaning out at the window, gazing now up the street, now
down, was Helen, her eyes restless, her face pale and woe-begone in the
bright moonlight.
It was a sad night for Helen Whitney. She did not attempt to undress,
as we knew later, but kept her post at that weary window. Every cab or
carriage that rattled into view was watched by her with eager, feverish
anxiety. But not one halted at the house, not one contained Captain
Foliott. Helen Whitney will never forget that unhappy night of
tumultuous feeling and its intolerable suspense.
But here was the wedding-morning come, and no bridegroom. The
confectioners were rushing in with more dishes, and the dressmakers
appearing to put the finishing touches to Helen. Lady Whitney was just
off her head: doubtful whether to order all the paraphernalia away,
or whether Captain Foliott might not come yet. In the midst of the
confusion a little gentleman arrived at the house and asked for Sir
John. Sir John and he had a long conference, shut in alone: and when
they at length came out Sir John's nose was a dark purple. The visitor
was George Foliott, the mill-owner: returned since some days from the
Cape.
And the tale he unfolded would have struck dismay to the nose of many
a wiser man than was poor Sir John. The scamp spoken of in the train
was Richard Foliott; and a nice scamp he turned out to be. Upon Mr.
Foliott's return to Milltown the prospective wedding had come to his
ears, with all the villainy encompassing it; he had at once taken
means to prevent Mr. Richard's carrying it out, and had now come up to
enlighten Sir John Whitney.
Richard Foliott had been a scamp at heart from his boyhood; but he had
contrived to keep well before the world. Over and over again had Mr.
Foliott paid his debts and set him on his legs again. Captain Foliott
had told the Whitneys that he quitted the army by the wish of his
friends: he quitted it because he dared not stay in. Before Mr. Foliott
departed for the Cape he had thrown Richard off; had been obliged to do
it. His fond foolish mother had reduced herself to poverty for him. The
estate, once worth ten thousand pounds, which he had made a pretence of
settling upon Helen, belonged to his mother, and was mortgaged about a
dozen deep. He dared not go much abroad for fear of arrest, especially
in London. This, and a great deal more, was disclosed by Mr. Foliott to
Sir John; who sat and gasped, and rubbed his face, and wished his old
friend Todhetley was at hand, and thanked God for Helen's escape.
"He will never be any better," affirmed Mr. Foliott, "be very sure of
that. He is innately bad, and the pain he has inflicted upon me for
years has made me old before my time. But--forgive me, Sir John, for
saying so--I cannot think you exercised discretion in accepting him so
easily for your daughter."
"I had no suspicion, you see," returned poor Sir John. "How could I have
any? Being your nephew, and Lord Riverside's nephew--"
"Riverside's nephew he called himself, did he! The old man is ninety, as
I dare say you know, and never stirs from his home in the extreme north
of Scotland. Some twenty years ago, he fell in with the sister of
Richard's mother (she was a governess in a family up there), and married
her; but she died within the year. That's how he comes to be Lord
Riverside's 'nephew.' But they have never met in their lives."
"Oh dear!" bemoaned Sir John. "What a villain! and what a blessed
escape! He made a great point of Helen's bit of money, three thousand
pounds, not being tied up before the marriage. I suppose he wanted to
get it into his own hands."
"Of course he did."
"And to pay his debts with it; as far as it would go."
"_Pay his debts with it!_" exclaimed Mr. Foliott. "Why, my good sir, it
would take thirty thousand to pay them. He would just have squandered it
away in Paris, at his gaming-tables, and what not; and then have asked
you to keep him. Miss Whitney is well quit of him: and I'm thankful I
came back in time to save her."
Great news to disclose to Helen! Deeply mortifying to have ordered
a wedding-breakfast and wedding things in general when there was no
wedding to be celebrated! The tears were running down Lady Whitney's
homely cheeks, as Miss Deveen drove up.
Mr. Foliott asked to see Helen. All he said to her we never knew--but
there's no doubt he was as kind as a father.
"He is a wicked, despicable man," sobbed Helen.
"He is all that, and more," assented Mr. Foliott. "You may be thankful
your whole life long for having escaped him. And, my dear, if it will at
all help you to bear the smart, I may tell you that you are not the
first young lady by two or three he has served, or tried to serve, in
precisely the same way. And to one of them he behaved more wickedly than
I care to repeat to you."
"But," ruefully answered poor Helen, quietly sobbing, "I don't suppose
it came so near with any of them as the very morning."
And that was the end of Helen Whitney's wedding.