INNOCENT’S CONFESSION.
After this crisis there came a great lull. Innocent was ill. She lay for
some weeks under the power of a mysterious disorder which was sometimes
called low fever, and sometimes by other names. “She had no doubt
received a shock,” the doctor said, when informed by Mrs. Eastwood to
that effect, and this was about all that any one could say. But she was
young, and she got better by degrees. They were all very good to her. By
the time she was able to come down-stairs Frederick had returned home.
He had let his little house in Mayfair, prudently making the best of his
domestic calamity, and had gone back to live with his mother after his
wife’s death, with a gentle melancholy about him which most people, or
at least most ladies, found impressive. He had been unfortunate, poor
fellow; his marriage had been a terrible mistake, but yet it was very
sad and shocking to lose a beautiful young wife so suddenly--and his
conduct was most becoming, all that could be desired in the
circumstances. Frederick had a luck for coming well out of a bad
business. He had taken his own way, and derived from that all the
enjoyment procurable, and then Providence had taken the trouble to step
in and deliver him from his wife, who could not but have been a
hindrance to him in life. Frederick himself accepted very piously this
explanation of affairs. I don’t know whether he went so far as to
believe himself a favourite of heaven, but at heart he felt that he was
lucky, very lucky; yet nevertheless he would talk about “my poor wife”
now and then with touching pathos, and was very much sympathized with in
some circles. On the whole, however, there can be no doubt that he was
deeply thankful to find himself back again in The Elms with his career
still before him, and no harm done, or at least no harm to speak of.
Sometimes, it is true, softening thoughts of tenderness towards the
beautiful creature whom he had supposed himself to love would cross his
mind. But Amanda’s charm had lasted but a very short time, an incredibly
short time considering the insane force of the passion which had swept
him along to his marriage, and the momentary pangs of loss, which, I
suppose, being human, he must sometimes have felt, were as nothing in
comparison with the sense of relief and deliverance which came over him
when he recalled with an effort the strange feverish episode of life
which he had gone through since he left the familiar family home to
which he had now returned. Sometimes he wondered if it had been real, or
if it was only some strange dream more vivid than usual, so entirely did
every trace of that episode pass away, and the old existence come back.
But I think, on the whole, Frederick was a more agreeable inmate since
he had gone through this experience. He was not fundamentally improved
by his troubles, but he was more civil and tolerant to others. His wife
had treated him and his feelings with no consideration at all, and he
had not found that treatment agreeable. Thus experience made up for him
the want of that moral imagination, if we may use the word, which
enables some of us to put ourselves in the places of others, and
consider their feelings by nature. Frederick was as far as ever from
any disposition to sacrifice what he cared for to anybody’s
convenience--but in matters which he did not care for, he had, it must
be allowed, gained a certain power of toleration, and had learned to
think that the others might have wishes, and to respect them. He was
pleasanter to have in the house, even Nelly acknowledged. Things went
more smoothly in the re-united household. Brownlow came back again well
pleased, restoring to the house a certain amount of dignity which it had
lost; and to all of them Amanda and her brief reign began to appear like
a feverish dream.
When Innocent came down-stairs, an invalid, thin and pale, with eyes
that seemed to have grown to double their size, and with all that
touching weakness which appeals to every good feeling of humanity,
Frederick was very good to her. There was nothing he would not do for
her gratification. He would stay at home in the evening, and give up
other engagements in order to read to her. He would draw her chair from
one place to another, and watch over her comfort. Would she soon get
quite well? Would she ever be the same creature as before--the passive
abstracted little soul, who lived in the midst of them without being of
them? In many ways Innocent was changed. She no longer hung upon
Frederick as she had once done. Her eyes did not go forth to meet him,
her hand to grasp his. Indeed, at first she had been startled by his
presence, which was unexpected by her, and had shrunk from him--a fact
which piqued him deeply, when at last he found it possible to believe
that Innocent was less desirous than usual of his society. She had not
the skill to conceal this strange and incomprehensible state of feeling,
and when his mother had endeavoured to explain to him that he too was
inextricably associated in Innocent’s mind with the record of that night
which had been the principal turning-point in her existence, Frederick
did not like it. “Nonsense!” he had cried, with something of his old
warmth; “What is it to her in comparison with what it must be to me? If
I can bear it, surely she may be able to bear it. I did not think
Innocent had been such a little fool.”
“She has strange ideas,” said Mrs. Eastwood, trembling as she spoke.
“Sometimes I think her mind has been thrown a little off its balance. If
she says anything strange to you about her own share in all that was
done on that melancholy night, don’t treat her with ridicule, Frederick.
Sometimes I do not know what to make of her. Sometimes she is very
strange.”
“She always was,” said Frederick, pulling his peaked beard with a
certain complacency. He thought he saw through it all. When he brought
her from Italy she had been very young, and had not understood her own
feelings; and then he married, and his position was changed. But now a
further change had come. He was a widower; he was free to love and to
marry over again. And Innocent, developed into self-consciousness, felt
this; and felt that she herself in her perilous position had need of
great additional prudence in her intercourse with him. Poor Innocent!
This interpretation of her motives entirely removed any offence that
Frederick might have felt. It gave him a delightful sense of his own
powers and attractions, and inclined him doubly towards the little
cousin who had so just an appreciation at once of himself and his
circumstances. It opened his eyes to many things, among others, to her
beauty, which had developed wonderfully. She was now not only very
handsome, but handsome in a way which struck everybody. Hers were not
the sweet and bright good looks of Nelly, but a quite distinct beauty of
a high order--and Frederick began to admire Innocent more than she had
ever admired him. He inquired into everything about her, and in the
course of his inquiries learned all that happened with Sir Alexis, and
was more amused and pre-occupied by this piece of news than his mother
could have supposed possible. He was amused, she supposed, for he
laughed long and low, and could not be done with the subject. “So
Longueville thought _he_ could have her for the asking,” Frederick said,
with a laugh which was full of keen and covert excitement. “He was very
nice about it,” said Mrs. Eastwood. “I think he was really fond of her;
and it would be a good thing for Innocent; a man who knows her so
thoroughly, and would not expect too much. I don’t think he has given up
hope.”
“Oh, he has not given up hope,” said Frederick half fiercely, half
laughing. He would not give any explanation of his amusement, but he
returned to the subject again and again with a curious interest. And
gradually he came to show a great deal of regard and attention to the
invalid of the house, to all Innocent’s desires and likings, as she came
out of her fever. Sometimes she would look at him strangely, as if she
had something to tell him, and then would sigh and shrink away, and
avoid all conversation with him. Poor, dear little Innocent! she felt
the difference. He was no longer a married man, he was free; she could
not disclose her guileless love any longer with the sense of security
she had once had. Nothing could be more natural, nothing sweeter, more
interesting to Frederick--and the whole secret of her conduct seemed to
him to be in his hands.
Strangely different were poor Innocent’s thoughts. The thing she wanted
to do was to tell him of the one event she had never forgotten. “I
killed your wife;” these were the words that were constantly on her
lips, which in her forlorn honesty, poor child, she could not rest
without saying. Though the sense of guilt had never left her, her mind
had begun to accustom itself to the idea, horrible as it was. She began
to feel herself in a measure the innocent victim of fate, guilty without
intention. She had not meant it. Innocent’s mind grew by degrees capable
of taking in this thought, which was more complex than anything she had
ever embraced with her intelligence before; she had not meant it--and
yet she was guilty. She had reft another of sweet life, she had freed
Frederick from his wife. She felt uneasy with him until she had told
him, an impostor, approaching him under false pretences. Poor Innocent
was in a sad strait between him and his mother. If she told Frederick
the terrible secret, which stood like a ghost between them, Mrs.
Eastwood would be angry with her. This kept her back; and who could
doubt that he, too, would be “angry” when he knew what she had done? The
latter thought, however, was an inducement to make the disclosure, for
Innocent, in her simplicity, could not bear the thought of keeping the
secret, which might alienate her cousin from her, and yet accepting his
kindness while she did not deserve it. Thus her secret had driven her
out of the primitive region of sentiment in which her mind had hitherto
dwelt, into that sphere of mental and moral complication in which most
of us have our home. This it was that made her uneasy, embarrassed,
almost unhappy with Frederick. It may seem strange to the reader that
any additional weight was necessary to disturb the calm of an unhappy
girl who thought herself guilty of a murder. But Innocent was passive in
feeling, and imagination scarcely existed in her; and besides, I believe
that though fictitious miseries are often very terrible, a fictitious
guilt like this, though it may affect the mind as if it were real, can
scarcely weigh upon the conscience like an actual crime. It is difficult
to grope into such darkling corners of nature or to discriminate between
moral and intellectual impressions to a point so fine drawn. I do not
affirm this as a certainty, but I put it forth as an opinion. Innocent
believed that she had been guilty of a terrible crime, and yet she knew,
poor child, that she was not guilty. Her mind was oppressed by it, her
life clouded, all her peaceful, passive existence revolutionized; but
her conscience was not affected to a similar degree. Her consciousness
had entered upon an entirely new chapter since this terrible event.
Herself had become revealed to her by the light of it, and it was only
by this light that she could realize her own individual and independent
being; but she was not so unhappy as in the circumstances she ought to
have been. She was unhappy with Frederick because he did not know,
because he thought otherwise of her than as she deserved; but the
general course of her life, though weighed down by this strange new
consciousness, was not so unhappy as, according to all rules, it ought
to have been.
There came a moment, however, when the crisis of this doubtful
intercourse between Innocent and her cousin could not be put off
further. Mrs. Eastwood and Nelly were dining out, and Frederick had
benignly announced his intention of staying at home to take care of
Innocent. This benevolent proposal did not quite meet with the gratitude
it deserved. His mother immediately hesitated about her engagement,
wondered whether it was necessary that she should go, and betrayed a
general uneasiness, in which Nelly shared. Innocent took little notice,
but she did not look at him with soft grateful eyes as she once would
have done. He was piqued, and he was rendered obstinate by this mingled
indifference and opposition, and, as her engagement was one which Mrs.
Eastwood could not really give up, Frederick had his way. Innocent and
Dick and he dined together, and when Dick went off to his studies, as
was needful, the two, between whom, as poor Innocent felt, that ghost
stood, were left alone. It was winter by this time, and the drawing-room
at The Elms was very warm and homelike when the ruddy curtains were
drawn, the lamp lighted, and the room full of cheerful firelight.
Frederick placed his little cousin in the easiest chair; he drew his own
seat near her, and took the book he had been reading to her on the
previous evening. It was a soft domestic scene, full of tender brotherly
affection, kind and pious duty to that feeblest and gentlest of all the
kindred, the youngest, the child of the house. Frederick felt a wave of
warm and delightful feeling suffuse his heart. In some cases duty itself
is the most pleasant of all pastimes, and this was one of those cases.
How lovely that passive, dreamy face was as Innocent sat and listened!
She was not at work, as so many women think it necessary to be. She was
capable of doing absolutely nothing, sitting with her hands laid loosely
across each other in her lap, listening--or dreaming--what did it
matter? The book that Frederick read was a story of gentle and
unexciting interest, a soft and simple narrative, such as Innocent was
capable of following. He felt that it was good of him merely to read
such a book--a book not adapted to his manly intelligence, food for
babes; to have been seen with it in his hand was a kind of certificate
of moral character. He, who had so many memories in his life which were
far from being domestic or dutiful, felt in this tender moment such an
accession of character as was enough to cover a great many peccadillos.
And Frederick loved character as much, or even more, though not with so
warm a passion as he liked self-indulgence. How exquisite was the
sensation when for once in a way duty and self-indulgence went hand in
hand!
“Do you like it, Innocent?” he inquired, after a time, pausing to look
at her, and laying down his book.
“Yes,” said Innocent softly; but she did not look at him as she had been
wont.
“You do not care very much for books, though? Do you remember, Innocent,
in summer, the first summer you were here, when we used to walk about
the garden together? you are changed since that time. You liked me
better then than you do now.”
“I, Frederick? You were the only one I knew,” she said, with a startled
look, moving uneasily in her chair.
“And you know the others now as well as me--my mother, and Nelly, and
Jenny, and Dick, and we are all the same to you? Do you know, Innocent,
I liked the old way best?”
She made no answer; her hands twined and untwined themselves in her lap;
her soft cheek coloured; it was still pale enough, heaven knows--but the
faint tint that came upon it was a blush for her.
“I like the old way best,” he continued, taking one of her hands into
his. “Innocent, I have been very foolish, I have had a sad life of it
for the last year. We must not say anything about the cause; but I have
often been far from happy, and I never thought my little cousin would
change to me. I could have understood any change in the world sooner
than one in _you_.”
“I have not changed, Frederick.”
“Yes, dear, you have,” he said. “Once you liked nothing better than to
sit with me, to walk with me; now you are uneasy and anxious to get
away. Your hand is trying to escape from my hand; why should it? Do you
know, when you used to put it on my arm in the old days in the garden,
the soft little touch was always a comfort to me? Don’t you think I have
more need of comfort now? but you take your hand away, Innocent.”
“It is not for that--it is not for that!” she cried. “Oh, Frederick, I
must tell you now. My aunt will be angry, and perhaps you will be angry,
and never speak to me again; but I must tell you--now.”
“What is it, dear?” he said in his softest tones. “I shall not be
angry--nothing can make me angry with you.”
“Oh, Frederick, you don’t know--you never could imagine what I have to
tell you. Do not touch me. I am too bad--too terrible! I killed--your
wife.”
He looked at her with eyes of utter amazement, turning pale--not at this
strange intimation, which seemed madness to him--but at the sharp recall
to his real position, and the different ideas involved in it. Then he
smiled--a somewhat forced smile.
“My dear Innocent, this is the merest madness,” he said. “I partly
understand what you mean. You think it was your innocent presence that
drove poor Amanda into this last fit of passion. Put away the thought
from your mind, my poor darling--any one else--any trifling accident
would have done the same----”
Innocent kept her eyes fixed upon him, learning what he meant from his
face rather than from his words--the words themselves were not adapted
to penetrate into her mind. But from his face she knew that he was not
angry, that he did not understand--that he was soothing her, persuading
her that she was mistaken, as her aunt had done.
“It was not the passion--it was what I gave her from the bottle,” she
said, her voice falling very low--“her medicine to make her sleep; she
shook me--she snatched it from my hand; that killed her--and it was I
who did it. Now, now you understand!--and I know you will never speak to
me again.”
“Good God!” he cried, and rose to his feet in sudden blind misery and
bewilderment, driven wild for the moment by a horrible doubt, which
brought up before him in a second of time half-a-dozen scenes and
suggestions. He had seen Amanda live through so many paroxysms of
passion--why should she have died of that one? And Innocent had fled
like a hunted creature from the house; why had she fled? These
questions, that never occurred to him before, fell upon him now all at
once. He seemed to see again the darkened house, the sudden excitement
and horror falling into the ordinary stillness of night, the sudden
change from ordinary events and the usual tenor of existence to
death--confusion and trouble for the survivors; eternal silence for the
one who had been the most exuberant, the most violent in her vitality.
God in heaven! was the child mad and raving; or could this horrible
confession be true?
Innocent sat very still in her chair, looking at him with fixed eyes.
She had made her confession, and calm had returned to her. Her pale,
slender hands lay loosely clasped in her lap, relieved against the black
dress which she wore as mourning for Amanda. Her eyes were anxious,
following his every look and gesture, but perfect calm had fallen upon
her slight figure, her habitual attitude. Her secret was told, and all
her embarrassment and uneasiness gone. To look at her so, and to believe
that she was an actor in any such tragedy was impossible. Frederick was
overcome; his eyes filled with tears. He was surprised by an overflow of
feeling which he did not know how to restrain. He went to the back of
her chair and bent over her, putting down his hand upon hers.
“Innocent,” he cried, “you are dreaming, you are raving; it is
impossible, anything is possible but this.”
She lifted her face to him, searching into the expression of his with
her anxious eyes. “Oh, do not be angry,” she said, like a child that had
done some petty wrong.
The incongruity of the appeal, the words so foolishly simple, the look
so tragically anxious, had such an effect upon Frederick as nothing in
his life had ever had before. Was the murder of which she accused
herself no more to this child than the breaking of a piece of china, the
neglect of some trifling duty? God help them all! Wonder, horror, pity,
love, all complicated with the mystery of a doubt which could not be
shaken off, and a certainty which was above all doubt, distracted the
very soul of the man, who could no more understand Innocent than she
could understand him. He took her uplifted face in his hands and kissed
the forehead again and again. “Innocent, forget this madness,” he said,
“you make me wretched as well as yourself, for I love you--I love you
better than anything in the world.”
“Ah!” she cried, freeing herself and turning away; “but I cannot forget,
I can never forget. For I did it; I did not mean it, but I did it. Do
not be angry; but you must never say you love me again.”