Transcriber’s Note: Italic text is denoted by _underscores_.
THE WELLFIELDS.
A Novel.
BY
JESSIE FOTHERGILL,
AUTHOR OF ‘THE FIRST VIOLIN’ AND ‘PROBATION.’
IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. III.
[Illustration]
LONDON:
RICHARD BENTLEY AND SON,
Publishers in Ordinary to Her Majesty the Queen.
1880.
[_All Rights Reserved._]
[Illustration]
CONTENTS OF VOL. III.
STAGE IV.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. A REED SHAKEN IN THE WIND 1
II. A CONSUMMATION 16
III. CONSEQUENCES 36
IV. ‘WOO’D AND MARRIED, AND A’.’ 59
STAGE V.
I. SARA 76
II. ‘YES’ 89
III. IRREVOCABLE 113
IV. DOUBTS 125
V. MEIN GENÜGEN 145
VI. EINE REISE IN’S BLAUE 159
VII. WELLFIELD 185
VIII. JEROME 207
IX. A MYSTERY 220
X. CAUGHT 233
XI. GEFUNDEN 250
L’ENVOI 264
[Illustration]
THE WELLFIELDS.
STAGE IV.
CHAPTER I.
A REED SHAKEN IN THE WIND.
Wellfield’s position had not been altogether an enviable one, during
the last few months. In his letter to Sara, summoning Avice home, he
had casually mentioned having had money troubles, and this was true. He
had shortly before heard from Mr. Netley, that now that his father’s
affairs were finally wound up, nothing would remain to him save
three to four hundred pounds, then lying in the bank to his account,
representing at most some twenty pounds a year. With this delightful
information in his pocket he repaired one day to Burnham as usual, and
during the morning had an interview with Mr. Bolton, in which that
gentleman, all unconscious of what had happened, offered him the post
of foreign correspondent to his house, at a salary of two hundred a
year. He was surprised at the manner in which the proposition was
received. Wellfield started, and exclaimed,
‘Mr. Bolton–I–cannot thank you–you do not know what this is to me.’
With which, leaning his elbows on the table, he covered his face with
his hands. In truth, his emotion was almost overpowering; this event
appealed strongly to all the superstitious elements of his nature.
Here, when he had just been debating on his way to Burnham whether he
should not that very morning explain his circumstances to Mr. Bolton,
and then and there take his leave, leaving a message for Nita, and so
cut the Gordian knot which he spent hours daily in futilely attempting
to untie–now, at this very moment came the only man who could help
him, and proffered him such tangible assistance that, it seemed to
his nature, it would be madness to refuse it. A great strain had
been put upon his nerves lately. He had expected and feared the news
which he had that morning received, but he had waited for it as if
paralysed. Now, everything, gratitude, necessity, convenience, pointed
out to him that he must remain where he was. It was most improbable
that anywhere else he would receive so much money, or be able to find
work which he could do competently. Poor, weak and vacillating heart,
which recognised honour and truth when it saw them, but which was too
weak and vain to lay hold of them and keep them! Surely natures like
his are more to be pitied than any others when their time comes for
struggling and deciding–the natures which can see the right, but which
_never_ perform it, if the wrong offers an easier task at the moment.
Mr. Bolton was naturally surprised. ‘Why, Wellfield,’ he asked, ‘what
ails you?’
Jerome lifted his face from his hands, pale and worn, and took the
letter from his pocket.
‘If you read that, you will understand what I must feel on receiving
your offer,’ he remarked.
‘Ah, indeed! I _do_ see,’ said Mr. Bolton, when he had finished it.
‘Yes–well, you need not fret so much about that now. Things don’t look
so bad. You have this salary coming in, and something to start with as
well.’
‘Yes–it is the feeling of relief, after all this strain which overcame
me for the moment,’ he answered; and added, earnestly, ‘Believe me,
Mr. Bolton, I shall never cease to be grateful for the goodness I have
received from you and yours, all this time–I, of all others!’
He spoke as he felt, and the remembrance of Nita’s goodness, and all
that it implied–of the miserable entanglement in the back ground,
out of which he could in no way emerge with honour, let the affair
terminate as it might–all this brought a mist before his eyes, and a
lump into his throat.
‘Pooh!’ said Mr. Bolton, ‘never talk of that. We are not barbarians, to
turn a stranger from our doors.’
Jerome went back to Wellfield that afternoon, firmly resolved to
write to Sara Ford, and ask her to set him free. When it came to the
point, he ‘could’ not do it. He could picture only too vividly what
such a letter would mean to her. It was Saturday afternoon. He would
wait until to-morrow, when he would go up to Brentwood to the morning
service, and would see Somerville and consult with him. Perhaps he
might even tell him the whole truth. He did not know. He went often
to the services at Brentwood now. They soothed him, and he found a
satisfaction in going there. Indeed, when one reflects upon the fact
that there are many natures partaking of the characteristics of his,
one sees how to these natures some form of religion, of an infallible
institution outside themselves, and yet within their reach, is an
absolute necessity; and one begins to perceive more clearly why
agnosticism has never been popular.
Wellfield could never have been an agnostic. He and such as he have
not the mental and moral toughness of fibre which enables a man to
contemplate the mystery of the heavens above and the earth beneath; of
the life and the death, and the pain and the evil that are upon the
earth, of his own feelings and speculations, and their origin, and the
purpose and destiny of them–and then, while reverently owning ‘I know
nothing, and I will assert nothing, upon these things,’ has yet the
courage to live up to an ethical code as high, as pure, and as stern as
that of St. John or of Christ–expecting nothing from a life to come,
as to the existence of which he is in absolute ignorance. The more part
of mankind want none of this; they want a religion, a thing that will
let them sin, and prescribe to them how they must get forgiven. Such
a religion was found in perfection at Brentwood, and thither Jerome
repaired.
There was an unusually splendid service that morning. A great
dignitary–a cardinal–preached. The sermon set forth eloquently
the rewards of faith and obedience. He assumed that all present had
overcome the initiatory difficulties, that they were all entirely
faithful and entirely obedient; and then he proceeded to depict their
happiness even here upon earth, not to mention the joys which awaited
them in heaven.
Wellfield listened; he saw others listening: a haughty-looking woman
in widow’s weeds, just on the other side of the aisle. She was Mrs.
Latheby of Latheby, whose only son was being educated at Brentwood. He
knew her well by sight; her pride and reserve were proverbial. Yet she
wiped tears from her eyes as she listened to the sermon. There was a
profound silence–a silence full of suppressed emotion, as the sermon
progressed. Faith and obedience; nothing to do but submit that private
judgment which is usually so ill-trained, and which invariably causes
such trouble, and _ye shall have rest unto your souls_.
That was the burden of the discourse–that was what echoed with so
seductive a sound in Wellfield’s ears.
After the service he saw Somerville; he was presented to Mrs. Latheby,
who remembered his mother, and told him so; adding with the regretful
smile which lent such pathos and sweetness to her proud and still
beautiful face:
‘Ah, Mr. Wellfield, if that beautiful mother of yours had been here
to-day, how happy she would have been in what she had heard ... and it
gives me a melancholy pleasure to think that had she lived to bring you
up, you might have been standing here, one of us, not a looker-on, out
in the cold.’
‘You are far too good, madam, to think of me at all,’ he replied, moved
somewhat by her words, and yet under the influence of the emotion which
the cardinal’s word-picture had aroused.
‘I must ever take an interest in the only son of Annunciata Wellfield,’
she answered; ‘and I want you to come and see me–will you?’
‘I shall only be too honoured.’
‘Then I shall write this week, and appoint a day for you and Mr.
Somerville to dine at Latheby–if you can come, father.’
‘I shall no doubt be able to come,’ replied Somerville.
Mrs. Latheby waited in the parlour to have an interview with his
Eminence. Somerville walked with Wellfield along the lane towards his
home. Wellfield told him what had happened.
‘I am superstitious, I suppose, according to your notions,’ said
Somerville, ‘and I call it a sign.’
‘I do not call it superstition,’ stammered Wellfield. ‘I have myself
been thinking to-day that–that—’
‘That you ought to follow my advice, and ask for Miss Bolton’s hand,’
was the firm, decided reply.
‘If it were not for this miserable business in the background——’
‘It is your duty to tell the truth to one lady, or to get some one to
do it for you,’ said Somerville, in a smooth, even voice, which yet cut
his hearer like a whip. He winced.
‘If you mean to stay here, you ought at least in duty and honour either
to propose to Miss Bolton, or to tell her that you are bound to another
woman.’
‘Do you suppose I don’t know that?’ retorted Wellfield, almost
fiercely. ‘Have I not been debating within myself until I am almost
mad, how to tell her.’
‘You are nervous, perhaps. Would you like me to do it for you?’
‘You–heaven forbid!’ he exclaimed passionately. ‘That would be to
ruin–I mean, I must think about it again. I will decide to-morrow.’
‘As you are taking the matter into consideration,’ observed Somerville,
with scarcely disguised insolence, ‘I would really strongly advise you
to reflect whether it would not be in every way more advisable to tell
the other lady that you wish to be free.’
‘Do you wish to insult me?’ asked Wellfield, pale with passion.
‘To insult you! I am simply trying to advise you for the best.
Remember, you are now dependent upon this post of Mr. Bolton’s. If you,
or anyone else, lets Miss Bolton know that you are engaged elsewhere,
it might be bad for your prospects. Girls who have an idea–however
mistaken–that their feelings have been trifled with, are apt to be
vindictive.’
There was a palpable sneer beneath the even politeness of his tone. He
had taken out the whip–the whip which Wellfield’s own pleasant sins
had knotted into a cord, and which his own weakness and vacillation had
put into the other’s hand. The very first stroke had drawn blood. With
a chest heaving convulsively, and a glitter in his eyes of anything but
agreeable import, Wellfield clenched his hands behind him, and said,
composing himself with an effort rendered efficacious by dire necessity.
‘I see what you mean, but I must think about it.’
‘Yes, do,’ retorted his monitor, with a smile. ‘And I must return, or I
shall receive a reprimand. Good-morning. I will stroll down to Monk’s
Gate to-morrow evening. Shall I find you in?’
‘I expect so,’ said Wellfield, sullenly.
They parted. Somerville smiled as he took his way towards Brentwood.
‘He will come back,’ he thought. ‘He has gone too far. He cannot do
without me ... and he is half won. Mrs. Latheby must flatter him, as
she _can_ flatter for us and for her Church. He will come. I see him
coming. And when he is married to Miss Bolton, of course she must learn
the truth, or they might live in such harmony that my game would be
spoiled.’
Somerville called early on the following evening, and it was during
this visit that the arrangements were made for Avice’s return. Jerome
was thankful for the suggestion. He dared not go to fetch her himself.
He dared not face Sara. But one side of his character–his pride,
we must call it, for want of a better name–the pride which did not
prevent him from making love to one woman while solemnly engaged to
another, pricked him sorely at the idea that Avice was receiving Sara’s
kindness and living under her care. He did not know how he was to
explain it, nor did he much care. He was getting callous, and reckless,
and anxious only to find a way out of the coil. Somerville had received
his orders suddenly, and was to set out almost immediately. Perhaps
the visit of his Eminence had something to do with the matter. He
had had a long conversation with Father Somerville, and had bestowed
his blessing upon him before parting. Jerome accordingly wrote that
letter to Sara, and on the following morning Somerville set out on his
travels.
[Illustration]
CHAPTER II.
A CONSUMMATION.
One afternoon, on returning from Burnham, Jerome found a letter
awaiting him. It was that which Somerville had written from Elberthal,
and it set Wellfield’s heart on fire. Somerville in his calculations
had not forgotten to reckon among the possible effects of his
communication that one which might lead Jerome to rush back again to
Sara’s feet, shocked into honesty by the fear of losing her. But the
priest had decided again, ‘No; he will remember that if he leaves Mr.
Bolton he leaves all his subsistence; that his sister is on her way
home, and he has nowhere to place her; and above all, that he cannot
present himself to Miss Ford in the character of injured innocence,
considering the manner in which he has been conducting himself.
Besides, it will be so much easier for him to stay where he is and
propose to Miss Bolton.’
Whether by chance, or in consequence of extreme and almost superhuman
cleverness, Somerville had managed to calculate with mathematical
correctness. Wellfield’s first impulse, on reading the letter, was to
rush off then and there in all haste, and never to pause until he had
found Sara, and clasped her in his arms, looked into her eyes, received
the assurance of her love. Then, across this fever of impatience came
the thought, creeping chilly:
‘When she turns and asks you to explain your late treatment of her,
what are you to say?’
He knew she might love with an utter abandonment of self; but should
she once suspect falsehood, it would all have to be disproved, all made
clear and clean, before she would touch his hand and speak tenderly
again. And it was too hard, too cruel. Avice was on her way home.
Sooner or later Sara would learn something of what had transpired
here, at Wellfield... What was all this talk about her favouring some
other man? Again the impulse was strong, if not to go to her, to seize
pen and paper, and ask what it all meant. And again came the cruel,
sudden check. She would have a perfect right to retort with a similar
question–to ask him what his conduct meant–to demand a reason for his
late ambiguous treatment of her. He might not write. He buried his face
in his hands and groaned. What was he to do? His counsellor was away.
For the first time he realised, by the intensity of his wish to see
him, what a hold Somerville had gained upon his mind.
It was a dreary, gusty November evening. Round the solid walls of the
old house of Monk’s Gate, the wind wuthered sadly and fitfully; the
deep-set lattices did not shake–one only heard the sound of the wind.
No passing vehicles disturbed the ear. The quiet country road was
profoundly still.
No one came to relieve his solitude, or to divert his mind from its
miserable debate with his conscience. He sat there perfectly alone,
until at last he could bear it no longer. He would go to the Abbey, and
join them there. There would be cheerful voices, honest faces; words to
listen to–not this hideous silence, broken only by the dismal sighing
of the wind about the roofs, and in the trees.
He snatched up his hat, opened the door, and sallied forth into the
night. The Abbey gate was close at hand. Soon he was within that dark
portal, beneath the now leafless avenue which shaded the river walk;
he could hear the swollen stream rushing noisily along. He saw a light
in the drawing-room windows, and, with an effort, he gathered himself
together, so as to appear composed and collected, for they would not
understand his disturbance, and the fear lest by betraying it he should
‘appear unto men a fool’ was sufficient to give him outward calm.
Of course, when the servant opened the door, Wellfield asked for Miss
Bolton, and was told she was in. But he was in the habit now of going
unannounced into the drawing-room. The page knew it, and retired.
Jerome hung up his hat, took his way to the drawing-room door, and with
a brief preliminary knock, entered.
A large fire was burning in the ample grate, but no lamps were lighted.
No one was in the room, either, except Nita, who was kneeling upon a
tiger-skin, straight in front of the fire–her dog Speedwell by her
side. Her hands were clasped before her; her eyes wide open, and her
cheeks, with them, exposed to the full fierceness of the glowing fire.
But she heard him come: heard his footstep, and started up–a deeper
blush mantling through the red which the heat of the fire had called
forth.
Jerome came slowly up to her, and stooped over her, and the firelight
shone into his eyes, and showed the hollows in his pale cheek.
‘Are you quite alone?’ he asked, and there was no surprise in his
accent, for it had flashed upon his mind, as he came in and found her
by herself, that perhaps this too was a ‘sign,’ as Somerville had
called it.
‘Yes,’ replied Nita, rising to her feet. ‘Papa has gone up to Abbot’s
Knoll, to see John: it is a wonder for him to be out, as you know. I
don’t know what plots they are concocting, I’m sure. John is perfectly
mad about some bird–a reed-warbler, he calls it–which he vows he
has found by the river here, and he is going to overthrow some great
authority, who says they are never found so far north.’
‘And Miss Shuttleworth?’ asked Wellfield, unconsciously acting on his
secret desire to know the coast clear.
‘Aunt Margaret has got a tea-party of school-teachers. She always has
one about this time. Did you want to see papa?’
‘I am afraid I don’t quite know what I want,’ he answered, with a great
sigh of exceeding weariness, as he rested his elbow on the mantelpiece,
and looked at her with his sombre, mournful eyes. ‘I don’t think I do
want to see your father–at least, I felt very glad when I saw you
alone. I think I want to escape from myself and my thoughts, Nita.’
‘Why, do your thoughts trouble you?’ she asked, softly and timidly.
‘Sometimes they do, very much–to-night particularly. Will you let me
sit with you a little while, or must I go back again to Monk’s Gate and
solitude?’
‘Oh, Mr. Wellfield, you know that you are always welcome here, when it
pleases you to come!’
‘That is a good hearing,’ he answered, and such was the odd mixture
of the man’s nature, he felt that it was good. He felt that from Nita
he would receive no blows or buffets, or rough words–nothing but
(metaphorically speaking) tenderest caresses and softest whispers. To
go back to solitude, and the harsh accusations of conscience, and the
disagreeable anticipations for the future, was not in him; so he stayed.
‘Do you never feel restless?’ he went on. ‘Do you never feel as if you
would like to set off on some indefinite journey, and without knowing
where you were going–with a sort of “onwards–but whither?” feeling,
that you would just like to go on and on, and for ever on, till life
itself came to a stop? Have you never felt it?’
‘Yes, often,’ said Nita, in a low voice. She was standing opposite
to him, on the other side of the fireplace. Her hands–soft, pretty,
little white hands–were folded lightly one over the other. Jerome,
in his idle sentimentalising, had time to notice that she had on very
pretty black-lace mittens, and that the stones of some rings sparkled
through them; that a gold bracelet was pushed tightly up the rounded
arm. He scarcely observed her averted face–her eyes looking into the
fire; her rapidly-heaving bosom; and he prosed on, because he liked
talking to her–because it was easy to make himself out sad, and
blighted and persecuted.
‘I felt sure you had,’ he said. ‘That is what I feel to-night. But for
your father’s goodness to me–but for the stern mandate of reason and
necessity and common sense, I would set off now, this moment; and
leave Wellfield, never to return to it.’
He had spoken this time without rhyme or reason; without any _arrière
pensée_–any calculation as to the effect his words might have upon
her; and when he saw what it was, even he was startled.
‘Leave Wellfield! Go away!’ she exclaimed, turning suddenly pallid.
‘What makes you say such a thing?’
‘Should you care much if I did?’ he asked recklessly and ruthlessly.
‘Would it–can I believe it would make any difference to you?’
He was standing before her, looking, as the girl in her sad
infatuation thought, so noble, so calm, so undaunted, after all his
misfortunes–undisturbed–only sad and a little despondent after his
reverses–more of a hero than ever. Ah! if she might only tell him what
she felt and wished! But at the moment something held her back; she
could not say all–could not speak the words her heart was breaking to
utter. She drew a long breath, and said:
‘You–it would make me very sad if you went away, for then I should
feel more than ever what interlopers we must seem to you. I should
feel that we had driven you out from your old home. And you speak of
papa’s goodness–but is it goodness? I don’t call it the work for
you–drudging in an office in that way, like some common clerk. I
should think after a time it would drive you almost mad.’
‘Oh no! It is only the getting into harness that is such hard work–the
learning how to become a machine. I fancy when that is accomplished,
and the routine mastered, one can go on easily enough–almost
unconsciously. I shall get used to it sometime. Meanwhile, I am
thankful to be so well off.’
‘You are not thankful to be well off when you know you are very ill
off,’ said Nita, with agitation. ‘And you will never get used to it.
If you could you would not be what you are–it would not all be so
horrible.... Oh, I wish the Abbey–I wish the money were mine, that I
might ask you to take it as your _right_–your inheritance! But I can
do nothing, nothing; I am powerless, helpless, and I believe it will
kill me!’
She turned away and threw herself upon a couch, burying her face
in the cushions, and trying to stifle her sobs. For, with a great,
overwhelming rush, the conviction had come to her of what she had
really said–a sense of intolerable shame, an agony of humiliation was
torturing her.
For one moment Wellfield gazed at her, at the prostrate form and
heaving shoulders, convulsed with sobs. Then he made a step to the
sofa, and knelt down beside her.
‘Nita!’ he whispered, ‘dear Nita! Look up! I want to speak to you.’
But she would not raise her face, exclaiming in a broken, stifled voice:
‘No, no! don’t ask me! I cannot look at you. I can never look at you
again. Oh, leave me! Mr. Wellfield–Jerome! for the love of heaven
leave me, or I shall die–I shall _die_ of shame!’
‘You shall not die of shame,’ he said, in the same low, persuasive
voice. ‘Nita, you shall look at me, my good angel, and hear what I have
to say to you.’
With gentle but irresistible force he drew her hands away, and lifted
her head, and made her look at him, and in that moment he had, perhaps,
forgotten the existence of Sara Ford.
‘Why do you speak of shame, Nita?’ he asked, looking tenderly into her
piteous face. ‘What shame can there possibly be in giving way to such
a generous impulse, and in showing a lonely, fallen man that there is
one sweet woman left who cares for him, and would make him happy if
she might? Heaven bless you, dear, for such goodness. But you know–you
must know, why I cannot take you in my arms and say, “I accept that
goodness, and offer you my life’s devotion in return for it.” You know
it would be the basest conduct on my part towards your father, who has
treated me with unheard-of goodness. I know he wishes you to marry, and
I know he would consider it the height of presumption in _me_ to ask
for you.’
‘Oh, don’t speak of such things–of marriage and such horrors!’ she
almost moaned, struggling to free her hands; but he went on:
‘No, I must face my future as best I may, and it will be with
the better cheer from the knowledge that goodness such as yours
exists–goodness which I worship and honour all the more in that you
have made it known to me.’
‘Oh, don’t! don’t speak of it! I cannot bear it!’ she cried, wrenching
her hands away, and again covering her face from his sight. She felt
as if she were in some strange, delirious dream. Wellfield’s looks and
tones thrilled through every nerve. Did he love her? Did he mean that
if he dared, he would tell her so? She knew not what to think. She only
knew that _he knew_, and that say or do what she might, she could never
undo the fact that she had betrayed herself; and that the one thing
which would have made it all right–would have made the difference
between a nightmare and a vision of Paradise–the knowledge that he
loved her–was wanting. Yes, despite his caressing tones, his eloquent
eyes, his tender words, she did not understand that he loved her.
‘Do not be so distressed,’ he said. ‘I will never speak of it again, if
you desire me to be silent. I will forget it–anything–only, dear, do
not be so unhappy!’
‘I hear them coming,’ said Nita, her ear preternaturally quick. ‘I hear
their voices. I cannot see them–they must not see me. Tell them–tell
them I am ill–for I am–and–let me go!’
‘Yes–stop one moment, Nita!’ he answered, clasping his arm round her
waist, as she was darting past him.
‘Let me go!’ she breathed again, but her voice died away as his lips
met hers–once and again, and he said, in a low, passionate voice:
‘There! We have that, whatever may happen in the future. Nita–_my_
Nita!’
He loosed his arm, and she had flashed past him, and out of the room,
in a second.
Jerome was left standing on the rug, feeling, he too, as if he had just
gone through some mad fit of delirium. What had hurried him on to that
act of a moment ago? He stood with bated breath, and eyebrows drawn
together–then breathing again, a long, nervous breath, he muttered:
‘By G–, I am a villain!’
And in the moment that ensued between this confession of conscience,
and the entrance of the others, he had time too to realise that one
cannot be a villain one moment, and have done with the villainy and its
effects in the next instant. One woman’s heart, at least, must go near
to break, in punishment for his sin of this night–or rather, for this
night’s consummation of his sin. It lay with him to decide which woman
must suffer–Nita, who was here, close by, and whose agonies he must
watch; or Sara Ford, away in Elberthal, and alone, now–and whom he
would not be able to see, let her have what she might to endure–Sara,
who had loved him all along–who loved him still, as he knew, and would
have known, had fifty letters come to tell him how devoted she and
Rudolf Falkenberg were, the one to the other. Which woman was to have
the blow from his cowardly hand?
An ugly problem; one which would require answering very soon–but not
to-night. It might be delayed till to-morrow.
He felt a sense of relief at this, as Mr. Bolton and John Leyburn came
in, and they began to ask him why he was alone, and what had become of
Nita.
The three men supped alone that night. When John Leyburn was departing,
and Wellfield was about to go with him, Mr. Bolton stopped him, saying
he wanted to speak to him. Jerome, still thankful to have excuses
which delayed his home-going, remained willingly. One other surprise
was in store for him that night. Mr. Bolton, in his usual stilted and
pedantic, but most distinct and unequivocal style, informed him that
he had that evening been taking counsel with John Leyburn, as his most
trusted friend, upon several important matters. That in the main John
agreed with him, and that he wished to lose no time in telling him,
Jerome Wellfield, that, after profound consideration, he had come to
the conclusion that it would be for his own pleasure and his daughter’s
happiness if a marriage between her and him–Wellfield–could be
concluded.
‘If you feel warranted, by your feelings towards her, in proposing
to her, you have my permission to do so. If not–you will excuse my
speaking plainly–your visits here will have to cease, for I do not
wish her happiness to be imperilled.’
Wellfield passed his hand over his eyes: he was almost stunned. At that
moment things stood out clearly, and, so it seemed to him, the right
bearings of them. To think of ever marrying Sara now was hopeless.
Love must be cast aside, and duty embraced instead. He was perhaps
not conscious that he was elaborately and ingeniously evading and
concealing the truth, when he said:
‘But for feeling sure that I should displease you exceedingly, and that
it would be an ill return for your benefits, for a penniless fellow
like myself to speak to her, I should have proposed to her to-night.’
Mr. Bolton’s face brightened.
‘Ah!’ he said, ‘I knew there was a liking on both sides. That makes it
smooth. Propose to her to-morrow morning, instead of to-night. You will
have her to yourself, for I shall be in town.’
They shook hands, but Wellfield’s eyes did not meet those of Mr. Bolton
as he went through the ceremony. He went away. Then it was upon that
proud head of Sara Ford that the stroke was to fall, and he was the
miserable wretch whose hand was to deal it.
[Illustration]
CHAPTER III.
CONSEQUENCES.
Wellfield, at last left alone to ponder upon his position, felt himself
in thoroughly evil case. Once or twice a wonder crossed his mind as to
whether there were yet time to turn back, retrace his steps along this
dire and darksome path; fight his way back to the light, and to Sara
Ford; confess everything, and put himself and his fate in her hands.
He had a longing to do it, but when he reflected what that course
involved, he had not the courage. It was to lose every assured present
advantage for a problematical one; for he could not–at least he said
so to himself–be sure that Sara would forgive; and if she did not——
He followed Mr. Bolton’s advice, and it struck him once or twice that
it was an unusual thing for a man in Mr. Bolton’s position to have
deliberately invited a ruined man like himself, without friends and
without references, to marry his only daughter, and enter his family.
Perhaps, had he heard Mr. Bolton’s confidential conversation of the
night before with John Leyburn, he might have felt the distinction less
flattering. John and Mr. Bolton had agreed that a great change had come
over Nita, and both of them, though they did not openly speak it out,
and confess it, owned tacitly that they considered that change had been
brought about by her feelings for Jerome Wellfield. And Mr. Bolton had
said:
‘He’ll never be any great shakes as a man of business, but it seems to
me that it is safe enough to put the management of his own–what used
to be his own–place into his hands. He will have every inducement to
care for it. And if it will make Nita happy, why should I refuse her
that happiness simply because the man has no money? He is steady and
honest, that seems certain. I’ve taken the trouble and the precaution
to find out all about his college career, and his habits there. It’s
all quite satisfactory–less backbone than I could have wished in my
girl’s husband, but no vice; music and painting and æsthetics–Nita
likes that sort of thing. Do you think I am a great fool?’
‘I think you are behaving in a very natural and very sensible manner,’
said John. ‘He seems to me to be all you say; and if he only makes Nita
happy, what more is needed?’
‘Exactly what I think,’ said Mr. Bolton. ‘Now, leave your books and
come and have supper with us. We haven’t seen as much of you as we
ought to have done.’
John shut up the great folio book on ornithology which he had been
studying when Mr. Bolton arrived, and picked up some water-colour
drawings of different wild birds which lay beside the book. They were
exquisitely finished, and, as one could see, copied by a faithful and
loving hand, from nature.
‘I promised these things to Nita,’ he casually observed. ‘Perhaps she
won’t care much about them now. But I will take them, at any rate.’
Mr. Bolton picked them up and looked at them.
‘They are very nice,’ he observed. ‘I wish some other people had such
innocent tastes and habits, and would confine their studies to natural
objects like these.’
John laughed, a little sarcastically, as he put away his book, and
taking the sketches in his hand announced that he was ready.
‘When Nita is married–or if she marries, Jack, you’ll have to look out
for a wife yourself,’ observed Mr. Bolton.
‘Perhaps Nita will look out for some one, then, and do the courting
for me,’ said John, drily. ‘I have no mind to begin it on my own
account–and am not likely to find favour if I did.’
‘There you talk rubbish, despite that sage head of yours,’ replied his
elderly friend. ‘Suppose you delegate the choice to my cousin; she has
a wonderfully good opinion of you.’
John laughed aloud. ‘If her opinion of me is so high, it might be a
dangerous thing to confide the choice to her,’ he remarked.
‘She might take a fancy to Abbot’s Knoll, and the master of it!’
exclaimed Mr. Bolton, highly delighted. ‘There is no accounting for the
presumptuous fancies which enter a young man’s head. Here we are!’
They had gone in, little suspecting the scene which was even then
coming to an end, and the rest of the evening had been passed as has
been related.
Jerome naturally knew nothing of all this conversation. He went to the
Abbey the following morning, and there was an unpleasantly-suggestive
rhyme running in his head as he took his way there–that rhyme which
gives the excellent advice:
‘Be sure you’re well off with the old love
Before you are on with the new.’
He found Nita at home, and alone–startled and surprised to see him;
overwhelmed with confusion as the sight of him recalled the scene of
last night.
Muttering some incoherent words she would have made her escape, but
Jerome stopped her, and taking her hands, looked into her face with an
expression of such intense gravity, even severity, that she gazed up at
him spell-bound and fascinated.
‘Did your father say anything to you this morning about me?’ he asked.
‘No,’ whispered Nita. ‘Why–what–he has not told you to go away–oh,
he has not told you that?’
‘No. We were talking about you last night, Nita, and he told me this,
that if you would marry me, I might stay; but if not, _then_ I was to
go. What do you say? May I stay? Will you let me try to make you happy,
or must I go?’
Nita was nerveless, cold, and trembling–perhaps never in her life had
she felt so unhappy as in this moment–which should have been the one
of supreme delight–when the man she loved with all her soul asked her
to be his wife.
‘Jerome–I–do you mean that you wish this?’ she asked, desperately
plunging into the question.
‘I mean that I wish it more than anything in the world; and listen,
Nita–I would not conceal this from you–that I have loved, and loved
deeply, before ever I knew you: but that is all over, gone, done with,
finished! I cannot offer you all the passion of a first strong love,
but I can offer you my life’s devotion, if you will be so good, so
wonderfully good, as to take it.’
He saw the blank shade that came over her face: he believed that she
was going to summon up her strength of will to refuse him. If she did,
what was left to him–what in this world to make life worth an hour’s
living?
‘Nita!’ he pleaded, in dire and dreadful earnest; ‘for God’s sake think
before you speak! Do not cast me away! Try to bear with me–or–or–I
shall be the most miserable wretch that ever lived!’
There was passion–there was even anguish in his tone–emotions which
Nita read there, and which overpowered her. All her love, all her
self-abnegation rushed out to meet him:
‘Oh, Jerome, if you care for my love–if it will give you one hour’s
comfort–it is yours, it is yours! And my whole life with it–for I
love you better than you can ever know.’
‘Better than I can ever deserve, try as I may,’ he murmured, in the
deep tone of conviction, as he folded her in his arms, and soothed the
passionate agitation which shook her–and tried to quench the tears
which rushed from her eyes–tears which none could have named with
certainty as being of joy or of grief.
But the die was cast: the bargain was struck. He might return to his
home with a mind free of care for the future; but with all the diviner
elements in his nature degraded, soiled, maimed, for they had been
dragged through the dust, and grievously maltreated.
Avice and her escorts arrived late that afternoon, and he met them, and
they went with him to his house. That is, Avice and Ellen went with
him–Somerville returned to Brentwood.
Avice felt a chill dismay strike her heart, at her brother’s reception
of her. There was an absence, a constraint, a coldness in all his
words and movements, which would not be removed. She expressed her
delight at the sight of her new home, and he absently replied that
it was very well, but rather dreary. She felt very soon that some
miserable explanation was to come. It came almost directly. They
had got into the house, and Avice had taken off her things, and was
somewhat languidly partaking of the meal which had been placed before
her. Suddenly she said:
‘Jerome, you have never once asked after Sara.’
She saw his face suddenly turn pale, and his lips set. The hand which
had been lying on the table, trifling with a paper-knife, closed upon
that knife quickly and firmly: he raised his eyes to his sister’s face,
and said coldly:
‘Miss Ford–how is she?’
‘Miss Ford!’ ejaculated the young girl, horror-struck. ‘Jerome! what
has happened? You speak as if she was nothing to you.’
‘Nor is she anything to me now,’ he answered, with that cold and
pitiless cruelty, unbending and unremorseful, which so often appears
in weak natures when they are driven to choose between themselves and
another–when the moment comes in which egoistic or altruistic feelings
can no longer be evenly balanced–in which one set must prevail over
the other.
‘Sara–nothing to you! I–I do not understand,’ she stammered, with a
sickening sensation of fear and bewilderment.
‘I will explain,’ he said, with the same cold glitter in his eyes, his
lips drawn to the same thin line–a look she had never seen him wear
before, and which sent her heart leaping to her throat.
‘For heaven’s sake, Jerome, do not look at me in that manner!’ she
cried. ‘It is just–just as papa used to look when he thought some one
wanted punishing.’
‘Do not interrupt with such vague, foolish nonsense,’ he replied
impatiently. ‘I am going to write to Miss Ford to-night, to set her
free from her engagement to me. And I–wish to be free from her. I am
going to marry some one else.’
Avice had pushed back her chair, and sat looking wildly at him; her
hands clenched tightly; her breath coming quickly, but unable to speak
a word.
‘It is as well you should understand this,’ he said, again beginning to
balance the paper-knife. ‘To-night you will want to rest, I suppose,
but afterwards you will have to meet the lady I speak of; and it
is to be hoped you will conduct yourself with more composure, more
self-respect, in fact, than you display at present.’
Then Avice found words.
‘Do you imagine that I will be false just because it pleases you to
be so!’ she exclaimed. ‘If you choose to behave like a coward and a
liar–yes, a coward and a liar,’ she repeated, looking full into his
eyes with an unblenching scorn that scorched him, ‘and that to the
noblest woman that ever lived, _I_ am neither a coward nor a liar. I
will have nothing to do with this girl you are going to marry. You have
brought me home, and you can make me miserable, I suppose. And you can
make me see her, I dare say; but you can never make me like her, or
behave as if I liked her, or as if I wished her to be my sister. And I
never will. You may take my word for it. I stand by Sara Ford to the
last, if I had to die for it.’
She spoke with vehement passion, and looked transformed. She spoke too
like a woman, not like a child any more. And yet she was but a child,
and a helpless one. He answered composedly:
‘It is as well that you have shown me by this specimen how you intend
to behave. I will give you till to-morrow morning to reflect upon your
position. Allow me to remind you that I never asked you to behave to
Miss Bolton as if you liked her. It will be perfectly immaterial to her
how you behave. But I want civility from you towards my future wife,
or, if you choose to withhold it, I shall have to exert my authority as
your guardian, and remove you–in other words, my dear little girl, I
have no wish to make your life uncomfortable, but unless you can obey
me without making scenes like this, I shall send you to school.’
Now ‘school’ had been the horror, and the bugbear, and the _bête
noire_ of Miss Wellfield’s life from her earliest childhood. She had
often been threatened with it; and seldom had the threat failed to
work its soothing spell. On hearing Jerome’s words now–on seeing the
cool unrelenting expression in his eyes, and the slight sarcastic
smile upon his lips, and recognising the absolute power he held
over her destiny–how easily he could make her miserable, if not so
easily happy; remembering that Sara was far away, and that under the
circumstances she might never see that dear friend again; remembering
that she had never seen this Miss Bolton, who might be quite ignorant
of all that had happened–remembering, in short, her own helplessness
and desolation, she burst into a passion of tears, of hopeless,
agonised weeping, exclaiming now and then:
‘What a home-coming! Oh, what a dreadful coming home!’
Jerome let her cry in the corner of the settee, and took no notice
of her; till about seven o’clock he rose from his chair, went to
her and put his hand upon her shoulder. She looked up, her face all
tear-stained and pitiful; her golden hair tumbled about her head.
‘I am going to the Abbey, and shall not be in till after ten o’clock,’
he said. ‘Am I to tell Miss Bolton that I may take you to see her
to-morrow, or not?’
‘I don’t know,’ replied Avice, hopelessly.
‘Ah, you will know by to-morrow. I shall tell her that I intend to
bring you. Good-evening. I should advise you to go to bed before long.’
But she did not go to bed. She sat in a stupor of grief and
bewilderment. While she had been crying, Jerome had written a letter.
Her passion had irritated him, and he had allowed his irritation to
influence his words to Sara. He had ‘set her free’ (no need to put such
a pitiful document into print–it was feeble and despicable, illogical,
and yet stabbing like a dagger, as such productions–the efforts of
selfishness to kick down the ladder by which it has risen–always
must be). ‘He would not stand in her way, he who had nothing to offer
her–no faintest prospect of a home, or of anything worthy to give
her.’ In short, under the pretence of consulting her interests, Jerome
Wellfield very decidedly asked Sara Ford to dismiss him, to release him
from his bond.
Avice, of course, knew nothing of this. She only knew that she had come
home to find everything miserable, to find an impostor in the brother
to whom she had given the whole worship of her youthful heart. And yet,
was he an impostor, or was he not rather a very wicked, dark, bad man,
like some Byronic hero?
She sat in the corner of the settee, darkly brooding, when some one
tapped quickly at the front-door; and then she heard it open, and a
man’s step in the little porch. Some one entered, saying in a slow,
lazy voice:
‘I say, Wellfield, I thought I’d call to wish—— Oh, I beg your
pardon!’ followed in a more animated accent.
Avice looked at the speaker, and saw a tall, clumsy-looking young man
peering at her, rather than looking, from a pair of short-sighted
brown eyes. On his homely, square-cut face there was an expression of
some embarrassment, not partaken of in the least by Miss Wellfield.
She rose, made a gracious bow, mentally casting a reflection of some
dismay upon her probably dishevelled appearance, and said, with
self-possession:
‘My brother has gone to the Abbey.’
To herself she was thinking, ‘What a great, queer, awkward-looking
creature. Surely _he_ can’t belong to one of those “fossilised Roman
Catholic families” whom Jerome told me about, as being the only
aborigines fit to visit.’
‘Oh! I saw the light in the window, and supposed he was in. I did not
know you had arrived.’
‘Do you want to see him particularly?’
‘Oh, another time will do, I suppose. He has just got engaged to my
cousin and my greatest friend, and I came to wish him joy.’
A pause. Then Avice said:
‘Miss Bolton is your cousin. Then of course you know her?’
‘I have known her since she was a baby.’
‘Then you must be Mr. Leyburn, I am sure. Jerome often used to speak of
you in his letters.’
‘Yes, that is my name,’ said John, unable to take his eyes from the
figure before him, with her lovely flushed face, ruffled golden hair,
and violet eyes at once bright with recent tears and dark and tired
with the fatigue of travelling, and, it must be confessed, with an
overpowering drowsiness, to which she had been just on the point of
yielding when he arrived. She was like nothing he had ever seen before,
and he felt tongue-tied and paralysed in her presence–as if, if he
spoke, he would infallibly say something idiotic, even drivelling, and
as though, if he moved, his boots would creak, or he would fall over
something. Together with these sensations, an intense anxiety neither
to speak as a fool, nor to tumble down; which combined currents of
emotion rendered his position anything but an agreeable one.
Avice herself had begun to think:
‘He is fearfully clumsy, but I am sure he has honest eyes; and if he
has known this horrid girl all his life, he can tell me something about
her. I shall ask him.’
She therefore said:
‘I was too tired to go out to-night, and—’
‘And I am keeping you,’ exclaimed John, hastily, shocked at the
reflections called up by this discovery.
‘Not at all. I wish you would tell me something about Miss Bolton, as
you know her so well. Is she pretty?’
John looked involuntarily at the lovely face and form confronting him,
and replied, slowly:
‘Not very–but she is a perfect angel of goodness, and very nice.’
‘Ah!’ said Avice, looking earnestly at him, while a new element seemed
introduced into the complication. If Miss Bolton was good and nice, it
was not Sara Ford alone who had been wronged.
‘Is she clever?’ she pursued.
‘She may not be exactly a genius,’ said John, ‘but she is the very
least stupid girl I ever knew. She is charming. I–I should think you
would like her,’ he added, a little confusedly.
‘It is to be hoped I may, as she is to be my brother’s wife,’ said
Avice, in so sharp and bitter a tone that John looked at her in
astonishment. Avice saw the look, and said hastily: ‘The engagement is
a surprise to me. I only heard of it this evening.’
‘Because it was only decided this morning,’ said John, with a beaming
smile. ‘Nita only told me of it herself this afternoon. I’ve been
congratulating her, and it is good to see her so happy. And I think I
shall pursue Wellfield up to the Abbey, and give him my good wishes
there. Nita will not mind. Good-night, Miss Wellfield.’
John’s drawl saved his sentences from the appearance of abruptness
which might otherwise have marred their beauty.
‘Good-night,’ said Avice, absently.
She held out her hand, and he shook it, and then let himself out,
painfully conscious that he knocked his feet together, and dashed
an umbrella or two to the ground in his exit, in a manner of which
Wellfield, and such as he, would never have been guilty.
As for Avice, she was reflecting more and more hopelessly on the
situation. Good, clever, charming, and very happy. Then it was evident
that she loved Jerome very much–and if she knew nothing, it was not
she who was to blame.
Avice carried her meditations to her room, where weariness soon
overcame her. In sleep she forgot alike the long journey home, the
strange, cold reception accorded to her, the dreadful news Jerome had
given her, her own anguish, and the great wrong done to Sara Ford. She
forgot even to wonder whether she should consent to go and see Miss
Bolton the following day, or sternly choose a dreary fate, and, for the
sake of duty, go to school.
[Illustration]
CHAPTER IV.
‘WOO’D AND MARRIED, AND A’.’
With the morning, when Jerome asked her what she was going to do, Avice
replied:
‘The only thing, there is for me to do I suppose. I must go and see
her, since you insist upon it.’
The flash in her eyes, as she spoke, was as far removed from meekness
as anything well could be. Jerome recognised, he could not help it,
traces of Sara’s influence–of her free, grand, bold nature in his
quiet little sister.
With Sara no good quality was suppressed, and he had noticed, even
yesterday, a franker, freer, more open bearing in his sister. It was
disagreeably apparent again to-day, because, of course, independent
outspokenness must be inconvenient and irksome to a selfishness which
has had to descend to subterfuge and intrigue, and the conscience of
which is no longer a ‘flawless crystal.’ Yes, he recognised the broad,
bold seal of Sara’s soul stamped upon this fragile-looking girl.
‘I am glad you have begun to think and speak more reasonably,’ he said
coolly.
‘I do not think any differently,’ she flashed out. ‘I think exactly the
same; but I have heard things about Miss Bolton which make me think
that I ought to pity her, not hate her; and I shall be silent about you
and what you have done, because I believe it will be for the best–not
because I agree with you.’
‘I shall be in to lunch at half-past one,’ he said, ‘and afterwards we
can go up to the Abbey.’
He could not answer her, but he could not silence her, and his
feelings were not enviable. Avice, he perceived had the whip-like
tongue of her father, only with her the whip was used to scourge all
that was not ‘pure and of good report.’
‘Very well,’ she replied, indifferently. ‘I shall probably go and see
Ellen off to the station, and after that I shall remain indoors.’
‘Ellen!’ he exclaimed, for he had forgotten her. He went into the
kitchen, and gave her the letter which she carried to Sara Ford. He
could not meet the woman’s eyes; he could not look either easy, or
natural, or self-possessed, as he desired her to give the letter,
without adding word or message. He perceived, without looking at her,
that she held herself stiffly, and received the envelope and his
commission in perfect silence. Then he went into the parlour again,
and had taken his hat off the peg, when Avice called out in a voice
from which all the liquid tenderness of their first acquaintance had
vanished:
‘Jerome, is it permitted me to write to my friend Miss Ford?’
He turned back upon her with scintillating eyes, and teeth set.
‘Avice, take care how you go too far,’ he said.
But there was not a drop of craven blood in her veins. There was
dauntless defiance in her open glance, as she said:
‘Surely you never wish me to speak of her as _your_ friend again! And
I merely ask to hear what you have to say, because I intend to write
whatever your answer may be. I wished to take precautions–that’s all.
I intend, metaphorically, to cast myself at her feet, and beg her not
to visit the sins of my brother too hardly upon me.’
‘Since you have made up your mind what to do, it was unnecessary to ask
me,’ he answered, setting his teeth.
‘I take that as a most gracious permission. I am glad that you see and
speak more reasonably,’ she retorted, mocking his own words.
He did not speak, but left the house, and during his short journey
to the station he felt–it was a degrading feeling, no doubt–but
he, Jerome Wellfield, who, six months ago, had been as proud, as
fastidious, and as exclusive a young man as any one of them that trod
this earth, crouched morally at that moment, like a whipped hound. He
was conscious of a cowardly longing to make Avice and Nita known to
one another as speedily as possible. He had an intuitive conviction
that Nita’s charm would soon win Avice’s heart, and then his mistress’s
purity and sweetness would stand between him and his sister’s tongue.
It was a delightful, an elevating, a soul-inspiring position, and he
enjoyed it to the full.
Avice, left behind, broke down, burst into a passion of tears, and,
engrossed in her sorrow, was surprised by Ellen, who was going away.
To her she gave the broken messages which Ellen had repeated to her
mistress. She was in too sore distress to go with Mrs. Nelson to the
station; but parted from her with more floods of tears, and cried long
after she had gone, till she had a headache, and everything looked
blurred and dim before her eyes, and while she was in this condition
some one knocked at the door, and on the servant opening it, Avice
heard a soft, gentle voice ask if Miss Wellfield was at home, and the
answer in the affirmative of the country servant, who would have said
the same thing had Avice been fainting, or raving in a delirium. No
escape was possible, for the front-door of the old house opened, as has
been said, straight into the irregular-shaped, raftered parlour.
She gazed earnestly at the figure of the girl who now entered, with a
great dun-coloured mastiff at her side, whose demeanour proclaimed him
an inseparable companion. She saw a slight, pretty figure in a large
sealskin paletot and a shady velvet hat with a large black feather
drooping round the brim, and soft-hued brown velvet dress. Compared
with the splendid beauty and queenly presence of that other woman this
was an insignificant apparition enough, but Avice’s eye and heart
instantly appreciated the charm of the sympathetic eyes, the mobile
face, and gentle manner.
Nita came forward, looking like anything rather than a rich heiress who
had just triumphantly bought away by her gold the allegiance of another
woman’s lover–which was the character in which Avice had pictured her
to herself: it was she who was blushing and embarrassed, and who said,
almost timidly:
‘I could not wait till afternoon to see you; and I did not like Jerome
to bring you up to the Abbey to me, as if I were some one so dreadfully
grand. I thought we could get on better without him’–she smiled–‘and
I hope you don’t mind my having come.’
She held out her hand. Avice was overpowered. With all her wrath and
indignation she was but a soft-hearted girl. The instant she saw Nita
she comprehended that it was she who had been deceived all along. She
felt she could not hate this girl, even to remain loyal to Sara Ford.
She stood still and silent, with a quivering lip. Nita saw it, and took
both her hands, saying:
‘I hope you don’t mind. I will go away if you do.’
‘No–no. It is very kind–very good of you to come,’ said Avice, her
voice dying away; breaking down entirely, she wept again, as she
realised the miserable hopelessness of the whole affair.
‘What is the matter?’ said Nita, sitting down beside her. ‘Why do you
cry? Is it because Jerome has asked me to marry him? I hope not?’
‘It–it is because I have left a very dear friend,’ Avice stammered,
and then, with a huge effort, she recovered herself. It would not
do–she must be composed.
‘Ah, that is sad. But do try not to be too sorry. I hope you will be my
friend. I have so longed to see you, and I have asked so many questions
about you that I am sure Jerome must have been weary of answering them.’
(‘“Jerome” at every other word,’ thought Avice. ‘I am sure she must be
desperately fond of him. It is dreadful.’)
She recovered herself, lifted her head, dried her eyes, and smiled
valiantly.
‘I’m very stupid,’ she said.
She could not address words of welcome to Nita, and the latter noticed
it, but was resolved to ignore it, and to make her new sister love her
sooner or later.
‘What a beautiful dog you have!’ said Avice, stooping to caress him.
‘That is Speedwell–my greatest friend, next to John Leyburn. By the
way, John said he had disturbed you last night, and he feared you would
think him rude.’
‘I thought him funny,’ said Avice, a small smile beginning to creep
to the corners of her mouth. Nita sat and looked at her, and suddenly
exclaimed:
‘How beautiful you are! I always thought no one could be handsomer than
Jerome, but you are like him–“only more so,” as John says. I hope you
won’t think me rude if I look at you rather often.’
This kind of innocent flattery was very pleasant. Avice began to cheer
up, to forget Ellen on her way to Sara with that dreadful letter. An
hour’s conversation made the girls like one another thoroughly. Nita
was not satisfied until she had carried Avice off to the Abbey, and
left a message for Jerome, desiring him, if he wanted either of them,
to come and seek them there.
Here Avice was solemnly introduced to Mr. Bolton and to Aunt Margaret;
and in observing the latter found such keen entertainment as to make
her forget her troubles. It was only when suddenly Jerome stood before
them, and she saw him kiss Nita, and the quick, enraptured smile of the
latter, that the pain suddenly returned for a moment; and the thought
of Sara, alone, gave her a bitter pang.
John Leyburn joined the party at supper, and was observed to be
unusually silent; in fact, almost speechless. When Nita, being apart
with him during the evening, innocently observed:
‘What do you think of her, John? is she not _lovely_?’ the unhappy
young man blushed crimson, and, not looking at ‘her’ at all, fumbled
wildly amongst some books, and stammered:
‘She’s–yes, she’s–rather good-looking.’
‘John!’ exclaimed Nita, looking at him for a moment, and then breaking
into laughter, not loud but prolonged, and of intense enjoyment.
‘Well?’ said John, maddened in the consciousness that he had said the
very thing he least wished to express; ‘rather good-looking’ being the
very last description he would have wished to apply to Avice Wellfield.
The evening passed over. As Jerome and his sister walked home, he did
not ask her what she thought of Nita, and she did not volunteer any
observation on the subject. Only, as she held out her hand and wished
him good-night, he asked:
‘Well, have you decided whether you will stay with me, or go to school?’
She replied, coldly,
‘I should prefer to stay here,’ and left him.
Indeed, she had quite decided that she would prefer to stay there.
Avice had to learn early to decide in a difficult matter: she found
herself face to face with a hard problem; she acted as a girl, as one
inexperienced and untried, with no great range of observation, no
extensive data to go upon, was likely to act. She was conscious that
Jerome had done wrong; she was aware that Sara Ford, at least, must be
suffering cruelly from his wrong-doing, and the problem was, whether
she ought to tell Nita Bolton what she knew, or whether she ought not
to tell her. She ended by not telling her; it seemed enough that there
should be one heartbreak in the case. Nita’s joy in her love, her
happiness, her high spirits, smote upon the other girl’s heart many a
time during the short engagement that lasted only while settlements
were being made, and legal affairs settled: she could not find it in
her heart to smite down that joy and happiness; she could not convince
herself that it was right to do so.
Meanwhile, two or three days passed, and then Jerome had news–if news
it could be called, wordless and yet eloquent as it was–of Sara. A
small packet arrived one morning, and the label belonging to it was
directed in her hand; bold, clear, and legible. He opened it, and found
the sapphire hoop he had given her when she had promised to marry him.
Nothing else–not a word–not a syllable–but that was enough, and more
than enough. It contained his ‘freedom,’ and her condemnation of him–a
condemnation too utter, too strong and intense for words. Wellfield had
arrived at that pitch of moral degradation in which he felt relieved
rather than otherwise, when the ring was in his keeping again. He had
opened the packet at the breakfast-table. Avice saw the ring, and with
suave but treacherous sweetness of accent, inquired:
‘Is that a present for Miss Bolton?’
Jerome made no answer. He wished the whole business were over, but
he felt no compunction now; no thought of turning back or relenting
entered his mind.
The marriage was not to be delayed. They only waited until settlements
could be arranged, and in cases like that, settlements are not apt
to be tedious affairs. Mr. Bolton (suffice it to say this) acted
generously. Both Nita and Jerome were amply provided for during Mr.
Bolton’s lifetime. At his death they were again to have an access
of property, but the great bulk of his estate was so arranged that
it should fall to Nita’s children, especially to an eldest son, in
case there should be one. And there was a stipulation that Wellfield
should continue to attend to business in Burnham–at least, during Mr.
Bolton’s lifetime.
To this Jerome agreed, nothing loth; for a constant leisure, with
no fixed or settled occupation, was a prospect he did not like to
contemplate.
Everything ran smoothly–wheels which are oiled with that infallible
solution known as ‘wealth’ usually do run smoothly. Nita had lost all
her first doubts and fears. Jerome was an assiduous lover; under the
new influence she bloomed into life and vigour, and something that was
very near being beauty. The sad November closed for her in a blaze of
sunshine. The death of the old year was to be the birth of her new
life; the entrance to a long, sun-lighted path, down which she was to
travel for the remainder of her life. Aunt Margaret’s ‘croakings’ had
to cease. Mr. Bolton daily congratulated himself upon the success of
his experiment; daily felt that he had done right in seeking Nita’s
happiness, not the gratification of whatever ambition might have
underlaid his money-making diligence of the last twenty years.
On the second of December–her twentieth birthday–a dank, mournful,
sad-looking morning, with the leaden clouds covering up the hills, and
a raw mist rising from the river–on this morning Anita Bolton became
the wife of Jerome Wellfield; Avice and John officiating as bridesmaid
and groomsman, Aunt Margaret as guest, and Mr. Bolton in his natural
capacity as father, and giver-away of the bride.
When it came to Nita’s turn to say ‘I will’ to all the portentous
questions asked, Avice saw, with a sudden thrill, and a quick
remembrance of all the dark background of this wedding ceremony,
how the girl made a perceptible pause, and raising her face, turned
it towards her bridegroom, looked directly into his eyes, a full,
inquiring glance, and then, with a faint smile, and a little nervous
sigh, repeated slowly and deliberately:
‘I will.’
It was over. The ring was placed upon Nita’s hand; she walked down the
aisle of the quaint old church–grey and hoary with the recollections
and the dust of many centuries of the dead–down that aisle she went,
Jerome Wellfield’s wife.
[Illustration]
STAGE V.
CHAPTER I.
SARA.
‘For life is not as idle ore,
But iron dug from central gloom:
And heated hot with burning fears,
And dipped in baths of hissing tears,
And battered with the strokes of doom,
To shape and use.’
Ellen Nelson had conjured her young lady not to fret, for that there
was no man in the world who was worth it. But her words had been spoken
into ears made unconscious of their meaning by the heart’s agony–and
for answer, Miss Ford had fainted in her old nurse’s arms; or, if not
absolutely fainting, she had been stunned and stupid with despair and
the shock and horror of the blow. But that merciful unconsciousness did
not last long. Soon she roused again to reality; opening her eyes, and
perplexed at first to account for the blank dejection she felt–for
the throbbing of her temples, and the aching of her heart. Then it all
rushed over her mind: Ellen’s arrival; her brief, portentous words–the
letter she had brought–Sara started up.
‘Ellen, where is the letter I was reading?’
‘Never mind the letter, Miss Ford. It will do you no good to read it.’
‘I wish to see it. Give it to me, if you please.’
Reluctantly, Ellen was obliged to yield up the hated scrap of paper,
which her mistress read through again, with a calm and unmoved
countenance. Then she took off Jerome’s ring, and with hands that were
now as steady as need be, made it up into a little parcel, directed
it, and said:
‘Ellen, I am very sorry to send you out again, so tired as you are; but
if you love me, you must go and put this in the post for me–get it
registered, or whatever it needs–I don’t know. There is a quarter of
an hour. I dare not trust it to anyone else.’
‘Surely I will, ma’am, this moment. And ... you won’t be working
yourself into a state again, while I am out?’
‘Certainly not. Why should I? That packet that you hold in your
hand–when it is safely gone, I shall be at peace.’
‘I am glad of it, ma’am,’ said Ellen, taking the letter, and hastening
as quickly as she might, to and from the Post-Office.
On her return she found that her young lady had indeed not been idle.
One end of the table was spread with a cloth, and she had placed upon
it bread and butter, and cold meat. The gas-stand was lighted, and the
little kettle upon it was singing cheerily–everything looked bright
and cheerful, only that Miss Ford’s face was white and haggard, and her
eyes hollow, while just between her eyebrows there was a slight fold,
telling of a world of mental suffering.
‘Miss Ford!’ exclaimed Ellen, almost shocked; ‘you shouldn’t have done
that. I could have got my supper ready without so much trouble.’
‘Come, sit down and refresh yourself, Ellen, for I am sure you will be
tired,’ said Sara, composedly. And she insisted upon Ellen’s sitting
down, and eating and drinking, while she asked little questions about
England, sitting upright in her chair, and even laughing once or twice,
but always with the same blanched face, the same unnatural fixity of
the eyes; and once Ellen saw how, in a momentary silence, a visible
shudder shook her–how she caught her breath and bit her lips.
All this took away Ellen’s appetite. She scarcely ate anything, but
professed herself mightily refreshed with what she had taken; and then
she rose and began to take away the things, and suggested that it was
time Miss Ford had her supper too.
‘I don’t want anything, thank you,’ she said; and it was in vain that
Ellen urged her to take something–a glass of wine; a bit of bread–for
she dreaded the results of a long fast and a long vigil, coming upon
this present mental and moral anguish.
Sara refused, and there was that in her manner, with all its
gentleness, which prevented Ellen from approaching a step nearer.
She could only grieve silently, and wish intensely that her young
lady had a single friend to whom to turn in this emergency. But there
was no one, neither father nor mother nor brother, to help her with
sympathising heart and strong protecting hand. There was no one but
Ellen herself, and her mental attitude towards the girl always was
and had been one of deference, with all the motherly love she felt
towards her. Amongst Miss Ford’s various friends and acquaintances
at Elberthal, she could think only of one whose face had impressed
her, whose manner and–to use the expressive German word–whose
whole _Wesen_ had carried to her mind the conviction that he was
trustworthy–and that was Rudolf Falkenberg. But he was, so far as she
knew, a new friend, and a man; not one who could be appealed to in such
a case. Thus, nothing remained to the poor woman but, when her mistress
insisted upon it, to go to bed. She did so, on receiving from Sara a
promise that she also would not be long in seeking her room.
Wearied with five days’ almost incessant travelling, and exhausted
with the mingled emotions which had filled the last forty-eight hours,
Ellen, though she had determined not to rest till her mistress went to
bed, was soon overcome with her fatigue, and dropped asleep; nor did
she awaken again until daylight, pouring into her room, told her it
must be growing late. She sprang up, and throwing on a dressing-gown,
opened the door and looked into the parlour. No one was there, and all
was still. Perhaps Sara slept. Ellen knocked at the closed door of
the bedroom, and was bidden by a composed but weary voice to come in.
She entered, and saw that Sara had never undressed. She had thrown a
wrapping gown about her, and was just then seated on a chair beside her
bed, which, as Ellen saw with dismay, had not been disturbed. As the
woman entered Sara looked at her–her face whiter than ever, her eyes
distended, an expression of such blank, utter woe in her whole look and
attitude as appalled Ellen, who said in a trembling tone:
‘Child, you promised me to rest!’
‘Did I, Ellen? Then I forgot it, and if I had remembered, I could not
have kept my promise. I could not have lain still for two seconds.’
‘But, Miss Sara, you’ll make yourself very ill, and you will break my
heart.’
‘Oh, what nonsense!’ she said, with a sound like a little laugh. ‘What
is the use of lying down when one can’t sleep. By-and-by I shall be so
tired that I can’t help sleeping, and when I feel like that, I will go
to bed.’
She folded her hands, and leaned back her head, and there was the same
expression upon her face as that which had been there ever since she
had given Ellen the little parcel containing Jerome’s ring to post–an
expression like the changeless one of some beautiful marble mask from
which a pair of restless, wretched human eyes looked forth, haunting
all who can read the language they speak.
Fear seized Ellen’s heart at the long duration of this strained,
unnatural calm. She dreaded the end of it. A terrible vision of her
young mistress, with perhaps reason for ever overturned, leading an
existence worse than death, occurred to her.
‘I wish he could see her,’ she thought bitterly. ‘It would haunt him
to his dying day, and if it drove him mad, it is only what he would
deserve. To think of an empty fool like that playing with the heart of
a woman like this. ’Tis enough to make one believe there’s nothing but
evil to prevail in the world.’
She dressed herself hastily, and prepared some coffee, of which she
induced Sara to partake. The day dragged on. No one came near. Even
Falkenberg failed in his usual call. Sara said nothing to Ellen of
any suffering she endured. The woman could only guess from the utter
transformation of her usual ways and habits that she was enduring
tortures, and her own pain and perplexity increased. Once Sara went to
her studio, and began to paint; but in a moment she flung down brush
and palette, and began to pace about the bare boards, restlessly.
She did not resume the effort: it had been in the first instance
mechanical.
The day appeared like a week to Ellen. It was November, when the
daylight soon faded. The weather was cold; there was a foretaste
already of a biting winter, in a sharp, black frost, and a leaden sky,
which caused the day to close in even earlier than usual.
It was evening. Sara had taken up a book, and was gazing unseeingly at
the page, and turning over the leaves restlessly. Suddenly she closed
the book, and said:
‘Is not this Wednesday, Ellen?’
‘Yes, Miss Sara, it is.’
‘It is Frau Wilhelmi’s evening at home. I shall go. And if I do, it is
time to get ready at once. Will you just go and get my dress?’
‘Miss Ford! you are not fit to go out,’ exclaimed Ellen, desperation
lending boldness to her.
Sara looked at her, and repeated her order. Ellen, in distress, asked
which dress she would wear.
‘Oh, any. The old black velvet–that will be best, for it is cold.’
Ellen was perforce obliged to go and get out the dress, and help Sara
to make her toilette, feeling all the time that it was as if she
attired a ghost. When she was ready the young lady looked beautiful, as
usual, but it was with a kind of beauty which no sane person cares to
see. Face and lips were ghastly white; there was a deathlike composure
and calm in her expression; only those beautiful eyes looked restlessly
forth, dark and clouded, and full of a misery which surpassed the power
of words to utter, or tears to alleviate. Sara hardly knew herself
why she was going out; there was a vague consciousness that her own
thoughts and the horrible suffering they brought with them were
becoming rapidly intolerable; that soon, if she did not see and speak
to some other beings, she would shriek aloud, or lose her reason, or
that something terrible would happen. She looked at herself in the
glass, and Ellen suggested that she wanted a little rouge.
‘Rouge!’ repeated Sara, laughing drily; ‘why, I am in a fever. Feel my
hand!’
Ellen took it, and incidentally felt as well, while her finger rested
on Miss Ford’s wrist, that her pulse was beating with an abnormal
rapidity. But the hand was burning as she had said.
With a dark foreboding of evil, Ellen threw a cloak around the girl’s
shoulders, and put on her own shawl and bonnet to accompany her, for
the Wilhelmi’s house was hard by, and at Elberthal it was the custom to
walk to every kind of entertainment.
‘Oh, how cool and refreshing!’ exclaimed Sara with a deep sigh, as the
icy air struck upon her burning face.
Ellen’s reply was a shiver. They soon stood at the Wilhelmis’ door,
and, as Ellen left her, Sara bade her return for her at half-past ten.
It was then after half-past eight.
The door was opened. Ellen watched her mistress as she passed into the
blaze of light in the hall, and, standing there, unfastened her cloak.
Then the door was closed again. Repressing her forebodings as well as
she could, Ellen returned home, and set herself to counting the minutes
until it should be time for her to return to Professor Wilhelmi’s.
[Illustration]