AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR.
Aurora found a civil railway official at the Doncaster station, who
was ready to take a ticket for her, and find her a comfortable seat in
an empty carriage; but before the train started, a couple of sturdy
farmers took their seats upon the spring cushions opposite Mrs.
Mellish. They were wealthy gentlemen, who farmed their own land, and
travelled express; but they brought a powerful odour of the stable-yard
into the carriage, and they talked with that honest northern twang
which always has a friendly sound to the writer of this story. Aurora,
with her veil drawn over her pale face, attracted very little of their
attention. They talked of farming-stock and horse-racing, and looked
out of the window every now and then to shrug their shoulders at
somebody else's agriculture.
I believe they were acquainted with the capabilities of every acre of
land between Doncaster and Harrow, and knew how it might have been
made "worth ten shillin' an acre more than it was, too, sir," as they
perpetually informed each other.
How wearisome their talk must have seemed to the poor lonely creature
who was running away from the man she loved,--from the man who loved
her, and would love to the end of time!
"I didn't mean what I wrote," she thought. "My poor boy would never
love me less. His great heart is made up of unselfish love and generous
devotion. But he would be so sorry for me; he would be so sorry! He
could never be proud of me again; he could never boast of me any more.
He would be always resenting some insult, or imagining some slight. It
would be too painful for him. He would see his wife pointed at as the
woman who had married her groom. He would be embroiled in a hundred
quarrels, a hundred miseries. I will make the only return that I can
ever make to him for his goodness to me: I will give him up, and go
away and hide myself from him for ever."
She tried to imagine what John's life would be without her. She tried
to think of him in some future time, when he should have worn out his
grief, and reconciled himself to her loss. But she could not, she could
not! She could not endure any image of _him_ in which he was separated
from his love for her.
"How should I ever think of him without thinking of his love for me?"
she thought. "He loved me from the first moment in which he saw me. I
have never known him except as a lover; generous, pure, and true."
And in this mind Aurora watched the smaller stations, which looked
like mere streaks of whitened woodwork as the express tore past them;
though every one of them was a milestone upon the long road which was
separating her from the man she loved.
Ah, careless wives, who think it a small thing, perhaps, that your
husbands are honest and generous, constant and true, and who are apt
to grumble because your next-door neighbours have started a carriage,
while you are fain to be content with eighteenpenny airings in vehicles
procured at the nearest cab-stand,--stop and think of this wretched
girl, who in this hour of desolation recalled a thousand little wrongs
she had done to her husband, and would have laid herself under his
feet to be walked over by him could she have thus atoned for her petty
tyrannies, her pretty caprices! Think of her in her loneliness, with
her heart yearning to go back to the man she loved, and with her love
arrayed against herself and pleading for him. She changed her mind
a hundred times during that four hours' journey; sometimes thinking
that she would go back by the next train, and then again remembering
that her first impulse had been, perhaps, after all, only too correct,
and that John Mellish's heart had turned against her in the cruel
humiliation of that morning's discovery.
Have you ever tried to imagine the anger of a person whom you have
never seen angry? Have you ever called up the image of a face that
has never looked on you except in love and gentleness, and invested
that familiar countenance with the blank sternness of estrangement?
Aurora did this. She acted over and over again in her weary brain the
scene that might have taken place between her husband and herself. She
remembered that scene in the hackneyed stage-play, which everybody
affects to ridicule and secretly weeps at. She remembered Mrs. Haller
and the Stranger, the children, the Countess, the cottage, the jewels,
the parchments, and all the old familiar properties of that well-known
fifth act in the simple, social tragedy; and she pictured to herself
John Mellish retiring into some distant country with his rheumatic
trainer Langley, and becoming a misanthropical hermit, after the manner
of the injured German.
What was her life to be henceforth? She shut her eyes upon that blank
future.
"I will go back to my father," she thought; "I will go back to him
again, as I went before. But this time there shall be no falsehoods, no
equivocations; and this time nothing shall tempt me to leave him again."
Amid all her perplexities, she clung to the thought that Lucy and
Talbot would help her. She would appeal to passionless Talbot Bulstrode
in behalf of her poor heart-broken John.
"Talbot will tell me what is right and honourable to be done," she
thought. "I will hold by what he says. He shall be the arbiter of my
future."
I do not believe that Aurora had ever entertained any very passionate
devotion for the handsome Cornishman; but it is very certain that she
had always respected him. It may be that any love she had felt for him
had grown out of that very respect, and that her reverence for his
character was made all the greater by the contrast between him and
the base-born schemer for whom her youth had been sacrificed. She had
submitted to the decree which had separated her from her affianced
lover, for she had believed in its justice; and she was ready now to
submit to any decision pronounced by the man, in whose sense of honour
she had unbounded confidence.
She thought of all these things again and again and again, while the
farmers talked of sheep and turnips, of Thorley's food, swedes, and
beans, and corn, and clover, and of mysterious diseases, which they
discussed gravely, under such terms as "red gum," "finger and toe," &c.
They alternated this talk with a dash of turf scandal; and even in the
all-absorbing perplexities of her domestic sorrows, Mrs. Mellish could
have turned fiercely upon these innocent farmers when they pooh-poohed
John's stable, and made light of the reputation of her namesake the
bay filly, and declared that no horse that came out of the squire's
stables was ever anything better than a plater or a screw.
The journey came to an end, only too quickly, it seemed to Aurora: too
quickly, for every mile widened the gulf she had set between herself
and the home she loved; every moment only brought the realization of
her loss more fully home to her mind.
"I will abide by Talbot Bulstrode's advice," she kept saying to
herself; indeed, this thought was the only reed to which she clung in
her trouble. She was not a strong-minded woman. She had the generous,
impulsive nature which naturally turns to others for help and comfort.
Secretiveness had no part in her organization, and the one concealment
of her life had been a perpetual pain and grief to her.
It was past eight o'clock when she found herself alone amidst the
bustle and confusion of the King's Cross terminus. She sent a porter
for a cab, and ordered the man to drive to Halfmoon Street. It was only
a few days since she had met Lucy and Talbot at Felden Woods, and she
knew that Mr. Bulstrode and his wife were detained in town, waiting for
the prorogation of the House.
It was Saturday evening, and therefore a holiday for the young advocate
of the Cornish miners and their rights; but Talbot spent his leisure
amongst Blue-books and Parliamentary Minutes, and poor Lucy, who might
have been shining, a pale star, at some crowded _conversazione_, was
compelled to forego the pleasure of struggling upon the staircase
of one of those wise individuals who insist upon inviting their
acquaintances to pack themselves into the smallest given space
consistent with the preservation of life, and trample upon each other's
lace flounces and varnished boots with smiling equanimity. Perhaps,
in the universal fitness of things, even these fashionable evenings
have a certain solemn purpose, deeply hidden under considerable
surface-frivolity. It may be that they serve as moral gymnasia, in
which the thews and sinews of social amenity are racked and tortured,
with a view to their increased power of endurance. It is good for a man
to have his favourite corn trodden upon, and yet be compelled to smile
under the torture; and a woman may learn her first great lesson in
fortitude from the destruction of fifty guineas' worth of Mechlin, and
the necessity of assuring the destroyer that she is rather gratified
than otherwise by the sacrifice. _Noblesse oblige._ It is good to
"suffer and be strong." Cold coffee and tepid ice-cream may not be the
most strengthening or delightful of food; but there may be a moral diet
provided at these social gatherings which is not without its usefulness.
Lucy willingly abandoned her own delights; for she had that ladylike
appreciation of society which had been a part of her education. Her
placid nature knew no abnormal tendencies. She liked the amusements
that other girls of her position liked. She had none of the eccentric
predilections which had been so fatal to her cousin. She was not like
that lovely and illustrious Spanish lady who is said to love the cirque
better than the opera, and to have a more intense appreciation of a
series of flying plunges through tissue-paper-covered hoops than of the
most elaborate _fioriture_ of tenor or soprano. She gave up something,
therefore, in resigning the stereotyped gaieties of the London season.
But Heaven knows, it was very pleasant to her to make the sacrifice.
Her inclinations were fatted lambs, which she offered willingly upon
the altar of her idol. She was never happier than when sitting by her
husband's side, making extracts from the Blue-books to be quoted in
some pamphlet that he was writing; or if she was ever happier, it was
only when she sat in the ladies' gallery, straining her eyes athwart
the floriated iron fretwork, which screened her from any wandering
glances of distracted members, in her vain efforts to see her husband
in his place on the Government benches, and very rarely seeing more
than the crown of Mr. Bulstrode's hat.
She sat by Talbot's side upon this evening, busy with some pretty
needlework, and listening with patient attention to her husband's
perusal of the proof-sheets of his last pamphlet. It was a noble
specimen of the stately and ponderous style of writing, and it
abounded in crushing arguments and magnificent climaxes, which utterly
annihilated somebody (Lucy didn't exactly make out who), and most
incontrovertibly established something, though Mrs. Bulstrode couldn't
quite understand what. It was enough for her that he had written that
wonderful composition, and that it was his rich baritone voice that
rolled out the studied Johnsonese. If he had pleased to read Greek to
her, she would have thought it pleasant to listen. Indeed there were
pet passages of Homer which Mr. Bulstrode now and then loved to recite
to his wife, and which the little hypocrite pretended to admire. No
cloud had darkened the calm heaven of Lucy's married life. She loved,
and was beloved. It was a part of her nature to love in a reverential
attitude, and she had no wish to approach nearer to her idol. To sit at
her sultan's feet and replenish his chibouque; to watch him while he
slept, and wave the punkah above his seraphic head; to love and admire
and pray for him,--made up the sum of her heart's desire.
It was close upon nine o'clock, when Mr. Bulstrode was interrupted
in the very crowning sentence of his peroration by a double knock at
the street-door. The houses in Halfmoon Street are small, and Talbot
flung down his proof-sheet with a gesture expressive of considerable
irritation. Lucy looked up, half sympathizingly, half apologetically,
at her lord and master. She held herself in a manner responsible for
his ease and comfort.
"Who can it be, dear?" she murmured; "at such a time, too!"
"Some annoyance or other, I dare say, my dear," answered Talbot. "But
whoever it is, I won't see them to-night. I suppose, Lucy, I've given
you a pretty fair idea of the effect of this upon my honourable friend
the member for----"
Before Mr. Bulstrode could name the borough of which his honourable
friend was the representative, a servant announced that Mrs. Mellish
was waiting below to see the master of the house.
"Aurora!" exclaimed Lucy, starting from her seat and dropping the fairy
implements of her work in a little shower upon the carpet; "Aurora! It
can't be, surely? Why, Talbot, she only went back to Yorkshire a few
days ago."
"Mr. and Mrs. Mellish are both below, I suppose?" Mr. Bulstrode said to
the servant.
"No, sir; Mrs. Mellish came alone in a cab from the station, I believe.
Mrs. Mellish is in the library, sir. I asked her to walk upstairs; but
she requested to see you alone, sir, if you please."
"I'll come directly," answered Talbot. "Tell Mrs. Mellish I will be
with her immediately."
The door closed upon the servant, and Lucy ran towards it, eager to
hurry to her cousin.
"Poor Aurora!" she said; "there must be something wrong, surely. Uncle
Archibald has been taken ill, perhaps; he was not looking well when
we left Felden. I'll go to her, Talbot; I'm sure she'd like to see me
first."
"No, Lucy; no," answered Mr. Bulstrode, laying his hand upon the door,
and standing between it and his wife; "I had rather you didn't see
your cousin until I have seen her. It will be better for me to see her
first." His face was very grave, and his manner almost stern as he said
this. Lucy shrank from him as if he had wounded her. She understood
him, very vaguely, it is true; but she understood that he had some
doubt or suspicion of her cousin, and for the first time in his life
Mr. Bulstrode saw an angry light kindled in his wife's blue eyes.
"Why should you prevent my seeing Aurora?" Lucy asked; "she is the best
and dearest girl in the world. Why shouldn't I see her?"
Talbot Bulstrode stared in blank amazement at his mutinous wife.
"Be reasonable, my dear Lucy," he answered very mildly; "I hope
always to be able to respect your cousin--as much as I respect you.
But if Mrs. Mellish leaves her husband in Yorkshire, and comes to
London without his permission,--for he would never permit her to come
alone,--she must explain to me why she does so before I can suffer my
wife to receive her."
Poor Lucy's fair head drooped under this reproof.
She remembered her last conversation with her cousin; that conversation
in which Aurora had spoken of some far-off day of trouble, that might
bring her to ask for comfort and shelter in Halfmoon Street. Had the
day of trouble come already?
"Is it wrong of Aurora to come alone, Talbot, dear?" Lucy asked meekly.
"Is it wrong?" repeated Mr. Bulstrode, fiercely. "Would it be wrong for
you to go tearing from here to Cornwall, child?"
He was irritated by the mere imagination of such an outrage, and he
looked at Lucy as if he half suspected her of some such intention.
"But Aurora may have had some very particular reason, dear?" pleaded
his wife.
"I cannot imagine any reason powerful enough to justify such a
proceeding," answered Talbot; "but I shall be better able to judge of
that when I've heard what Mrs. Mellish has to say. Stay here, Lucy,
till I send for you."
"Yes, Talbot."
She obeyed as submissively as a child; but she lingered near the door
after her husband had closed it upon her, with a mournful yearning in
her heart. She wanted to go to her cousin, and comfort her, if she
had need of comfort. She dreaded the effect of her husband's cold and
passionless manner upon Aurora's impressionable nature.
Mr. Bulstrode went down to the library to receive his kinswoman. It
would have been strange if he had failed to remember that Christmas
evening, nearly two years before, upon which he had gone down to the
shadowy room at Felden, with every hope of his heart crushed, to ask
for comfort from the woman he loved. It would have been strange if, in
the brief interval that elapsed between his leaving the drawing-room
and entering the library, his mind had not flown back to that day of
desolation. If there was an infidelity to Lucy in that sharp thrill of
pain that pierced his heart as the old memory came back, the sin was
as short-lived as the agony which it brought with it. He was able now
to say, in all singleness of heart, "I made a wise choice, and I shall
never repent having made it."
The library was a small apartment at the back of the dining-room. It
was dimly lighted, for Aurora had lowered the lamp. She did not want
Mr. Bulstrode to see her face.
"My dear Mrs. Mellish," said Talbot gravely, "I am so surprised at this
visit, that I scarcely know how to say I am glad to see you. I fear
something must have happened to cause your travelling alone. John is
ill, perhaps, or----"
He might have said much more if Aurora had not interrupted him by
casting herself upon her knees before him, and looking up at him with a
pale, agonized face, that seemed almost ghastly in the dim lamp-light.
It was impossible to describe the look of horror that came over Talbot
Bulstrode's face as she did this. It was the Felden scene over again.
He came to her in the hope that she would justify herself, and she
tacitly acknowledged her humiliation.
She was a guilty woman, then; a guilty creature, whom it would be his
painful duty to cast out of that pure household. She was a poor, lost,
polluted wretch, who must not be admitted into the holy atmosphere of a
Christian gentleman's home.
"Mrs. Mellish! Mrs. Mellish!" he cried, "what is the meaning of this?
Why do you give me this horrible pain again? Why do you insist upon
humiliating yourself and me by such a scene as this?"
"Oh, Talbot, Talbot!" answered Aurora, "I come to you because you are
good and honourable. I am a desolate, wretched woman, and I want your
help--I want your advice. I will abide by it; I will, Talbot Bulstrode;
so help me, Heaven."
Her voice was broken by her sobs. In her passionate grief and confusion
she forgot that it was just possible such an appeal as this might
be rather bewildering in its effect upon Talbot. But perhaps, even
amid his bewilderment, the young Cornishman saw, or fancied he saw,
something in Aurora's manner which had no fellowship with guilt; or
with such guilt as he had at first dreaded. I imagine that it must have
been so; for his voice was softer and his manner kinder when he next
addressed her.
"Aurora," he said, "for pity's sake, be calm. Why have you left Mellish
Park? What is the business in which I can help or advise you? Be calm,
my dear girl, and I will try and understand you. God knows how much I
wish to be a friend to you, for I stand in a brother's place, you know,
my dear, and demand a brother's right to question your actions. I am
sorry you came up to town alone, because such a step was calculated to
compromise you; but if you will be calm and tell me why you came, I may
be able to understand your motives. Come, Aurora, try and be calm."
She was still on her knees, sobbing hysterically. Talbot would have
summoned his wife to her assistance, but he could not bear to see the
two women associated until he had discovered the cause of Aurora's
agitation.
He poured some water into a glass, and gave it her. He placed her in
an easy-chair near the open window, and then walked up and down the
room until she had recovered herself.
"Talbot Bulstrode," she said quietly, after a long pause, "I want
you to help me in the crisis of my life. I must be candid with you,
therefore, and tell you that which I would have died rather than tell
you two years ago. You remember the night upon which you left Felden?"
"Remember it? Yes, yes."
"The secret which separated us then, Talbot, was the one secret of my
life,--the secret of my disobedience, the secret of my father's sorrow.
You asked me to give you an account of that one year which was missing
out of the history of my life. I could not do so, Talbot; _I would
not!_ My pride revolted against the horrible humiliation. If you had
discovered the secret yourself, and had accused me of the disgraceful
truth, I would have attempted no denial; but with my own lips to utter
the hateful story--no, no, I could have borne anything better than
that. But now that my secret is common property, in the keeping of
police-officers and stable-boys, I can afford to tell you all. When I
left the school in the Rue Saint-Dominique, I ran away to marry my
father's groom!"
"Aurora!"
Talbot Bulstrode dropped into the chair nearest him, and sat blankly
staring at his wife's cousin. Was this the secret humiliation which had
prostrated her at his feet in the chamber at Felden Woods?
"Oh, Talbot, how could I have told you this? How can I tell you now why
I did this mad and wicked thing, blighting the happiness of my youth
by my own act, and bringing shame and grief upon my father? I had no
romantic, overwhelming love for this man. I cannot plead the excuses
which some women urge for their madness. I had only a school-girl's
sentimental fancy for his dashing manner, only a school-girl's
frivolous admiration of his handsome face. I married him because he had
dark-blue eyes, and long eyelashes, and white teeth, and brown hair.
He had insinuated himself into a kind of intimacy with me, by bringing
me all the empty gossip of the race-course, by extra attention to my
favourite horses, by pampering my pets. All these things brought about
association between us; he was always my companion in my rides; and he
contrived, before long, to tell me his story. Bah! why should I weary
you with it?" cried Aurora scornfully. "He was a prince in disguise,
of course; he was a gentleman's son; his father had kept his hunters;
he was at war with fortune; he had been ill-used and trampled down
in the battle of life. His talk was something to this effect, and I
believed him. Why should I disbelieve him? I had lived all my life
in an atmosphere of truth. My governess and I talked perpetually of
the groom's romantic story. She was a silly woman, and encouraged my
folly; out of mere stupidity, I believe, and with no suspicion of the
mischief she was doing. We criticised the groom's handsome face, his
white hands, his aristocratic manners. I mistook insolence for good
breeding; Heaven help me! And as we saw scarcely any society at that
time, I compared my father's groom with the few guests who came to
Felden; and the town-bred impostor profited by comparison with rustic
gentlemen. Why should I stay to account to you for my folly, Talbot
Bulstrode? I could never succeed in doing so, though I talked for a
week; I cannot account to myself for my madness. I can only look back
to that horrible time, and wonder why I was mad."
"My poor Aurora! my poor Aurora!"
He spoke in the pitying tone with which he might have comforted her had
she been a child. He was thinking of her in her childish ignorance,
exposed to the insidious advances of an unscrupulous schemer, and his
heart bled for the motherless girl.
"My father found some letters written by this man, and discovered that
his daughter had affianced herself to his groom. He made this discovery
while I was out riding with James Conyers,--the groom's name was
Conyers,--and when I came home there was a fearful scene between us. I
was mad enough and wicked enough to defend my conduct, and to reproach
my father with the illiberality of his sentiments. I went even further:
I reminded him that the house of Floyd and Floyd had had a very humble
origin. He took me to Paris upon the following day. I thought myself
cruelly treated. I revolted against the ceremonial monotony of the
_pension;_ I hated the studies, which were ten times more difficult
than anything I had ever experienced with my governess; I suffered
terribly from the conventual seclusion, for I had been used to perfect
freedom amongst the country roads round Felden: and amidst all this,
the groom pursued me with letters and messages; for he had followed
me to Paris, and spent his money recklessly in bribing the servants
and hangers-on of the school. He was playing for a high stake, and he
played so desperately that he won. I ran away from school, and married
him at Dover, within eight or nine hours of my escape from the Rue
Saint-Dominique."
She buried her face in her hands, and was silent for some time.
"Heaven have pity upon my wretched ignorance!" she said at last; "the
illusion under which I had married this man ended in about a week. At
the end of that time I discovered that I was the victim of a mercenary
wretch, who meant to use me to the uttermost as a means of wringing
money from my father. For some time I submitted, and my father paid,
and paid dearly, for his daughter's folly; but he refused to receive
the man I had married, or to see me until I separated myself from
that man. He offered the groom an income, on the condition of his
going to Australia, and resigning all association with me for ever.
But the man had a higher game to play. He wanted to bring about a
reconciliation with my father; and he thought that in due time that
tender father's resolution would have yielded to the force of his love.
It was little better than a year after our marriage that I made a
discovery that transformed me in one moment from a girl into a woman;
a revengeful woman, perhaps, Mr. Bulstrode. I discovered that I had
been wronged, deceived, and outraged by a wretch who laughed at my
ignorant confidence in him. I had learned to hate the man long before
this occurred: I had learned to despise his shallow trickeries, his
insolent pretensions; but I do not think I felt his deeper infamy the
less keenly for that. We were travelling in the south of France, my
husband playing the great gentleman upon my father's money, when this
discovery was made by me--or not by me; for it was forced upon me by a
woman who knew my story and pitied me. Within half an hour of obtaining
this knowledge, I acted upon it. I wrote to James Conyers, telling
him I had discovered that which gave me the right to call upon the law
to release me from him; and if I refrained from doing so, it was for
my father's sake, and not for his. I told him that so long as he left
me unmolested and kept my secret, I would remit him money from time to
time. I told him that I left him to the associations he had chosen for
himself; and that my only prayer was, that God, in His mercy, might
grant me complete forgetfulness of him. I left this letter for him with
the _concierge_, and quitted the hotel in such a manner as to prevent
his obtaining any trace of the way I had gone. I stopped in Paris for a
few days, waiting for a reply to a letter I had written to my father,
telling him that James Conyers was dead. Perhaps that was the worst sin
of my life, Talbot. I deceived my father; but I believed that I was
doing a wise and merciful thing in setting his mind at rest. He would
have never been happy so long as he had believed the man lived. You
understand all now, Talbot," she said mournfully. "You remember the
morning at Brighton?"
"Yes, yes; and the newspaper with the marked paragraph--the report of
the jockey's death."
"That report was false, Talbot Bulstrode," cried Aurora. "James Conyers
was not killed."
Talbot's face grew suddenly pale. He began to understand something of
the nature of that trouble which had brought Aurora to him.
"What, he was still living, then?" he said anxiously.
"Yes; until the night before last."
"But where--where has he been all this time?"
"During the last ten days--at Mellish Park."
She told him the terrible story of the murder. The trainer's death had
not yet been reported in the London papers. She told him the dreadful
story; and then, looking up at him with an earnest, imploring face, as
she might have done had he been indeed her brother, she entreated him
to help and counsel her in this terrible hour of need.
"Teach me how to do what is best for my dear love," she said. "Don't
think of me or my happiness, Talbot; think only of him. I will make any
sacrifice; I will submit to anything. I want to atone to my poor dear
for all the misery I have brought upon him."
Talbot Bulstrode did not make any reply to this earnest appeal. The
administrative powers of his mind were at work; he was busy summing
up facts and setting them before him, in order to grapple with them
fairly; and he had no attention to waste upon sentiment or emotion. He
was walking up and down the room, with his eyebrows knitted sternly
over his cold gray eyes, and his head bent.
"How many people know this secret, Aurora?" he asked presently.
"I can't tell you that; but I fear it must be very generally known,"
answered Mrs. Mellish, with a shuddering recollection of the "Softy's"
insolence. "I heard of the discovery that had been made from a
hanger-on of the stables, a man who hates me,--a man whom I--had a
misunderstanding with."
"Have you any idea who it was that shot this Conyers?"
"No, not the least idea."
"You do not even guess at any one?"
"No."
Talbot took a few more turns up and down the small apartment, in
evident trouble and perplexity of mind. He left the room presently,
and called at the foot of the staircase:
"Lucy, my dear, come down to your cousin."
I'm afraid Mrs. Bulstrode must have been lurking somewhere about the
outside of the drawing-room door, for she flew down the stairs at the
sound of the strong voice, and was by her husband's side two or three
seconds after he had spoken.
"O Talbot!" she said, "how long you have been! I thought you would
never send for me. What has been the matter with my poor darling?"
"Go in to her, and comfort her, my dear," Mr. Bulstrode answered,
gravely: "she has had enough trouble, Heaven knows, poor girl. Don't
ask her any questions, Lucy; but make her as comfortable as you can,
and give her the best room you can find for her. She will stay with us
as long as she remains in town."
"Dear, dear Talbot," murmured the young Cornishman's grateful
worshipper, "how kind you are!"
"Kind!" cried Mr. Bulstrode; "she has need of friends, Lucy; and,
God knows, I will act a brother's part towards her, faithfully and
bravely. Yes, bravely!" he added, raising his head with an almost
defiant gesture as he slowly ascended the stairs.
What was the dark cloud which he saw brooding so fatally over the
far horizon? He dared not think of what it was,--he dared not even
acknowledge its presence; but there was a sense of trouble and horror
in his breast that told him the shadow was there.
Lucy Bulstrode ran into the library, and flung herself upon her
cousin's breast, and wept with her. She did not ask the nature of the
sorrow which had brought Aurora an unexpected and uninvited guest to
that modest little dwelling-house. She only knew that her cousin was
in trouble, and that it was her happy privilege to offer her shelter
and consolation. She would have fought a sturdy battle in defence of
this privilege; but she adored her husband for the generosity which
had granted it to her without a struggle. For the first time in her
life, poor gentle Lucy took a new position with her cousin. It was her
turn to protect Aurora; it was her turn to display a pretty motherly
tenderness for the desolate creature whose aching head rested on her
bosom.
The West-End clocks were striking three, in the dead middle of the
night, when Mrs. Mellish fell into a feverish slumber, even in her
sleep, even in her sleep repeating again and again: "My poor John! my
poor dear love! what will become of him? my own faithful darling!"