THE RETURN.
While Mr. Goresby was trotting back to the Manor, over the Yorkshire
moors, Phemie and her companion were travelling southward as fast as a
train which stopped at every station and kept time at none, could take
them.
They had the compartment to themselves, and each five minutes Phemie
looked at her watch, and said to herself, “Now in a quarter of an hour I
shall have told him,” but when the quarter came and passed, Basil still
thought his child was living.
He talked continuously about Harry and about his wife; he let the whole
history of their wretched experience drop from his lips, sentence after
sentence. He said it was Marshlands she had wanted, and Marshlands she
had got; he declared she thwarted him in his every wish—that it was
enough for him to express a desire, and straightway she opposed him.
“As for her children, she never cared for them—not in the least,” he
went on; “she never cared for me either. Give her money and dress, and
equipage and servants, and she would not fret if she never saw me more.
She shall have her wish now; she may live in London or any place she
likes, so as she leaves me and the children in peace at Marshlands. The
children!” he broke off suddenly. “Oh! Phemie, do you think Harry will
recover?”
“I am afraid there is no hope,” she answered, trying to steady her
voice.
“She must not let me see her if anything happens to him,” he said,
doggedly, and he went on to ask his companion whether she thought they
would be in time, and then he broke into a rage about the slowness of
the trains, about the folly of not telegraphing for him instead of
coming, about the certainty that whatever Georgina planned was sure to
be wrong, about his conviction that if Phemie had stayed at Marshlands
more might have been done for the boy.
“Who would sit up with him last night?” he went on; “who would attend to
everything that the doctor directed? The idea of leaving the place with
only servants under the circumstances, and Georgina even not being able
to see to things! I think she is mad, I really do.”
“I sent for my uncle,” remarked Phemie.
“That is what she never would have thought of,” was the husband’s
comment. Phemie drew back in her corner, feeling she could not tell him
the worst, that he was impracticable, that he was selfish beyond
anything she could have conceived of, that his affection for his child
was but another form of affection for himself.
What good had her coming wrought, then? Had it done any one of the
things Georgina had prayed of her to effect? They would speak indeed,
but there would be a quarrel—possibly a separation, for that was
evidently the result Basil desired to bring about.
Never before, never had Phemie felt herself so powerless as with this
man, who once professed to love her; and it was for him—oh! Heaven, it
was for one like this—she had broken her husband’s heart, and nearly
brought dishonour on an honest man.
“How I loved him—God of mercy, _how_ I loved him,” she murmured to
herself, while her companion still kept rhyming out his complaints, and
then, thinking of all the misery of the past—of the terrible trial in
store for him—of the fearful contrast between his thoughts and hers, her
self-command gave way, and covering her face with her hands, sobbed like
a child.
In an instant Basil ceased his lamentations; the very tone of his voice
changed as he asked her what was the matter—what he had said to vex
her—why she was weeping. He drew her hands from before her eyes with a
gentle force, and prayed her to stop crying, or, at all events, to tell
him what she was crying for.
“I was thinking about the years gone by,” she answered.
“Those happy years,” he said, and the voice was tender as the voice she
remembered so well.
“Were they happy to you?” she returned. “They were not so to me. Can you
bear to look back upon them?—I cannot,” and then, urged by necessity,
Phemie made a speech which brought the colour to her cheeks and dried
the tears in her eyes. “You said you loved me in those days, Basil—was
it true?”
“True as sorrow,” he answered; but he felt there was something behind
her question, and he kept his hand on her arm, and prevented her turning
completely away from him, while she proceeded—
“I do not want to go back and tell of all the misery you caused me then,
but I do want you to promise me something now, for the sake of that old
dead love of the long ago.”
“Not dead, Phemie!—not dead!” he replied.
“Do not say that, or you stop me,” she returned; “or say it if you can,
remembering everything, and I will frame my request differently. For the
sake of the man who forgave you and me, both of us, will you promise to
grant me one favour?”
“I will.”
“I want you not to speak harshly to your wife. I want you not to
reproach her. I want you never by word or look to lay this—this accident
at her door, whether Harry lives or whether he dies.”
He remained for a few moments looking down at the carpet on the floor of
the carriage, then he answered—“You do not know everything, and your
request is harder to grant than perhaps you can imagine, but still I
will keep my promise—I will not reproach her;” and he got up from his
seat and went to the opposite window to that at Phemie’s left hand, and
looked out over the country, and stamped his foot for very impatience at
the slow rate of travelling, and wondered if they ever should arrive at
the junction, and how long it would take to get a special train ready.
She let him run on for a time in this manner, while she searched about
for some form of words in which she might convey an idea of the worst to
him. Over and over again he said—“nothing ever really hurt children;
that they were like cats and had nine lives;” he wondered if Mr. Aggland
would think of having a surgeon down from London; he mourned about his
own absence from home, and then he began abusing the railway
arrangements once more, and finally, pulling out his watch for the
hundredth time, declared they ought to be at the junction in ten
minutes.
“Once there, instead of waiting for the express we must get a special,
and push on at a very different pace to this.”
He flung himself into the seat by the window, as he spoke, and Phemie
having at last made up her mind that she would tell him, left her place,
and took the one opposite to that he occupied.
She had been thinking over the words she should use for hours, and yet
now no word she had intended to employ was uttered.
“Basil.”
“Yes, Phemie.”
“We need not hurry so much.”
“What do you mean?”—he asked the question as though there was no
necessity for him to do so.
He read the answer in her face.
“Oh! Basil—Basil!” she cried; and after that there was a great silence,
while the train swept on.
She did not dare to look at him—but she felt blindly about for his hand,
and took and held it in hers;—and he let it lie there passive.
When they came near to the junction, she resumed her old position, from
which she stole a glance at Basil.
His face was shaded by his hand, and she could tell nothing of how it
was with him.
With a great shriek and hustle, the train rushed into the station.
“He was dead, then, when you left,” Basil said, without lifting his
head, or turning his face, or moving his hand.
“Yes,” she answered; and the train stopped, and the junction he had
desired so earnestly to reach was gained.
Through the darkness, Phemie and Basil travelled on together, not by any
special train but by the express, in which once again they were able to
have a compartment to themselves. By the time they left the junction,
the short day was drawing to its close; and before they had got twenty
miles nearer home it was quite dark, and the stations through which they
shot were lighted up and bright with gas.
They never spoke to one another. Greatly that journey reminded Phemie of
a former one she had undertaken, when, through the night, she and her
uncle hastened away from Marshlands to seek a new home. Then it had been
Mr. Aggland who sate beside the window looking out into the summer
night; now it was Basil who never turned his head away from the
contemplation of the blackness, which was no darker than his own
thoughts.
Through the night the train dashed on—through the hours he and she never
opened their lips to speak to one another.
She would have given anything to hear his voice—to hear even the sound
of lamentation and the words of mourning, but Basil remained obstinately
mute.
He was thinking of his boy—his first-born—the child whom he brought from
India with him—thinking of him, and of his wife, and of the woman who
had carried the evil tidings to him.
For the first time, also, he was thinking of his life—of his past—of the
sin that past held.
Every idea seemed vague and shadowy—the only one certainty he appeared
able to grasp being that Harry was dead, and that he was travelling home
to see him.
Home—what a mockery the word sounded!
At Disley they found Mr. Aggland waiting for their arrival on the
platform.
“I brought the carriage over on chance,” he said, “hoping you might
return by this train. Mrs. Stondon is very ill,” he added, addressing
Basil. But Basil paid no attention to the sentence.
“Does he know?” whispered Mr. Aggland to his niece, who nodded an
affirmative.
After they reached Marshlands, Basil stood in the hall for a moment,
like a man trying to collect his senses; but when Phemie was going to
leave him with her uncle, he detained her, saying—
“I want to see——”
“Had you not better wait a little?” she asked.
He only answered her with an impatient gesture, and motioned that she
should lead the way.
She ascended the staircase, he following; they passed by the door of
Mrs. Stondon’s room, and at the end of a long corridor crossed the
threshold of the chamber in which the child lay.
Almost involuntarily as it seemed, Basil caught hold of Phemie’s hand,
after the fashion of a frightened girl; and so, together, side by side,
they walked towards the bed.
He let her draw back the sheet, and then, trembling violently, looked
upon his boy.
Till that moment it seemed as if he had not fully realised his loss. But
whenever his eyes fell on the face—which was the face of his first-born
and yet that of a stranger,—when he touched the little cold hands, and
pressed his lips on the icy cheeks, Basil Stondon gave way, and his
grief burst out wild and uncontrolled.
Phemie moved back and closed the door. Then, standing at a distance from
him, she let the trouble flow on unchecked,—only, with folded hands and
bowed head, prayed for him silently.
There are few things in life harder to look upon than a man’s violent
sorrow;—and Phemie found it hard to witness Basil’s. But yet she never
tried to comfort him; she never crossed the room and laid her hand on
his shoulder, and spoke to him words of sympathy. She knew the passion
must find vent;—she felt that such an outburst was better for him than
his former silence; and so she let the grief take its course without
check or comment.
“Tell me about it,” he said at last; “tell me all you know.” And, thus
entreated, Phemie told him how the child had given his nurse the slip,
and got round to the stables during the men’s dinner hour.
“Sewell saw him, but not in time,” she went on. “He saw Harry striking
the young grey horse with a leather strap across the hind legs—so”—and
Phemie imitated the boy’s heedless stroke. “Sewell shouted to him to
come away, and ran across the yard to catch him, but before he could
reach the stall the animal kicked out, and Harry never stirred again.”
“I have punished him for that very trick a dozen times at least,” said
Basil; “and his mother has called me cruel for hindering him. What have
they done with the horse?”
“I do not know,” answered Phemie.
He went away along the corridor, and down the staircase, and so into the
servants’ hall; where, finding Sewell, he desired him to have the grey
killed at once.
After that he returned to Harry’s room; and neither persuasion nor
remonstrance could induce him to move from it.
“Do you remember your promise, Basil?” Phemie asked at last, seeing that
he made no movement to go and speak to his wife.
“Perfectly,” he answered.
“And do you mean to keep it?” she persisted.
“I am keeping it,” he said; “and shall keep it all the better if I stay
away from her. I cannot go and see her; I cannot. If you will have it, I
shall say something you would be sorry for. Do not ask me.
Phemie—Phemie—for heaven’s sake, leave me alone.”
But she would not leave him alone. She prayed and entreated of him to go
and see his wife. She persisted that unless he did so, he would be but
quibbling with his word—breaking faith with her. She reminded him that
it was Georgina’s child as well as his who lay before him; and at last,
finding her words had none effect, she left the room, and tried to
soothe his wife with such excuses for his absence as she could invent.
After a time, however, a message came from Basil, desiring to speak with
her.
“I will go and tell her I shall never reproach her, if you wish me to do
so,” he said. “You have been very good to me, Phemie—very good, and
kind, and patient; and you have gone through much for my sake, and I
will pleasure you in this matter if you like.”
“God bless you, Basil,” answered Phemie—“God bless and comfort you;” and
she stood aside while he passed into his wife’s room, closing the door
behind him.