When Horace arrived at his lodgings he found two letters awaiting him,
which gave a momentary diversion to the dark current of his thoughts.
One of them was from Colonel Sutherland, being an innocent device of
that innocent old soldier to draw a candid and frank reply out of his
nephew's uncandid soul. Out of his dismal passion and murderous thoughts
Horace came down to something like his old everyday contempt of other
people, as he read his uncle's letter, which ran thus:--
"MY DEAR HORACE--I have lately learnt by accident that you know Roger
Musgrave, which I was not aware of; and as the youth has interested me
very much, I would gladly know what you, with your superior
penetration, think and know of him. I will tell you frankly what makes
me wish this. Susan had begun to tell me of some encounter of yours with
an old man at the railway, in which mention was made of young Musgrave,
when she suddenly remembered that you did not wish her to mention it.
This, of course, as you will suppose, knowing the nature of garrulous
old men and gossips like myself, made me ten times more curious, and I
managed to get out of Susan some vague story about a pension and
something that had been found out. Susan is ignorant as a girl should be
of a young man's follies, but I unfortunately know better. I wish you
would tell me, if you can without breaking confidence, the rights of
this story, and whether it is to hide some youthful sin that Musgrave is
expected to pay somebody a pension. If it should be so, believe me, my
dear boy, who know life and the world, that it is far better to tell
all. Pay the money if need be, but hide nothing; it is fatal policy,
trust an old man's word.
"Susan is very well and happy with me, where I hope you will come and
see this flown bird, and where we have always a bed and a welcome for my
sister's son. Come when you can--the sooner the better; and while this
unfortunate difference lasts between you and your father, it would give
me great pleasure, my dear boy, if you would look upon Milnehill as your
home.
"Affectionately your uncle,
"E. SUTHERLAND."
This simple-minded letter brought Horace back to himself for the moment.
He read it over a second time, with one of his familiar sneers, and,
with scarcely the pause of a minute, hunted up writing materials in a
cold corner of his half-lighted room, and rushed into a premature and
imprudent reply.
"Your acuteness, my dear uncle," wrote Horace, "has not led you astray.
Of course I could enter into no explanations with a girl like Susan,
from whose ears one would naturally keep everything of the kind. But you
are quite right in your supposition. Such insight as yours into our
little concealments is a more effectual argument than any other to
prevent us young fellows from trying to bide what cannot be hidden. I
cannot enter into any particulars, and it seems needless to say anything
more than that you are right.
"Thank you for your kind offer of a home at Milnehill; and with love to
Susan, believe me in haste,
"Your dutiful nephew,
"HORACE SCARSDALE."
This letter was closed and thrown aside before Horace perceived the
other one which lay on the table before him. He turned it over half
suspiciously. In a female handwriting, and sent evidently by some
private messenger, the look of it puzzled him who had no correspondents.
Then the signature threw him into a flush of eager anxiety. What could
induce Amelia Stenhouse to write to _him?_ But, after all, the contents
were commonplace enough. It was a very brief note, dated from her
father's house the morning of this same day:--
"DEAR SIR--Papa is suddenly taken ill. The doctors fear it looks like
cholera, and he is rather alarmed himself. He wishes to see you
immediately, if you can come. I hope this may reach you soon, and that
you will be able to return directly, for he seems anxious to see you, as
if he had something to say.
"Yours sincerely,
"AMELIA STENHOUSE."
It was some little time before Horace understood distinctly the contents
of this note; for he was a lover, unlovely though his love was, and the
first communication moved him into a momentary tumult, in which the
words lost their due meaning. When he turned over to the address,
however, and the "to be forwarded immediately" caught his eye, he began
to rouse himself to a consciousness of the urgent circumstances. Mr.
Stenhouse was ill, and wanted to see him. Twenty-four hours ago Horace
would have supposed that his employer knew something of his father's
secret. Now he was somewhat indifferent as to any communication which
Mr. Stenhouse might have to make. But he was Amelia's father, and she
was likely to be there. He got up accordingly, in the haste which was
congenial to his agitated condition, and made his toilette rapidly, but
with unusual care. He was pale, and his passion of evil thoughts had
left traces upon his face; but the very excitement of those murderous
fancies lighted an unusual fire in his eye, and animated the
countenance, which, in common times, was not a remarkable face. As he
went out he took up the letter he had written to his uncle, and tossed
it carelessly into the post as he passed, thinking, with a momentary
contemptuous wonder as he did so, of the simple old man who had opened
his arms and heart to Susan, and who held open for Horace himself that
warm domestic shelter, the home of which the young man felt no need. The
contrast was wonderful enough--Uncle Edward and his Susan in their
bright, peaceful room at Milnehill, in the evening calm and sweet
comfort of that home life; and this young solitary, hurrying by himself
through the dark streets of Harliflax, the wind flaring the street-lamps
overhead, and a crowd of hurrying phantoms rushing through the darkness
of his mind, where the air was wild with the excitement of a storm, and
lightning gleams of evil intention threw a fitful illumination. He went
on, hurrying through the night, with a careless intuition that he was
going to a death-bed. It was nothing to Horace. He was going to serve
his own purposes, to see Amelia. His pulse beat high at last, with a
rising exhilaration. In the changing tide of his thoughts he began to
remember that fortune was secure to him, though not now, and he was
going to see the first and only creature who had ever touched his
selfish soul into passion. His spirit rose into a thrill of expectation
and dark enjoyment. That inarticulate horror lay darkling still among
his thoughts, but it did not disturb the rising flush of youthful
elevation and hope.
The lawyer's house was lighted all over, but not with lights which could
be mistaken for an illumination of pleasure. Even in so short a time the
whole place had acquired a look of painful hurry and anxiety. The
daughters and the servants were wandering restlessly up and down the
stairs, making ceaseless inquiries, and keeping up a perpetual
disturbance at the door of the sick-room, where Mrs. Stenhouse, restored
to her due place, by the visitation of trouble, watched by her husband,
and where even Amelia was not permitted to enter. Amelia was not very
anxious for the privilege, it must be owned. She kept up a perpetual
succession of messages, sending her sisters and her maid, and every half
hour going herself to ask whether papa was any better?--whether there
was any change?--with cheeks paled half by anxiety about her father, and
half by fright and apprehension for herself; for the cholera had come to
Harliflax, a dreaded visitor, some months before, and still made itself
remembered in fatal droppings of poison, here and there a single "case"
renewing in the public mind its original panic. The beauty was glad to
escape from her fears and the troubled atmosphere of the house, into a
burst of hurried conversation with Horace, who was not sentimental
enough to require of her any great degree of devotion to her father, and
did not find it at all unsuitable to the agitated condition of the
household that Amelia turned to himself so readily for occupation in her
restless idleness. She swept down upon a little sofa, which was lost and
disappeared under the covert of her ample skirts, and shaded her face
with her hand, and declared that she was so unhappy she did not know
what to do. "For it really is the cholera, Mr. Scarsdale," said Amelia;
"and we may all be gone in a week, for anything any one can tell. Poor
papa is so bad, it is dreadful to think of it! And I am sure, ever since
I knew what it was, I have been in such a state! If you were to listen
now, you could hear my heart beat."
"I am listening; but my ear is too far off," said Horace, with bold
admiration. "I should like to study that sound at a less distance, if I
might----"
"Oh! Mr. Scarsdale--if I were not so anxious and so agitated, I should
be very angry," said Amelia. "Pray, go away, sir. You are a great deal
too bold, you gentlemen. But to think of poor papa: quite well yesterday
morning, and to-night--oh dear! oh dear!"
"Perhaps he is not so bad as you suppose," said Horace.
"He is a great deal worse than anybody supposes," cried Amelia, with a
little sob. "Here, you--Harriet--Emma! Run up this moment, and knock at
the door, and ask how dear papa is; whether there is any change. I am so
afraid to hear there is any change; the words sound so dreadful--don't
they, Mr. Scarsdale?--and when it is one's father! Oh! what a long time
that child loiters. I must run myself! Wait just a moment, please."
And Amelia swept away, upsetting a chair in her progress, and almost
puffing out one of the candles on the table by the current of air which
attended her movements. She came back again a few minutes after,
breathless, but walking with great solemnity.
"He is no better--there is no difference, Mr. Scarsdale," she said, with
a great sigh, seating herself with the deepest seriousness, casting down
her eyes, and shaking her head. Horace watched her through all this
pantomime with glowing eyes. Not that he remarked or commented on the
character which thus showed itself: he cared no more for Amelia's
character than he did for her grandmother's; but from the splendid black
hair wreathed round her head, to the little foot which came out from
under her wide drapery, and upon which her own downcast eyes were fixed,
the young man devoured her with his gaze of bold and selfish passion. He
should have her yet, whoever might object: she should belong to him,
whether she would or not. That was the pivot of his fancy; and all
Amelia's pretty trickery was nothing to her thorough-going admirer, nor
did he even feel himself reminded of his special errand here, or of the
suffering man upon whom "as yet"--ominous words--there was no change!
Perhaps neither of the young people knew very well how long Horace
remained in that deserted drawing-room, which had so strange an air of
agitation to-night upon all its familiar aspects, and which, though
nothing was changed, bore somehow so clear an impression of being no
longer the centre of interest, but rather a forsaken corner out of the
current. After a while, however, the _tête-à-tête_ was rudely
interrupted by the staggering entrance of Mr. Stenhouse's
man-of-all-work, carrying in his arms the invalid boy with whom Horace
had made private acquaintance on his first visit here.
"Mr. Edmund's sent for up to master," said the man, confusedly, as he
saw that his young mistress was there. "Beg your pardon, Miss Amelia;
but I didn't know no one was here, and come in to rest--he's mortal
heavy, for all he's so little," he continued, as he staggered out again,
somewhat dismayed by his blunder. Miss Amelia was not the gentlest of
rulers. Little Edmund, meanwhile, clung to his bearer's shoulder, with
his suspicious eyes gleaming large and eager out of his little white
child's face. Edmund was not the person to come and go without a word.
"I say, sir, you!" cried Edmund, "papa's ill. You're not to come
a-courting, as Stevens says you all do, to-night. I won't have it--_I_
won't! I'm papa's son, and when he's ill there shan't be strangers in
the house!"
The end of this harangue was lost in the depths of the stairs, where
Stevens had borne forth in alarm his dangerous charge. Amelia started,
half rose, shook out her great skirts, and turned with graceful
condescension to her lover.
"Don't mind that little savage, Mr. Scarsdale. But really I had quite
forgotten that papa asked to see you; this has been such an agitating,
anxious day. Pray call Stevens, and make him tell papa that you are
here; and please," she continued, rising up suddenly, and laying her
hand on Horace's arm, "please do let me know what he says to you. Oh,
I'm sure it's about little Edmund--that little wretch is such a pet with
papa, and it's so unfair to us. Will you?" she cried, with animation,
making no resistance when Horace took and held her hand. "Will you
really? Oh, do, there's a dear good--oh no, I did not mean that; I
meant, there's a kind friend; now don't be foolish, Mr. Scarsdale; go up
directly to papa."
"I will, because you tell me," said Horace; "for your sake--it would be
hard to go on any other argument; and when I promise to tell you what
he says, promise that _you_ will see me again."
"Oh, yes, yes," said Amelia, hurrying him to the door, with a little
fright, adding piquancy to her gratified vanity. She had seen various
people "in love," and was a little indifferent to the manifestations of
that youthful delusion; but the eyes of Horace glowed upon her with no
commonplace fervour. She was flattered, but she was a little afraid,
even though she was not aware what black companion she had in the young
man's dangerous heart.