THE PROFESSOR’S EXPERIMENT
MRS. HUNGERFORD’S NOVELS
‘_Mrs. Hungerford has well deserved the title of being one of the most
fascinating novelists of the day. The stories written by her are the
airiest, lightest, and brightest imaginable, full of wit, spirit, and
gaiety; but they contain, nevertheless, touches of the most exquisite
pathos. There is something good in all of them._’—ACADEMY.
=A MAIDEN ALL FORLORN=, and other Stories. Post 8vo., illustrated
boards, 2s.; cloth limp, 2s. 6d.
‘There is no guile in the novels of the authoress of “Molly Bawn,” nor
any consistency or analysis of character; but they exhibit a faculty
truly remarkable for reproducing the rapid small-talk, the shallow but
harmless “chaff” of certain strata of modern fashionable
society.’—_Spectator._
=IN DURANCE VILE=, and other Stories. Post 8vo., illustrated boards,
2s.; cloth limp, 2s. 6d.
‘Mrs. Hungerford’s Irish girls have always been pleasant to meet upon
the dusty pathways of fiction. They are flippant, no doubt, and often
sentimental, and they certainly flirt, and their stories are told often
in rather ornamental phrase and with a profusion of the first person
singular. But they are charming all the same.’—_Academy._
=A MENTAL STRUGGLE.= Post 8vo., illustrated boards, 2s.; cloth limp,
2s. 6d.
‘She can invent an interesting story, she can tell it well, and she
trusts to honest, natural, human emotions and interests of life for her
materials.’—_Spectator._
=A MODERN CIRCE.= Post 8vo., illustrated boards, 2s.; cloth limp, 2s.
6d.
‘Mrs. Hungerford is a distinctly amusing author.... In all her books
there is a “healthy absenteeism” of ethical purpose, and we have derived
more genuine pleasure from them than probably the most earnest student
has ever obtained from a chapter of “Robert Elsmere.”’—_Saturday
Review._
=MARVEL.= Post 8vo., illustrated boards, 2s.; cloth, 2s. 6d.
‘The author has long since created an imaginary world, peopled with more
or less natural figures; but her many admirers acknowledge the easy
grace and inexhaustible _verve_ that characterize her scenes of
Hibernian life, and never tire of the type of national heroine she has
made her own.’—_Morning Post._
=LADY VERNER’S FLIGHT.= Crown 8vo., cloth extra, 3s. 6d.; post 8vo.,
illustrated boards, 2s.; cloth limp, 2s. 6d.
‘There are in “Lady Verner’s Flight” several of the bright young
people who are wont to make Mrs. Hungerford’s books such very
pleasant reading.... In all the novels by the author of “Molly Bawn”
there is a breezy freshness of treatment which makes them most
agreeable.’—_Spectator._
=THE RED-HOUSE MYSTERY.= Crown 8vo., cloth extra, 3s. 6d.
‘Mrs. Hungerford is never seen to the best advantage when not dealing
with the brighter sides of life, or seeming to enjoy as much as her
readers the ready sallies and laughing jests of her youthful personages.
In her present novel, however, the heroine, if not all smiles and mirth,
is quite as taking as her many predecessors, while the spirit of
uncontrolled mischief is typified in the American heiress.’—_Morning
Post._
=THE THREE GRACES.= 2 vols., crown 8vo., 10s. net.
‘It is impossible to deny that Mrs. Hungerford is capable of writing a
charming love-story, and that she proves her capacity to do so in “The
Three Graces.”’—_Academy._
LONDON: CHATTO & WINDUS, PICCADILLY.
THE
PROFESSOR’S EXPERIMENT
=A Novel=
BY
MRS. HUNGERFORD
AUTHOR OF
‘MOLLY BAWN,’ ‘THE RED-HOUSE MYSTERY,’ ‘THE THREE GRACES,’ ‘LADY
VERNER’S FLIGHT,’ ETC.
[Illustration]
IN THREE VOLUMES
VOL. II.
=London=
CHATTO & WINDUS, PICCADILLY
1895
THE
PROFESSOR’S EXPERIMENT
CHAPTER XXI.
‘Confidence imparts a wondrous inspiration to its possessor. It bears
him on in security, either to meet no danger or to find matter of
glorious trial.’
The girl seems powerfully affected by the determination she has come to,
so much so as to be almost on the point of fainting. Wyndham, catching
her by the arm, presses her back into the garden-chair.
‘Not a word,’ says he. ‘Why should you tell me?’
‘I must, I will!’ She sits up, and with marvellous strength of will
recovers herself. ‘There is very little to tell,’ says she faintly. ‘I
have lived all my life in one house. As a little child I came to it.
Before that I remember nothing. If’—she looks at him—‘I tell you names
and places, you will keep them sacred? You will not betray me?’ Her
glance is now at once wistful and frightened.
‘I shall certainly not do that,’ says he gravely. ‘But why speak if you
need not?’
‘I don’t know.’ She pauses, clasping her hands tightly together, and
then at last, ‘I want to tell you.’
‘Well, tell me,’ says Wyndham gently.
‘The name of the people I lived with was Moore,’ says she, speaking at
once and rapidly, as if eager to get rid of what she has volunteered to
tell. ‘They called me Moore, too—Ella Moore—though I know, I am sure, I
did not belong to them.’
‘Ella?’
‘Yes, Ella; I think’—hesitatingly—‘that is my real Christian name,
because far, far back someone’—pressing her hand to her head, as though
trying to remember—‘used to call me Elly, someone who was not Mrs.
Moore. It was not her voice. And Moore—that is not my name, I know.’ Her
tone has grown quite firm. ‘Mrs. Moore always called herself my aunt;
but I don’t think she was anything to me. She was kind sometimes,
however, and I was sorry when she died. She had a husband, and I lived
with them ever since I can remember anything.’
‘Perhaps you were Mr. Moore’s niece.’
‘Oh, not that!’ She grows very pale, and makes a quick gesture of
repulsion with her hands. ‘Not that. No, thank God!’ She pauses, and he
can see that she has begun to tremble as if at some dreadful thought.
‘She, Mrs. Moore, died two months ago, and after that he—she was hardly
in her grave—and he—Oh, it is horrible!’—burying her face in her hands.
‘But he—he told me he wanted to marry me.’ She struggles with herself
for a moment, and then bursts into wild tears. One can see that the
tears are composed of past cruel memories, of outraged pride as well as
grief.
‘Oh, monstrous!’ says Wyndham hurriedly. He begins to pace rapidly up
and down the walk, coming back to her when he finds her more composed.
‘It is true, though,’ cries she miserably. ‘Oh, how I hate to think of
it!’—emphatically. ‘When I said no, that I’d rather die than marry
him—and I would—he was furious. A fortnight afterwards he spoke to me
again, saying he had ordered the banns to be called; and when I again
said I would never consent, he locked me in a room, and said he would
starve me to death unless I gave in. I’—clenching her small white
teeth—‘told him I would gladly starve in preference to that. And for
three nights and two days I did starve. He brought me nothing; but I did
not see him, and that kept me alive. On the third day he came again, and
again I defied him, and then—then—’ She cowers away from Wyndham, and
the hot flush of shame dyes her cheek. ‘Then—he beat me.’
‘The — scoundrel!’ says Wyndham between his teeth.
‘He beat me,’ says the girl, dry sobs breaking from her lips, ‘until my
back and arms were blue and swollen; and then he asked me again if I
would give in and marry him, and I—’
Here she pauses, and stands back as if confronting someone. She is
looking past Wyndham and far into space. It is plain that that past
horrible, degrading scene has come back to her afresh. The gross
indignity, the abominable affront, is again a present thing. Again the
blows rain upon her slender arms and shoulders; again the brute is
demanding her submission; and again, in spite of hunger, and pain, and
fear, she is defying him. Her head is well upheld, her hands clenched,
her large eyes ablaze. It is thus she must have looked as she defied the
cowardly scoundrel, and the effect is magnificent.
‘I said “No” again.’ The fire born of that last conflict dies away, and
she falls back weakly into the seat behind her. ‘That night I ran away.
I suppose in his rage he forgot to lock the door after him, and so I
found the matter easy. It was a wet night and very cold. I was tired,
half dead with hunger and with bitter pain. That was the night—’
She comes to a dead stop here, and turns her face away from him. A shame
keener than any she has known before, even in this recital made to him,
is filling her now. But still she determines to go on.
‘That was the night your servant found me!’
‘Poor child!’ says Wyndham. His sympathy—so unexpected—coming on her
terrible agitation, breaks her down. She bursts into a storm of sobs.
‘I would to God,’ says she, ‘that I had died before he found me!
Yes—yes, I would, though I know it was His will, and His alone, that
kept me alive, half dead from cold and hunger as I was. I can’t bear to
think of that night, and what you must have thought of me! It was
dreadful—dreadful! You shrank from me because I courted death so openly.
Yes—yes, you did’—combating a gesture on his part—‘but you did not know
how near I was to it at that moment. I was famished, bruised, homeless—I
was almost senseless. I knew only that I could not return to that man’s
house, and that there was no other house to go to. That was all I knew,
through the unconsciousness that was fast overtaking me. To die seemed
the best thing—and to die in that warm room. I was frozen. Oh, blame me,
despise me, if you like, but anyone would have been glad to die, if they
felt as homeless and as starving as I did that night!’
‘Who is blaming you?’ says Wyndham roughly. ‘Good heavens! is there a
man on earth who could blame you, after hearing so sad a story? Because
you have met one brute in your life, must you consider all other men
brutes?’
His manner is so vehement that Ella, thinking he is annoyed with her,
shrinks from him.
‘Don’t be angry with me,’ says she imploringly.
‘Angry with you!’ says he impatiently. ‘There is only one to be angry
with, and that is that devil. Where does he live?’
She gives him the road, and the number of the house where she had lived
with the Moores—a road of small houses, chiefly occupied by artisans and
clerks; a road not very far from the Zoological Gardens.
‘But what are you going to do?’ asks she nervously. ‘You will not tell
him I am here?’
‘Of course not. But it is quite necessary that a fellow like that should
feel there is a law in the land.’
‘But if you say anything about me,’ says she in a tone now thoroughly
frightened, ‘he will search me out, no matter in what corner of the
earth I may be.’
‘I don’t think so, once I have spoken to him,’ says the barrister
grimly.
‘You mean’—she looks at him timidly—‘you think that if—’ She breaks off
again. ‘He told me that his wife, who he said was my aunt, had made him
guardian over me, and that he would be my master for ever.’
‘Even supposing all that were true, and Mrs. Moore were your aunt—which
I doubt—and had left her husband guardian over you, still, there are
limits to the powers of guardians.’
‘Then if you see him, you think’—with trembling anxiety—‘you can tell
him that he has no hold over me?’
‘Yes, I think so.’
‘And I shall be free?’
‘Quite free.’
Ella leans forward. Her hands are upon her knees and are tightly
clenched. She is thinking. Suddenly a soft glow overspreads her face.
She lifts her eyes to his, and he can see that a wonderful
brilliance—the light of hope—has come into them.
‘It is too good to be true,’ says she slowly.
‘Oh no, I hope not. But I wish I had a few more particulars, Miss Moore.
I am afraid’—seeing a shade upon her face—‘I shall be obliged to call
you that until I have discovered your real name. And to do that you must
help me. Have you no memory that goes farther back than the Moores? You
spoke of someone who used to call you Elly—’
‘It was a woman,’ says she quickly. ‘Often—often in my dreams I see her
again. She used to kiss me—I remember that.’
It is such a sad little saying—once, long ago, so long ago that she can
scarcely remember it, some woman used to kiss her! But, evidently, since
that tender kisses had not fallen to the poor child’s lot.
‘But she died. I saw her lying dead. I thought she was asleep. She was
very beautiful—I remember that, too. I don’t want to see anyone dead
again. Death,’ says she with a shudder, ‘is horrible!’
This, coming from one who had braved its terrors voluntarily so very
lately, causes Wyndham to look at her in some surprise.
‘Yes!’ says he. ‘And yet that night when the Professor gave you
something that might have led to death, were you frightened then?’
‘I think I have explained that,’ says she, with a slight touch of
dignity.
‘True.’ He continues the slow pacing to and fro upon the garden-path
that he has taken up occasionally during this interview. ‘There is
nothing more, then, that you can tell me? The lady of whom you speak,
who used to kiss you, was perhaps your mother?’
‘I think so—I believe it,’ says the girl. She turns to him a face
flushed and gratified. ‘Mr. Wyndham, it was kind of you to call her
that—a lady! To me, too, she seems a lady, and, besides that, an angel.’
A lady! Wyndham’s kindly instincts go out to this poor waif and stray
with an extreme sense of pity. A lady! Very likely, but perhaps no wife.
The mother, if a lady, has certainly left the gentle manners of good
birth to this poor child, but nothing else. A vindictive anger against
the vices of this life in which he lives, and a still greater anger
against the _bétises_ of society that would not admit this girl into
their ranks, however faultless she may be, because of a blot upon her
birth, stirs his soul. That she is one of the great unknown seems very
clear to him, but does not prevent his determination to hunt out that
scoundrel Moore and break his hold over the girl. In the meantime, it
would be well for her to mix with her kind.
‘About a companion,’ says he. ‘You told me you were anxious to continue
your studies. I think I know a lady—elderly, refined, and gentle—who
would be able to help you. You could go out with her.’
‘I shall not go out of this house,’ says the girl. She has begun to
tremble again. ‘Mr. Wyndham, do not ask me to do that. Even’—slowly, but
steadily—‘if you did ask me, I should refuse. I will not go where I can
be found. This lady you speak of, if she will come and live with me, and
teach me—I should like that; but—’
‘You will require very little teaching, I think,’ says Wyndham, who has
been struck by the excellence of both her manners and her speech,
considering her account of her former life.
‘I know nothing,’ says she calmly; ‘but, as I told you, I had read a
good deal, and for the past three years I used to go as nursery
governess to a Mrs. Blaquiere, who lived in Westmoreland Road. I used to
lunch with her and the children, and she was very kind to me; and she
taught me a good deal in other ways—society ways.’
‘You were an apt pupil,’ says he gravely, a little doubtfully, perhaps.
‘I liked the way she talked, and it seemed to come very easy to me after
awhile,’ says the girl indifferently, not noticing his keen glance at
her. ‘But this governess—this companion?’ asks she. ‘Will she want to go
out—to be amused? If so, I could not have her. I shall never go out of
this place until—’
‘Until?’ asks he.
‘You tell me that man has no longer any power over me. I’—she looks at
him, and again terror whitens her face—‘I am sure you are wrong, and
that he has the power to drag me away from this, if he finds me.’
‘I should advise you not to dwell on that until I have found him,’ says
Wyndham, a little stiffly. The successful barrister is a little thrown
back upon himself by being told that he will undoubtedly find himself in
the wrong. ‘But this Mrs. Blaquiere, who was so kind to you—why do you
not apply to her for protection?’
‘She and her husband and the children all went to Australia in the early
part of last spring, and so I lost sight of them.’
‘Lost your situation, too?’—regarding her carefully.
‘Yes; and I had no time to look for another. Mrs. Moore grew ill then,
and I had to attend her day and night until she died. The rest I have
told you.’
‘I see,’ says Wyndham. ‘Tell me again this man Moore’s address.’ He
writes it now in his pocket-book, though it was written well into his
brain before; but he wished to see if she would falter about it the
second time.
He bids her good-bye presently, refusing her timid offer of tea.
At the gate he finds Mrs. Denis, presumably tying up a creeper, but most
undoubtedly on the look-out for him.
‘Good-evening, yer honour.’
‘Good-evening’—shortly. Wyndham is deep in thought, and by no means in a
good temper. He would have brushed by her; but, armed with a garden
rake, a spade, and a huge clipper, Mrs. Denis is not lightly to be dealt
with.
‘Askin’ yer pardon, sir, ’tis just a word I want wid ye. Miss Ella, the
crathure—ye’re going to let her stay here, aren’t ye?’
‘Yes,’ says Wyndham gruffly.
‘The saints be praised!’ says Mrs. Denis piously. ‘Fegs! ’tis a good
heart ye have, sir, in spite of it all.’ What the ‘all’ is she leaves
beautifully indefinite. ‘An’, sure, ’twas meself tould Denis—that ould
raprobate of a fool o’ mine—that ye’d niver turn her out. “For where
would she go,” says I, “if he did—a born lady like her?” An’ there’s
plenty o’ room for her here, sir.’
‘I dare say,’ says Wyndham, feeling furious. ‘But for all that, I can’t
have all the young women in Ireland staying in my house just because
there is room for them.’
‘God forbid, yer honour! All thim young women would play the very divil
wid the Cottage, an’’—thoughtfully—‘aitch other too. Wan at a time, sir,
is a good plan, an’ I’m glad it’s Miss Ella has had the first of it.’
This remarkable speech is met by Wyndham with a stony glare that goes
lightly over the head of Mrs. Denis. That worthy woman is too much
elated with the news she has dragged out of him to care for glares of
any sort. Childless, though always longing for a child—and especially
for a daughter—Mrs. Denis’s heart had gone out at once to the pretty
waif that had been cast into her life in so strange a fashion. And now
she hastens back to the house to get ‘her Miss Ella a cup o’ tay, the
crathure!’ and wheedle out of her all the news about the ‘masther.’