AT HERITAGE HALL.
Mr. and Mrs. Edward Heritage and Miss Gertie were at breakfast.
The post-bag had just come in, and Ruth and Gertie were sorting the
letters.
‘Fourteen for you, Edward dear, this morning,’ said Ruth, with a smile;
‘one for mamma, and four for me.’
Mrs. Heritage opened her letters, which were of no importance, and the
master of the establishment—the squire, as he was now called in the
neighbourhood—put his by the side of his plate.
It was a peculiarity of his never to open his letters until he was
alone in his study. Ruth had once asked him the reason, saying
jestingly that she was always so anxious to know what was in hers that
she could not wait a minute.
Her husband parried the question, and turned it off with a little joke,
and Ruth had at last got accustomed to the habit. It was not his only
peculiarity. One—and one which sometimes distressed his wife very
much—was a habit of sitting for hours without saying a word, heedless
of all that was passing around him, his thoughts far away in some
dreamland of his own.
Sometimes, after sitting for a couple of hours in one of these fits of
abstraction, he would order his horse to be saddled, and ride away, not
returning, perhaps, until night.
He told his wife that these attacks were constitutional, that he had
been liable to these fits of depression all his life, and that the only
thing which relieved them was long and violent exercise.
At last ‘the squire’s fits’ became proverbial in the neighbourhood, and
when the villagers or any of the folks round about met Marston
galloping along the lanes at a furious pace, his face pale and
determined, and his long hair flying in the wind, they knew what it
meant. Old Matthews, the village tailor, and the gossip of the place,
declared that the squire always rode as if he was pursued by a
demon—and old Matthews was right.
Edward Heritage galloped across the country to escape from a demon who
was relentless in pursuit—the demon of the past.
Everything had prospered with him from the day Ruth became his wife. He
was respected by his tenantry, well received by his neighbours, and
thoroughly happy in his home-life. Ruth had been all that a woman could
be to him, and he thanked God every day for the blessing of her love.
But amidst every outward appearance of happiness there was a canker
preying upon his heart. Do what he would, the memories of the past
would crowd upon him, and bring fears for the future.
The more he became accustomed to the new existence, the greater grew
his terror lest any ghost of the old life should wander into the
charmed circle.
To all the world he was Squire Heritage; to himself he was Edward
Marston. People saw in him a benevolent country gentleman, devoted to
his wife and his young ward; he saw in himself an undiscovered forger
and thief, a criminal hiding from justice. His loving wife was a woman
he had dragged into a shameful alliance, and was one sin the more upon
his conscience. His ward was the grand-daughter of an accomplice, a man
in whose keeping lay his honour and his life. When at the county
sessions he took his seat upon the bench, he trembled lest among the
malefactors in the dock there might be some who had know him in the old
days.
But there was not much chance of his being recognised. The change of
name was a great safeguard, and added to that was the fact that his
appearance had changed too. He had aged very rapidly since his
marriage. He wore his hair long, and allowed his beard and whiskers to
grow freely. These were tinged already with grey, and altogether the
change was so complete, not only of surroundings but of appearance,
that none but those who had known him intimately and who were searching
for him would probably have recognised him.
After breakfast on the morning when we renew our acquaintance with
Edward, Ruth, and Gertie, the two ladies went up to old Mrs. Adrian’s
room, and left the gentleman alone.
Mrs. Adrian had broken rapidly after her husband’s death, and was now
unable to leave her room.
Ruth, like a loving daughter, endeavoured to make her mother feel her
loss as little as possible, and always that portion of the morning
which her husband spent in his study she and Gertie would pass with the
old lady.
They read to her, chatted with her, brought her all the news and all
the village gossip they thought she would care to hear, and sometimes,
as an extra treat, contradicted her, just to give her an opportunity of
exercising her old privilege of scolding them.
When Ruth and Gertie had gone upstairs, the squire picked up his
letters and carried them into his study.
He looked at the superscriptions carefully, and tossed some of them
aside. They were either circulars or bills, and not of pressing
importance. But one envelope he looked at long and anxiously before he
opened it.
He knew the handwriting.
It was that of Seth Preene.
Preene was the only one of the gang he had once been connected with who
still enjoyed his confidence. Preene was necessary to him, and could be
trusted. He paid him liberally for his services. But why should Preene
write to him? He had strict orders not to do so unless it was of the
first necessity. He received his allowance regularly through Mr.
Heritage’s London solicitors, and it was understood that there was to
be no direct communication unless something happened which rendered it
necessary.
What had happened?
The squire—for so we are bound to call him, as he is Edward Marston no
longer—turned the envelope about nervously. He dreaded to open it. Was
it possible that at last the blow was about to fall? What he dreaded
was the necessity for action. He would do anything rather than that the
structure he had raised with so much labour should be pulled about his
ears, but he feared the necessity for any active steps arising.
He was tired of crime—he had washed his hands of it for ever; but
rather than his sins should come to light and shame fall upon his dear
ones, he knew there was no desperate deed he would not commit.
He dreaded to find himself at bay. He hoped that the past was so
securely buried that he would need to fling no fresh earth over it, and
here was a letter from Seth Preene. What could it be about save the
past?
Nerving himself with an effort, he opened the envelope and read the
letter at a glance.
It fell from his hands, and he rose from his chair and paced the room.
‘Curse him!’ he muttered. ‘Why couldn’t he stay where he was? Have I
not suffered enough already, that this scoundrel must turn up to be the
terror of my life?—now, now, when at last I had begun to feel secure.’
He picked up the letter and read it carefully again:
‘Dear Sir,
‘Heckett is back. From what I have discovered he means mischief. I
ought to see you at once.’
‘How dared he come back?’ exclaimed the squire angrily. ‘He cannot have
found out the trick played upon him. What does Preene mean by “he means
mischief”? What has he discovered? Ah! I must see Preene at ones. I
wouldn’t have an unknown danger hanging over my head now for worlds. It
would kill me.’
The squire sat moodily in his chair and gazed across the broad acres
that were his. He would have given them all to be free at this moment
from the dread which had once again taken possession of his breast.
‘Poor Ruth!’ he murmured; ‘if she only kuew what a miserable wretch I
am! How I play an odious comedy every time I smile! I must see Preene
and know the worst.’
He sat down to his desk and commenced a letter, bidding Preene come
down; but before it was finished he tore it up and flung it into the
fire.
‘Better not,’ he muttered; ‘this place has never been polluted yet by
any of the gang except myself. I’ll keep it pure as long as I can.’
Then he wrote a fresh note. It was to the effect that he would be in
town at a certain time on the morrow and Preene was to meet him.
He signed it with his old initials, E. M., and, having directed it in a
running hand utterly unlike his own, he went out and posted it in the
village himself.
He felt inexpressibly mean and guilty and miserable. As he walked home
he fell into one of his fits of depression. He anticipated the worst.
There was an end to his fool’s paradise at last. On the morrow he would
have to be scheming, and might, for all he knew, be drawn into the old
vortex again. His only safety from the past might lie in a fresh crime.
Gertie was standing in the garden near the front entrance as he came up
the path. She noticed his black look and shrank aside. He went straight
through the house and shut himself in his study. He was busy all the
morning with some papers which he took from a drawer that he always
kept locked.
Ruth saw nothing of him till evening, when they sat down to dinner.
Gertie had told her that he had one of his ‘fits’ on him, and Ruth,
like a sensible little woman, thought discretion was the better part of
valour, and did not go and worry him.
At dinner he scarcely spoke, and Ruth and Gertie had the conversation
to themselves. When the servants were out of the room, Ruth, thinking
to coax him out of his silence, laughingly offered him a penny for his
thoughts, and, when he did not reply, raised her offer to twopence, and
put the two coppers in front of him on the table.
He pushed them angrily away, and in doing so his hand caught the
wine-glass and dashed the contents all over the table-cloth.
‘Oh, Edward, how careless!’ exclaimed Ruth. ‘Why, what-ever’s put you
out?’
‘Nothing!’ he answered snappishly.
‘Nonsense! something has. Come, tell me. Why have secret from me? Was
it anything in the letters this morning?’
‘Will you leave me alone?’ exclaimed her husband, clinching his hand,
and striking it on the table.
The tears came into Ruth’s eyes.
‘Gertie dear,’ she said, ‘go up and sit with mamma a little, will you?’
Gertie took the hint and went out, her cheeks scarlet and her lip
quivering.
‘Edward, what is the matter with you?’ Ruth then said. ‘I never heard
you speak like this before! Are you mad?’
‘No, I’m just coming to my senses,’ answered her husband; ringing the
bell violently.
The servant entered.
‘Bring me the time-table.’
The servant went into the study and brought the local time-table. The
squire ran his finger down it.
‘There’s a train to town at 9.30. Pack my portmanteau at once.’
The servant withdrew, as much astonished at the idea of the master’s
abrupt departure as Ruth was.
‘Do you mean to say that you are going to town to-night’, Edward?’ she
asked, scarcely believing her ears.
‘Yes, I do.’
‘But you never said a word——’
‘Madam, am I bound to consult you about my move——’
He broke down suddenly. The sight of Ruth’s grave face and the hot
tears welling to her eyes was too much for him.
‘Forgive me, my darling,’ he cried, clasping her to his breast and
kissing her passionately. ‘Ah, Ruth, Ruth! if you only knew what I have
suffered you would forgive me.’
‘Tell me what it is, Edward,’ sobbed Ruth. ‘Let me bear your secret
with you.’
‘I cannot,’ he moaned. ‘I am going to town now. When I return all may
be well. In the meantime trust in me.’
He kissed her passionately and went out of the room. Half-an-hour later
he bade her adieu and drove to the station.
He could not let the night go over. He was in a state of nervous
excitement, and felt that he must get away from home at once, and see
Preene there and then and know the worst.
That night, for the first time since their marriage, Ruth and her
husband were parted. That night, for the first time, she closed her
eyes with a heavy heart, and felt that something had come between them.
And up in London the squire sat with Seth Preene and heard his story,
and then he knew that his dream was at an end; that he must wander back
into the old path of shame once more, and plot and plan again, putting
his conscience behind him if he would not let his enemy triumph over
him and drag him and her who bore his name to ruin and disgrace.