XXV

Lord Dungory dined at Brookfield that evening. He noticed that Olive was

nervous and restless, and he reminded her of what a French poet had said

on the subject of beauty. But she only turned her fair head impatiently,

and a little later on when her mother spoke to her she burst into tears.

Nor was she as easily consoled as usual, and she did not become calm

until Mrs. Barton suggested that her dear child was ill, and that she

would go upstairs and put her to bed. Then, looking a little alarmed,

Olive declared she was quite well, but she passionately begged to be

left alone. As they left the dining-room she attempted to slip away;

Alice made a movement as if to follow her, but Mrs. Barton said:

'Leave her to herself, Alice; she would rather be left alone. She has

overstrained her nerves, that is all.'

Olive heard these words with a singular satisfaction, and as she

ascended the stairs from the first landing, her heart beat less

violently. On the threshold of her room she paused to listen for the

drawing-room door to shut. Through the silent house the lock sounded

sharply.

'I hope none of them will come upstairs bothering after me,' the girl

murmured to herself. 'If they do I shall go mad;' and standing in the

middle of the floor she looked round the room vacantly, unable to

collect her thoughts. The wardrobe was on her right, and, seeing herself

in the glass, she wondered if she were looking well. Her eyes wandered

from her face to her shoulders, and thence to her feet. Going over to

the toilette-table she sought amid her boots, and, having selected a

strong pair, she began to button them. Her back was turned to the door,

and at the slightest sound she started. Once or twice the stairs

creaked, and she felt something would occur to stop her. Her heart was

beating so violently that she thought she was going to be ill; and she

almost burst out crying because she could not make up her mind if she

should put on a hat and travelling-shawl, or run down to the wood as she

was, to meet the Captain. 'He will surely,' she thought, 'have something

in the carriage to put around me, but he may bring the dog-cart, and it

looks very cold. But if Alice or mamma saw me coming downstairs with a

shawl on, they'd suspect something, and I shouldn't be able to get away.

I wonder what time it is? I promised to meet Edward at nine; he'll of

course wait for me, but what time is it? We dined at half-past seven; we

were an hour at dinner, half-past eight, and I have been ten minutes

here. It must be nearly nine now, and it will take me ten minutes to get

to the corner of the road. The house is quiet now.'

Olive ran down a few steps, but at that moment heavy footsteps and a

jingling of glasses announced that the butler was carrying glasses from

the dining-room to the pantry. 'When will he cease, when will he cease;

will he hang about that passage all night?' the girl asked herself

tremblingly; and so cruel, so poignant had her suspense become, that had

it been prolonged much further her overwrought nerves would have given

way, and she would have lapsed into a fit of hysterics. But the

tray-full of glasses she had heard jingling were now being washed, and

the irritative butler did not stir forth again. This was Olive's

opportunity. From the proximity of the drawing-room to the hall-door it

was impossible for her to open it without being heard; the kitchen-door

was equally, even more, dangerous, and she could hear the servants

stirring in the passages; there was no safe way of getting out of the

house unseen, except through the dining-room.

The candles were lighted, the crumbs were still on the tablecloth;

passing behind the red curtain she unlocked the French window, and she

shivered in the keen wind that was blowing.

It was almost as bright as day. A September moon rose red, and in a

broken and fragmentary way the various aspects of the journey that lay

before her were anticipated: as she ran across the garden swards she saw

the post-horses galloping in front of her; as her nervous fingers strove

to unfasten the wicket, she thought of the railway-carriage; and as she

passed under the great dark trunks of the chestnut-trees she dreamed of

Edward's arm that would soon be cast protectingly around her, and his

face; softer than the leafy shadows above her, would be leaned upon her,

and his eyes filled with a brighter light than the moon's would look

down into hers.

The white meadow that she crossed so swiftly gleamed like the sea, and

the cows loomed through the greyness like peaceful apparitions. But the

dark wood with its sepulchral fir-tops and mysteriously spreading

beech-trees was full of formless terror, and once the girl screamed as

the birds flew with an awful sound through the dark undergrowth. A

gloomy wood by night has terrors for the bravest, and it was only the

certainty that she was leaving girl-life--chaperons, waltz-tunes, and

bitter sneering, for ever--that gave courage to proceed. A bit of

moss-grown wall, a singularly shaped holly-bush, a white stone, took

fantastic and supernatural appearances, and once she stopped, paralyzed

with fear, before the grotesque shadow that a dead tree threw over an

unexpected glade. A strange bird rose from the bare branches, and at

that moment her dress was caught by a bramble, and, when her shriek tore

the dark stillness, a hundred wings flew through the pallor of the

waning moon.

At the end of this glade there was a paling and a stile that Olive would

have to cross, and she could now hear, as she ran forward, the needles

of the silver firs rustling with a pricking sound in the wind. The heavy

branches stretched from either side, and Olive thought when she had

passed this dernful alley she would have nothing more to fear; and she

ran on blindly until she almost fell in the arms of someone whom she

instantly believed to be Edward.

'Oh! Edward, Edward, I am nearly dead with fright!' she exclaimed.

'I am not Edward,' a woman answered. Olive started a step backwards; she

would have fainted, but at the moment the words were spoken Mrs.

Lawler's face was revealed in a beam of weak light that fell through a

vista in the branches.

'Who are you? Let me pass.'

'Who am I? You know well enough; we haven't been neighbours for fifteen

years without knowing each other by sight. So you are going to run away

with Captain Hibbert!'

'Oh, Mrs. Lawler, let me pass. I am in a great hurry, I cannot wait; and

you won't say anything about meeting me in the wood, will you?'

'Let you pass, indeed; and what do you think I came here for? Oh, I know

all about it--all about the corner of the road, and the carriage and

post-horses! a very nice little plan and very nicely arranged, but I'm

afraid it won't come off--at least, not to-night.'

'Oh, won't it, and why?' cried Olive, clasping her hands. 'Then it was

Edward who sent you to meet me, to tell me that--that--What has

happened?'

'Sent me to tell you! Whom do you take me for? Is it for a--well, a nice

piece of cheek! I carry your messages? Well, I never!'

'Then what did you come here for--how did you know? . . .'

'How did I know? That's my business. What did I come here for? What do

you think? Why, to prevent you from going off with Teddy.'

'With Teddy!'

'Yes, with Teddy. Do you think no one calls him Teddy but yourself?'

Then Olive understood, and, with her teeth clenched she said, 'No, it

isn't true; it is a lie; I will not believe it. Let me pass. What

business have you to detain me?--what right have you to speak to me? We

don't know you; no one knows you: you are a bad woman whom no one will

know.'

'A bad woman! I like that--and from you. And what do you want to be, why

are you running away from home? Why, to be what I was. We're all alike,

the same blood runs in our veins, and when the devil is in us we must

have sweethearts, get them how we may: the airs and graces come on

after; they are only so much trimming.'

'How dare you insult me, you bad woman? Let me pass; I don't know what

you mean.'

'Oh yes, you do. You think Teddy will take you off to Paris, and spoon

you and take you out; but he won't, at least not to-night. I shan't give

him up so easily as you think for, my lady.'

'Give him up! What is he to you? How dare you speak so of my future

husband? Captain Hibbert only loves me, he has often told me so.'

'Loves nobody but you! I suppose you think that he never kissed, or

spooned, or took anyone on his knee but you. Well, I suppose at twenty

we'd believe anything a man told us; and we always think we are getting

the first of it when we are only getting someone else's leavings. But it

isn't for chicks of girls like you that a man cares, it isn't to you a

man comes for the love he wants; your kisses are very skim milk indeed,

and it is we who teach them the words of love that they murmur

afterwards in your ears.'

The women looked at each other in silence, and both heard the needles

shaken through the darkness above them. Mrs. Lawler stood by the stile,

her hand was laid on the paling. At last Olive said:

'Let me pass. I will not listen to you any longer; nor do I believe a

word you have said. We all know what you are; you are a bad woman whom

no one will visit. Let me pass!' and pushing passionately forward she

attempted to cross the stile. Then Mrs. Lawler took her by the shoulder

and threw her roughly back. She fell to the ground heavily.

'Now you had better get up and go home,' said Mrs. Lawler, and she

approached the prostrate girl. 'I didn't mean to hurt you; but you

shan't elope with Teddy if I can prevent it. Why don't you get up?'

'Oh! my leg, my leg; you have broken my leg!'

'Let me help you up.'

'Don't touch me,' said Olive, attempting to rise; but the moment she put

her right foot to the ground she shrieked with pain, and fell again.

'Well, if you are going to take it in that way, you may remain where you

are, and I can't go and ring them up at Brookfield. I don't think there

will be much eloping done to-night, so farewell.'