‘After life’s fitful fever, she sleeps well!’
The few days following the one on which the spiritualistic _séance_ was
held were passed by Bradley in a sort of dream. The more he thought
of what he had heard and seen, the more puzzled he became. At times he
seemed half inclined to believe in supernatural collaboration, then he
flouted his belief and laughed contemptuously at himself. Of course it
was all imposture, and he had been a dupe.
Then he thought of Eustasia, and the interest which she had at first
aroused in him rapidly changed to indignation and contempt.
Very soon these people ceased to occupy his thoughts at all; so
self-absorbed was he, indeed, in his own trouble that he forgot them as
completely as if they had never been. After all they were but shadows
which had flitted across his path and faded. Had he been left to himself
he would assuredly never have summoned them up again.
But he was evidently too valuable a convert to be let go in that way.
One morning he received the following note, written on delicate paper in
the most fairylike of fragile hands:
‘My dear Mr. Bradley,--We hold a _séance_ to-morrow night at six, and
hope you’ll come; at least, _I_ do! Salem don’t particularly want you,
since you broke the conditions, and he regards you as a disturbing
influence. I _know better_: the spirits like you, and I feel that with
you I could do great things; so I hope you’ll be here.
‘Eustasia Mapleleafe.’
Bradley read the letter through twice, then he gazed at it for a time
in trembling hesitation. Should he go? Why not? Suppose the people were
humbugs, were they worse than dozens of others he had met? and they had
at least the merit of bringing back to him the presence of the one being
who was all in all to him. His hesitation lasted only for a moment--the
repulsion came. He threw the letter aside.
À few days later a much more significant incident occurred. As Bradley
was leaving his house one morning he came face to face with a veiled
woman who stood before his door. He was about to pass: the lady laid a
retaining hand upon his arm and raised her veil.
It was Eustasia.
‘Guess you’re surprised to see me,’ she said, noticing his start;
‘suppose I may come in, though, now I’m here?’
Bradley pushed open the door, and led the way to his study. Eustasia
followed him; having reached the room, she sat down and eyed him
wistfully.
‘Did you get my letter?’ she asked.
‘Yes.’
‘You didn’t answer it?’
‘No.’
‘Why not?’
Bradley hesitated.
‘Do you want me to tell you?’ he said.
‘Why, certainly--else why do I ask you? but I see you don’t wish to tell
me. Why?’
‘Because I dislike giving unnecessary pain.’
‘Ah! in other words you believe me to be a humbug, but you haven’t the
cruelty to say so. Well, that don’t trouble me. _Prove_ me to be one,
and you may call me one, but give me a fair trial first.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Come to some more of our _séances_, will you? _do_ say you’ll come!’
She laid her hand gently upon his arm, and fixed her eyes almost
entreatingly upon him. He stared at her like one fascinated, then shrank
before her glance.
‘Why do you wish me to come?’ he said.
‘You know my thoughts and feelings on this subject. You and I are cast
in different moulds; we must go different ways.’
She smiled sadly.
‘The spirits will it otherwise,’ she said; while under her breath she
added, ‘and so do I.’
But he was in no mood to yield that day. As soon as Eustasia saw this
she rose to go. When her thin hand lay in his, she said softly:
‘Mr. Bradley, if ever you are in trouble come to _us_; you will find it
is not all humbug _then!_’
Eustasia returned home full of hope. ‘He will come,’ she said; ‘yes, he
will assuredly come.’ But days passed, and he neither came nor sent; at
last, growing impatient, she called again at his house; then she learned
that he had left London.
‘He has flown from me,’ she thought; ‘he feels my influence, and fears
it.’
But in this Eustasia was quite wrong. He was flying not from her but
from himself. The wretched life of self-reproach and misery which he was
compelled to lead was crushing him down so utterly that unless he made
some effort he would sink and sicken. Die? Well, after all, that would
not have been so hard; but the thought of leaving Alma was more than he
could bear. He must live for the sake of the days which might yet be in
store for them both.
He needed change, however, and he sought it for a few days on foreign
soil. He went over one morning to Boulogne, took rooms in the Hôtel de
Paris, and became one of the swarm of tourists which was there filling
the place.
The bathing season was then at its height, and people were all too
busy to notice him; he walked about like one in a dream, watching the
pleasure-seekers, but pondering for ever on the old theme.
After all it was well for him that he had left England, he thought--the
busy garrulous life of this place came as a relief after the dreary
monotony of town. In the evenings he strolled out to the concerts or
open-air dances, and observed the fisher girls, with their lovers moving
about in the gaslight; while in the mornings he strolled about the sand
watching with listless amusement the bathers who crowded down to the
water’s edge like bees in swarming time.
One morning, feeling more sick at heart than usual, he issued from the
hotel and bent his steps towards the strand. On that day the scene was
unusually animated. Flocks of fantastically-dressed children amused
themselves by making houses in the sand, while their _bonnes_ watched
over them, and their mammas, clad in equally fantastic costumes,
besieged the bathing-machines. Bradley walked for a time on the sands
watching the variegated crowd; it was amusing and distracting, and he
was about to look around for a quiet spot in which he could spend an
hour or so, when he was suddenly startled by an apparition.
A party of three were making their way towards the bathing-machines, and
were even then within a few yards of him. One was a child dressed in a
showy costume of serge, with long curls falling upon his shoulders; on
one side of him was a French _bonne_, on the other a lady extravagantly
attired in the most gorgeous of sea-side costumes. Her cheeks and lips
were painted a bright red, but her skin was white as alabaster. She
was laughing heartily at something which the little boy had said, when
suddenly her eyes fell upon Bradley, who stood now within two yards of
her.
It was his wife.
She did not pause nor shrink, but she ceased laughing, and a peculiar
look of thinly veiled contempt passed over her face as she walked on.
‘_Maman_,’ said the child in French, ‘who is that man, and why did he
stare so at you?’
The lady shrugged her shoulders, and laughed again.
‘He stared because he had nothing better to look at, I suppose, _chéri_;
but come, I shall miss my bath; you had best stay here with Augustine,
and make sand-hills till I rejoin you. _Au revoir_, Bébé.’
She left the child with the nurse, hastened on and entered one of the
bathing-machines, which was immediately drawn down into the sea.
Bradley still stood where she had left him, and his eyes remained fixed
upon the machine which held the woman whose very presence poisoned the
air he breathed. All his old feelings of repulsion returned tenfold; the
very sight of the woman seemed to degrade and drag him down.
As he stood there the door of the machine opened, and she came forth
again. This time she was the wonder of all. Her shapely limbs were
partly naked, and her body was covered with a quaintly cut bathing-dress
of red. She called out some instructions to her nurse; then she walked
down and entered the sea.
Bradley turned and walked away. He passed up the strand and sat down
listlessly on one of the seats on the terrace facing the water. He took
out Alma’s last letter, and read it through, and the bitterness of his
soul increased tenfold.
When would his misery end? he thought. Why did not death come and claim
his own, and leave him free? Wherever he went his existence was poisoned
by this miserable woman.
‘So it must ever be,’ he said bitterly. ‘I must leave this place, for
the very sight of her almost drives me mad.’
He rose and was about to move away, when he became conscious, for the
first time, that something unusual was taking place. He heard sounds of
crying and moaning, and everybody seemed to be rushing excitedly towards
the sand. What it was all about Bradley could not understand, for he
could see nothing. He stood and watched; every moment the cries grew
louder, and the crowd upon the sands increased. He seized upon a passing
Frenchman, and asked what the commotion meant.
‘_Ras de marée, monsieur!_’ rapidly explained the man as he rushed
onward.
Thoroughly mystified now, Bradley resolved to discover by personal
inspection what it all meant. Leaving the terrace he leapt upon the
shore, and gained the waiting crowd upon the sand. To get an explanation
from anyone here seemed to be impossible, for every individual member of
the crowd seemed to have gone crazy. The women threw up their bands and
moaned, the children screamed, while the men rushed half wildly about
the sands.
Bradley touched the arm of a passing Englishman.
‘What is all this panic about?’ he said.
‘The _ras de marée!_’ r Yes, but what is the ras de marée?’
‘Don’t you know? It is a sudden rising of the tide; it comes only once
in three years. It has surprised the bathers, many of whom are drowning.
See, several machines have gone to pieces, and the others are floating
like driftwood! Yonder are two boats out picking up the people, but if
the waves continue to rise like this they will never save them all. One
woman from that boat has fainted; no, good heavens, she is dead.’
The scene now became one of intense excitement. The water, rising higher
and higher, was breaking now into waves of foam; most of the machines
were dashed about like corks upon the ocean, their frightened occupants
giving forth the most fearful shrieks and cries. Suddenly there was a
cry for the lifeboat; immediately after it dashed down the sand, drawn
by two horses, and was launched out upon the sea; while Bradley and
others occupied themselves in attending to those who were laid fainting
upon the shore.
But the boats, rapidly as they went to work, proved insufficient to save
the mass of frightened humanity still struggling with the waves. The
screams and cries became heartrending as one after another sank to rise
no more. Suddenly there was another rush.
‘Leave the women to attend to the rescued,’ cried several voices. ‘Let
the men swim out to the rescue of those who are exhausted in the sea.’
There was a rush to the water; among the first was Bradley, who,
throwing off his coat, plunged boldly into the water. Many of those who
followed him were soon overcome by the force of the waves and driven
back to shore; but Bradley was a powerful swimmer, and went on.
He made straight for a figure which, seemingly overlooked by everyone
else, was drifting rapidly out to sea. On coming nearer he saw, by the
long black hair, which floated around her on the water, that the figure
was that of a woman. How she supported herself Bradley could not see;
she was neither swimming nor floating; her back was towards him, and she
might have fainted, for she made no sound.
On coming nearer he saw that she was supporting herself by means of a
plank, part of the _debris_ which had drifted from the broken machines.
By this time he was quite near to her;--she turned her face towards him,
and he almost cried out in pain.
He recognised his wife!
Yes, there she was, helpless and almost fainting--her eyes were heavy,
her lips blue; and he seemed to be looking straight into the face of
death. Bradley paused, and the two gazed into each other’s eyes. He saw
that her strength was going, but he made no attempt to put out a hand
to save her. He thought of the past, of the curse this woman had been
to him; and he knew that by merely doing nothing she would be taken from
him.
Should he let her die? Why not? If he had not swum out she most
assuredly would have sunk and been heard of no more. Again he looked at
her and she looked at him: her eyes were almost closed now: having once
looked into his face she seemed to have resigned all hopes of rescue.
No, he could not save her--the temptation was too great. He turned and
swam in the direction of another figure which was floating helplessly
upon the waves. He had only taken three strokes when a violent revulsion
of feeling came; with a terrible cry he turned again to the spot where
he had left the fainting and drowning woman. But she was not there--the
plank was floating upon the water--that was all.
Bradley dived, and reappeared holding the woman in his arms. Then he
struck out with her to the shore.
It was a matter of some difficulty to get there, for she lay like lead
in his hold. Having reached the shore, he carried her up the beach, and
placed her upon the sand.
Then he looked to see if she was conscious.
Yes, she still breathed;--he gave her some brandy, and did all in his
power to restore her to life. After a while she opened her eyes, and
looked into Bradley’s face.
‘Ah, it is _you!_ she murmured faintly, then, with a long-drawn sigh,
she sank back, dead!
Still dripping from his encounter with the sea, his face as white as the
dead face before him, Bradley stood like one turned to stone. Suddenly
he was aroused by a heartrending shriek. The little boy whom he had
seen with the dead woman broke from the bauds of his nurse, and sobbing
violently threw himself upon the dead body.
‘_Maman! maman!_’ he moaned.
The helpless cries of the child forced upon Bradley the necessity for
immediate action. Having learned from the nurse the address of the
house where ‘Mrs. Montmorency’ was staying, he had the body put upon a
stretcher and conveyed there. He himself walked beside it, and the child
followed, screaming and crying, in his nurse’s arms.
Having reached the house, the body was taken into a room to be properly
dressed, while Bradley tried every means in his power to console the
child! After a while he was told that all was done, and he went into the
chamber of death.