Sir Philip Hastings returned to his own house earlier than had been
expected, bringing with him the physician he had gone to seek, and
whom--contrary to the ordinary course of events--he had found at once.
They both went up to Lady Hastings's room, where the physician,
according to the usual practice of medical men in consultation,
approved of all that his predecessor had done, yet ordered some
insignificant changes in the medicines in order to prove that he had
not come there for nothing. He took the same view of the case that Mr.
Short had taken, declaring that there was no immediate danger; but at
the same time he inquired particularly how that lady rested in the
night, whether she started in her sleep, was long watchful, and
whether she breathed freely during slumber.
The maid's account was not very distinct in regard to several of these
points; but she acknowledged that it was her young lady who usually
sat up with Lady Hastings till three or four o'clock in the morning.
Sir Philip immediately directed Emily to be summoned, but the maid
informed him she had gone out about an hour and a half before, and had
not then returned.
When the physician took his leave and departed, Sir Philip summoned
the butler to his presence, and inquired, with an eager yet gloomy
tone, if he knew where Mistress Emily had gone.
"I really do not, Sir Philip," replied the man. "She went out with Mr.
Dixwell, but they parted a little way down the road, and my young lady
went on as if she were going to farmer Wallop's or Jenny Best's."
At the latter name Sir Philip started as if a serpent had stung him,
and he waved to the man to quit the room. As soon as he was alone he
commenced pacing up and down in more agitation than he usually
displayed, and once or twice words broke from him which gave some
indications of what was passing in his mind.
"Too clear, too clear," lie said, and then after a pause exclaimed,
holding up his hands; "so young, and so deceitful! Marlow must be told
of this, and then must act as he thinks fit--it were better she were
dead--far better! What is the cold, dull corruption of the grave, the
mere rotting of the flesh, and the mouldering of the bones, to this
corruption of the spirit, this foul dissolution of the whole moral
nature?"
He then began to pace up and down more vehemently than before, fixing
his eyes upon the ground, and seeming to think profoundly, with a
quivering lip and knitted brow. "Hard, hard task for a father," he
said--"God of heaven that I should ever dream of such a thing!--yet it
might be a duty. What can Marlow be doing during this long unexplained
absence? France--can he have discovered all this and quitted her,
seeking, in charity, to make the breach as little painful as possible?
Perhaps, after all," he continued, after a few moments' thought, "the
man may have been mistaken when he told me that he believed that this
young scoundrel was lying ill of a fall at this woman's cottage; yet
at the best it was bad enough to quit a sick mother's bedside for long
hours, when I too was absent. Can she have done it to show her spleen
at this foolish opposition to her marriage?"
There is no character so difficult to deal with--there is none which
is such a constant hell to its possessor--as that of a moody man. Sir
Philip had been moody, as I have endeavored to show, from his very
earliest years; but all the evils of that sort of disposition had
increased upon him rapidly during the latter part of his life.
Unaware, like all the rest of mankind, of the faults of his own
character, he had rather encouraged than struggled against its many
great defects. Because he was stern and harsh, he fancied himself
just, and forgot that it is not enough for justice to judge rightly of
that which is placed clearly and truly before it, and did not
remember, or at all events apply the principle, that an accurate
search for truth, and an unprejudiced suspension of opinion till truth
has been obtained, are necessary steps to justice. Suspicion--always a
part and parcel of the character of the moody man--had of late years
obtained a strong hold upon him, and unfortunately it had so happened
that event after event had occurred to turn his suspicion against his
own guiltless child. The very lights and shades of her character,
which he could in no degree comprehend, from his own nature being
destitute of all such impulsiveness, had not only puzzled him, but
laid the foundation of doubts. Then the little incident which I have
related in a preceding part of this work, regarding the Italian
singing-master--Emily's resolute but unexplained determination to take
no more lessons from that man, had set his moody mind to ponder and to
doubt still more. The too successful schemes and suggestions of Mrs.
Hazleton had given point and vigor to his suspicions, and the betrayal
of his private conversation to the government had seemed a climax to
the whole, so that he almost believed his fair sweet child a fiend
concealed beneath the form of an angel.
It was in vain that he asked himself, What could be her motives? He
had an answer ready, that her motives had always been a mystery to
him, even in her lightest acts. "There are some people," he thought,
"who act without motives--in whom the devil himself seems to have
implanted an impulse to do evil without any cause or object, for the
mere pleasure of doing wrong."
On the present occasion he had accidentally heard from the farmer, who
was the next neighbor of Jenny Best, that he was quite certain Sir
John Hastings, as he called him, was lying ill from a fall at that
good woman's cottage. His horse had been found at a great distance on
a wild common, with the bridle broken, and every appearance of having
fallen over in rearing. Blood and other marks of an accident had been
discovered on the road. Mr. Short, the surgeon, was seen to pay
several visits every day to the old woman's house, and yet maintained
the most profound secrecy in regard to his patient. The farmer argued
that the surgeon would not be so attentive unless that patient was a
person of some importance, and it was clear he was not one of Jenny
Best's own family, for every member of it had been well and active
after the surgeon's visits had been commenced.
All these considerations, together with the absence of John Ayliffe
from his residence, had led the good farmer to a right conclusion, and
he had stated the fact broadly to Sir Philip Hastings.
Sir Philip, on his part, had made no particular inquiries, for the
very name of John Ayliffe was hateful to him; but when he heard that
his daughter had gone forth alone to that very cottage, and had
remained there for a considerable time in the same place with the man
whom he abhorred, and remembered that the tale which had been boldly
put forth of her having visited him in secret, the very blood, as it
flowed through his heart, seemed turned into fire, and his brain
reeled with anguish and indignation.
Presently the hall door was heard to open, and there was a light step
in the passage. Sir Philip darted forth from his room, and met his
daughter coming in with a sad and anxious face, and as he thought with
traces of tears upon her eyelids.
"Where have you been?" asked her father in a stern low tone.
"I have been to Jenny Best's down the lane, my father," replied Emily,
startled by his look and manner, but still speaking the plain truth,
as she always did. "Is my mother worse?"
Without a word of reply Sir Philip turned away into his room again and
closed the door.
Alarmed by her father's demeanor, Emily hurried up at once to Lady
Hastings's room, but found her certainly more cheerful and apparently
better.
The assurance given by the physician that there was no immediate
danger, nor any very unfavorable symptom, had been in a certain degree
a relief to Lady Hastings herself; for, although she had undoubtedly
been acting a part when in the morning she had declared herself dying,
yet, as very often happens with those who deceive, she had so far
partially deceived herself as to believe that she was in reality very
ill. She was surprised at Emily's sudden appearance and alarmed look,
but her daughter did not think it right to tell her the strange
demeanor of Sir Philip, but sitting down as calmly ass he could by her
mother's side, talked to her for several minutes on indifferent
subjects. It was evident to Emily that, although her father's tone was
so harsh, her mother viewed her more kindly than in the morning, and
the information which had been given her by the surgeon accounted for
the change. The conduct of Sir Philip, however, seemed not to be
explained, and Emily could hardly prevent herself from falling into
one of those reveries which have often been mentioned before. She
struggled against the tendency, however, for some time, till at length
she was relieved by the announcement that Mistress Hazleton was below,
but when Lady Hastings gave her maid directions to bring her friend
up, Emily could refrain no longer from uttering at least one word of
warning.
"Give me two minutes more, dear mamma," she said, in a low voice. "I
have something very particular to say to you--let Mrs. Hazleton wait
but for two minutes."
"Well," said Lady Hastings, languidly; and then turning to the maid
she added, "Tell dear Mrs. Hazleton that I will receive her in five
minutes, and when I ring my bell, bring her up."
As soon as the maid had retired Emily sank upon her knees by her
mother's bedside, and kissed her hand, saying, "I have one great favor
to ask, dear mother, and I beseech you to grant it."
"Well, my child," answered Lady Hastings, thinking she was going to
petition for a recall of her injunction against the marriage with
Marlow, "I have but one object in life, my dear Emily, and that is
your happiness. I am willing to make any sacrifice of personal
feelings for that object. What is it you desire?"
"It is merely this," replied Emily, "that you would not put any trust
or confidence whatever in Mrs. Hazleton. That you would doubt her
representations, and confide nothing to her, for a short time at
least."
Lady Hastings looked perfectly aghast "What do you mean, Emily?" she
said. "What can you mean? Put no trust in Mrs. Hazleton my oldest and
dearest friend?"
"She is not your friend," replied Emily, earnestly, "nor my friend,
nor my father's friend, but the enemy of every one in this house. I
have long had doubts--Marlow changed those doubts into suspicions, and
this day I have accidentally received proof positive of her cruel
machinations against my father, yourself, and me. This justifies me in
speaking as I now do, otherwise I should have remained silent still."
"But explain, explain, my child," said Lady Hastings. "What has she
done? What are these proofs you talk of? I cannot comprehend at all
unless you explain."
"There would be no time, even if I were not bound by a promise,"
replied Emily; "but all I ask is that you suspend all trust and
confidence in Mrs. Hazleton for one short day--perhaps it may be
sooner; but I promise you that at the end of that time, if not before,
good Mr. Dixwell shall explain every thing to you, and place in your
hands a paper which will render all Mrs. Hazleton's conduct for the
last two years perfectly clear and distinct."
"But do tell me something, at least, Emily," urged her mother. "I hate
to wait in suspense. You used to be very fond of Mrs. Hazleton and she
of you. When did these suspicions of her first begin, and how?"
"Do you not remember a visit I made to her some time ago," replied
Emily, "when I remained with her for several days? Then I first
learned to doubt her. She then plotted and contrived to induce me to
do what would have been the most repugnant to your feelings and my
father's, as well as to my own. But moreover she came into my room one
night walking in her sleep, and all her bitter hatred showed itself
then."
"Good gracious! What did she say? What did she do?" exclaimed Lady
Hastings, now thoroughly forgetting herself in the curiosity Emily's
words excited.
Her daughter related all that had occurred on the occasion of Mrs.
Hazleton's sleeping visit to her room, and repeated her words as
nearly as she could recollect them.
"But why, my dearest child, did you not tell us all this before?"
asked Lady Hastings.
"Because the words were spoken in sleep," answered Emily, "and excited
at the time but a vague doubt. Sleep is full of delusions; and though
I thought the dream must be a strange one which could prompt such
feelings, yet still it might all be a troublous dream. It was not till
afterwards, when I saw cause to believe that Mrs. Hazleton wished to
influence me in a way which I thought wrong, that I began to suspect
the words that had come unconsciously from the depths of her secret
heart. Since then suspicion has increased every day, and now has
ripened into certainty. I tell you, dear mother, that good Mr.
Dixwell, whom you know and can trust, has the information as well as
myself. But we are both bound to be silent as to the particulars for
some hours more. I could not let Mrs. Hazleton be with you again,
however--remembering, as I do, that seldom has she crossed this
threshold or we crossed hers, without some evil befalling us--and not
say as much as I have said, to give you the only hint in my power of
facts which, if you knew them fully, you could judge of much
better than myself. Believe me, dear mother, that as soon as I am
permitted--and a very few hours will set me free--I will fly at once
to tell you all, and leave you and my father to decide and act as your
own good judgment shall direct."
"You had better tell me first, Emily," replied Lady Hastings; "a woman
can always best understand the secrets of a woman's heart. I wish you
had not made any promise of secrecy; but as you have, so it must be.
Has Marlow had any share in this discovery?" she added, with some
slight jealousy of his influence over her daughter's mind.
"Not in the least with that which I have made to-day," replied Emily;
"but I need not at all conceal from you that he has long suspected
Mrs. Hazleton of evil feelings and evil acts towards our whole family;
and that he believes that he has discovered almost to a certainty that
Mrs. Hazleton aided greatly in all the wrong and injury that has been
done my father. The object of his going to France was solely to trace
out the whole threads of the intrigue, and he went, not doubting in
the least that he should succeed in restoring to my parents all that
has been unjustly taken from them. That such a restoration must take
place, I now know; but what he has learned or what he has done I
cannot tell you, for I am not aware. I am sure, however, that if he
brings all he hopes about, it will be his greatest joy to have aided
to right you even in a small degree."
"I do believe he is a very excellent and amiable young man," said Lady
Hastings thoughtfully.
She seemed as if she were on the point of saying something farther on
the subject of Marlow's merits; but then checked herself, and added,
"But now indeed, Emily, I think I ought to send for Mrs. Hazleton."
"But you promise me, dear mother," urged Emily eagerly, "that you will
put no faith in any thing she tells you, and will not confide in her
in any way till you have heard the whole?"
"That I certainly will take care to avoid, my dear," replied Lady
Hastings. "After what you have told me, it would be madness to put any
confidence in her--especially when a few short hours will reveal all.
You are sure, Emily, that it will not be longer!"
"Perfectly certain, my dear mother," answered her daughter. "I would
not have promised to refrain from speaking, had I not been certain
that the time for such painful concealment must be very short."
"Well, then, my dear child, ring the bell," said Lady Hastings. "I
will be very guarded merely on your assurances, for I any sure that
you are always candid and sincere whatever your poor father may
think."
Emily rung the bell, and retired to her own room, repeating mournfully
to herself, "whatever my poor father may think?--Well, well," she
added, "the time will soon come when he will be undeceived, and do his
child justice. Alas, that it should ever have been otherwise!"
She found relief in tears; and while she wept in solitude Lady
Hastings prepared to receive Mrs. Hazleton with cold dignity. She had
fully resolved, when Emily left her, to be as silent as possible in
regard to every thing that had occurred that day; not to allude,
directly or indirectly, to the warning which had been given her, and
to leave Mrs. Hazleton to attribute her unwonted reserve to caprice,
or any thing else she pleased. But the resolutions of Lady Hastings
were very fragile commodities when she fell into the hands of artful
people who knew her character, and one was then approaching not easily
frustrated in her designs.