"She shall go. I always knew she was a thief," said Aunt Marguerite, as
she stood by her open window, listening to a whispered communication
going on. "Wait till Louise can act like a woman, and see to her
housekeeping again, and that girl shall go."
She listened again, and could hear a rough woman's voice urging
something, while the more familiar voice of Liza was raised again and
again in a whispered protest.
Then followed more talking, and at last there was a pause, followed by a
hasty whisper, and the heavy step of old Poll Perrow, with her basket on
her back, supported by the strap across her brow. Aunt Marguerite had
been to her niece's door again and again, and tried it to find it
fastened; and she could get no response to her taps and calls. She
seemed to feel no sorrow, only rage against all by whom she was
surrounded; and, isolated as it were, she spent the afternoon going to
and fro between her own room and one which gave her a good view of the
harbour mouth with boats going and returning; for the search for the
body of Harry Vine was kept up without cessation, the fishermen lending
themselves willingly to the task, and submitting, but with an ill grace,
to the presence of the police.
Aunt Marguerite, however, in spite of her vindictive feeling, suffered
intense grief; and her sorrow seemed to deepen the lines in her handsome
old face.
"They've murdered him, they've murdered him!" she kept on muttering as
she watched the passing boats. "Nne understood him but me."
She drew back sharply from the window, for just then a closely-veiled
figure came hurriedly into view, her goal being evidently the old
granite house.
Aunt Marguerite's eyes sparkled with vindictive malice.
"Yes," she said, half aloud; "and you too, madam--you had your share in
the poor boy's death. Oh! how I do hate your wretched Dutch race."
She crossed to the door, and opened it slightly, to stand listening, to
hear voices a few minutes later, and then steps on the stairs, which
stopped, after a good deal of whispering, at her niece's door, after
which there was a low tapping, and Liza's voice arose:
"Miss Louise! Miss Louise!"
"Yes, knock again. She will not answer. One of them has some pride
left."
"Miss Louise, Miss Louise, you're wanted, please."
There was no reply, nor yet to repeated knocks. There was a smile of
satisfaction on Aunt Marguerite's face as she drew herself up, and
opened her fan as if at some presentation, or about to dismiss an
intruder; but her countenance changed directly, and, forgetting her
dignity, she craned forward, for all at once a pleading voice arose.
"Louise, Louise, for pity's sake let me in."
There was a short pause, and then the sharp sound of the shooting back
of a bolt and the creaking of a door. Then it was closed again, and as
the listener threw her own open there came the faint sound of a
passionate cry and a low sobbing.
Aunt Marguerite stepped out into the passage, her head erect, and her
stiff silk trailing noisily behind her, to go to her own room, but the
way was barred by the presence of Liza, who was down on the floor
crouched in a heap, sobbing passionately, with her apron up to her eyes.
"Get up!" said Aunt Marguerite imperiously, as she struck at the girl's
hand with her fan.
Liza leaped to her feet, looked aghast at the figure before her, and
fled, while Aunt Marguerite strode into her room, and loudly closed the
door. As she passed her niece's chamber, Louise was clasped tightly in
Madelaine's arms, and it was long before the two girls were seated, hand
in hand, gazing wonderingly at the inroads made so soon by grief.
"It is so horrible--all so horrible," whispered Madelaine at last, for
the silence was for long unbroken, save by an occasional sob. Louise
looked at her wildly, and then burst into a passion of tears.
"Maddy!" she cried at last, "is it all true?"
They could say no more, but sat gathering comfort from the sympathetic
grasp of each other's hands.
At last, in a dull heavy way, the words came, each sounding as if the
speaker were in despair, but willing to suffer so that her companion
might be spared, and by degrees Louise learned that Van Heldre still lay
in the same insensible state, the awaking from which Madelaine shrank
from with horror, lest it should mean the return for a brief time of
sense before the great final change.
"I could not come to you," said Louise, after a long silence, as she
gazed wistfully in her friend's face, "and thought we should never meet
again as friends."
"You should have known me better," replied Madelaine. "It is very
terrible, such a--such a--oh, Louie, dearest, there must have been some
mistake. Harry--Harry could not have been so base."
Louise was silent for a time. At last she spoke.
"There must be times," she said gently, "when even the best of us are
not answerable for our actions. He must have been mad. It was when,
too--he had--promised--he had told me--that in the future--oh," she
cried, shuddering, as she covered her face with her hands, "it can't be
true--it cannot be true."
Again there was a long silence in the room, whose drawn-down blind
turned the light of a sickly yellow hue. But the window was open, and
from time to time the soft sea breeze wafted the blind inward, and a
bright ray of sunny light streamed in like hope across the two bent
forms.
"I must not stay long," said Madelaine. "I shiver whenever I am away,
lest--"
"No, no," cried Louise, passionately, as she strained her friend to her
breast, "we will not despond yet. All this comes across our lives like
a dense black cloud, and there must be a great change in the future.
Your father will recover."
"I pray that he may," said Madelaine.
"And I will not believe that Harry is--dead."
"I pray that he may be alive, Louie, to come some time in the future to
ask forgiveness of my father. For I did love him, Louie; at first as a
sister might the brother with whom she had played from childhood, and of
late in sorrow and anguish, as the woman whom he had always said he
loved. I fought with it, oh, so hard, but the love was there, and even
when I was most hard and cold--"
"And he believed you cared for Mr Leslie."
The words slipped from Louise Vine's lips like an escaped thought, and
the moment they were spoken, she shrank away with her pale cheeks
crimsoning, and she gazed guiltily at her companion.
"It was a foolish fancy on his part," said Madelaine gravely. "I cannot
blame myself for anything I ever said or did to your brother. If I had
been wrong, my lapse would have come upon me now like the lash of a
whip; but in the long hours of my watches by my poor father's bed, I
have gone over it again and again, and I cannot feel that I have been
wrong."
Louise drew her more closely to her breast.
"Maddy," she whispered, "years will have to pass, and we must separate.
The pleasant old days must end, but some day, when all these horrors
have been softened by time, we may call each other sister again, and in
the long dark interval you will not forget."
"Forget!" said Madelaine, with a smile full of sadness. "You know that
we shall always be unchanged."
"Going--so soon?" exclaimed Louise, for her friend had risen.
"He is lying yonder," said Madelaine. "I must go back. I could not
stay away long from you, though, without a word."
They stood for a few moments clasped in each other's arms, and then in a
slow, sad way went hand in hand towards the door. As she opened it for
her friend to pass through, Louise shrank back from the burst of
sunshine that flooded the passage, and placed her hand across her eyes.
It was a momentary act, and then she drew a long breath and followed her
friend, as if her example had given the needed strength, and acted as an
impetus to raise her from the lethargic state into which she had fallen.
In this spirit she went down with her to the door, when, as their steps
sounded on the hall floor, the dining-room door was thrown open quickly,
and Vine stood in the darkened opening, gazing wildly at the veiled
figure of Madelaine.
"Van Heldre?" he said, in an excited whisper; "not--not--" He could not
finish his speech, but stood with his hand pressed to his throat.
"My father's state is still unchanged," said Madelaine gently.
"Then there may yet be hope, there may yet be hope," said Vine hoarsely
as he shrank once more into the darkened room.
"Mr Vine," said Madelaine piteously, as she stood with extended hands
asking sympathy in her grievous trouble.
"My child!" he cried, as he caught her to his breast, and she clung
there sobbing bitterly. Then he softly disengaged her hands from his
neck. "No, no," he said dreamily, "I am guilty too; I must never take
you to my heart again."
"What have I done?" sobbed Madelaine, as she clung to him still.
"You?" he said fondly. "Ah! it was once my dream that you would be more
and more my child. Little Madelaine!"
He drew her to his breast again, kissed her with spasmodic eagerness,
and then held out a hand to Louise, who flew to his breast as with an
angry, malicious look, Aunt Marguerite advanced to the end of the
landing and looked down at the sobbing group.
"Good-bye!" whispered the stricken man hoarsely, "good-bye, my child. I
am weak and helpless. I hardly know what I say; but you must come here
no more. Good-bye."
He turned from them hastily, and glided back into the darkened room,
where Louise followed him, as Madelaine went slowly down toward the
town.
Vine was seated before the empty grate, his head resting on his hand, as
Louise went to his side, and he started as if from a dream when she
touched his shoulder.
"You, my child?" he said, sinking back. "Ah! stay with me--pray with
me. It is so hard to bear alone."
Volume 2, Chapter XVI.