JUST inside the door there appeared the figure of a small woman dressed
in plain and poor black garments. She silently lifted her black net veil
and disclosed a dull, pale, worn, weary face. The forehead was low
and broad; the eyes were unusually far apart; the lower features were
remarkably small and delicate. In health (as the consul at Mannheim had
remarked) this woman must have possessed, if not absolute beauty,
at least rare attractions peculiarly her own. As it was now,
suffering--sullen, silent, self-contained suffering--had marred its
beauty. Attention and even curiosity it might still rouse. Admiration or
interest it could excite no longer.
The small, thin, black figure stood immovably inside the door. The dull,
worn, white face looked silently at the three persons in the room.
The three persons in the room, on their side, stood for a moment without
moving, and looked silently at the stranger on the threshold. There was
something either in the woman herself, or in the sudden and stealthy
manner of her appearance in the room, which froze, as if with the touch
of an invisible cold hand, the sympathies of all three. Accustomed to
the world, habitually at their ease in every social emergency, they
were now silenced for the first time in their lives by the first serious
sense of embarrassment which they had felt since they were children in
the presence of a stranger.
Had the appearance of the true Grace Roseberry aroused in their minds a
suspicion of the woman who had stolen her name, and taken her place in
the house?
Not so much as the shadow of a suspicion of Mercy was at the bottom of
the strange sense of uneasiness which had now deprived them alike of
their habitual courtesy and their habitual presence of mind. It was as
practically impossible for any one of the three to doubt the identity of
the adopted daughter of the house as it would be for you who read these
lines to doubt the identity of the nearest and dearest relative you have
in the world. Circumstances had fortified Mercy behind the strongest of
all natural rights--the right of first possession. Circumstances had
armed her with the most irresistible of all natural forces--the force
of previous association and previous habit. Not by so much as a
hair-breadth was the position of the false Grace Roseberry shaken by
the first appearance of the true Grace Roseberry within the doors of
Mablethorpe House. Lady Janet felt suddenly repelled, without knowing
why. Julian and Horace felt suddenly repelled, without knowing why.
Asked to describe their own sensations at the moment, they would have
shaken their heads in despair, and would have answered in those words.
The vague presentiment of some misfortune to come had entered the room
with the entrance of the woman in black. But it moved invisibly; and it
spoke as all presentiments speak, in the Unknown Tongue.
A moment passed. The crackling of the fire and the ticking of the clock
were the only sounds audible in the room.
The voice of the visitor--hard, clear, and quiet--was the first voice
that broke the silence.
“Mr. Julian Gray?” she said, looking interrogatively from one of the two
gentlemen to the other.
Julian advanced a few steps, instantly recovering his self-possession.
“I am sorry I was not at home,” he said, “when you called with your
letter from the consul. Pray take a chair.”
By way of setting the example, Lady Janet seated herself at some little
distance, with Horace in attendance standing near. She bowed to the
stranger with studious politeness, but without uttering a word, before
she settled herself in her chair. “I am obliged to listen to this
person,” thought the old lady. “But I am _not_ obliged to speak to her.
That is Julian’s business--not mine. Don’t stand, Horace! You fidget me.
Sit down.” Armed beforehand in her policy of silence, Lady Janet folded
her handsome hands as usual, and waited for the proceedings to begin,
like a judge on the bench.
“Will you take a chair?” Julian repeated, observing that the visitor
appeared neither to heed nor to hear his first words of welcome to her.
At this second appeal she spoke to him. “Is that Lady Janet Roy?” she
asked, with her eyes fixed on the mistress of the house.
Julian answered, and drew back to watch the result.
The woman in the poor black garments changed her position for the first
time. She moved slowly across the room to the place at which Lady Janet
was sitting, and addressed her respectfully with perfect self-possession
of manner. Her whole demeanor, from the moment when she had appeared at
the door, had expressed--at once plainly and becomingly--confidence in
the reception that awaited her.
“Almost the last words my father said to me on his death-bed,” she
began, “were words, madam, which told me to expect protection and
kindness from you.”
It was not Lady Janet’s business to speak. She listened with the
blandest attention. She waited with the most exasperating silence to
hear more.
Grace Roseberry drew back a step--not intimidated--only mortified and
surprised. “Was my father wrong?” she asked, with a simple dignity
of tone and manner which forced Lady Janet to abandon her policy of
silence, in spite of herself.
“Who was your father?” she asked, coldly.
Grace Roseberry answered the question in a tone of stern surprise.
“Has the servant not given you my card?” she said. “Don’t you know my
name?”
“Which of your names?” rejoined Lady Janet.
“I don’t understand your ladyship.”
“I will make myself understood. You asked me if I knew your name. I
ask you, in return, which name it is? The name on your card is ‘Miss
Roseberry.’ The name marked on your clothes, when you were in the
hospital, was ‘Mercy Merrick.’”
The self-possession which Grace had maintained from the moment when she
had entered the dining-room, seemed now, for the first time, to be on
the point of failing her. She turned, and looked appealingly at Julian,
who had thus far kept his place apart, listening attentively.
“Surely,” she said, “your friend, the consul, has told you in his letter
about the mark on the clothes?”
Something of the girlish hesitation and timidity which had marked her
demeanor at her interview with Mercy in the French cottage re-appeared
in her tone and manner as she spoke those words. The changes--mostly
changes for the worse--wrought in her by the suffering through which she
had passed since that time were now (for the moment) effaced. All that
was left of the better and simpler side of her character asserted itself
in her brief appeal to Julian. She had hitherto repelled him. He began
to feel a certain compassionate interest in her now.
“The consul has informed me of what you said to him,” he answered,
kindly. “But, if you will take my advice, I recommend you to tell your
story to Lady Janet in your own words.”
Grace again addressed herself with submissive reluctance to Lady Janet.
“The clothes your ladyship speaks of,” she said, “were the clothes of
another woman. The rain was pouring when the soldiers detained me on the
frontier. I had been exposed for hours to the weather--I was wet to the
skin. The clothes marked ‘Mercy Merrick’ were the clothes lent to me by
Mercy Merrick herself while my own things were drying. I was struck
by the shell in those clothes. I was carried away insensible in those
clothes after the operation had been performed on me.”
Lady Janet listened to perfection--and did no more. She turned
confidentially to Horace, and said to him, in her gracefully ironical
way: “She is ready with her explanation.”
Horace answered in the same tone: “A great deal too ready.”
Grace looked from one of them to the other. A faint flush of color
showed itself in her face for the first time.
“Am I to understand,” she asked, with proud composure, “that you don’t
believe me?”
Lady Janet maintained her policy of silence. She waved one hand
courteously toward Julian, as if to say, “Address your inquiries to
the gentleman who introduces you.” Julian, noticing the gesture, and
observing the rising color in Grace’s cheeks, interfered directly in the
interests of peace
“Lady Janet asked you a question just now,” he said; “Lady Janet
inquired who your father was.”
“My father was the late Colonel Roseberry.”
Lady Janet made another confidential remark to Horace. “Her assurance
amazes me!” she exclaimed.
Julian interposed before his aunt could add a word more. “Pray let us
hear her,” he said, in a tone of entreaty which had something of the
imperative in it this time. He turned to Grace. “Have you any proof to
produce,” he added, in his gentler voice, “which will satisfy us that
you are Colonel Roseberry’s daughter?”
Grace looked at him indignantly. “Proof!” she repeated. “Is my word not
enough?”
Julian kept his temper perfectly. “Pardon me,” he rejoined, “you forget
that you and Lady Janet meet now for the first time. Try to put yourself
in my aunt’s place. How is she to know that you are the late Colonel
Roseberry’s daughter?”
Grace’s head sunk on her breast; she dropped into the nearest chair. The
expression of her face changed instantly from anger to discouragement.
“Ah,” she exclaimed, bitterly, “if I only had the letters that have been
stolen from me!”
“Letters,” asked Julian, “introducing you to Lady Janet?”
“Yes.” She turned suddenly to Lady Janet. “Let me tell you how I lost
them,” she said, in the first tones of entreaty which had escaped her
yet.
Lady Janet hesitated. It was not in her generous nature to resist the
appeal that had just been made to her. The sympathies of Horace were far
less easily reached. He lightly launched a new shaft of satire--intended
for the private amusement of Lady Janet. “Another explanation!” he
exclaimed, with a look of comic resignation.
Julian overheard the words. His large lustrous eyes fixed themselves on
Horace with a look of unmeasured contempt.
“The least you can do,” he said, sternly, “is not to irritate her. It
is so easy to irritate her!” He addressed himself again to Grace,
endeavoring to help her through her difficulty in a new way. “Never mind
explaining yourself for the moment,” he said. “In the absence of your
letters, have you any one in London who can speak to your identity?”
Grace shook her head sadly. “I have no friends in London,” she answered.
It was impossible for Lady Janet--who had never in her life heard of
anybody without friends in London--to pass this over without notice. “No
friends in London!” she repeated, turning to Horace.
Horace shot another shaft of light satire. “Of course not!” he rejoined.
Grace saw them comparing notes. “My friends are in Canada,” she broke
out, impetuously. “Plenty of friends who could speak for me, if I could
only bring them here.”
As a place of reference--mentioned in the capital city of
England--Canada, there is no denying it, is open to objection on the
ground of distance. Horace was ready with another shot. “Far enough off,
certainly,” he said.
“Far enough off, as you say,” Lady Janet agreed.
Once more Julian’s inexhaustible kindness strove to obtain a hearing for
the stranger who had been confided to his care. “A little patience, Lady
Janet,” he pleaded. “A little consideration, Horace, for a friendless
woman.”
“Thank you, sir,” said Grace. “It is very kind of you to try and help
me, but it is useless. They won’t even listen to me.” She attempted to
rise from her chair as she pronounced the last words. Julian gently laid
his hand on her shoulder and obliged her to resume her seat.
“_I_ will listen to you,” he said. “You referred me just now to the
consul’s letter. The consul tells me you suspected some one of taking
your papers and your clothes.”
“I don’t suspect,” was the quick reply; “I am certain! I tell you
positively Mercy Merrick was the thief. She was alone with me when I was
struck down by the shell. She was the only person who knew that I had
letters of introduction about me. She confessed to my face that she
had been a bad woman--she had been in a prison--she had come out of a
refuge--”
Julian stopped her there with one plain question, which threw a doubt on
the whole story.
“The consul tells me you asked him to search for Mercy Merrick,” he
said. “Is it not true that he caused inquiries to be made, and that no
trace of any such person was to be heard of?”
“The consul took no pains to find her,” Grace answered, angrily. “He
was, like everybody else, in a conspiracy to neglect and misjudge me.”
Lady Janet and Horace exchanged looks. This time it was impossible for
Julian to blame them. The further the stranger’s narrative advanced, the
less worthy of serious attention he felt it to be. The longer she spoke,
the more disadvantageously she challenged comparison with the absent
woman, whose name she so obstinately and so audaciously persisted in
assuming as her own.
“Granting all that you have said,” Julian resumed, with a last effort
of patience, “what use could Mercy Merrick make of your letters and your
clothes?”
“What use?” repeated Grace, amazed at his not seeing the position as
she saw it. “My clothes were marked with my name. One of my papers was
a letter from my father, introducing me to Lady Janet. A woman out of a
refuge would be quite capable of presenting herself here in my place.”
Spoken entirely at random, spoken without so much as a fragment of
evidence to support them, those last words still had their effect.
They cast a reflection on Lady Janet’s adopted daughter which was too
outrageous to be borne. Lady Janet rose instantly. “Give me your arm,
Horace,” she said, turning to leave the room. “I have heard enough.”
Horace respectfully offered his arm. “Your ladyship is quite right,” he
answered. “A more monstrous story never was invented.”
He spoke, in the warmth of his indignation, loud enough for Grace to
hear him. “What is there monstrous in it?” she asked, advancing a step
toward him, defiantly.
Julian checked her. He too--though he had only once seen Mercy--felt
an angry sense of the insult offered to the beautiful creature who had
interested him at his first sight of her. “Silence!” he said, speaking
sternly to Grace for the first time. “You are offending--justly
offending--Lady Janet. You are talking worse than absurdly--you are
talking offensively--when you speak of another woman presenting herself
here in your place.”
Grace’s blood was up. Stung by Julian’s reproof, she turned on him a
look which was almost a look of fury.
“Are you a clergyman? Are you an educated man?” she asked. “Have you
never read of cases of false personation, in newspapers and books? I
blindly confided in Mercy Merrick before I found out what her character
really was. She left the cottage--I know it, from the surgeon who
brought me to life again--firmly persuaded that the shell had killed me.
My papers and my clothes disappeared at the same time. Is there nothing
suspicious in these circumstances? There were people at the Hospital who
thought them highly suspicious--people who warned me that I might find
an impostor in my place.” She suddenly paused. The rustling sound of
a silk dress had caught her ear. Lady Janet was leaving the room, with
Horace, by way of the conservatory. With a last desperate effort of
resolution, Grace sprung forward and placed herself in front of them.
“One word, Lady Janet, before you turn your back on me,” she said,
firmly. “One word, and I will be content. Has Colonel Roseberry’s letter
found its way to this house or not? If it has, did a woman bring it to
you?”
Lady Janet looked--as only a great lady can look, when a person of
inferior rank has presumed to fail in respect toward her.
“You are surely not aware,” she said, with icy composure, “that these
questions are an insult to Me?”
“And worse than an insult,” Horace added, warmly, “to Grace!”
The little resolute black figure (still barring the way to the
conservatory) was suddenly shaken from head to foot. The woman’s eyes
traveled backward and forward between Lady Janet and Horace with the
light of a new suspicion in them.
“Grace!” she exclaimed. “What Grace? That’s my name. Lady Janet, you
_have_ got the letter! The woman is here!”
Lady Janet dropped Horace’s arm, and retraced her steps to the place at
which her nephew was standing.
“Julian,” she said. “You force me, for the first time in my life, to
remind you of the respect that is due to me in my own house. Send that
woman away.”
Without waiting to be answered, she turned back again, and once more
took Horace’s arm.
“Stand back, if you please,” she said, quietly, to Grace.
Grace held her ground.
“The woman is here!” she repeated. “Confront me with her--and then send
me away, if you like.”
Julian advanced, and firmly took her by the arm. “You forget what is due
to Lady Janet,” he said, drawing her aside. “You forget what is due to
yourself.”
With a desperate effort, Grace broke away from him, and stopped Lady
Janet on the threshold of the conservatory door.
“Justice!” she cried, shaking her clinched hand with hysterical frenzy
in the air. “I claim my right to meet that woman face to face! Where is
she? Confront me with her! Confront me with her!”
While those wild words were pouring from her lips, the rumbling of
carriage wheels became audible on the drive in front of the house.
In the all-absorbing agitation of the moment, the sound of the wheels
(followed by the opening of the house door) passed unnoticed by the
persons in the dining-room. Horace’s voice was still raised in angry
protest against the insult offered to Lady Janet; Lady Janet herself
(leaving him for the second time) was vehemently ringing the bell to
summon the servants; Julian had once more taken the infuriated woman by
the arms and was trying vainly to compose her--when the library door
was opened quietly by a young lady wearing a mantle and a bonnet. Mercy
Merrick (true to the appointment which she had made with Horace) entered
the room.
The first eyes that discovered her presence on the scene were the eyes
of Grace Roseberry. Starting violently in Julian’s grasp, she pointed
toward the library door. “Ah!” she cried, with a shriek of vindictive
delight. “There she is!”
Mercy turned as the sound of the scream rang through the room, and
met--resting on her in savage triumph--the living gaze of the woman
whose identity she had stolen, whose body she had left laid out for
dead. On the instant of that terrible discovery--with her eyes fixed
helplessly on the fierce eyes that had found her--she dropped senseless
on the floor.