week or so they were spent in wondering whether or not she should write
a letter to Lord Walderhurst which should convey the information to him
which even Lady Maria would have regarded as important, but the more she
argued the question with herself, the less she wavered from her first
intention. Lady Maria's frank congratulation of herself and Lord
Walderhurst in his wife's entire unexactingness had indeed been the
outcome of a half-formed intention to dissipate amiably even the vaguest
inclination to verge on expecting things from people. While she thought
Emily unlikely to allow herself to deteriorate into an encumbrance, her
ladyship had seen women in her position before, whose marriages had made
perfect fools of them through causing them to lose their heads
completely and require concessions and attentions from their newly
acquired relations which bored everybody. So she had lightly patted and
praised Emily for the course of action she preferred to "keep her up
to."
"She's the kind of woman ideas sink into if they are well put," she had
remarked in times gone by. "She's not sharp enough to see that things
are being suggested to her, but a suggestion acts upon her
delightfully."
Her suggestions acted upon Emily as she walked about the gardens at
Palstrey, pondering in the sunshine and soothed by the flower scents of
the warmed borders. Such a letter written to Walderhurst might change
his cherished plans, concerning which she knew he held certain
ambitions. He had been so far absorbed in them that he had gone to India
at a time of the year which was not usually chosen for the journey. He
had become further interested and absorbed after he had reached the
country, and he was evidently likely to prolong his stay as he had not
thought of prolonging it. He wrote regularly though not frequently, and
Emily had gathered from the tone of his letters that he was more
interested than he had ever been in his life before.
"I would not interfere with his work for anything in the world," she
said. "He cares more for it than he usually cares for things. I care for
everything--I have that kind of mind; an intellectual person is
different. I am perfectly well and happy here. And it will be so nice to
look forward."
She was not aware how Lady Maria's suggestions had "sunk in." She would
probably have reached the same conclusion without their having been
made, but since they had been made, they had assisted her. There was one
thing of all others she felt she could not possibly bear, which was to
realise that she herself could bring to her James's face an expression
she had once or twice seen others bring there (Captain Osborn
notably),--an expression of silent boredom on the verge of irritation.
Even radiant domestic joy might not be able to overrule this, if just at
this particular juncture he found himself placed in the position of a
man whom decency compelled to take the next steamer to England.
If she had felt tenderly towards Hester Osborn before, the feeling was
now increased tenfold. She went to see her oftener, she began to try to
persuade her to come and stay at Palstrey. She was all the more kind
because Hester seemed less well, and was in desperate ill spirits. Her
small face had grown thin and yellow, she had dark rings under her eyes,
and her little hands were hot and looked like bird's claws. She did not
sleep and had lost her appetite.
"You must come and stay at Palstrey for a few days," Emily said to her.
"The mere change from one house to another may make you sleep better."
But Hester was not inclined to avail herself of the invitation. She made
obstacles and delayed acceptance for one reason and another. She was, in
fact, all the more reluctant because her husband wished her to make the
visit. Their opposed opinions had resulted in one of their scenes.
"I won't go," she had said at first. "I tell you I won't."
"You will," he answered. "It will be better for you."
"Will it be worse for me if I don't?" she laughed feverishly. "And how
will it be better for you if I do? I know you are in it."
He lost his temper and was indiscreet, as his temper continually
betrayed him into being.
"Yes, I am in it," he said through his teeth, "as you might have the
sense to see. Everything is the better for us that throws us with them,
and makes them familiar with the thought of us and our rights."
"Our rights," the words were a shrill taunt.
"What rights have you, likely to be recognised, unless you kill her. Are
you going to kill her?"
He had a moment of insanity.
"I'd kill her and you too if it was safe to do it. You both deserve it!"
He flung across the room, having lost his wits as well as his temper.
But a second later both came back to him as in a revulsion of feeling.
"I talk like a melodramatic fool," he cried. "Oh, Hester, forgive me!"
He knelt on the floor by her side, caressing her imploringly. "We both
take fire in the same way. We are both driven crazy by this damned blow.
We're beaten; we may as well own it and take what we can get. She's a
fool, but she's better than that pompous, stiff brute Walderhurst, and
she has a lot of pull over him he knows nothing about. The smug animal
is falling in love with her in his way. She can make him do the decent
thing. Let us keep friends with her."
"The decent thing would be a thousand a year," wailed Hester, giving in
to his contrition in spite of herself, because she had once been in love
with him, and because she was utterly helpless. "Five hundred a year
wouldn't be indecent."
"Let us keep on her good side," he said, fondling her, with a relieved
countenance. "Tell her you will come and that she is an angel, and that
you are sure a visit to the Manor will save your life."
They went to Palstrey a few days later. Ameerah accompanied them in
attendance upon her mistress, and the three settled down into a life so
regular that it scarcely seemed to wear the aspect of a visit. The
Osborns were given some of the most beautiful and convenient rooms in
the house. No other visitors were impending and the whole big place was
at their disposal. Hester's boudoir overlooked the most perfect nooks of
garden, and its sweet chintz draperies and cushions and books and
flowers made it a luxurious abode of peace.
"What shall I do," she said on the first evening in it as she sat in a
soft chair by the window, looking out at the twilight and talking to
Emily. "What shall I do when I must go away?"
"I don't mean only from here,--I mean away from England, to loathly
India."
"Do you dislike it so?" Emily asked, roused to a new conception of her
feeling by her tone.
"I could never describe to you how much," fiercely. "It is like going to
the place which is the opposite of Heaven."
"I did not know that," pityingly. "Perhaps--I wonder if something might
not be done: I must talk to my husband."
Ameerah seemed to develop an odd fancy for the society of Jane Cupp,
which Jane was obliged to confess to her mistress had a tendency to
produce in her system "the creeps."
"You must try to overcome it, Jane," Lady Walderhurst said. "I'm afraid
it's because of her colour. I've felt a little silly and shy about her
myself, but it isn't nice of us. You ought to read 'Uncle Tom's Cabin,'
and all about that poor religious Uncle Tom, and Legree, and Eliza
crossing the river on the blocks of ice."
"I have read it twice, your ladyship," was Jane's earnestly regretful
response, "and most awful it is, and made me and mother cry beyond
words. And I suppose it is the poor creature's colour that's against
her, and I'm trying to be kind to her, but I must own that she makes me
nervous. She asks me such a lot of questions in her queer way, and
stares at me so quiet. She actually asked me quite sudden the other day
if I loved the big Mem Sahib. I didn't know what she _could_ mean at
first, but after a while I found out it was her Indian way of meaning
your ladyship, and she didn't intend disrespect, because she spoke of
you most humble afterwards, and called his lordship the Heaven born."
"Be as kind as you can to her, Jane," instructed her mistress. "And take
her a nice walk occasionally. I daresay she feels very homesick here."
What Ameerah said to her mistress was that these English servant women
were pigs and devils, and could conceal nothing from those who chose to
find out things from them. If Jane had known that the Ayah could have
told her of every movement she made during the day or night, of her
up-gettings and down-lyings, of the hour and moment of every service
done for the big Mem Sahib, of why and how and when and where each thing
was done, she would have been frightened indeed.
One day, it is true, she came into Lady Walderhurst's sleeping apartment
to find Ameerah standing in the middle of it looking round its contents
with restless, timid, bewildered eyes. She wore, indeed, the manner of
an alarmed creature who did not know how she had got there.
"What are you doing here?" demanded Jane. "You have no right in this
part of the house. You're taking a great liberty, and your mistress will
be angry."
"My Mem Sahib asked for a book," the Ayah quite shivered in her alarmed
confusion. "Your Mem Sahib said it was here. They did not order me, but
I thought I would come to you. I did not know it was forbidden."
"What was the book?" inquired Jane severely. "I will take it to her
ladyship."
But Ameerah was so frightened that she had forgotten the name, and when
Jane knocked at the door of Mrs. Osborn's boudoir, it was empty, both
the ladies having gone into the garden.
But Ameerah's story was quite true, Lady Walderhurst said in the evening
when Jane spoke of the matter as she dressed her for dinner. They had
been speaking of a book containing records of certain historical
Walderhursts. It was one Emily had taken from the library to read in her
bedroom.
"We did not ask her to go for it. In fact I did not know the woman was
within hearing. She moves about so noiselessly one frequently does not
know when she is near. Of course she meant very well, but she does not
know our English ways."
"No, my lady, she does not," said Jane, respectfully but firmly. "I took
the liberty of telling her she must keep to her own part of the house
unless required by your ladyship."
"You mustn't frighten the poor creature," laughed her mistress. She was
rather touched indeed by the slavish desire to please and do service
swiftly which the Ayah's blunder seemed to indicate. She had wished to
save her mistress even the trouble of giving the order. That was her
Oriental way, Emily thought, and it was very affectionate and
child-like.
Being reminded of the book again, she carried it down herself into the
drawing-room. It was a volume she was fond of because it recorded
romantic stories of certain noble dames of Walderhurst lineage.
Her special predilection was a Dame Ellena, who, being left with but few
servitors in attendance during her lord's absence from his castle on a
foraging journey into an enemy's country, had defended the stronghold
boldly against the attack of a second enemy who had adroitly seized the
opportunity to forage for himself. In the cellars had been hidden
treasure recently acquired by the usual means, and knowing this, Dame
Ellena had done splendid deeds, marshalling her small forces in such way
as deceived the attacking party and showing herself in scorn upon the
battlements, a fierce, beauteous woman about to give her lord an heir,
yet fearing naught, and only made more fierce and full of courage by
this fact. The son, born but three weeks later, had been the most
splendid and savage fighter of his name, and a giant in build and
strength.
"I suppose," Emily said when they discussed the legend after dinner, "I
suppose she felt that she could do _anything_," with her italics. "I
daresay _nothing_ could make her afraid, but the thought that something
might go wrong while her husband was away. And strength was given her."
She was so thrilled that she got up and walked across the room with
quite a fine sweep of heroic movement in her momentary excitement. She
held her head up and smiled with widening eyes.
But she saw Captain Osborn drag at his black moustache to hide an
unattractive grin, and she was at once abashed into feeling silly and
shy. She sat down again with awkward self-consciousness.
"I'm afraid I'm making you laugh at me," she apologised, "but that story
always gives me such a romantic feeling. I like her so."
"Oh! not at all, not all," said Osborn. "I was not laughing really; oh
no!"
But he had been, and had been secretly calling her a sentimental,
ramping idiot.
It was a great day for Jane Cupp when her mother arrived at Palstrey
Manor. It was a great day for Mrs. Cupp also. When she descended from
the train at the little country station, warm and somewhat flushed by
her emotions and the bugled splendours of her best bonnet and black silk
mantle, the sight of Jane standing neatly upon the platform almost
overcame her. Being led to his lordship's own private bus, and seeing
her trunk surrounded by the attentions of an obsequious station-master
and a liveried young man, she was conscious of concealing a flutter with
dignified reserve.
"My word, Jane!" she exclaimed after they had taken their seats in the
vehicle. "My word, you look as accustomed to it as if you had been born
in the family."
But it was when, after she had been introduced to the society in the
servants' hall, she was settled in her comfortable room next to Jane's
own that she realised to the full that there were features of her
position which marked it with importance almost startling. As Jane
talked to her, the heat of the genteel bonnet and beaded mantle had
nothing whatever to do with the warmth which moistened her brow.
"I thought I'd keep it till I saw you, mother," said the girl
decorously. "I know what her ladyship feels about being talked over. If
I was a lady myself, I shouldn't like it. And I know how deep you'll
feel it, that when the doctor advised her to get an experienced married
person to be at hand, she said in that dear way of hers, 'Jane, if your
uncle could spare your mother, how I should like to have her. I've never
forgot her kindness in Mortimer Street.'"
Mrs. Cupp fanned her face with a handkerchief of notable freshness.
"If she was Her Majesty," she said, "she couldn't be more sacred to me,
nor me more happy to be allowed the privilege."
Jane had begun to put her mother's belongings away. She was folding and
patting a skirt on the bed. She fussed about a little nervously and then
lifted a rather embarrassed face.
"I'm glad you _are_ here, mother," she said. "I'm thankful to _have_
you!"
Mrs. Cupp ceased fanning and stared at her with a change of expression.
She found herself involuntarily asking her next question in a half
whisper.
"Why, Jane, what is it?"
Jane came nearer.
"I don't know," she answered, and her voice also was low. "Perhaps I'm
silly and overanxious, because I _am_ so fond of her. But that Ameerah,
I actually dream about her."
"What! The black woman?"
"If I was to say a word, or if you did, and we was wrong, how should we
feel? I've kept my nerves to myself till I've nearly screamed sometimes.
And my lady would be so hurt if she knew. But--well," in a hurried
outburst, "I do wish his lordship was here, and I do wish the Osborns
wasn't. I do wish it, I tell you that."
"Good Lord!" cried Mrs. Cupp, and after staring with alarmed eyes a
second or so, she wiped a slight dampness from her upper lip.
She was of the order of female likely to take a somewhat melodramatic
view of any case offering her an opening in that direction.
"Jane!" she gasped faintly, "do you think they'd try to take her life?"
"Goodness, no!" ejaculated Jane, with even a trifle of impatience.
"People like them daren't. But suppose they was to try to, well, to
upset her in some way, what a thing for them it would be."
After which the two women talked together for some time in whispers,
Jane bringing a chair to place opposite her mother's. They sat knee to
knee, and now and then Jane shed a tear from pure nervousness. She was
so appalled by the fear of making a mistake which, being revealed by
some chance, would bring confusion upon and pain of mind to her lady.
"At all events," was Mrs. Cupp's weighty observation when their
conference was at an end, "here we both are, and two pairs of eyes and
ears and hands and legs is a fat lot better than one, where there's
things to be looked out for."
Her training in the matter of subtlety had not been such as Ameerah's,
and it may not be regarded as altogether improbable that her observation
of the Ayah was at times not too adroitly concealed, but if the native
woman knew that she was being remarked, she gave no sign of her
knowledge. She performed her duties faithfully and silently, she gave no
trouble, and showed a gentle subservience and humbleness towards the
white servants which won immense approbation. Her manner towards Mrs.
Cupp's self was marked indeed by something like a tinge of awed
deference, which, it must be confessed, mollified the good woman, and
awakened in her a desire to be just and lenient even to the dark of skin
and alien of birth.
"She knows her betters when she sees them, and has pretty enough manners
for a black," the object of her respectful obeisances remarked. "I
wonder if she's ever heard of her Maker, and if a little brown Testament
with good print wouldn't be a good thing to give her?"
This boon was, in fact, bestowed upon her as a gift. Mrs. Cupp bought it
for a shilling at a small shop in the village. Ameerah, in whose dusky
being was incorporated the occult faith of lost centuries, and whose
gods had been gods through mystic ages, received the fat, little brown
book with down-dropped lids and grateful obeisance. These were her words
to her mistress:
"The fat old woman with protruding eyes bestowed it upon me. She says it
is the book of her god. She has but one. She wishes me to worship him.
Am I a babe to worship such a god as would please her. She is old, and
has lost her mind."
Lady Walderhurst's health continued all that could be desired. She arose
smiling in the morning, and bore her smile about with her all day. She
walked much in the gardens, and spent long, happy hours sewing in her
favourite sitting-room. Work which she might have paid other women to
do, she did with her own hands for the mere sentimental bliss of it.
Sometimes she sat with Hester and sewed, and Hester lay on a sofa and
stared at her moving hands.
"You know how to do it, don't you?" she once said.
"I was obliged to sew for myself when I was so poor, and this is
delightful," was Emily's answer.
"But you could buy it all and save yourself the trouble."
Emily stroked her bit of cambric and looked awkward.
"I'd rather not," she said.
Well as she was, she began to think she did not sleep quite so soundly
as had been habitual with her. She started up in bed now and again as if
she had been disturbed by some noise, but when she waited and listened
she heard nothing. At least this happened on two or three occasions. And
then one night, having been lying folded in profound, sweet sleep, she
sprang up in the black darkness, wakened by an actual, physical reality
of sensation, the soft laying of a hand upon her naked side,--that, and
nothing else.
"What is that? Who is there?" she cried. "Someone is in the room!"
Yes, someone was there. A few feet from her bed she heard a sobbing
sigh, then a rustle, then followed silence. She struck a match and,
getting up, lighted candles. Her hand shook, but she remembered that she
must be firm with herself.
"I must not be nervous," she said, and looked the room over from end to
end.
But it contained no living creature, nor any sign that living creature
had entered it since she had lain down to rest. Gradually the fast
beating of her heart had slackened, and she passed her hand over her
face in bewilderment.
"It wasn't like a dream at all," she murmured; "it really wasn't. I
_felt_ it."
Still as absolutely nothing was to be found, the sense of reality
diminished somewhat, and being so healthy a creature, she regained her
composure, and on going back to bed slept well until Jane brought her
early tea.
Under the influence of fresh morning air and sunlight, of ordinary
breakfast and breakfast talk with the Osborns, her first convictions
receded so far that she laughed a little as she related the incident.
"I never had such a real dream in my life," she said; "but it must have
been a dream."
"One's dreams are very real sometimes," said Hester.
"Perhaps it was the Palstrey ghost," Osborn laughed. "It came to you
because you ignore it." He broke off with a slight sudden start and
stared at her a second questioningly. "Did you say it put its hand on
your side?" he asked.
"Don't tell her silly things that will frighten her. How ridiculous of
you," exclaimed Hester sharply. "It's not proper."
Emily looked at both of them wonderingly.
"What do you mean?" she said. "I don't believe in ghosts. It won't
frighten me, Hester. I never even heard of a Palstrey ghost."
"Then I am not going to tell you of one," said Captain Osborn a little
brusquely, and he left his chair and went to the sideboard to cut cold
beef.
He kept his back towards them, and his shoulders looked uncommunicative
and slightly obstinate. Hester's face was sullen. Emily thought it sweet
of her to care so much, and turned upon her with grateful eyes.
"I was only frightened for a few minutes, Hester," she said. "My dreams
are not vivid at all, usually."
But howsoever bravely she ignored the shock she had received, it was not
without its effect, which was that occasionally there drifted into her
mind a recollection of the suggestion that Palstrey had a ghost. She had
never heard of it, and was in fact of an orthodoxy so ingenuously entire
as to make her feel that belief in the existence of such things was a
sort of defiance of ecclesiastical laws. Still, such stories were often
told in connection with old places, and it was natural to wonder what
features marked this particular legend. Did it lay hands on people's
sides when they were asleep? Captain Osborn had asked his question as if
with a sudden sense of recognition. But she would not let herself think
of the matter, and she would not make inquiries.
The result was that she did not sleep well for several nights. She was
annoyed at herself, because she found that she kept lying awake as if
listening or waiting. And it was not a good thing to lose one's sleep
when one wanted particularly to keep strong.
Jane Cupp during this week was, to use her own words, "given quite a
turn" by an incident which, though a small matter, might have proved
untoward in its results.
The house at Palstrey, despite its age, was in a wonderful state of
preservation, the carved oak balustrades of the stairways being
considered particularly fine.
"What but Providence," said Jane piously, in speaking to her mother the
next morning, "made me look down the staircase as I passed through the
upper landing just before my lady was going down to dinner. What but
Providence I couldn't say. It certainly wasn't because I've done it
before that I remember. But just that one evening I was obliged to cross
the landing for something, and my eye just lowered itself by accident,
and there it was!"
"Just where it would have tripped her up. Good Lord! it makes my heart
turn over to hear you tell it. How big a bit of carving was it?" Mrs.
Cupp's opulent chest trimmings heaved.
"Only a small piece that had broken off from old age and worm-eatenness,
I suppose, but it had dropped just where she wouldn't have caught sight
of it, and ten to one would have stepped on it and turned her ankle and
been thrown from the top to the bottom of the whole flight. Suppose I
_hadn't_ seen it in time to pick it up before she went down. Oh, dear!
Oh, dear! Mother!"
"I should say so!" Mrs. Cupp's manner approached the devout. This
incident it was which probably added to Jane's nervous sense of
responsibility. She began to watch her mistress's movements with
hyper-sensitive anxiety. She fell into the habit of going over her
bedroom two or three times a day, giving a sort of examination to its
contents.
"Perhaps I'm so fond of her that it's making me downright silly," she
said to her mother; "but it seems as if I can't help it. I feel as if
I'd like to know everything she does, and go over the ground to make
sure of it before she goes anywhere. I'm so proud of her, mother; I'm
just as proud as if I was some connection of the family, instead of just
her maid. It'll be such a splendid thing if she keeps well and
everything goes as it should. Even people like us can see what it means
to a gentleman that can go back nine hundred years. If I was Lady Maria
Bayne, I'd be here and never leave her. I tell you nothing could drive
me from her."