THE GIRL FROM NOWHERE
_By_ MRS. BAILLIE REYNOLDS
Author of "The Notorious Miss Lisle," "Out of the
Night," "A Doubtful Character"
GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY
NEW YORK
_Copyright_, 1910
BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY
BY MRS. BAILLIE REYNOLDS
A Doubtful Character
The Notorious Miss Lisle
The Girl from Nowhere
Out of the Night
A Make-shift Marriage
GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY
NEW YORK
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I. Despair
II. Flight
III. A Refuge of Straw
IV. Up River
V. Separation
VI. The Outcast's Brother
VII. The First Letter
VIII. A Touch of Sympathy
IX. The Squire Defies Conventions
X. The Hunt is Up
XI. Felix Takes Advice
XII. Rona's Knight
XIII. The Finished Product
XIV. "You Never Were Mine"
XV. A Difficult Situation
XVI. Happenings in a Strange Land
XVII. "I was the Man Selected"
XVIII. The Kirgiz Yourtar
XIX. The Despair of Vronsky
XX. What is this Love?
XXI. Denzil Does His Duty
XXII. Forebodings
XXIII. The Escape of Aunt Bee
XXIV. Veronica "On Her Own"
XXV. The Convalescence of Denzil
XXVI. Strangers Yet
XXVII. Two in the Campagna
XXVIII. The Primrose Path
XXIX. A Double Dilemma
XXX. Veronica is Surprised
CHAPTER I
DESPAIR
The sense that every struggle brings defeat,
Because Fate holds no prize to crown success:
That all the oracles are dumb, or cheat,
Because they have no secret to express:--
That none can pierce the vast black veil uncertain
Because there is no light behind the curtain,
That all is vanity and nothingness!
_The City of Dreadful Night._
The curtain rises on an empty stage.
Managers assure those of us who try to write plays nowadays that we
must lay our scenes in well-to-do circles if we wish to attract an
audience.
The scene before us now has few recommendations, either as a romantic
or a tragic background. It is not quite wretched enough to suggest
dark deeds; it is not nearly old enough to convey a hint of mystery:
it is merely the back parlor of a London lodging-house of the meaner
kind.
On a certain murky day in March it lay bare to the eye of anyone who
was desirous of exploring.
The street of which it formed a narrow section was small and dreary.
The front parlor window of this particular house was discreetly
veiled with curtains which had once been white. Between them stood
an artificial aspidistra in a ginger-colored pot, envied by some of
the other dwellers in the immediate neighborhood.
This front parlor, at the date in question, was unlet. It had
folding-doors, affording the sole entrance to a very small room
behind, generally let as a bedroom, with the front room as
sitting-room. For the past month this back parlor had been tenanted
by one who was far too poor to think of needing more than one room in
which to starve. Moreover, he was there on the understanding that he
would vacate should a better let offer itself.
Had the curtain risen on that back room, the eye would have taken but
one glance to feel assured of destitution on the part of the absent
occupier. There was a bed, a washstand, a table, a chair. There was
a cupboard, the door hanging open on one hinge, revealing the fact
that an empty mug formed its sole contents. There was no carpet on
the floor, no cloth on the rickety table--the only trace of occupancy
was in a penny bottle of ink and a few sheets of paper which lay upon
the table.
The smoke-dimmed window looked sheer down upon a mazy labyrinth of
railway lines. Day by day trains rumbled by, and sent up each its
contribution of soot and grime to choke the atmosphere and darken the
unlovely prospect.
This window--it was more correctly a glass door--was open; and
without was a mean iron railing, with a flight of corroded steps,
which, at the time the house was built, probably led to the garden.
The encroaching line had shorn away all the garden, leaving the iron
steps overhanging the abyss with a futility that moved to pity the
soul of the present occupier when he had a thought to spare from the
anguish of his own condition.
So much for the stage. The actor, when at last he made his abrupt
appearance, bursting in, as an actor should, dramatically, through
the center doors--seemed to have been cast by Nature for a leading
part.
He was still young, and somewhat tall; and, though his cheeks were
sunken, his eyes rimmed with red, his hair rough, his beard some days
old, and his clothes soiled and ragged, he yet kept that air of the
dominant race, that carriage of the head and movement of the
shoulders that tells of the public school if not the university.
But it was not merely this air of incongruity with environment which
made him noticeable. It was a certain atmosphere that clothed him--a
peculiar expression which cut him off from any other young man of his
age and class--a quality of isolation which hung about him like some
poisonous exhalation.
The eyes of the young look forward. Not always with hope or
eagerness; sometimes with apprehension, or terror, or anxiety. But,
in some wise, they do look forward. Life, whether it be good or bad,
is still to come.
This man's eyes had ceased to travel on. He had done with life. He
came into the room, as the last flicker of a flame may leap up in
burnt paper. Though he still existed, hope and fear were alike dead
in him. All was over: he had given up the contest with Fate.
In no sense was he any longer a part of his surroundings. He had
severed himself, by an act of will, from the struggle and the fret.
His pilgrimage--evil and brief--was ended.
He fastened the folding-doors behind him with deliberation, and,
advancing to the table, laid down one or two packages upon it.
The largest of these must have been instantly recognized by any
expert as rejected manuscript. Some irate publisher, at the end,
probably, of a morning's fruitless search for something worth
publishing, had scrawled in blue pencil upon the outside of the
parcel: "Why the deuce don't you get your stuff typewritten?" In
addition to this derisive question, the title of the bulky package
was clearly legible, printed in large ink letters: "THE TRUMPET CALL
TO REVOLUTION."
Seating himself by the table, the owner of the despised treasure drew
from his pocket a very small bottle, labeled "Laudanum." He rose,
searched the mattress of his bed, and extracted from various holes
three other small bottles of the same size. Then he produced a paper
from his pocket, smoothed it out, and spread it upon the table. A
letter, upon good, thick writing-paper, stamped with an
address--Normansgrave, Cleveshire.
The writing upon the bluish-tinted sheet was fine and clear:
"DEAR FELIX,--Bearing in mind the circumstances which led to your
disgrace, you cannot, I think, upon your first emergence from prison,
reasonably expect me to intrust you with money. I have placed a
certain sum in the hands of the police-court missionary, with
instructions to him to pay you so much a week from it, so as to give
you time to seek honest employment. I have made it clear to him
that, should you hold any kind of communication with the murderous
gang of anarchists who have brought you to this pass, you are to
forfeit all further right to your allowance.
"Once again let me entreat you to make a fresh start, and endeavor to
atone, by a future of steady work, for the aberrations of your early
manhood. Should you show any signs of a real effort to improve, I
shall not refuse to receive you here once more as my father's son.
But to do so now, before you have proved yourself, would be an
injustice both to myself and you.--I remain, your brother, DENZIL
VANSTON."
After carefully reading through this letter Felix Vanston took up a
sheet of paper from among two or three lying near, and wrote as
follows:
"DEAR PHARISEE,--You have sent the publican to his just doom. He
goes to it with the publican's old prayer upon his lips. 'God be
merciful'--for certainly man is not. You may continue to fast twice
in the week and give tithes of all you possess to other objects than
your disreputable brother--FELIX."
This letter he folded, addressed, and arranged with the other in the
center of the table, marked thus:
"TO BE READ BY THE CORONER AT
THE INQUEST ON MY BODY.
(N.B.--No room for suspicion of insanity)."
This done, he took his bundle of MS. in his arms and went to the
empty grate. Tearing off a few leaves, he pushed them through the
bars, produced a box still containing two or three matches, and set
them alight. He sat by on the grimy floor tearing off more and
feeding the flames with it until the whole book was consumed.
The world, he found, was an oyster that he could not open. He had
declined to try the usual kind of knife--that provided by custom for
him, in the shape of an office stool. He had imbibed socialistic
theories somehow in early boyhood, and his half-brother, Denzil
Vanston, had from that moment assured him that he was lost.
The late Squire Vanston, of Normansgrave, had made a foolish second
marriage. He had been caught by a designing young woman whom he met
at a Brighton hotel. While Felix was still a child, his father died,
leaving the widow a life interest in the property. Poor Denzil had
cause to feel displeasure. The second Mrs. Vanston filled the house
with a crew of very second-rate journalists, music-hall artistes, and
sporting men. Her son, Felix, was most imprudently indulged; her
stepson, Denzil, had no home as long as she lived. His own mother
had been the exact reverse of his father's second wife--a good,
rather dull woman, affectionate and sincere, but hard and prim.
Denzil, brought up on these lines, was unspeakably shocked by the
proceedings which at Normansgrave followed his father's death.
Mrs. Vanston was killed in a carriage accident, after a reckless ten
years of very frivolous widowhood. This is putting the case with an
extreme mildness, which the inhabitants of the neighborhood might
class as euphemism. She died intestate, and was found to have spent
the whole of the money which the Squire had left to her, with a view
to its coming to Felix after her death. His will bequeathed all the
property and all the money, with the exception of this sum, to his
elder son. Felix was unprovided for.
At this time he was eighteen years old, and studying at a Continental
university. Oxford and Cambridge were not Bohemian enough for him.
His brother was willing to make him an allowance, on condition of his
qualifying for some profession; and although the only profession for
which he would show interest was journalism, and though Denzil
profoundly, and perhaps excusably, mistrusted journalism after his
experience of his stepmother's set, he did help him, and did make him
an allowance, until debts and irregular habits and bad associates
convinced him that Felix would do no good until he had actually to
work for his living.
Actuated by the best intentions, the elder brother said he would stop
supplies until Felix really buckled down to work. The next thing was
that the police raided a Dynamite Club in Soho, and Felix was
arrested, brought to trial, and convicted. He had served the greater
part of his two years' sentence. And now the end had come. At the
age of twenty-three Felix Vanston decided that life was not worth
living.
It is possible that journalism was not his destined medium. It is
certain that nobody would pay him for what he wrote. With hunger
comes depression. Moreover, Felix, from the moment when he donned
his prison garb, had lost his self-respect. There was nothing to
hold him back from the thing he contemplated. He had nothing to lose.
His book was burnt. The incoherent ravings of a boy caught by
catchwords, not understanding what he thought or wished or hoped,
knowing little, comprehending less--it was all ashes now. The wild
heart of him had gone out into its formless sentiments. Nonsense as
it was, he had burned with the necessity of expressing it. Now it
was gone; and the world finally went out with it. The last flicker,
oddly enough, took him back to a boyish episode, when the gardeners
had a big bonfire at Normansgrave in the autumn long ago. He saw, as
he crouched by the rusty grate, a dream-picture of October woods,
rising in billows of color upon the swelling uplands that cradled the
old red-brick house. He saw the drift of blue smoke between his eyes
and the distance, smelt the aromatic fragrance of burning wood and
smoldering leaf. He could feel again the warmth of his big brother's
hand as he stood, in his fur and velvet and plumed cap, shouting to
Denzil to make it blaze. He saw his mother coming along the garden
walk, somewhat hurried. She had a smile for the men who fed the
fire, and for the two boys--the little and big--watching. Then she
ordered them away. She said Felix must not be out in the cold air.
Denzil, kindly enough, tried to draw away the small boy, who, spoilt
and uncontrolled, declined to go--stamped, shrieked, and fought. In
the midst of his fighting the fire blazed up higher--just near where
they were standing. He saw his mother, with a furtive, sweeping look
round at the men, whose backs were turned as they lifted more fuel on
the flames with a fork--he saw her make a swift movement and fling
into the glowing red part of the fire some letters which she had
clasped in her hand.
The fire was very fierce; they were ashes in a moment; and, stroking
her boy's smooth cheek, she said, laughingly: "Let him stay a while,
Denzil, if he cares so much."
Then the child was conscious of a silence--an interchange of glance
between his mother and her step-son. Denzil knew that Mrs. Vanston
had come down to the bonfire to burn something--that she had desired
to send him and Felix away that they might not see her do so; that
the sudden opening of a glowing hot hole in the fire quite near had
made her risk detection and toss in what she came to destroy. Felix
had not understood. He thought Denzil looked severely at "Ma"
because she spoilt him, Felix, and let him have his way when he
roared. But as his paper fire flared and died down and blackened,
the memory of the little scene floated to him through the mist of
years; he saw the sweet place, the faint sunlight, the privet hedges
and green archways of the vegetable garden; and for one moment there
swept over him a desire to live--a desire to see the Cleveshire hills
again.
It expired with the last red glow in the flapping ash of paper. Life
was over. Nobody there at Normansgrave wanted him. Nay, more, they
would be devoutly thankful to know that he was dead.
He rose from his crouched attitude and straightened himself as well
as he could for the gnawing pains of hunger. Then he took the mug
from the cupboard and carried it to the table. He paused, looking
round. The bed was unmade, its unwholesome grayish linen crumpled
and tossed. Since he was to lie there to sleep his last sleep, it
might as well be smooth. He made it hurriedly, for the wolf that
gnawed him was growing clamorous, and came back to the table, where
stood the bottles of oblivion. Pouring the brown syrup into the mug,
he raised it to his lips.
"A health to Denzil Vanston, of Normansgrave!" he cried aloud; and
then, just as the rim of the mug touched his mouth, a shadow fell
before his eyes, some dark thing passed swiftly across the window,
there was a heavy thud, and a muffled shriek.
The suicide started as if he had been shot. He trembled in every
limb. What, in Heaven's name, could it be? Something, someone, was
hanging doubled over the sooty iron railing outside his open window.
He put down the cup. He staggered forward. A human body was hanging
across the rail. It writhed; in one instant more it would have
fallen, and it must fall upon the railway lines below.
That human instinct which comes into action before thought sent him
flying to the rescue. He seized the limp, twisting body, and drew it
with difficulty, for he was very weak, back over the rail till the
feet rested upon the small iron balcony beside him.
It was a girl--a girl about sixteen, with a torrent of bright brown
hair. She was very thin; her face seemed to him of a bluish tinge.
The moment he touched her she began to cry out. When she was on her
feet she began to struggle.
"Let me go! Let me go! Don't touch me, I must kill myself! How
dare you hold me! Let me go, I say!"
Stupefaction held Felix mute for a minute or two. To be consistent,
he should have helped her over the verge. The bare thought of so
doing made his head swim. With no words, but still obeying imperious
instinct, he pulled her, struggling feebly against him, into his
desolate apartment. He dragged her to the bed, so recently prepared
for the accommodation of another guest, and having pushed her upon
it, ran to the window and fastened it, with an overmastering dread
lest she should make a dash for her freedom, and he not have the
strength to stop her.
Seated on the edge of the bed, she doubled herself together and
moaned. Her rescuer, sinking dizzily upon the one chair, stared in
dumb contemplation. The girl was evidently in terrible pain.
Probably she had broken all her ribs. Ought he to go and fetch a
hospital ambulance? Dare he leave her alone within reach of that
window? Whence had she fallen, and why did she want to kill herself?
In spite of hunger, he almost thought he must postpone his own exit
until he knew what prompted this child to attempt hers.
After two or three bewildered minutes he went up to her, sat down
beside her, and said weakly, "There, there! Tell me where you have
hurt yourself."
She uncovered her face and shot a look at him. They had a
simultaneous impulse of surprise. Looking at each other, they knew,
intuitively, each that the other was not the kind of person you would
expect to find in Hawkins Row, Deptford.
For the first time since the gates of the jail closed behind him,
Felix forgot to be lonely. He had a sudden, wholly ridiculous sense
of being wanted. The moment he saw the face of the girl beside him
he knew that she must be saved.
Cautiously he lowered her to the pillow, lifted her legs upon the
bed, laid her flat, and bent over her.
"Where do you feel the pain?" he urgently asked.
"Everywhere--all over me. Oh, what shall I do? Why couldn't you let
me die?"
"I don't know," said Felix, staring stupidly.
She sobbed aloud, drawing each breath with a groan. He sat by, his
mind hardly working, vaguely wondering what would happen next.
Presently he was conscious that her moaning had ceased, and he looked
up with a sudden leap of his heart in his exhausted frame lest she
should be dead. But her eyes were wide open, and roaming round the
room.
"Do you live here?" she asked, timidly.
He laughed miserably. "I have contrived to support existence here
for ten days," he said. "Now I can't stick it any longer. I was
just going to take poison, that very moment that you--came."
She turned her head right round on the dirty pillow to look at him
with horror. "You were going to kill yourself? How wicked!" she
said, with tremendous emphasis.
He peered at her from under his heavy lashes with a real curiosity.
"You say wicked? But you were going to do the same thing yourself?"
"Yes, but that was different. If I had been a man I wouldn't. It is
cowardly for a man to bolt. It is the only thing a girl can
do--sometimes."
He took a long look at her. There were so many things to say--such
crushing replies to make to her artless philosophy. But he was too
weak and shaken to make them.
"Come," he said, "shall I take you to a hospital, or will you wait
here while I go and see if I can find the parish doctor?"
She waved her small frail hand to the mug on the table. "I'll share
that stuff with you."
Felix sat reflecting. He could not give her poison. Why could he
not? Which was wrong--his former despair, or his new-found
sentiment? He could not determine, but he was bracing himself up to
resist her. "There's not enough to kill us both," he said, weakly,
"and I am not going to let you throw yourself on those lines down
there."
She made no reply to this, but lay with her eyes closed. He ventured
a question, "How far did you fall?"
"Only from the room just above this. He locked me in."
"Who did?"
"The man who calls himself my uncle." She pushed up her sleeve,
showing a livid bruise upon her arm. "Look," she said, "there are
worse on my back and shoulders."
Felix clenched his hands, quite instinctively.
"If he comes back," she sobbed, "he'll--he said he'd do worse than
kill me. And you're not strong enough to fight him, are you?"
"Let's run away," said Felix, without an instant's reflection.
She sat up, propping herself upon her arms, while she stared at him.
"Have you got any money?"
"Not a halfpenny." He sank back in despair. This hunger of his must
be appeased, or he must die.
"I've got a shilling and three-halfpence," said the girl. "It would
get us something to eat. But I won't go to those night refuges; I
had much rather jump down on the railway lines. And I won't go to a
reformatory, or any institution place; so it is no use to try and
persuade me...." She reflected a while. "It would be no good to try
and get more poison; they wouldn't sell any to me or to you."
Felix had in his pocket the doctor's prescription which had enabled
him to purchase what he already had. But he did not say so. She
should not know. His eyes had lit up at the bare mention of food.
"See," he said, "I am really, actually starving. I'm in such pain, I
hardly know what I am saying just now. Let us go out together and
get some food, and then think what we can do afterwards. Do you feel
as if you could walk?"
She slipped off the bed and stood up. "I feel very bad," she said,
hesitatingly; "but I can walk. Yes--let us get away from here and
have something to eat; And then we can jump off a bridge to-night, if
there seems nothing else to do."