"IT IS WORSE THAN I THOUGHT."
A week or so later Saint Méran went away. Ffrench informed his partner
of this fact with a secret hope of its producing upon him a somewhat
softening effect. But Haworth received the statement with coolness.
"He'll come back again," he said. "Let him alone for that."
The general impression was that he would return. The opinion most
popular in the more humble walks of Broxton society was that he had gone
"to get hissen ready an' ha' th' papers drawed up," and that he would
appear some fine day with an imposing retinue, settle an enormous
fortune upon Miss Ffrench, and, having been united to her with due
grandeur and solemnity, would disappear with her to indefinitely
"furrin" parts.
There seemed to be little change in Rachel Ffrench's life and manner,
however. She began to pay rather more strict attention to her social
duties, and consequently went out oftener. This might possibly be
attributed to the fact that remaining in-doors was somewhat dull.
Haworth and Murdoch came no more, and after Saint Méran's departure a
sort of silence seemed to fall upon the house. Ffrench himself felt it
when he came in at night, and was naturally restless under it. Perhaps
Miss Ffrench felt it, too, though she did not say so.
One morning, Janey Briarley, sitting nursing the baby in the door-way
of the cottage, glanced upward from her somewhat arduous task to find a
tall and graceful figure standing before her in the sun. She had been
too busily engaged to hear footsteps, and there had been no sound of
carriage-wheels, so the visitor had come upon her entirely unawares.
It cannot be said she received her graciously. Her whilom admiration had
been much tempered by sharp distrust very early in her acquaintance with
its object.
"Art tha coomin' in?" she asked unceremoniously.
"Yes," said Miss Ffrench, "I am coming in."
Janey got up and made room for her to pass, and when she had passed,
gave her a chair, very much overweighted by the baby as she did so.
"Does tha want to see mother?"
"If your mother is busy, you will serve every purpose. The housekeeper
told me that Mrs. Dixon was ill, and as I was passing I thought I would
come in."
Janey's utter disbelief in this explanation was a sentiment not easily
concealed, even by an adept in controlling facial expression, and she
was not an adept. But Miss Ffrench was not at all embarrassed by any
demonstration of a lack of faith which she might have perceived. When
Janey resumed her seat, she broke the silence by an entirely unexpected
observation. She touched the baby delicately with the point of her
parasol--very delicately indeed.
"I suppose," she remarked, "that this is an extremely handsome child."
This with the air of one inquiring for information.
"Nay, he is na," retorted Janey unrelentingly. "He's good enow, but he
nivver wur hurt wi' good looks. None on 'em wur, an' he's fou'est o'
th' lot. I should think tha could see that fur thysen."
"Oh," replied Miss Ffrench, "then I suppose I am wrong. My idea was that
at that age children all looked alike."
"Loike him?" said Janey dryly. "Did tha think as tha did?"
As the young Briarley in question was of a stolid and unornamental type,
uncertain of feature and noticeable chiefly for a large and unusually
bald head of extraordinary phrenological development, this gave the
matter an entirely novel aspect.
"Perhaps," said Miss Ffrench, "I scarcely regarded it from that point of
view."
Then she changed the subject.
"How is Mrs. Dixon?" she inquired.
"She's neyther better nor worse," was the answer, "an' a mort o'
trouble."
"That is unfortunate. Who cares for her?"
"Mother. She's th' on'y one as can do owt wi' her."
"Is there no one else she has a fancy for--your father, for instance?"
inquired Miss Ffrench.
"She conna bide th' soight o' him, an' he's feart to go nigh her. Th'
ony man as she ivver looked at wur Murdoch," answered Janey.
"I think I remember his saying she had made friends with him. Is she as
fond of him now?"
"I dunnot know as I could ca' it bein' fond on him. She is na fond o'
nobody. But she says he's getten a bit more sense than th' common run."
"It is rather good-natured on his part to come to see her----"
"He does na coom to see her. He has na been nigh th' house fur a month.
He's been ill hissen or summat. He's up an' about, but he'd getten a
face loike Death th' last toime I seed him. Happen he's goin' off loike
his feyther."
"How is that?"
"Did na tha know," with some impatience, "as he went crazy over summat
he wur makkin', an' deed 'cause he could na mak' out to finish it? It's
th' very thing Murdoch took up hissen an' th' stroikers wur so set
ag'in."
"I think I remember. There was a story about the father. Do you--think
he is really ill?"
"Murdoch? Aye, I do.--Mak'less noise, Tummos Henry!" (This to the
child.)
"That is a great pity. Ah, there is the carriage."
One of her gloves had been lying upon her lap. When she stood up, it
dropped. She bent to pick it up, and as she did so something fell
tinkling upon the flag floor and rolled under a table. It was one of her
rings. Janey brought it back to her.
"It mun ha' been too large fur thee," she said, "or tha'rt gettin' thin.
Seems loike tha'rt a bit different to what tha wur," with a glance at
her.
"Never mind that," she answered sharply, as she handed her some money.
"Give this to your mother."
And she dropped the ring into her purse instead of putting it on again,
and went out to her carriage.
Janey stood and watched her.
"She is a bit thinner, or summat," she remarked, "but she need na moind
that. It's genteel enow to be thin, an' I dunnot know as it ud hurt
her."
Rachel Ffrench went home, and the same afternoon Murdoch came to her for
the last time.
He had not intended to come. In his wildest moments he had never
thought of going to her again, but as he passed along the road,
intending to spend the afternoon in wandering across the country, he
looked up at the windows of the house, and a strange fancy seized upon
him. He would go in and ask her the question he had asked himself again
and again. It did not seem to him at the time a strange thing to do. It
looked wonderfully simple and natural in his strained and unnatural
mood. He turned in at the gate with only one feeling--that perhaps she
would tell him, and then it would be over. She saw him come up the path,
and wondered if the man at the door would remember the charge she had
given him. It chanced that he did not remember, or that he was thrown
off his guard. She heard feet on the stairs in a few seconds, and almost
immediately Murdoch was in the room. What she thought when, being
brought thus near to him, she saw and recognized the dreadful change in
him, God knows. She supported herself with her hand upon the back of her
chair as she rose. There was a look in his face almost wolfish. He would
not sit down, and in three minutes broke through the barrier of her
effort at controlling him. It was impossible for her to control him as
she might have controlled another man.
"I have only a few words to say," he said. "I have come to ask you a
question. I think that is all--only to ask you a question."
"Will you tell me," he said, "what wrong I have done you?"
She put her other hand on the chair and held it firmly.
"Will you tell me," she said, almost in a whisper, "what wrong I have
done _you_?"
She remained so, looking at him and he at her, with a terrible
helplessness, through a moment of dead silence.
She dropped her face upon her hands as she held the chair, and so
stood.
He fell back a pace, gazing at her still.
"I have heard of women who fancied themselves injured," he said,
"planning to revenge themselves upon the men who had intentionally or
unintentionally wounded their pride. I remember such things in books I
have read, not in real life, and once or twice the thought has crossed
my mind that at some time in the past I might, in my poor ignorance,
have presumed--or--blundered in some way to--anger you--and that this
has been my punishment. It is only a wild thought, but it was a straw to
cling to, and I would rather believe it, wild as it is, than believe
that what you have done has been done wantonly. Can it be--is it true?"
"No."
But she did not lift her face.
"It is not?"
"No."
"Then it is worse than I thought."
He said the words slowly and clearly, and they were his last. Having
said them, he went away without a backward glance.