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Title: The Weird Sisters, Volume II (of 3)
A Romance
Author: Richard Dowling
Release Date: December 4, 2012 [EBook #41553]
Language: English
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THE WEIRD SISTERS.
A Romance.
BY RICHARD DOWLING,
AUTHOR OF "THE MYSTERY OF KILLARD."
In Three Volumes.
VOL. II.
LONDON:
TINSLEY BROTHERS, 8, CATHERINE ST., STRAND.
1880.
[_All rights reserved._]
CHARLES DICKENS AND EVANS,
GREAT NEW STREET, LONDON.
TO
EDMOND POWER, ESQ.,
OF SPRINGFIELD,
Whose kindness to Mine and to Me
I SHALL NEVER FORGET
WHILE I AM.
CONTENTS.
Part I.--A Plain Gold Guard--_continued_.
XII.--THE SHADOW OF THE TOWER OF SILENCE 1
XIII.--ON BOARD THE STEAMSHIP RODWELL 26
XIV.--ON THE RIVER 42
XV.--THE FUTURE AS IT SEEMED 59
XVI.--THE PRESENT AS IT WAS 80
XVII.--THE ASCENT OF THE TOWER OF SILENCE 95
XVIII.--ON THE TOP 113
Part II.--The Towers of Silence.
I.--A STRANGER AT THE CASTLE 127
II.--THE READING OF THE WILL 148
III.--"COUSIN MAUD"--"NO; MAUD" 173
IV.--THE TWO GUARDIANS 200
V.--THE INDEFINITE PRESENT 216
VI.--THE TYRANNICAL PAST 235
THE WEIRD SISTERS.
PART I. A PLAIN GOLD GUARD.
CHAPTER XII.
THE SHADOW ON THE TOWER OF SILENCE.
After giving way to the feelings which had overwhelmed him in the
passage, and which had almost betrayed him at the bedside, Grey, by a
great effort, collected himself and walked soberly and deliberately
until he found the grand staircase of the Castle. This he descended, and
when he reached the bottom hastily sought the courtyard, and from the
courtyard the grounds.
"I thought it would have killed me in that room. I wish it had," he
whispered to himself, as he passed aimlessly over the short dry grass.
"No, no, no, no, no! I must not think of it. I must think of something
else."
He was now beyond the range of the Castle windows, in a little fern-clad
hollow above a miniature cove.
"Who said I was a coward?" he demanded, in a loud harsh voice, looking
fiercely round on the cool silver river that lisped soft whispers at his
feet and made low melodious concord of its rippling surge, filling the
ear with memories of the far-off sea.
"Who said I was a coward?" He repeated the question to the grave oaks
standing above him, motionless and voiceless against the opal ocean of
the unclouded sky.
"No coward. I never quailed. I never winced. I held up my head as
fearlessly as any undaunted soldier kneeling upon his coffin facing the
firing-party. I was not afraid of anything. I only thought I should die
there and then. I am sorry I did not die."
He seemed to imagine himself in a dock, and the huge oaks the grave and
grey jury empanelled to try him, and the sweet low voice of the river
the indictment that never ceased to sound.
"I own I quailed when I heard his first words from the threshold, but
that was when he accused me of what I have done." He had once more
dropped his voice to a cautious whisper.
"Who would not, being a thief, quake at being called a thief for the
first time by the man he had stolen from, and in the presence of her for
whom the vast savings of a lifetime had been laid by? No man could have
helped quailing at that. But when the old man showed his confidence in
me unbroken, when he swore me to take care of her property and of his
child, when he kissed, Oh, God! when he kissed my hand, did I quail? No.
I stood it like a man. _That_ was the vulgar end of the coarse objective
tragedy. That was the poison-bowl, the dagger-thrust. That was the
breaking of the last bone on the wheel. I am dead since then. But _that_
was only the bell for the curtain to go up on the other tragedy, the
subjective play. I am enrolled among the immortals. I play the chief
part in a tragico-farce by the Angel of Night. I play the leading part.
The stage is in the nether depth. I play to an audience of everlasting
Outcasts. The audience are assembled, the curtain is up. I forget my
cue, and the prompter is asleep. Judas, I forgot my cue, and the
prompter is asleep. What am I to say? What am I to do, comrade Judas?"
"Mr. Grey, I have been looking for you, sir. You are wanted at the
Castle, please, sir."
Mr. Grey turned round and saw just above him, on the edge of the little
hollow, Sir Alexander's old servant, Michael.
"Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, Michael, is it you?" Mr. Grey laughed and asked.
"Yes, sir," answered Michael promptly, as though he were accustomed to
finding his identity doubted.
"I was rehearsing a part I am going to take in an amateur play, Michael,
just to get the memory of poor Sir Alexander out of my mind. Well, am I
wanted at the Castle?"
"Yes, please, sir; and you will please to come at once. Mrs. Grant wants
to see you. The doctors have been, and I am afraid there is bad news
about Sir Alexander."
"I hope not, Michael. I shall run. You can take your time."
And with these words the banker started off at a quick pace.
He found Mrs. Grant sobbing violently, and for a while quite unable to
command her voice. At length, after a few reassuring and encouraging
words from the banker, she spoke through her sobs.
"Oh, Mr. Grey! Oh, my poor darling Maud! Oh, Mr. Grey, what are we to
do?"
"It will be kindest and wisest," said he, in a conciliatory voice, "if
we all try to keep as calm as we can under the circumstances. Michael
told me the doctors had been here, and that the news is bad; but I do
not know yet what the news is."
"Oh, my poor child! Mr. Grey, you can't tell how I feel. I, who have
been with her now more than six years, until I have grown to look upon
her as a daughter. Oh, Mr. Grey, this is dreadful!"
"There is nothing the matter with Miss Midharst, I trust. She is quite
well?"
"Quite well."
"In health, I mean?"
"Oh, yes. But think of her thrown out of her father's place without a
home or a relative, and so young and so simple."
"But, Mrs. Grant, Miss Midharst is enormously rich, and can make a most
handsome home anywhere she pleases."
"But think of an upstart younger son of a whole lot of no-good younger
sons turning my darling out into the cold, bleak, cheerless world,
turning her out of the house of her forefathers, this grand old place. I
never knew how grand it was or how I had grown to love it until now."
The poor woman, in her great sympathy for Maud, could not dissociate the
ideas of leaving the home-tree and poverty. When her husband died, and
the instable home-tree under which soldiers sling their hammocks had to
be abandoned, there were narrow ways and the friendless world that wait
on narrow ways to be encountered and endured. In her anxious sympathy
she thought the heiress of a rich baronet would have the same hardship
and privation to encounter as the widow of a penniless captain in a
marching regiment.
The banker placed his hand firmly, though lightly, on the shoulder of
Mrs. Grant, and said, in an impressive voice:
"We are all, I am sure, very sorry Sir Alexander is so ill; but we must
not add to our grief for him the fear that Miss Midharst will be
unprovided for. There will be few richer heiresses, and she and her
fortune shall be well taken care of. I wish you would be kind enough to
tell me what the doctors said about Sir Alexander."
"Oh, Mr. Grey, I hope you will excuse me. I am so fearfully troubled and
excited. I know what trouble is myself. I have had my own sad
experience----"
"And the doctors said, Mrs. Grant?" interrupted the banker gently.
"Oh, Mr. Grey, I hope you will forgive me. They are in the
banqueting-room, and said they would be glad to see you there."
"Thank you; I will go to them instantly. Dear Mrs. Grant, do try and
keep up your spirits, for Miss Midharst's sake."
With these words he left, and walked quickly in the direction of the
great room.
As he did so, the river passenger steamboat _Rodwell_ went past on the
outer or northern side, in front of the great archway leading to the
courtyard of the Island Castle.
Mr. Grey approached the dreary state dining-room, and having entered
found the three doctors seated by the open narrow windows, and looking
out upon the silent peaceful scene beneath. He approached them quietly,
gravely.
Dr. Hardy rose to receive him. The doctor and the banker bowed to one
another; then Mr. Grey bowed to the other two doctors, and they returned
his salutation with respectful inclinations of the head and in silence.
The banker broke the silence:
"Mrs. Grant informs me that you wish to see me, and I understand that
you desire to communicate something very important concerning the health
of Sir Alexander. I trust nothing very serious is to be told."
For a moment the three doctors stood admiring Grey, and no one of them
answered him. There was such a soothing and reassuring air of capable
responsibility about him at the instant, they could not withhold their
respect, and it was displayed in silence.
At last Dr. Hardy found his voice:
"We are informed that you, Mr. Grey, had an interview with Sir Alexander
Midharst this evening. Are we correctly informed that during the
interview Sir Alexander's head was quite clear and his mind quite free
from delusion?"
"Quite clear and quite free from delusion," answered the banker, as
carefully as though he were sworn, and the life of a fellow-being hung
on his words.
"In that interview did he seem to apprehend any disastrous ending to
his illness?" asked Dr. Hardy, with weight and impressiveness.
"I cannot go so far as to say that," answered Grey, with the most
circumstantial conscientiousness; "but from the nature of what occurred,
I am convinced he regarded what he said as of the very highest
importance."
"You are aware that he has made his will?"
"I am."
"Did what occurred between you and him this evening bear in any way upon
his will? Observe, we do not want you to trouble yourself with detail;
but what we want to know is this: Are you satisfied in your own mind
that Sir Alexander has arranged his worldly affairs as fully as you,
being a man of the world, could desire?"
Dr. Hardy put this question with all the gravity he could import into
his manner.
Throughout the interview the banker could in no way satisfy himself as
to what Dr. Hardy was driving at. He, therefore, framed his answers so
that they might be the least discursive and most easy of corroboration.
But the present question disturbed him greatly. Was all that had
hitherto been on this day but the prelude to the springing of an awful
mine under his feet? Did the three men now in front know what he knew?
Were they a kind of lay inquisition--a species of infernal council of
three--the advocate, judge, and jury destined to cause the lead to
overtake the gold? But he had already endured a worse ordeal that
evening, and he was not to be cowed by this. He answered in the same
self-collected tone as before:
"So far as I know of Sir Alexander's affairs they are in perfect order;
and in the interview which I had with him this evening, I think I am
justified in assuming he added by word of mouth, and in the presence of
Miss Midharst and Mrs. Grant, such matters as may not be embodied in his
will, or such additions to what may be in his will as he desired to
make."
The three doctors looked significantly at one another, and Grey awaited
with perturbation of mind, although he preserved an indifferent
exterior, the next move in this strangely shifting drama.
The doctors then nodded to one another that they had agreed to some
course understood between them, and Dr. Hardy said, in a tone of relief:
"You are fully in possession, we know, of the business position of Sir
Alexander's affairs. The medical position is this: A development of
symptoms has occurred since you saw the patient; his mind has sunk into
complete darkness, from which, in the natural course of the disease, it
never emerges between this and death----"
"This is most sad," interrupted Grey.
"_But_," said Dr. Hardy, taking note of the interruption with the
emphasis on the conjunction, "an operation which might accelerate death
would in all likelihood give the patient a few minutes of consciousness
to-night. If to-night passes without the operation it would be useless
to-morrow. The question, then, is: Are you of opinion there is any need
to run the risk of that operation in the hope of getting some final
instruction for the disposal of the worldly affairs of Sir Alexander
Midharst?"
"That is a very grave question indeed."
"A very grave question. Observe, it consists of two parts. 1. The
business portion. 2. The medical portion. You are not expected to answer
both responsibly. You are responsible for the business portion; we for
the medical. The portion of the question you have to answer is this: Do
you know of any business reason for restoring to consciousness at some
risk Sir Alexander Midharst?"
"I do not."
"Then we may go. We can do no more. Good evening, Mr. Grey; you have
been most admirably careful and conscientious in this matter."
The doctors bowed and withdrew.
Once more Grey found himself alone. He could not remain indoors. He felt
oppressed, suffocated. He hastened into the courtyard. Having gained the
grounds he turned his face to the east, and walked slowly onward with
his hands clasped behind him and his chin sunk upon his breast.
How that brief interview with the doctors had altered the whole aspect
of his affairs, he thought. In that terrible scene at the bedside, he
had sworn to take charge of Miss Midharst's fortune; a light
responsibility that was now. In that same interview he had sworn to take
care of Miss Midharst; a grave responsibility that was now. And yet last
night he had been thinking of the most intimate and responsible form of
guardianship for her. He had been thinking if he were a widower he might
marry Miss Midharst, and so cover up the great scandal. If he married
her now, he should be in the best position to keep his oath to the old
man.
Last night he had been affrighted by the notion of being left a widower,
lest it might enter Sir Alexander's mind a second man should be
associated with him in the guardianship of a great heiress.
All this had almost miraculously changed to meet his position. The old
man was likely to live some time, but never again to possess his senses;
never again to have sufficient recollection to make any change in that
will in which his, Grey's, fortune and fate were wholly wound up. That
was a tremendous relief.
He was becoming calmer. The memory of that scene by the bedside was
gradually growing less troublesome, less insistent, less oppressive. He
breathed more freely if it was for nothing else but the knowledge the
repetition of such a scene had become impossible.
His thoughts ran on:
Sir Alexander might live days, weeks, months, and then after his death
he, Grey, would have a whole year. Yes, a whole year! Of course he had
no shadow of hope of replacing the money; but then, in, say a year and
three or four months, something might happen.
He might be free.
The burden might be lifted off his shoulders and he might be free. Who
could say but--
He had turned round and was looking west.
"By Jove," he exclaimed, "I have missed the boat! There she goes past
the tail of the Island."
The _Rodwell_ had just got round the end of the Island, and was steaming
west in the broad river, full in the light of the setting sun.
The air was still. Now and then the lonely notes of a lamenting thrush
enriched the silence. In the whole vast arc of the heavens from the
violet-purple brooding east to the full crimson activity of the splendid
west, not a cloud broke the chromatic scale. There was something fierce
and warlike and fine in the sun; something wasted and desolate and
forlorn in the deserted realms of the east. It seemed as though the
sun, that general of Time, were celebrating in the west his triumph over
another day; while the eastern fields of the empyrean lay broken in hope
abandoned, fit region for the reign of dusky night, for ghosts of noble
hopes, and flitting phantoms of human joys. The northern plains of the
heavens were pale grey blue. To the south the sky was green. Overhead a
pulse of liquid pink seemed breaking through the fair soft blue, like
the pink that steals into a mother's blue eyes when she hears her baby
praised and stoops to kiss it, thinking "Their praises are sweet, but
they are only drops of sweetness falling into the ocean of my love."
Although Grey knew there was no chance of his overtaking the boat, he
now walked west, keeping on the high ground of the island. He passed the
Castle; still the boat was in view. The sight of it distracted his
thoughts, and any distraction was better than the subject-matter thrust
upon his attention by his mind.
From the tail of Warfinger Island to the bend of the river which would
completely conceal the steamer was about two miles. The sun now lay
level with the horizon. Against the blazing orb the boat steamed on. The
edge of the sun had already touched the low horizon when Grey paused at
the top of the high ground and looked west.
"I shall drive from the Ferry to Seacliff. It is only six miles by the
road, and I can be there before the boat.
"There go my wife and five thousand pounds of--of the money I laid my
hands on in an accursed hour. How strange it is that a few minutes ago
when I thought of my position I never thought of that! What a whimsical
thing chance is! There are Miss Midharst's five thousand pounds helping
to carry my wife from Daneford to Seacliff; and here am I, who owe a
hundred times that sum, and with no way out of the thing except I should
chance to be at liberty to marry within a few months.
"Ah, well, let me try and think of something that's probable. Trying to
square the circle is an elegant and harmless and profitable way of
spending one's time; it pays much better than trying to see the way out
of my mess. Possibly in a short time I may go mad. That would be a
capital way out of it, particularly if my madness took the form of going
over that bedside scene for ever. Bah! I am giddy already. I _must_
think of something else. Let me get back. That drive to Seacliff will
freshen me. Anyway I ought to be very well satisfied with the
substantial events of this evening."
He turned around and began slowly retracing his steps. As he did so, he
raised his eyes to the Castle.
Already the walls of the pile were steeped in the shadows of night. But
the Witch's Tower--the Tower of Silence--had just caught the fierce
gleam of light from the river.
He paused, looked up, and thought:
"How simple the people were long ago! They had no idea of cause and
effect. They saw that this tower blazed red after all the rest of the
building was laid in shadow. But the poor idiots never thought of the
light on the river. I can hardly believe it. An evening like this, when
there wasn't a cloud in the heavens, someone must have noticed that the
light on the tower first appeared when the sun caught the river and
remained steady until the sun had gone altogether. It is incredible that
people were ever such fools."
He stopped.
"I will wait until it fades," he thought, by way of honouring his scorn
for the past.
Presently and quickly the red glow faded from the tower.
"Now," he cried, "the sun is set, and no witchcraft can rekindle that
glow for four-and-twenty----What! The light again! Am I mad already?"
Once more, beyond all doubt, the blood-red glare burnt on the summit of
the Tower of Silence.
Grey turned quickly round, and looked in surprise and horror west. He
shaded his eyes with his hands. He rushed forward a few paces, shaded
his eyes again and looked. He swung himself into the branches of a tree,
climbed up, and having reached the highest branches that would sustain
his weight, glared into the west, into the track of crimson fire that
shot the red shaft at the Tower.
Then he descended heavily, drowsily, as though half asleep.
When on the ground he threw himself on his face, and muttered in a thick
voice:
"What is this? What is this? I have not been thinking murder, have I? I
have not been thinking wife-murder? Have I? No, no, no, Grey! Not so bad
as that."
Then a sudden change passed over him. He became inspired with superhuman
energy and strength. He sprang to his feet, and winding his arms wildly
about his head rushed towards the Castle, shouting:
"Help! help!"
CHAPTER XIII.
ON BOARD THE STEAMSHIP RODWELL.
The passenger steamboat _Rodwell_ left Daneford on that evening of the
17th of August, 1866, at the usual time, with an average number of
passengers for the season and her ordinary crew. She was a saloon boat,
and licensed to carry three hundred and fifty passengers between
Daneford and Seacliff. As a matter of fact she never, except on very
rare occasions, had more than half that number on board. Her crew, all
told, were fifteen; and on the evening of the 17th of August, 1866, she
carried about one hundred and twenty passengers.
The saloon-deck was abaft the paddle-boxes, and after-deck passengers
had access to the saloon and bridge as well as the after-deck; the
fore-deck passengers were confined to the fore-deck and the fore-cabin,
the latter being a dull, cheerless, dreary place, where no one ever
thought of going, unless in bad weather.
Smoking was allowed on the fore-deck to the second-class passengers, but
not in the fore-cabin. On neither the saloon-deck, nor in the saloon
itself, was smoking permitted; but all smoking Daneford declared that,
in the whole world, there could be found no place or circumstances under
which a cigar might be tasted with such plenteous peace and enjoyment as
upon the bridge of the _Rodwell_, while she steamed down the broad
placid Weeslade of a fine summer's evening.
Although Daneford was not a straitlaced city, there was a good deal of
solid propriety in the character of its people. Judged by criminal
statistics, it was rather worse than the average city of its size; but
if a little prodigal in its crimes, it was discreet and prudent in its
sins. If it cheated, it cheated in a legitimate and business-like
manner. If it got drunk, it did not brawl. Whatever wicked thing it did,
it kept under the rose. So that it enjoyed the double advantage of being
highly estimated for its virtue, without allowing itself the unpleasant
deprivations which the pursuit of virtue requires.
As regards smoking, Daneford observed one rule in the year 1866, and of
that rule a single breach could not be proved against a single resident
of the city. The rule was that no man should, while walking through the
streets of Daneford in company with a lady, give the death-blow to
chivalry and light a cigar.
The mere fact that on the bridge of the _Rodwell_ smoking was allowed
secured it against the remotest chance of female incursion. The most
respectable maiden ladies, who had ceased to be giddy with youth, made
it a practice to look as little as possible at that bridge, and, if they
could, to sit with their backs to it.
Just forward of the bridge, on the main deck, were the steward's pantry
and the cook's galley. The passage between the forward house on deck and
the paddle-boxes being very narrow, the view from the fore to the after
deck was so much interrupted as practically to be cut off.
Under the bridge, amidships, were the engines; aft of the engines, the
engine-room and stoke-hole, all in one; and farther aft still, the
furnaces and boilers.
All first-class lady passengers, whether escorted by men or alone,
confined themselves to the after-deck and the saloon.
The defect which had been discovered in the boiler had not become a
matter of general knowledge. No one in either Daneford or Seacliff knew
anything about it, except a few persons connected with the steamer and
the company's office.
There was no railway from the city to the little town, but an omnibus
and a coach went daily in and out, the distance between the two places
being, by road, not half the distance by water.
The road was no longer a rival of the river as a highway between the two
places; but if public faith got cool in the riverway, people might fall
back upon the road, which of old had enjoyed the monopoly. Nothing could
more effectually shake public faith in the water-way than a suspicion
that weakness or defect existed in the steamer. Therefore the fact that
the boilers of the _Rodwell_ exhibited unfavourable symptoms had been
kept a profound secret, and on the 17th of August no passenger on board
the boat had the shadow of a suspicion anything was wrong.
Steadily the steamboat held her course down the Weeslade that lovely
August evening.
A man with a fiddle at the bow struck up a lively air, and in a few
minutes some of the younger and gayer of the forward passengers stood up
and began to dance.
The men smoking on the bridge drew near the rail, and looked down with
smiles of quiet cordiality upon the dancers.
Then a man with a large white hat, blackened face, huge white
shirt-collar, blue-and-white calico coat, red waistcoat, and check-linen
trousers approached the fiddler; and having whispered to the fiddler,
the latter brought the dance-music to a stop, and the nigger minstrel
stepped out into the open space just quitted by the dancers, and sang a
pathetic song.
This won great applause, and caused some of the women to weep.
Then the fiddler changed the tune into one of sly and artful purport;
and the nigger, assuming an attitude and a manner of audacious drollery,
sang a song of such comical force that all the forward passengers
greeted the end of each verse with roars of laughter, forgetting, in
their own enjoyment, to applaud the singer: a form of commendation doing
much more homage to the performer than all the cool and calculating
approval that accepts and adopts the dry formula of hand smiting hand as
a mark of satisfaction. So successful was this song that some of the
critical loungers on the bridge turned to others and said, "Not half so
bad," in a tone indicating the possession of responsible critical
discernment and chivalric honour in the interests of truth.
Among the men on the bridge was a merchant of Daneford accompanied by a
nephew, a young lad from the country who had come on a first visit to
the city; to him the merchant was indicating the various objects of
interest they passed on the way down.
"This," said the merchant, pointing, "is the Foundery. Although it is
called the Foundery, it is in reality, as you see, a dockyard fer
building iron steamers. The last one launched was 2,500 tons register.
"That is the Cove, and there bathing is allowed all day long. The water
is not clear, and the bottom is very muddy; but in the hot weather
city-folk of the lower order are not nice in such matters. We haven't
any clear streams or mill-ponds such as you have in the country.
"That is the Glashouse over there, and this part of the river is called
Glashouse Reach.
"Farther down you see a windmill on a headland; that headland is called
Windmill Head, and that large white house in the glen there is Windmill
Hall, the residence of Colonel Wood Maitland, who distinguished himself
in the Crimean War. A Cossack thrust at Maitland's colonel, who was
wounded and propped up against a dead trooper's dead horse. Captain Wood
Maitland (he was only a captain then) lifted the Cossack's lance with an
up-cut. The Cossack wheeled, thrust at the captain; the lance caught the
captain in the left forearm, and the shaft being wounded by the up sword
cut, broke off two feet from the head, and stuck in the captain's
forearm. The captain was borne down. The Cossack wheeled again and
drew. Captain Maitland had lost his sword in the fall. The Cossack rode
up, brandishing his sword and making again for the wounded colonel, who
lay helpless against the belly of the dead horse. Captain Maitland was
now unarmed and wounded. A few paces in advance of the captain was a
large fragment of a shell; he rose, picked this up, and, at the moment
the Cossack was within a few yards of the wounded colonel, threw the
piece of the shell with all his force, and struck the horse on the head,
causing the horse to swerve and the rider to lose his cut. As the
Cossack swept by Captain Maitland pulled the lance-head out of his left
forearm, and thrust it through the bowels of the Cossack, who rode on a
little and then tumbled out of his saddle. But that was only one of a
dozen or more brave things Maitland did.
"That snug little cottage under the slope on the other shore is where
Samuel Sholl, the richest merchant in Daneford, lives. He is a Quaker,
and many men of five hundred a year have finer houses. But this one is
the most beautifully kept in the neighbourhood.
"If you look right ahead now you will see the Island. Its name is
Warfinger. On the top of the hill in the Island is the Castle. Sir
Alexander Midharst lives there. He has a fine property, worth more than
twenty thousand a year; but he is a miser, and saves up nineteen out of
every twenty pounds of his income.
"Wat Grey, the banker, a very rich man too, takes care of all Sir
Alexander's money. The Castle is old, as you see, and has a deserted,
lonely look.
"Wat Grey lives at the Manor, in the Manor House, another queer house,
and he has called the two houses the Weird Sisters. You see that round
tower. Now you can see it better as we come in front of the archway to
the Castle-yard, the western tower. Well, they used to say it was
haunted by the ghost of one of the wives of the family which owned it
before the Midharsts came into the property. There's a tower on the
Manor also, and no doubt you have heard or read of places in the
East--China, I think, or maybe Rangoon--where they put their dead on the
top of towers, called the Towers of Silence. The carrion birds eat off
the flesh, and the bones fall through a grating. Well, Wat Grey calls
these two towers the Towers of Silence.
"That level plain of grass-land between the river and these hills is
called the Plain of Spears. A great number of spear-heads have been
found there from time to time, and until quite lately it was supposed a
battle must have been fought there. But although bones of cows and
sheep have been discovered, no human bones ever turn up, and no one has
been able to account for the spear-heads. You shall see many of those
spear-heads in the rooms of the Weeslade Scientific Institute to-morrow.
"In that little creek there, Glastenbury Cove, three boys were drowned
last year. A boat capsized in a squall of wind, and none of the three
boys could swim; so they were all drowned.
"That large yellow house at the top of the dip of land is the Hon.
Skeldemere Istelshore's. He is the brother of an earl, and a violent
Radical. He has a large property hereabouts, and farms two thousand
acres himself.
"The sun is getting down now. Twilight is the pleasantest time on the
river at this season. Now, if you look back, you will see as pretty a
view as there is on the whole of the Weeslade, Don't the pasture and
park lands look well with the hills behind them, and dead astern, in the
throat of the river, Warfinger Island with its hill, and on the top of
the hill the old Castle standing out sharp against the sky, with the
Tower of Silence highest of all?
"By-the-way, in a moment you will see why people got a superstitious
feeling about that tower. Right in our wake is the Castle, and we are
steering right into the sun. We could not be better placed to see the
witch's fire dance on the tower. The sun is just dipping. Now watch the
tower. There! Did you see that? That flash on the top of the tower?
That's what the people call the witch's fire. There it is again, now. I
never saw it brighter--never. Look again. The boat is right in the track
of the sun, and the wash of the paddles makes the light flicker. I never
saw----"
At that instant he ceased to speak--for ever. An iron bar struck him at
the throat, severing the head from the body, and killing also a man who
stood behind him.
The after end of the bridge was flung upward, and all upon it, the
living and the dead, were shot down upon the fore-deck.
Coal and planks and wreck of the saloon, and bodies of those who had
been on the after-deck and in the saloon, toiled upward a moment in a
dense cloud of steam and water, hung a moment suspended in air, while a
dull groaning sound spread abroad from the steamer. Then all descended
again, falling upon the ruined boat, upon the placid water, with thud
and hiss and shriek.
For a second all was still.
Then a dull groan from those forward. Then screams and yells when it was
plain the shell of the boat could not float more than a few seconds.
About fifty people were still alive.
The wreck made a drive astern. The water washed over the fore-deck, and,
striking the forward bulwark, laid the steamer on an even keel for a
breath's space.
Then the water rushed aft once more, and in a stern-board the stern went
under water, the boat fell over to star-board, swung half-way back
again, and then heeled steadily over and went down.
The boiler of the _Rodwell_ had burst, and the steamer _Rodwell_ had
gone down before any one who still survived had had time to jump
overboard.
CHAPTER XIV.
ON THE RIVER.
Still calling out for help, Grey reached the Castle. When he got in
front of the chief gateway he paused a moment, and pressed his hand over
his forehead, trying to collect his thoughts.
The _Rodwell_ had blown up. Yes, that was clear. And all the people who
had not been killed or drowned were now struggling in the water, and his
wife had been aboard.
No good purpose could be served by alarming the people at the Castle.
They could render no assistance, and they had trouble enough there just
now. The best thing to do was to dash across the Island, tell the
ferryman to hasten to the scene of the wreck (he could not have seen the
steamer from the northern shore of the Island), jump into a boat, and
pull rapidly towards the fatal spot.
Grey crossed the Island at the top of his speed; paused a moment to
recover his breath; then shouted to the ferryman the news of the
disaster, and, bidding him row with all his might to the place, jumped
into another boat himself and pulled rapidly down the river.
Under the circumstances nothing could have been better for him than the
exertion necessary for driving the boat forward.
He was a powerful man and a skilful oarsman. He bent forward and flung
himself back with swift and weighty regularity, that made the boat fly.
He deliberately kept his mind free from thought. He concentrated all his
attention upon the physical work. When a young man he had often pulled
in local amateur races, but never before with such strictly undivided
attention.
"Get all way on the boat! Make her go through the water!" were the
thoughts that filled his mind. Gradually as he warmed to his work he
felt his power increase. He felt conscious of great skill and enormous
strength.
As he drove onward muscle after muscle of his body seemed to come into
sympathy with those in his legs and back and arms, to increase his
force. While the muscles came into play their action stole the sluggish
blood from his head, sent up his pulse, cooled his forehead, and cleared
his mind.
"There is no use in thinking now. No use in my thinking until I am there
and know all. _Now_ I have only to make this boat fly."
As he swung himself backward and forward, and plucked the blades through
the hissing water, he felt all things possible to man were possible to
him then.
"I could crush this wherry flat in my arms, or command a burning ship,
or lead a forlorn hope to certain victory at this moment," he thought.
"But I must be careful not to break an oar. To break an oar now would be
fatal. How they bend! They are the twisted ropes of the catapult, and
the wherry is the bolt, and we are going almost as fast as a flying
bolt.
"That's the tail of the Island at last. There is no use in my looking
round; it might disturb me. All I have to think of now is, Eyes in boat,
a clean wake, and give way with a will.
"Half ebb, by the marks. Give her a sheer out into mid-stream, and get
the crawl of the ebb under her. It's only a crawl compared to what
we're doing, although it's a five-knot ebb."
He was out of training, and his mouth became dry, his tongue parched,
and his breathing short; his muscles, under the unaccustomed strain,
tingled and grew heated, and his joints fiery hot. But he felt all the
better pleased for this. He took a fierce delight in squandering the
magnificent resources of his strength.
"My will," he thought, "is stronger than my body and my arms and my
legs, and if they fancy they are to get the better of my will I'll show
them their mistake. On you go! ay, faster." And he tore the blades
hissing from the water, and feathered, and switched the blades into the
water without a sound or a splash.
"Already," he continued, "the Island dead astern. The Black Rock and
the Witches' Tower, my Tower of Silence, in a line, and I out in
mid-stream. This means I am near."
"Where are you going? Eh? Where are you going with that wherry?" Grey
was hailed from ahead.
Backing water with his right hand and pulling with his left he swung the
boat round, bringing her gunwale under.
He had almost run into a four-oared river fishing-boat that had a
variety of floating objects in tow, and a few small things in the boat.
Four or five other boats were pulling slowly hither and thither, with a
man standing up in the bow of each.
When Grey ceased to pull it was growing dusk. For a moment he sat with
his oars peaked, staring around him. Then he tried to speak, but when he
opened his mouth his tongue rattled like a bone against his teeth, and
his throat felt dusty dry. Notwithstanding that the water here was
strong and brackish he leaned out of the boat, and filled his right hand
and drank. Then his tongue became flexible again, and although his voice
was hoarse and ragged, he could speak.
"You were here soon after it happened; how long is it now?"
Notwithstanding the gloom the men in the fishing-boat recognised him,
and their manner turned to civility at once.
"Close upon an hour ago, sir. I did not know your back, Mr. Grey; and
you were running right into us, and with such way on too."
"One, two, three, four, five, six," counts Grey. "Six boats?"
"Yes, sir, six boats. It's the awfullest thing ever happened on the
river in my time; and I'm on the Weeslade, man and boy, upwards of forty
year."
"An hour ago. I did not think it was so long. I came as quickly as I
could."
"I saw you pull a punt-race twenty-five years ago, sir, and you'd have
beaten your pulling in the punt then by your pulling in the wherry this
evening. Ay, sir, you'd have pulled that wherry round the punt."
"How many were saved?"
"About forty."
"Were they landed at one or both sides of the river?"
"They were all landed at Asherton's Quay over there."
"Do you know--did you see any of the saved?"
"Most of them. I helped to bring in some thirteen."
"There is, if it is an hour since she blew up, no chance of any more
being alive in the water, even clinging on to anything."
"No, Mr. Grey."
"Do you know----" His tongue was dry again, and he dipped his hand into
the brackish water and drank out of his palm.
The fisherman shuddered at this. "It's brackish at best," thought the
man; "but after what has happened--ugh! He must be drunk or queer in his
head."
Grey drew in both oars before completing the question, "Do you
know--Mrs. Grey--my wife?"
"Yes, sir, I know her well. I often sold her salmon, and saw her with
you on the _Rodwell_. I humbly hope, sir, she wasn't aboard this
evening?"
"You did not see her among the saved?"
"Mr. Grey, I may be mistaken----"
"Answer me, man, or----" He suddenly sprang up in the boat, and,
whirling an oar in his hands, threatened the fisherman in the other
boat. "Answer, man, or I'll brain you, d'ye hear? And if you tell me a
lie I'll come back and brain you when I find it out. Is my wife saved?"
"I did not see her," answered the man, shoving off the wherry.
But Grey hooked the fishing-boat to the wherry with his foot, and,
brandishing the oar aloft, whirled it over the head of the cowering man,
and shouted out in a voice that crossed the waters and crept up the
hushed shores: "Damn you, man, don't you see I mean to brain you if you
won't speak?"
"She was not saved. No one on the after-deck or in the saloon was saved.
It was the boilers blew up, and all aft were killed or drowned."
Grey unhooked his foot from the fishing-boat, and with his foot pushed
off from her. Then throwing down the oar in the boat, he folded his arms
tightly across his chest, and, still standing, drifted down the river,
his large figure standing out in black against the fading purple of the
west, his face turned towards the blackening east.
"Only that he lost his reason with his wife," said the fisherman, "I'd
take the law of him."
"Ay," answered another man in the boat, "it's an excuse for a man to do
any wild thing to lose his wife like this."
They had drifted a bit, and were now pulling back towards the spot where
they had first hailed Grey.
"He's standing up still in that wherry. With a big man like him standing
up in a cockleshell of a craft like that, the swell of a steamboat
wouldn't think much of twisting her from under his feet," said the first
speaker.
"And maybe he wouldn't much mind if it did, poor gentleman," in kindly
tone, said the man whom Grey had threatened.
The wherry drifted on, but for a time Grey never altered his position.
He was without his coat, without his hat; his white sleeves were rolled
up above the elbows, and his powerful arms tightened across his wide
chest. Gradually the boat, as it drifted, swung round, and brought his
face to the fading east.
There was not a ripple on the river, not a murmur in the trees; a faint
thin rustle of the water where it touched the shore was the only sound.
Night was coming, with its healing dew and spacious silence for
universal sleep.
Upright he stood still. The boat began to swing round once more. He did
not move. Again his face was towards the darkening east.
At length the wherry gave a sudden lurch; it had encountered something,
and had almost capsized.
He instinctively brought the boat on an even keel by throwing the weight
of his whole body on the rising side. In a few moments the boat was
still as of old. With a sudden shake and shudder he came back to a
consciousness of where he was.
"That is the red No. 4 Buoy I ran foul of; it nearly capsized me," he
thought.
Then shading his eyes with his open right hand, he stared back into the
eastern gloom long and fixedly.
"My wife and the _Rodwell_ are both gone," he whispered. "Bee and my
five thousand. My wife and my five thousand pounds are gone. She brought
me about five thousand when she came to me, long ago. It was to have
gone to her children, if she had any, and away from me if she had none.
Now she is gone, and that five thousand and another five: and I am
saved! Saved!
"Saved!"
He sat down in the boat, and, keeping his legs wide apart, rested his
elbows on his knees and his head on his hands. His shirt-collar was
open, and yet he felt his throat tighten, and put his hand to it. When
he found it free he muttered:
"It is only the hangman untying the knot; for in spirit I was a
murderer. And yet I remember the day I saw her first. I can tell you all
about the day I told her I loved her. I could show you the way she
looked; pretty, and with her head this way. Then I knew she was mine.
She was small, Bee was small; and I lifted her up and kissed her--not
often, but once; once, and I felt weak for joy at that kiss; and
something happened in my head or heart, and I saw all my life before
me, and felt her always on my arm. And after that I was calm. It seemed
we had known one another always, and had been married years.
"And I remember the first thing I said after that was not anything wild
or romantic; it was:
"'In the back of the Bank-house there is a bay-window like this, but
there are creepers on it.' And she asked me what kind the creepers were;
and I laughed and said I did not know. 'But,' I said, a kind of foolish
pun, 'my Bee shall come and tell me, won't she?' And Bee said, 'Maybe
so.'
"And I remember when I bought the engaged ring, and how she kissed me
then the first time of her own accord.
"And I remember how when we were married first she clung to me, and
seemed to grudge her eyes for anything but me. And I remember how I
used to walk around her and about her through the streets, if anything
seemed to threaten her with disturbance--a dog, or a draught, or a cab,
or a----"
"He suddenly threw up his face to the deep purple sky, and cried out, in
a hoarse whisper:
"And to-night, by God, I am not man enough to weep that she is dead! I
am not man enough to wish her back again!"
He looked around the water, as though he expected to see some form of
temporal or eternal vengeance approaching him.
As his eyes fell upon the water, something came very slowly floating
towards him. Something which was almost wholly submerged, and, owing to
that fact, drifted more quickly than the boat. As the thing drew nearer
it gradually settled down in the water, and, before he could touch it,
sank.
"It looked like a cloak," he whispered. "What have I been doing here? I
must get ashore, and see if the----" He could not bring himself to say
"body," and without thought sat down, and began rowing rapidly towards
Asherton's Quay.
CHAPTER XV.
THE FUTURE AS IT SEEMED.
When Grey's boat came alongside the little quay he jumped out, and went
hastily to a crowd of people assembled round the bodies and wreckage
landed already.
His manner was highly excited, and the questions put by him came in such
an incoherent torrent the people did not know where to begin the
answers.
Some of the survivors, some of those who had been on the fore-deck,
stood near: these he asked if they knew Mrs. Grey.
Yes, some of them knew Mrs. Grey.
Had they seen her either before or after the boat went down? Did they
see her go aboard? She was to have been on board, and he was to have
gone too, but he had been called away. Then he was to have joined the
steamer off the Island; but she slipped him by, and he was not able to
go on board. Could it be possible no one had seen his wife, Mrs. Grey?
Could no one give him any tale or tidings of his wife?
No. No one could tell him anything about her. No one had seen her; but
then that was not to be wondered at, for all the people who survived had
been on the fore-deck, and from the fore-deck it was impossible, or
nearly impossible, to see the people on the after-deck.
But surely some of those who had been saved knew whether his wife had or
had not gone on board at Daneford? That was simple enough.
They could not say; they only knew they had neither seen her nor heard
of her that evening on the _Rodwell_, or in connection with the
_Rodwell_.
Among that sad group on the shore, Grey was the first who came enquiring
for friend or relative, and those who knew him pitied him with all their
hearts; for they recollected his marriage had been the result of a
love-match, and that he was reputed to be the kindest, most generous,
and most loyal husband in the city. His constant good-humour and kindly
actions, his generosity, and his great importance and usefulness to the
people of Daneford, added in no slight way to increase the sympathy and
respect of those who stood on the little quay that night and heard his
excited questions, and answered him back gently and with tears in their
hearts.
For his own part he had not yet been able to bring the results of the
disaster sharply before his mind. The fact that the disaster had
occurred was never clearly with his apprehension. As soon as he removed
his eyes from the salvage and the dead, and looked out upon the broad
peaceful river, it seemed impossible that at the very spot he had
recently rowed over scores of people lay dead, and among the dead his
wife.
The news of the catastrophe spread quickly, and gradually the crowd
gathered and swelled. From the neighbourhood, some who had friends in
the unlucky boat came, and found their friends alive in houses around
the landing-place. Others found friends or relatives beneath the cloths
which had been spread over the dead. Others were in a condition similar
to Grey: could find no trace of those whom they supposed to be in the
boat at the time she blew up.
Among the last-named searchers was a man who lived on the banks of the
river, and had heard the explosion and hastened to the spot. He had
reason to fear his only son had been in the boat, but he could not to be
certain, as the young man lived at Daneford, and often, though not
invariably, took the boat on a Friday evening. The father was
distracted, and at last came to Grey, whom he knew slightly, and, under
the impression that the banker had been a passenger, asked for tidings
of his son.
After a few half-incoherent replies from Grey, the father gathered the
facts of the latter's case, and found they were both circumstanced in
the same way. For a moment the old man felt utterly helpless and
desperate. Then his mind seemed to clear up suddenly, and, turning to
Grey, he said:
"Neither of us is sure he is a sufferer by this awful calamity, nor can
we be certain as long as we stay here unless our worst fears come true."
He pointed to the river and shuddered. "They have already begun
dragging, but it will be days before all are found, if all are ever
found. Each of us may hope still. Suppose, instead of this sickening
waiting here, we drive back to the city? There we may find those whom we
fear to find here. Is not that better than watching each boat, and
bending over each poor body that is landed?"
"You are right!" cried Grey eagerly, all his faculties suddenly starting
into life, and his mind for the first time seizing upon the idea of
getting certain knowledge speedily. The torpor which had fallen upon his
intellectual faculties at the moment of the explosion left him, and he
not only warmly seconded the old man's plan, but before the other could
speak, had secured and was seated in one of the many flys which had
already begun to arrive with helpers and friends at the scene of the
wreck.
In a few seconds the fly was spinning along in the direction of
Daneford. Both the men in the vehicle were too much occupied with their
own concerns for conversation. Grey's thoughts ran on:
"She is dead. Beyond all doubt she is dead. Poor Bee! poor Bee! I wonder
did she think of me with her last thought. I wonder was she glad or
sorry to go. And now that she is gone, my poor Bee, I don't know how I
feel.
"Poor Bee, I shall miss her. I have been unkind and unjust to her. I
have treated her cruelly, cruelly. My being unkind and scornful to her
did no one any good. It hurt her, and it hurt me. Poor thing!
"The house will be strange now. The rooms where she has been will feel
so quiet, so useless. What is a house for but a woman? A man does not
want a house of many rooms. Least of all does he want a house of many
rooms haunted by a memory. A man wants only two rooms, one to eat in and
one to sleep in. When a childless man's wife dies he ought to give up
housekeeping. What is the use of hollow rooms all round a man's head?
They are only chilling storehouses of recollection."
Here his mind halted a long time. When he resumed at the point where he
had left off, he added but one more thought:
"I'll sell the Manor."
He paused much longer, said to himself, as though he were familiarising
himself with the whole situation by repeating the words forming the key
to it:
"I'll sell the Manor."
After going over the words so often that they began to lose their
meaning, he started suddenly:
"No. I cannot sell the Manor. I cannot sell the Manor House. A man in my
position must have a house. A man in my position----
"My position! My position! My position!
"Curse it, why can't I keep my head clear? I am not going mad, I should
hope. What an amusing maniac I should make just now! The people would
gather from all sides to hear honest Wat raving about stealing the
property of the baronet. It would be town talk. Never was mad-mad so
mad, they would say. But let me get on----
"Of course a man in my position ought to have a house. I must have a
place to see my friends in. I must entertain a little and----"
His thoughts paused again a while, and then he abandoned thinking on
the line he had been following with the mental exclamation: "No, no! I
must not think of that now. I must not think of that--over the open
grave of poor Bee!"
He shook himself and endeavoured to fix his mind on matters of the hour,
and to keep it free of the future:
"How the purely business aspect of things has altered within these awful
twenty-four hours! Sir Alexander has become powerless to alter that
will, and still lives. The longer he lives now, the better for me. While
he retained his faculties there was always great danger he might make
some change. Now there is no longer any fear of that.
"What a terrible scene that was at the bedside! If I had known anything
of the kind was about to occur, I don't think I should have had the
courage to face it. I fear I would have gone the fatal length before I
would have knowingly encountered it. It was so awful to hold her hand
and swear such things in the face of the facts. But it is all over, and
I am well out of it. Perhaps, after all, it is better the scene should
have taken place.
"I suppose I shall be much at the Castle now. In fact, I don't know who
is to give any orders now if I do not. It will be all thrown on me, I
can plainly see that. Often at the Castle means meeting her often, and
meeting her often means that we shall be good friends.
"How long did we stand hand-in-hand this evening? Not long. I did not
note her beauty then, but now I can call back the face and change the
surroundings----
"No, no! I must not sell the Manor. A man in my position must have a
house for--I may marry again."
He set his teeth and clenched his hands, and drove the nails of his
fingers into his palms. Then he faced the position resolutely:
"A while ago I shirked looking into the future across an open grave. But
my own grave is open too. Can I fill it up? I think I can.
Self-preservation is the first law. I cannot get back my five thousand
pounds from the _Rodwell_. I cannot get back my wife from the Weeslade:
can I get back my life? That is the question of questions, and it is
idle out of feeble sentimentalism to defer looking at such grave
business in a straightforward and candid way.
"I must marry, and I must marry this girl. Nothing else can save me, and
I think nothing can prevent my doing it. I hold the winning cards in my
hand at last, and I mean to win."
The old gentleman here broke in upon the banker's reverie with: "We are
passing your house, Mr. Grey."
"Ah, so we are; thank you. Drop me here; I'll walk up, and you take the
fly on. I hope you will find your son all safe."
"God grant it! I hope you will find your wife at the house."
"Thank you; good-night."
"Good-night."
Grey turned into the Park, and walked slowly in the direction of his
house.
Twice he paused and faced round, as though the place were new to him,
and he wished to fix indelibly on his memory what could be seen in the
dim light. Or was it that he now looked at the Park in a new aspect,
from a new standpoint? Or was it that he wanted to gain time and
composure before reaching the house? He could not have told himself why
he stopped, in fact he was perfectly unconscious of having ceased to
move forward; and although his eyes passed deliberately from tree to
tree, and seemed to be dissatisfied with the want of light, he was not
aware his thought was occupied with the scene. The pause in his walk
indicated merely a pause in his thought. While he moved towards the
house he had but one idea.
"I must marry, and I must marry this girl. Nothing else can save me."
With this thought beating through his brain he shook himself,
straightened his figure, and collected his faculties for meeting the
servants and formally ascertaining his wife had left the house and taken
passage in the ill-fated _Rodwell_.
With a steady stride, and head erect, he walked up to the front door and
into the hall.
He looked round hastily, and then asked:
"James, where is your mistress?"
The man blinked in surprise at seeing his master and being asked such a
question. Mrs. Grey had told the servants that morning she and Mr. Grey
were going to Seacliff that evening, and now here was his master come
back alone, and asking in a startling manner where the mistress was. He
had better be guarded in his reply. "I don't know, sir," was his answer.
"Is she in the house, James?"
"No, sir."
"Are you quite sure?"
"Quite sure."
"When did she go out?"
"I did not see her go out, sir; but at luncheon she said she was going
out, and I have not seen her since."
"Did she say where she was going?"
"Yes, sir. She said if anyone called I was to tell them she had gone to
Seacliff with you this evening."
"Are you quite sure of all this?"
"Quite sure, sir. The cook was in the dining-room at the time, and heard
the mistress tell me. Mistress had the cook up to give her orders about
to-morrow."
"James, you will never see your poor mistress again. The _Rodwell_ blew
up, and she was not among the saved."
"Good God!" exclaimed the old soldier, starting back and involuntarily
bringing his hand to his forehead, as though he found himself thrust
into the presence of the general of the enemy. He fell back two paces,
and, dropping his hand to his mouth, uttered a sob. "Good God!"
exclaimed the near-sighted servant, whose heart was full of dumb
gratitude and desolate sense of loss. "The last words she said to me
were, 'Thank you for the flowers, James; I know it was you put them
fresh in the vases. Thank you, James.' That's what she said to me as she
went down the passage to her own room. When she was in the passage she
turned back, and said so that I shouldn't forget it, 'Thank you, James;
and recollect if anyone calls I'll be back to-morrow.' And now to think
that she is dead!" He had forgotten the presence of his master, who
stood irresolute a moment, and then with a heavy sigh walked into the
inner hall and disappeared up the gloomy unlit staircase.
Neither master nor mistress having been expected home, there was no
light in any of the rooms or passages on the first floor. With heavy
slow step Mr. Grey proceeded to his own bedroom and lit the gas.
How cold and dreary and desolate it looked!
He poured out some water and bathed his face. This revived and
invigorated him. Then he rang the bell. The chambermaid answered it.
"Jane, I suppose you have heard the awful news from James?"
"Yes, sir." The girl burst out crying.
"Do you know the exact time at which your poor mistress left the house
for the boat?"
"No, sir. None of us saw her go; but none of us were in the front of the
house after luncheon. We dined at three, just after the mistress had her
luncheon; and we all think she must have gone out while we were sitting
down."
"That will do, Jane, thank you."
"Thank you, sir; and if you please, sir, we're all very sorry for her
and for you," crying. "She was a good kind mistress, and never took any
of us up short, or refused us anything in reason."
"She was a good kind mistress, Jane. I am very much obliged to you and
to them. Tell all of them below that."
The girl withdrew, weeping bitterly.
Once more he was alone.
Until now there had lingered in his mind a haunting doubt. He could not
believe the evidence before him. Now all was simple and intelligible.
He commenced to pace the room. At first his step was firm and slow. He
was weighing mighty thoughts.
Gradually the past seemed to fall from him like a cope of lead. He
folded his arms on his breast. He threw up his head into the air, as in
fancy he stepped across the threshold of his new life. The colour came
into his cheeks and the sparkle into his eye. He strode beneath
triumphal arches, and heard the shouts of surging multitudes in his
ears.
Yes, the past was now vanished into the darkness, which need never again
be explored, be visited, be contemplated. Let the past bury its dead.
Let him look at the future.
It was brighter now than ever. The position of the Bank was secure above
all chances of assault. He should marry that girl, and by that marriage
cover up for ever the crime he had committed. The reputation of her
fortune would enormously increase the security and business of the Bank.
Then--long-deferred ambition--then he might enter Parliament. The best
society would gradually open to him. He should be successful in the
House; he should possibly rise to place; if this happened, considering
he should have the reputation of great wealth, and for a wife the
beautiful daughter of a baronet, of a race that went back to the
Conquest, what more possible than that there should in a few years, in
Debrett, be the name of Sir Henry Walter Grey, Bart.?
The prospect was not unreasonable. What intoxicating probabilities were
these!
He would like a little brandy now. He did not care to go downstairs for
it, or to ring again. There was some, no doubt, in the tower cupboard.
Yes, that would do. Here was the key in his pocket.
With a radiant face and an elastic step he left the room, carrying a
lighted candle in his hand.
He stalked back in a few minutes, holding the candle out at arm's length
before him.
"The other key is at the other side of the door. The door is locked on
the inner side, and my wife is there!"
CHAPTER XVI.
THE PRESENT AS IT WAS.
He put the candle on the dressing-table, and sat down in front of the
glass. He placed one elbow on the table, bent his head low, and catching
his hair, softly rested his head on the ball of his hand.
His brows were knit. His eyes, bent on the toilet-cover, were vacant,
rayless; they carefully explored the pattern of the cloth. His mind was
a blank. It showed nothing. It was as incapable of reflection as the
waters of the middle sea battered by the winds beneath the tawny clouds.
His reason was not with him, and the machinery of his mind had stopped.
There were no ideas in his imagination. His mind floated free in
unoccupied space.
For a while he sat thus. Then he raised his head and looked firmly into
the glass.
"What has happened to me?" he thought, with his eyes fixed on the eyes
in the glass. "A moment ago, when I discovered she still lived, I felt
in despair; and now I am calm. What has happened to me?
"What has happened to me?
"Here is the situation:
"The servants think she went to that boat. She knew on such occasions I
always took charge of whatever little luggage we required. They have not
seen her since luncheon. They believe she was in the _Rodwell_. It is
scarcely possible anyone can say she was not in the _Rodwell_; all the
people and crew who were on the after-deck are dead. Any one who heard
of my visit to Asherton's Quay, or met one of the servants, would regard
me as a widower. I _was_ a widower at Asherton's Quay. I _was_ a widower
while I drove up from Asherton's Quay to this. My servants assure me I
am a widower.
"To-morrow all Daneford will regard me a widower.
"To-morrow morning Maud Midharst will think of me as a widower--Maud
Midharst, who will one day own that chest, which, when opened, will be
found to contain the bones of a thief and a suicide, not the fortune of
a great heiress.
"To-morrow morning Maud Midharst will think of me as a widower; _what
will she think of me as--at night_?"
Suddenly the fixed expression left his face. A thought that sent the
blood tingling through his veins had rushed in upon him.
"Perhaps," he said, breathless, "I am a widower! She may be dead!"
He rose nimbly, and, taking up the candle, once more went into the
passage leading to the first-floor room of the Tower of Silence.
He looked carefully round, and then going to the end of the passage
further from the tower, closed the two doors and locked the inner one.
He proceeded cautiously back to the door leading into the tower. This
was a single door. He held the candle in his left hand, knocked with his
right, and bent his ear towards the door.
No reply.
He knocked again, this time more loudly.
Still no reply.
Holding the candle behind him, he bent low and looked into the keyhole.
Undoubtedly there was the end of the shaft of the key shining against
his eye.
He paused a while in deep thought; then shaking himself up, knocked more
loudly, battering with his clenched fist.
No answer.
He looked at the candle he carried. It was wax, and in his moving to and
fro the wax had overflowed the flame-pan and run down the side, making a
long thin ridge. He took a piece of pencil from his pocket, stripped off
the ridge of wax, softened the wax at the flame, and stuck a lump the
size of a pea on the end of the pencil.
Then he heated the free end of the wax, and when it had just begun to
run thrust it cautiously into the keyhole, and pressed the wax against
the shaft of the key in the lock. He held the pencil steadily thus for
a few minutes. With great caution he tried it. All was well. The wax
adhered firmly to the end of the pencil and the shaft of the key.
With elaborate care he twisted the pencil slightly one way, then the
other. The key moved slowly in the lock. He tried it four or five times
right and left, and holding the candle behind him and his eye on a level
with the keyhole. At last the hole was completely blocked up by the body
of the key. Forcing the pencil in firmly, the key slipped through the
hole and fell on the floor within.
He straightened himself, leaned against the wall for a moment, and wiped
his forehead. Then drawing his keys out of his pocket, he inserted one
in the lock, turned the lock softly, and entered.
As he did so the head of a man disappeared below the window-sill. Grey
did not see this head, nor did he at that time know of the man's
presence.
The room was one of medium size, but it was dark in colour, and the one
candle was almost lost in it, and revealed little or nothing.
Holding the light above his head Grey peered around.
He approached a couch, on which could be dimly seen the prostrate figure
of a woman. The figure did not move as he drew near.
He stood over the couch and looked down upon his wife. She was lying on
her back. Her mouth was slightly open, and her face very pale. Her eyes,
too, were partly open.
He waved the candle across the eyes. No sign of consciousness. He called
"Bee" softly two or three times. No answer.
Could it be she was really dead? Really dead after all?
He stooped down and put his ear over her mouth.
No, this was not death. This was--brandy.
He shook her slightly. He caught her by the shoulder and shook her more
strongly, calling her name into her ear.
She responded by neither sound nor motion.
Then putting the candle down on the floor he stood up, folded his arms,
and reflected intently with his eyes fixed on her.
Not death but brandy, and yet how like death, and how near death! How
near death! And still in the interval between this and death lay his
ruin, his destruction. A blanket thrown on that face would bridge over
the interval between this state and death, and give him a golden road to
happiness and glorious prosperity.
His wife! This his wife here, degraded thus! This woman whom he had
loved with all the love he had ever given woman! This woman, whom he had
married in defiance of his father's wish and all worldly wisdom! Great
God, was this to be borne?
She had brought herself nigh death. She was nigh death now. It might be
she would never awake. It was quite possible she might never awake. But
then the hideous scandal! The coroner's jury found that Mrs. Grey, wife
of Henry Walter Grey, Esq., died of excessive drink! Intolerable!
And yet this wretched woman lying here had made such a thing not only
possible but probable. Suppose she should never wake, what an
unendurable position for him! He could not live through that odious
inquest, never survive that degrading verdict. He should throw himself
into the Weeslade, or blow out his brains first.
Any time she might get into such a condition and never awake! Great God!
this was a view of the case he had never taken until now. He had always
had the dread of disclosure before his mind, but now he should have the
infinitely more appalling horrors of a coroner's jury and a coroner's
verdict. This was insupportable. Abominable!
Any time in the future she might die as she was now. Then no doubt he
should be a widower, but a widower under what a terrible shadow! Suppose
she should die now, and by any means it should come out that he had
deliberately placed the brandy in her way, he had better leave Daneford
at once. They would look on him as a murderer.
As a murderer!
They would _know_ he had put a fatal temptation in his wife's path. The
discovery was what he dreaded.
Suppose she never woke again--ah!
Suppose she never got up alive off that couch!
Never got up from where she lay!
That was a royal thought? Now to make all right, all secure. Now! What a
royal thought! A thought worthy of the prince regnant of the Nether
Depths.
He stooped, took up his candle, and crossed the room with rapid steps.
He locked the door of the tower-room, and, having reached his own room,
rang the bell.
James answered the bell.
"James," he said, "I cannot rest. I cannot believe this dreadful thing.
I wish you and the other servants to search the house thoroughly from
garret to cellars. Mind, a room is not to be omitted. When every room
has been examined let me know. I have been in the tower."
James left, and for an hour the banker sat alone in his bedroom. At the
end of the hour James came back with the report that every room had
been examined and no trace found.
"We can do no more, James. I shall want no one to-night. You may all go
to bed as soon as you like. Good-night."
Again he was alone. Alone for the night. Alone save for the proximity of
his wife in the next room. Alone with his royal idea and the easy means
of carrying it out.
He braced himself, and began walking up and down the room firmly.
Yes, this was a golden opportunity, which would have been utterly
worthless but that in the mid-centre and at the right moment his great
thought had burst in upon him.
It was most likely his wife would never wake. In fact, the chances were
in favour of her not waking. It would be almost a miracle if ever she
returned to consciousness.
Why should there ever be an inquest?
Supposing she had died in her sleep, it would have done no one any good
to hold an inquest.
Then, if she did die in this sleep, what would Maud Midharst regard him
as to-morrow night?
As a widower, of course.
And what should he regard himself as?
As a man doubly delivered from a wife who was the slave of an odious
vice, and from ruin, disgrace, and suicide.
She was sleeping still, he supposed. He would go and try.
He stole cautiously out into the passage, and, opening the door into the
tower-room, crept towards the couch. He did not carry a candle this
time. He stumbled over something hard and metallic which he had seen
when last in the room. He recovered himself rapidly. He paused,
balanced himself on the balls of his feet, leaned forward, and listened
intently.
The sound had not roused her.
It was as dark as a vault. A faint blue square, like the bloom under
trees in summer, showed the situation of the one window. All the rest
was as much out of view as if the solid earth intervened.
He crossed the room and approached the couch, with his head thrust
forward, and all the faculties of his mind bent on his hearing; he
stooped over the couch and listened, as though he would pierce remotest
silence to reach what he sought.
Yes, there was a low, faint sound of breathing, but so low it seemed to
come from a long distance.
He knelt down beside the couch, and called softly in her ear, "Bee."
No answer.
"Bee."
No answer.
"Bee."
No answer.
A long pause followed, during which no sound stirred in the intense
darkness. The husband still leant over the wife, the wife still breathed
faintly.
Then----
In ten minutes from that strange sound Grey was back in his bedroom,
standing before the glass with set resolute lips and a rigid white
face.
CHAPTER XVII.
THE ASCENT OF THE TOWER OF SILENCE.
"There need be no inquest," he thought. "There need be no inquest _now_.
To-morrow morning every one in Daneford will believe that she is dead,
and every one will be--right. Her name will be included in the list of
the dead, there will be a reference to my broken-hearted behaviour at
Asherton's Quay, and there will be expressions of sympathy with me.
"I shall wear mourning.
"What o'clock is it?" He looked at his watch. "Too soon yet. I must wait
until all are asleep.
"I shall wear mourning and receive the condolences of my friends. I
shall pass through avenues of faces cast in sorrow for my grief. They
will hush their voice when I enter the Daneford Bank. They will
unanimously vote resolutions of sympathy at most of the public bodies to
which I belong. And I--I--how shall I receive their greetings?
"How shall I receive them? Shall I quail and tremble and jabber of
to-night's work? Shall I become hysterical or gloomy? No, no, no. I
shall be as bold at least as the thief whom they crucified on the Left
Hand.
"The oath I took by that bedside this evening was my swearing into the
army of the everlasting damned, and no one shall ever say I quailed or I
faltered.
"What o'clock is it? Yet too soon. This is all I need be careful about.
Once it is there, I shall be free and blithe--free and blithe!
"I shall meet them all and never show a sign. It is a pity I did not go
on the stage. I feel quite confident I can play out this part to the
end, and carry my audience with me so thoroughly that not one of them
will know I am playing a part. No living man shall find out I do not
speak my own words. It is only comrade Judas and his friends know who
the real author of the play is."
He turned away from the glass and began pacing the room quickly. He was
thinking with fierce pride of the brave front he should show to the
world, and motion stimulated his mind and gave reality to his mental
action.
Yes, he should never waver. In fact he felt stronger now than before. He
had lived under the shadow of her fault; now he faced his own crime. All
depended on himself, and he knew he was equal to the situation and its
contingencies.
He could face them all. All the people of Daneford and Seacliff. Every
one of----
He shivered, drew his body together, and leaned for a moment against the
wall. The cold sweat oozed from his white forehead, and he gasped for
breath. In a while he shook himself, threw up his arms, and wound them
round his head, as if to protect himself against the blows of a
merciless enemy, and moaned out, in a tone of craven misery:
"No, no! Not you? Go away! I cannot look at you; you must not come near
me. I have ceased to be your son. I am not the child you suckled. I am
not the son you taught to pray. I am not the man you inspired with
respect and love. I am not the son you always tried to make do his duty.
Mother, let me call you mother darling once again; to call you my angel,
mother, seems to purge me of my crime. I am a strong man, mother, but I
cannot look at you. Bee is dead, and I have killed her. Now, will you
not fly from me? Think of your son as dead, and fly this murderer. What!
you will not! You see the brand of Cain, and you will not go! Oh,
invincible love! Intolerable devotion! Supreme disciple of Christ, you
drive me mad. I am mad already. Go, woman; go, woman, or I may kill you
too."
He dropped his arms from his head, and glared round the room with the
fire of madness in his eyes. The neck-ribbon his wife had worn last
night at dinner hung on the glass; a pair of her slippers, soft slippers
for comfort, were under the dressing-table. His eyes lighted on the
ribbon, then on the slippers.
With an idiotic laugh he staggered across the room, and, sitting down on
the side of the bed, remained in a torpor for a long time. The last
vision conjured up by him had stunned his imagination and baffled his
intellect, and his mind, while he sat thus, was blank as the viewless
wind.
It was a long time before he roused himself, and even then he had to
employ considerable effort to bring himself up to the point of action.
He knew he had yet something of the last importance to do. He looked at
his watch.
"Eleven. All is quiet. I may safely go now."
He arose, and, taking the candle with him, walked heavily into the
passage, and having opened the other door passed into the tower-room,
and locked the door of that room, leaving his own key in the lock.
Remembering the second key, he lowered the candle and looked for it on
the dark oak floor. He saw it and picked it up. As he did so his eyes
caught another metallic glitter on the floor, and stepping towards it he
took up something.
Holding the metallic object next the light, he seemed for a moment
perplexed.
"What brings a burglar's jemmy here? How can it have come here?"
He looked very cautiously and slowly round the room.
"I did not notice until now," he thought, "those open drawers. Why, the
place has been broken into."
His first impulse was to rush to the window. But he curbed that. It
would be just as well not to be seen at that window now. Suppose by any
chance the burglar happened to be lurking in the neighbourhood, in the
Park. No part of the house or grounds commanded this room, and so long
as he did not go near the window all would be well.
He had stumbled over that jemmy before--before he had added to the
perfidy of Judas the sin of Cain.
He approached the couch. All was quiet there. Not a sound, not a breath.
He went still nearer. Now for the first time he noticed close by the
couch an empty decanter, the one into which James had poured brandy, and
by it a glass.
He noticed something else too; the left hand of the figure on the couch
lay on the breast, and from the third finger all the rings were gone.
"All the rings gone!" he thought, in dismay. "The place broken into and
all the rings gone! This room broken into and the rings taken off the
finger! She never removed the wedding-ring, and scarcely ever the guard.
She must have been asleep when he came in; and he, no doubt, seeing the
decanter and the glass, and observing she took no notice of sounds,
went about his work. A bold man, a very bold man."
When had that man been there? He had no means of determining the time at
which the burglar had been in the room. It was clear, however, he had
been there while she was alive.
Had he been there after the sailing of the steamboat _Rodwell_ from
Daneford that evening? If so, that burglar could hang him, Grey.
Out with the candle.
He extinguished it.
A profound quiet brooded abroad. Not a leaf stirred. The trees were as
motionless and the air as mute as if the air was solid crystal. No sound
from the city or the road intruded upon the voiceless darkness of that
tower-room.
Grey stood a while looking at the square of dim blue bloom indicating
where the window was. Then he stooped and touched what lay on the
couch, and pulled himself upright with a jerk.
He stooped down his head once more, and listened intently. Last time he
had so stooped he had heard a low faint breathing. Now nothing reached
his ears, but beyond the reach of human ears he heard the deep roll of
the Eternal Ocean on the shores of Everlasting Night.
The ocean of everlasting silence, where her voice had been, was more
awful than the clangour of war, or the shouts of a burning town.
"It will not do to think now. I must make thought drunk with action. She
is not heavy. I have often carri----No, no; that sort of thing would be
the worst of all. Now for it!"
He stooped once again, rose more slowly than at any former time, and
walked down the room with heavy footfall, carrying a burden.
The room had two doors--one between it and the passage leading to the
bedroom; the other between it and the landing of the tower-stairs.
The staircase down from the landing was boarded off, so that egress from
the tower-room by that staircase was impossible.
The upward way was unimpeded. The staircase had not been used once for
years. There was nothing in either of the upper rooms, and no one had
ever been in either of them since Grey himself, when he had gone over
the house before buying it.
The staircase was as dark and silent as a grave. A thin carpet of dust
deadened the footfalls, and, clinging to the boot-leather, muffled the
feet. Now and then his foot crushed a small piece of plaster which had
fallen from the ceiling. This made a sound like a wild beast crunching
bones.
The paper had parted from the walls in many places, and hung in damp
festoons from the ceiling here and there.
Now and then long slimy arms of paper stretched out to him from the
walls and held him back. This made him stagger against the balustrade to
steady himself. The balustrade upon which he laid his hand was rickety,
and covered with a damp spongy dust, that clung to his hand and worked
up between his moist fingers, and stuck his fingers together as with
blood. When he had got clear of the paper that, hanging from the walls,
had seized him, and had pushed himself away from the slimy balustrade,
he toiled upward.
But the day had been a terribly exhausting one, and his progress was
very slow.
He held his burden with his right arm on his right shoulder, and
steadied himself against the wall with his right elbow, against the
balustrade with his left hand.
Owing to the inviolate darkness and his small acquaintance with the way,
he was obliged to feel carefully with his foot each step before
advancing.
He gained the first landing. The darkness was so complete, it pressed
with weight upon his eyeballs, and thickened the air in his lungs. He
had already begun to breathe heavily, and he paused for breath. Only
about a sixth of his upward way had been accomplished, and yet he felt
fatigued. The stifling sultry air of the tower made him languid and
drowsy.
The sooner this was done, the better.
He recommenced the ascent.
On reaching the next landing, that of the second-floor room, he paused
again.
His breathing had by this time become more laboured, and he felt as if
his chest would burst. No fresh air had entered that loathsome place for
years. In winter the walls wept, the paper hung off, and fungus covered
the walls and the woodwork.
In summer the walls dried up, and from the dead fungi rose the stifling
vapours exhaled when decay feeds on decay. These odious vapours enriched
the walls with new growing powers, and so the process went on. The tower
rotted inwardly. Damp came first, and later mildew, and then fungus. The
fungus lived its life and finally fell to pieces, yielding inodorous
fibre and mephitic spirit. The spirit fed the later growth of fungus.
Here nitre clung in crystals to the walls, and there were incomplete
stalagmites under the stone window-sills.
Huge spiders wove gigantic nets from balustrade to wall, from roof to
wall, from window-sash to floor. But no flies ever came to these webs,
and the spiders spread needless snares, and lived at ease on lesser
game.
In summer all the dust upon the floor moved continually with worm and
maggot of extraordinary size, and obscene ugliness of form and colour.
Neither beetle nor cockroach, earwig nor cricket, found a home here.
Nothing moved swiftly, not even the spider, for he found food without
pursuit or strife. Here was no contention among individuals. As in all
earliest forms of life, nearly everything was done for the individual by
heat and moisture. The unseemly inside of that tower was fretting and
rotting slowly away, being slowly devoured by the worm and the maggot
and the fungus.
Through the warm vapours of that polluted tower the man staggered
upward. His breathing had now become stertorous, and beat in the hollow
staircase and against the sounding boards furnished by the empty rooms
like the snorting of a hunted monster.
The air grew thicker in his lungs, and his heart tingled and throbbed as
though it would burst. The arteries in his neck appeared at each beat of
his pulse about to jump from their places. His gullet was dry, and the
air rushing through his windpipe seemed burdened with sand that tore the
skin of his parched throat. The arteries in his temple twanged against
the bone with noises that made him giddy. The uproar of strangulation
was in his head. His knees were sinking under him, and he felt he should
faint or fall down in a fit if he did not do something.
He resolved to shift his burden from the right shoulder to the left.
How heavy! Ugh!
Cold already!
Oh, great God! the lips had touched his forehead, and they were cold!
The lips he had a thousand times----
With a howl that made the hollow chambers and the invisible staircase
shake, he clasped his burden to his left shoulder and dashed wildly up
the stairs.
Now he ran against the wall in front, now against the balustrade. He
took a step too many, and plunged headforemost against the wall. He took
a step too few, and fell headlong upon a landing.
What was all that to him now? What was all that to him, who had loved
her once, her whose cold lips--cold of his own chilling--had touched his
forehead as he shifted his murdered darling from one shoulder to
another?
Oh, God! the lips he had lingered on lovingly long ago! The lips he had
sought with all his soul and won to his own exclusive use! How often had
they told his name! How often had they told her love to him, when all
else in the world sank into nothingness compared with the august
privilege of knowing she loved him! How often when she slept had he
heard those lips breathe his name with terms of endearment! And now, oh
God!
On! On! There is a clamour of memories worse than demons at his back.
On! Out of this place! Away from these memories!
The roof at last!
The roof, with cool air and a wide view, and--This!
He placed his burden softly on the roof of the tower; then throwing
himself down at full length, rolled over on his face, and, putting one
forearm under the other, rested his forehead on the upper arm, and,
excepting the heavy heaving of his chest, lay still.
CHAPTER XVIII.
ON THE TOP.
The top of the tower was flat. It was reached through a hooded doorway
resembling a ship's companion. A parapet about two and a half feet high
ran round the tower on all sides, and in the left-hand angle of the
parapet, looking towards the grounds in front of the house, stood the
tall, battered, dilapidated, rusted tank.
This tank had been of substantial make. Four upright bars of iron still
stood showing where the four angles of the elevation of the tank had
been. Binding the top of these four uprights together had been a
substantial rail. The inner side of that rail had disappeared; the three
other sides remained. Half-way down the uprights had been four girders
binding the uprights together. Of these girders three were entire, the
one on the outside having succumbed to violence of time. A few of the
plates clung to the uprights in the upper section of the tank. In the
lower section only one plate was missing, and that on the back of the
tank. The base of the tank was eight feet square, the height of the
uprights ten feet. Once in it had been stored the water-supply. More
than fifty years ago it had been superseded by a tank put up in the main
building. Since then not a dozen times had any one visited the top of
the tower.
That night of the 17th of August was dark; there were neither stars nor
moon. No wind had arisen to disturb the intense calm.
At length Grey rose from the ground somewhat refreshed and quieted.
There was no use in being foolhardy, and although a person standing on
the avenue below could not possibly see a human figure on the top of the
tower, still all means caution could suggest ought to be employed. So he
stepped into the dilapidated tank through the opening, and having,
except on the inner side, a complete bulwark around him five feet high,
there was no chance of any one seeing him. He did not care to face yet
the descent through that stifling tower.
He would wait a while until he should be fully restored.
He had eaten nothing since luncheon, and the physical and mental ordeals
through which he had since passed reduced the activity of his mind, and
made his thoughts move slowly, and dimmed the ideas in his imagination.
Still in a dull way he sought to review his position.
There to the right lay Daneford, his town, the city of which he was
dictator, which would do anything, everything he asked. You could not
see the city from this, but there it reposed under that red-yellow stain
upon the sky.
The people of that town, if they had seen him take that old man's gold,
would not have believed the evidence of their senses. They would have
placed their opinion of him against the evidence of their eyes, and his
reputation would turn the balance as though nothing was in the other
scale. He was sure of that.
To the left was the Island. The old man probably still lived and would
live for some time, but the will was now safe. Maud was still unmarried,
and he--was free! Free in a double sense: free to marry again, and free
from the clutches of the law--so far.
In front of him lay the Manor Park with its stifling groves and alleys,
whose lush, rank vegetation and loathsome reptiles and insects kept
curious boy and prying man at bay.
By his side stood the Manor House, upon which no green thing would grow,
and which had an evil name.
Beneath him was that repulsive tower, up which no one would care to go
except upon dire compulsion.
Behind him----
Yes, behind him lay--It.
The question was, Would his reputation in the town, the fact that by
noon to-morrow everyone in Daneford would believe he had lost his wife
in the _Rodwell_, the unpopular Park, the uncanny house, the foul tower,
the parapet, the remains of this tank (perfect five feet from the roof,
except for one eighteen-inch plate, which, owing to its position at the
back, could not be even missed from any standpoint but the top of the
tower itself), keep It from discovery? be an effectual and life-long
barrier between detection and crime, so that he might marry and live
once more in----? Well, never mind in what. Anyway, might live?
It was a long question. He put it to himself many times, and could
arrive at no answer. His reason answered Yes. His imagination answered
No; and according as his reason or his imagination dominated he hoped or
he despaired.
The hours advanced. It would be well to get this all over and go down.
He had locked the door on the passage, and there was no need for fear or
hurry. But staying here did no good, and he had now sufficiently
recovered to go down.
He stepped out of the tank and approached the burden.
He raised it, and bending low carried it to the tank. There was
difficulty in getting it through the narrow opening, but at last all was
accomplished.
He stepped out of the tank, and stood on the open part of the top of the
tower for a few moments to recover his breath.
"Hah! I am all right now. I shall grope my way down very well; it will
not take half so long to go down as it did to come up."
He placed his hand on the hood of the doorway and stooped to descend; he
paused and drew back, thinking:
"If I have killed her, that is no reason why I should add brutality to
crime. I did not cover her face, and the birds might----"
He crept back to the tank, leaving the thought unfinished.
He entered it and stooped.
All at once something happened in his mind. Just as he stooped to cover
the face of his dead wife, he fell upon his knees beside her, and cried
out:
"Almighty God, I have killed her. Almighty God, be merciful if Thou
wilt, and let me die."
Burying his face in his hands he burst into hysterical sobs that shook
him and would not be uttered without racking pains. They were too big
for his chest, too big for his throat, too big for his mouth. While a
sob was bursting from his labouring chest he felt the weight of ten
thousand atmospheres pressing down his throat. When the sob burst forth,
he shuddered and shivered and winced as if a scourge wielded by a
powerful arm had fallen on his naked shoulders.
The violence of this outburst had one alleviating effect: while it
racked the physical it annihilated the mental man. He was sobbing
because he knew he had most excellent cause for inarticulable sorrow.
But the sorrow itself made no image in his mind. It was with him as with
the player of an instrument, who, coming upon a well-known passage of
great mechanical difficulty, finds when the passage is passed small
memory of the music and strong memory of each flexion of the fingers,
but can, when he needs it, hear all the passage again note for note as
it had flown from beneath his fingers.
The wife of his middle life had been murdered by some one long ago. He
thought nothing of that. But now he was kneeling by the corpse of the
wife of his youth, the bride-sweetheart of his stronger years.
All the trouble, all the cark, all the memory of her faults, of her odd
ways, were gone. He was not the middle-aged husband penitent by the
body of the middle-aged wife he had murdered. He was the young
enthusiastic husband-lover by the side of his dead young wife.
He had not killed the Beatrice he had married long ago. But, O woe, woe,
incommunicable agony, he had slain all the faults of his middle-aged
wife, he had slain all the years of his life during which his
indifference had sprouted and blossomed, and was now by the side of the
woman dead whose existence had been to him the sunshine and the rapture
of his life.
In a moment of madness he had sought to kill a faulty wife, but by
terrible decrees of Heaven he had killed, instead, all the faults of his
faulty wife and the sweetheart of his youth. Almighty Maker, did his
crime deserve this!
Gradually the physical agony left him, only to be followed by the mental
anguish.
"Bee," he moaned, "Bee, won't you get up and walk with me? We shall not
go far, for it is late. I want to tell you what we shall do with the
back drawing-room in the summer. Don't you remember how I told you once,
love, and you were pleased and kissed me, Bee? It is about building the
little conservatory for you. You will get up and walk with me a little
way. Do, Bee. Let me lift you up."
He stretched out his hand and caught something.
"Cold!
"Cold!"
Then he shuddered and drew back. A third and final change came with the
touch of that dead woman's hand. All illusion left him, and, covering
the face of the dead, he crawled out of the tank--the murderer of his
wife.
Still overhead hung the black sky, still abroad brooded the unbroken
stillness.
He looked deliberately around him. What had been done could not be
undone, and he had now only to make the best of the situation. Already
he felt one good result from his greater crime; it had dwarfed the other
to insignificant proportions. The theft now seemed a trifle.
But what had happened to Daneford and the country round, and the grounds
about his house, and the tower upon which he stood? Some strange change
had come over the relations between him and them. What was it? Daneford,
and the country round, and the ground at his feet had receded, gone back
from him. He was farther from them than he had been that day. What a
strange sensation!
The sensation was very peculiar. He had never felt anything like it
before. What had that morning seemed most important to him had now sunk
into insignificance. Nothing was of consequence--save One; namely, the
chance of a stranger coming to the top of that tower while It remained
there.
The feeling was new to Grey, for he was new to the situation he had that
night created. The solitude of a vast desert of sand under the pale
stars, the solitude of the topmost frozen peaks of the Himalaya, the
solitude of an ice-locked Arctic sea, the solitude for a hunted man of
an unknown city, is profound and awful; but all combined and intensified
a hundred-fold are nothing compared with the appalling solitude upon
which man enters when over one shoulder, he knows not which, peers for
ever the face of a murdered victim.
That face had not yet come to Grey, but as he descended the muffled
stairs of the Tower of Silence he felt her cold lips touch his forehead
once again; and once again he plunged forward on his way, caring little
for life.
PART II. THE TOWERS OF SILENCE.
CHAPTER I.
A STRANGER AT THE CASTLE.
"Maud, darling," said Mrs. Grant, "a gentleman dressed in black, who
will not give his name, and says he wants to see you most particularly,
has arrived. What message do you wish to send him? Will you see him?"
"Oh, Mrs. Grant, I can't see any one. How can any one be so unreasonable
as to think I can see him to-day! Such a day for a stranger to call!"
Both ladies were in the deepest new mourning.
"Mr. Grey has also come. He sends word that he could not think of
intruding upon you, but that if you wish to see him he is at your
service."
"Oh, no, Mrs. Grant! Dear Mrs. Grant, do save me! Tell them all that I
am too wretched to see any one. Thank them all for me, dear Mrs. Grant,
and save me from them. Pray, save me from them!" The girl threw her arm
round the widow and sobbed helplessly.
"No, no, my child, they shall not come near you. I only brought you the
messages. I do not ask you to see any one. You shall, my darling Maud,
do just as you please. A number of other people have come too. Many of
Sir Alexander's old friends. But you hardly know these. My only thought
was, might you wish to see Mr. Grey, who is doing everything; and I
wondered if you might not wish to say something to him. I wondered if
you might not like to tell him some last wish, for they will start
presently--in less than an hour."
The girl made a strong effort, and succeeded in calming herself.
"Dear Mrs. Grant, try to forgive me. I am too selfish. But I am
distracted. I never knew till now how fond I was of--of my father, and
it would be rude and ungrateful in me not to see Mr. Grey after all his
care and trouble. What should we have done without him? Not a soul
belonging to us near us. Dear Mrs. Grant, will you go to him and
say--don't send a servant, he deserves all the courtesy we can show
him--say to him I would go to him myself, but the house and place is
so--so crowded, and I am not very--strong. Say I should like to see him,
if only for a moment, to thank him. Go, please go. I would not for the
world have him think that I did not feel gratitude for all his
kindness."
This was on Wednesday, 31st of October, 1866, ten weeks after the
blowing up of the steamship _Rodwell_, on her way from Daneford to
Seacliff, and a few days more than eight weeks after the visit of Joe
Farleg to the banker Grey at the banker's residence, the Manor,
Daneford.
On the preceding Saturday--that is to say, October the 27th--Sir
Alexander Midharst had passed quietly away. The doctors had foretold
correctly; and from the 17th of August to the 27th of October Sir
Alexander Midharst had never had a lucid moment.
While the baronet lay insensible Grey was, as he had foretold, much at
the Castle, but in that time nothing of importance arose. Grey had
gradually fallen into the position to be occupied by him of right when
the old man died, and was consulted on all matters of moment connected
with the estate and the Island. In fact, after the first few weeks of
Sir Midharst's complete unconsciousness, the direction of affairs fell
almost wholly into his hands. He originated all matters of consequence,
and, having asked and obtained Miss Midharst's approval, saw them
carried out.
This bright, crisp, last day of October was the day of the funeral. For
this ceremony Grey had made the arrangements. Only personal friends of
the late baronet and twenty of the principal tenants were to go to the
Island for the purpose of carrying the body from the Castle to the slip,
and accompanying it across the water. The remainder of the tenants, and
all others desirous of attending the funeral, were to assemble on the
mainland and await the body. When the coffin had been landed, the
procession would proceed in a certain determined order; and as the
deceased had no near relative, and no relative near or distant was to be
present, Mr. Grey, in virtue of his long connection with Sir Alexander,
and of the relations in which the will would place him to Sir
Alexander's child, was to occupy the place of chief mourner.
Mrs. Grant found the banker in the library, and gave him, in a somewhat
modified form, the message Miss Midharst had sent to him. Without saying
a word he left the room, following the lady.
"Where is the strange gentleman who wanted to see Miss Midharst, and
would not give his name?" asked the lady, as they passed down the
corridor leading to the staircase. "I did not see him in the library.
Oh, here he is."
They encountered a tall, slight, sad-faced man clad in black.
Mrs. Grant stopped, Mr. Grey fell back a few paces, and the widow said:
"I am sorry Miss Midharst is so much distressed just now that she does
not feel equal to seeing you. You will of course understand that the
circumstances are very trying upon her."
The stranger bowed, and answered in a low, quiet, full voice:
"I am deeply grieved by Miss Midharst's trouble. I would not think of
seeking to intrude upon her but for good reasons. There is no absolute
necessity for my seeing her at this moment. Later I hope to have an
opportunity of expressing personally to her my sympathy, and of saying
what further I wish to say. I am much indebted to you for the effort you
have made in my behalf."
He indicated that he had nothing to add, and by keeping bowed showed
that he did not desire to detain Mrs. Grant longer.
When she and the banker were out of the stranger's hearing, she said to
Grey:
"Do you know who that gentleman is? I have never seen his face before."
"I do not know who he is. Nor have I seen his face before."
It was well for Grey they were in the dimly-lighted corridor, because he
blenched and staggered for a moment.
"Who can this man be?" he thought, "who has such urgent business with
Miss Midharst? Can this swarthy solemn man be here on _official_
business connected with--with Miss Midharst's money? He looks a
gentleman, but talks too like a book for one. A detective? That would be
a nice finale to this ceremony.
"Dear Miss Midharst, here is Mr. Grey come to see you," said Mrs. Grant,
opening the door of the little drawing-room and ushering in the banker.
Grey entered with a calm, sympathetic face.
Maud had collected herself, and was now much less distressed than when
Mrs. Grant left her a little while before. She held out her hand, and
said, in a tone, under the transient sadness of which could be felt the
steady current of grave gratitude,
"Mr. Grey, you will add to all your great kindness if you consider my
inexperience and how little I know the way to tell you my thanks. I feel
ashamed I am not able to express them; but I know you will understand my
gratitude even though I cannot put it in words. Mrs. Grant and you are
the only friends I have in the world; and if it were not for you two, I
think I should die."
He took her hand respectfully, and retained it a moment.
"Mrs. Midharst, I beg of you not to trouble yourself about such matters.
I know Mrs. Grant is invaluable; but as to me--you are aware what I
promised Sir Alexander about you, and if you trouble yourself to thank
me I shall begin to suspect you imagine I find it irksome to do towards
the living what I have sworn to the dead."
"Oh, no, no, no! Forgive me! I only meant to tell you I am very
grateful, and don't know how to say it. Indeed, you must think nothing
of the kind, Mr. Grey. Tell me you forgive me!" She stretched impetuous
appealing hands to him, and looked out of soft tear-dimmed eyes into
his.
For a moment his admiration of her delicate beauty overcame everything
else, and he remained gazing silently into that sweet young pleading
face--that face pleading to him to believe she felt grateful to him.
Then he came back to the circumstances and the time, and said,
"There is only one thing I shall never forgive you."
"And what is that?"
"If you discover any way in which I can be of use to you and fail to let
me know."
"You are too good, Mr. Grey. How shall I ever thank you?"
He waved her speech aside with a deprecating gesture and a faint smile.
"I have come merely to know if I can be of use to you? Is there anything
you wish done you did not mention to me yesterday?"
"No, nothing. Only I cannot meet any one. If I must go to the library by
and by, that will be more than I should like to see of people. Some
gentleman, who did not give his name, and whom I do not know and can't
see, has asked me to meet him. If you speak to him you will explain and
apologize for me."
"I will, most assuredly," and, bowing once more, the banker retired.
"Who can this man be who has come to the Island uninvited, and seeks to
thrust himself upon Miss Midharst such a day as this? Can it be anything
has been discovered? I have no assurance but Farleg's word that he did
not tell some one besides his wife what he saw in the Tower-room that
evening after the blowing up of the _Rodwell_. But then, if he did tell,
it is not to this place the owner of such news would come, but to me at
the Bank or at the Manor. If this man is here for any unpleasant
purpose, it must be in connection with the Consols. There is nothing
else to cause the dangerous presence of such a man. If he is here about
the Consols, what does he know?"
By this time Grey had reached the library-door, and stood a moment with
his hand on the handle. Suddenly his face cleared, as, with a sigh of
relief, he thought,
"What right have I to assume he is here for an unpleasant or disastrous
purpose? His gloomy face has put a gloomy notion into my head, that is
all."
He entered the room, and found the tall, sad-faced stranger alone; the
others, those who had been invited, were now assembling in the great
hall, where the body of the baronet lay beneath a black velvet pall,
under the eyes of his painted ancestors, who stared at the crowd from
their gilded frames on the walls.
Mr. Grey approached the stranger with a bland face and conciliatory
carriage, saying, "You find us, sir, in very great confusion to-day, and
I must apologize to you for any want of courtesy you may have felt. I am
sure, however, you will make allowances for us under the melancholy
circumstances."
The stranger bowed gravely, and said, in a deep, full voice, "I have
experienced no want of courtesy; on the contrary, every one I met has
been most polite."
"I feel," Grey went on, with a graceful and urbane gesture of the
hand,--"I feel myself more or less responsible for the good treatment of
all guests here to-day. My name is Grey. I have just come from Miss
Midharst. I understand you wish to see her, and, I am sorry to say, she
does not feel herself equal to an interview; but if you will favour me
with any communication for her, or let me know the nature of your
business, I shall be happy to do anything I can for you." Grey spoke in
a kind and winning manner. "There is no knowing what facts he may be in
possession of, and nothing can be lost by politeness to him," was
Grey's reflection.
"I am very much obliged to you," answered the stranger, with a slight
inclination of the head; "but I shall reserve what I have to say until
I have an opportunity of saying it later in the day to Miss Midharst
herself."
There was in the manner of the speaker a profound and imperturbable
self-possession most disquieting to the banker. The latter rejoined,
"But, indeed, I greatly fear she will not be able to see you any time
to-day."
The stranger smiled faintly, waved the point aside with an air of
perfect assurance, and asked, "Will you be good enough to tell me when
and where the will is to be read? I am told it is to be read."
"May I know why you ask?"
"Because I intend to be present?"
"In what capacity?"
"I shall explain then."
"The will is to be read in this room to-day, when we have returned from
the funeral. Such was Sir Alexander's wish."
"Thank you. I shall be here. When does the funeral start?"
Grey looked at his watch. "In quarter of an hour."
"I will not detain you further, Mr. Grey. I know your time is fully
occupied to-day;" and with a bow which indicated the interview was over,
he withdrew towards the window.
Grey was completely confounded between dread of the knowledge this man
might possess and the disagreeable sensation awakened by the sense, for
the first time experienced in his life, of having met a man, foot to
foot and eye to eye, who was a more able fencer than himself.
As Grey took his way from the library to the hall, he felt far from
easy. He did not want men near him, and he did not want strange men; he
did not want strange men more than a match for him in fence; and, above
all, he did not want this man, who was not only a stranger and a better
master of the foils, but who, moreover, had matter of importance to
communicate to Miss Midharst, and displayed a plain conviction he should
that day have an opportunity of speaking to Miss Midharst,
notwithstanding her denials.
And now he had declared his intention of being present at this
old-fashioned reading of the will. What could that mean? Who could he be
that thus insisted upon thrusting himself upon this house of mourning?
Then a terrible fear rushed in upon Walter Grey's mind. Could it be
that at the last moment the old man had altered his will and appointed
a second trustee, one to act in conjunction with him, Grey, and that
this cool self-possessed man was that second trustee? If it were so, the
alteration in the will was Grey's death-warrant.
But much remained to be done in little time; so Grey hastened to the
hall, and was soon lost in the business of getting the funeral under
way.
As the funeral was about starting from the Castle to the Ferry, and just
as Mr. Grey had placed himself immediately behind the coffin, the
stranger stepped up to the banker's left side, and saying, "Pardon me,"
slipped his right arm under the left arm of the other.
Grey looked hastily over his shoulder.
"You will let me walk with you. I assure you I have ample authority."
Grey staggered, so that the other had to steady him. "Authority! ample
authority!" thought the banker in dismay. "What can the nature of that
authority be? Has he a warrant in his pocket to arrest me for the murder
of my wife? Does he defer putting it into execution just now, so as to
avoid making a scene; and has he thus taken my arm to prevent the chance
of my escape?"
Or had he come down with a warrant in his pocket to arrest him the
moment the will had been read? It might be that someone at the Bank had
discovered the Midharst Consols had been sold; and the only evidence
wanting in the chain would be supplied by a reference in the will to the
stock, thereby showing that Sir Alexander, at the time of his death, was
under the impression the stock was still his, thus proving it had not
been disposed of with the baronet's knowledge.
Grey felt himself powerless to resist. He thought it best to raise no
question, make no demur. The cold sweat broke out on his forehead; he
knew his voice would tremble if he essayed to speak. He bowed his head
in token of acquiescence, and the funeral proceeded to the Ferry.
"Can it be," thought Grey in an agony of fear--"Can it be, while I am
walking after the body of him whom I have robbed, they are gazing on the
body of her I have murdered."
They reached the boats, and were ferried across to the main land.
They re-formed, and were joined by a vast gathering of tenants,
labourers, and others. The procession set off once more.
During all this time the stranger remained silent. He did not address a
single word to Grey, nor Grey to him.
During all this time Grey was suffering the agony of the rack. He felt
confident he was about to be attacked, but he did not know whence the
attack would come, or what the nature of it might be. A successful
attack of any kind upon him could have but one result--Destruction.
On the way back to the Castle the stranger seemed plunged in still
deeper reverie; and beyond a few of the most ordinary common-places, not
a word passed between Grey and him.
All throughout the stranger kept on the left-hand side of Grey.
All throughout Grey saw at his left shoulder the Nemesis of his fate,
and over the right the pallid face of his murdered victim.
CHAPTER II.
THE READING OF THE WILL.
"Now, Maud darling, do try to bear up. Drink this wine to give you
strength. Come, they are all waiting for us in the library. Drink this
for my sake. Well, half; drink half of it for my sake, my dear, dear
child. It was your father's direct order the will should be read and you
should be present. Mr. Shaw tells me this is not usual, but must be
done."
"I cannot drink the wine. It will not take long, I suppose?"
"Mr. Grey says that it is not likely to take more than quarter of an
hour. The will is very short."
"Is Mr. Grey in the library?"
"Yes, dear."
"Please, put away that wine; I am ready to go now. You will come with
me?"
"Of course, Maud. My place is at your side, poor darling."
Mrs. Grant's words touched some chord in the girl's heart, and she burst
into tears, crying:
"Oh, Mrs. Grant, I never felt lonely before. I don't know what I should
do, only for you and Mr. Grey."
"Thank you, love. You know I'll stay with you all my life. I have no one
of my own to live for; they are all gone. I have no father or mother, or
brother or sister, or husband or child. I am as lonely as you, Maud;
only you have lost a father and this home, and by and by you will marry
and have a new home, a husband, and little ones at your knee; but for
me the world is over. Every day I live keeps me further off from my
husband; every day you live brings you nearer to yours. Ah, Maud, women
have but poor lives of it, and the poor childless widow is worse than
the dead." She burst into tears.
"Mrs. Grant," cried the girl, throwing her arms round the woman, "pray,
pray forgive me! I have been cruelly selfish, thinking only of my own
sorrow and never of yours. Dear Mrs. Grant, do forgive my selfishness!"
The widow wound her arms around the weeping girl, and crushing back her
own grief, said passionately:
"Selfish, Maud! you selfish! Why, my darling never thinks there is such
a person as herself until she finds she can be of use to some one. No,
love, not selfish. There, love, love, don't cry; we shall be the best of
friends all our lives. We are both friendless and alone; that is all
the more reason why we should be good friends all our lives, Maud
darling. I'll never leave you if you will let me stay. There now,
there's a dear child; dry your eyes and drink the wine, and let us go
and get this matter over."
"Put away the wine; I am ready. We shall never, never part, Mrs. Grant
dear."
The two left the little drawing-room. Mrs. Grant put one arm
affectionately round the girl's waist; Maud held one of Mrs. Grant's
hands in hers.
As they drew near the library-door they found Mr. Grey awaiting them in
the passage. Placing himself on her right side, he offered her his arm.
Mrs. Grant dropped to the rear, and, preserving this order, they reached
the library-door.
Here Mr. Grey paused for a moment, and said to his partner in a low
voice:
"The strange gentleman who would not give his name is within. He says he
has authority to be present. He may be a solicitor on behalf of some of
the smaller legatees. I do not wish to be rude to him or to say he must
give me his authority. He says he will speak to you some time to-day. Do
you wish me to tell him to go, or do you prefer that I should merely
request him to give up all hope of an interview to-day?"
"I cannot, I cannot see him," cried the girl, clinging to his arm, and
looking up appealingly into his face.
"Protect her," he thought, "against this unknown man, who seems to
threaten my safety and her peace, of course I shall. This is the first
time she has sought my protection, and by a fortunate chance it is
against one whom I have reason to dislike. How lucky! How lucky I have
been in everything connected with this Castle--about the will, about
the old man's illness, about the confidence! All has turned out exactly
as I wished. Her arm is now in mine. She is calling out to me for help.
I feel already as if I had won her; as if she leaned upon my arm as
my--wife."
Then he whispered to her,
"Rest assured this man shall not intrude upon you. If he keeps quiet he
may remain until the will has been read. Then I shall be officially
installed as your guardian, Miss Midharst, and I shall know how to act
towards him if he dares to interfere with you."
Drawing himself up to his full height, he walked slowly into the library
with Miss Midharst on his arm, and Mrs. Grant following a few paces
behind. His face was calm and firm; in his tread and gait there was
conscious power. He felt he could have faced any danger then. She, upon
whose good regard towards him and final acceptance of him as a suitor
all depended, hung on his arm and clung to him for protection. The
chance that the Tower of Silence would in his lifetime give up its
secret was one to a million. He had a single reasonable cause of dread,
and that was lest she, Maud Midharst, might turn away from him--might
finally reject him. With her arm on his, and the memory of her confiding
glance, he felt like a great captain, who, having in secret prepared a
crushing attack, throws up his head and pants at hearing the great bay
of the signal-gun which is to shake out the standards and let loose the
thunders of prodigious war.
No more than a dozen people were present. The servants stood at the end
of the room remotest from the one large window.
With its back to the window, at the head of the table, was the baronet's
great straight-backed oak chair, empty. Mr. Grey led Miss Midharst to a
chair on the right of this. As she moved up through the room, half a
dozen gentlemen, seated round the room and at the table, rose and bowed.
The stranger, whose chair was at the foot of the table, rose with the
rest, and bowed more profoundly than any of the others.
As soon as Miss Midharst was seated, Mr. Grey crossed at the back of the
vacant chair and sat down upon the left of it. Upon Grey's left sat Mr.
Shaw, the deceased baronet's lawyer. On Miss Midharst's right sat Mrs.
Grant. Dr. Hardy, who had attended the funeral, was present by
particular request. The old lawyer, whose hands were tremulous, closed
his eyes up firmly first, pulled his white whiskers, shook his white
hair, and, looking at Grey, demanded in a feeble shaky voice:
"Is everything now ready for reading the last will and testament of Sir
Alexander Midharst, deceased, as by him desired?"
For a moment there was no reply. Then Grey cleared his throat and said,
in soft gentle accents:
"As the heir to the baronetcy and property did not reply to my
notification of the late Sir Alexander's death, and therefore was not to
be here at the reading of the will, or represented by a solicitor, he
being, I understand, in Egypt, I have taken it upon myself to nominate a
solicitor to be present on his part. I have therefore asked Mr.
Barrington to be good enough to favour us with his presence, and watch
the interests of the heir."
An excessively fat and prosperous-looking young man stood up and bowed
deeply all round, saying, in a rich oily voice:
"I am proud to represent the heir to this noble house, this lordly
property, and the glorious family of Midharst."
Having bowed all round again, he sat down.
Then Mr. Shaw opened the will, and began reading it in a weak and
quavering voice.
The will was brief, and the language straightforward and plain.
The baronet left small legacies to his servants, and expressed a desire
that Michael might remain in his daughter's service, until he chose to
retire, upon which he was to receive an annuity of forty pounds a year,
in addition to the five hundred pounds, payable within one year from the
opening of the will.
The few other servants kept by the baronet were left legacies on this
scale in proportion to their positions.
To Mrs. Grant he left a thousand pounds, coupled with a request that she
would continue to stay with Miss Midharst as her companion as long as
Miss Midharst might wish.
Upon hearing this Mrs. Grant wept, and put her hand on the girl's hand
and caught the hand, and looked at the girl with eyes that swore,
"Never, never, will I leave you while I live."
To Dr. Hardy he left two hundred and fifty, and to each of the other two
physicians who had attended, one hundred pounds over and above their
proper fees.
To Mr. Shaw he bequeathed five hundred pounds, over and above his proper
fees, and expressed a hope that any legal business which had to be done
in connection with his will, his daughter, or the money, would be
intrusted to Mr. Shaw.
To Henry Walter Grey he bequeathed the gross sum of five thousand
pounds, over and above all his just claims against the estate. Two
thousand five hundred of this was to be paid within twelve months of the
opening of the will, and the other two thousand five hundred upon the
expiration of Grey's guardianship. This was bequeathed in grateful
remembrance of many years of careful guardianship of the testator's
fortune in the past, and in consideration of the duties and obligations
imposed upon the legatee by the will.
The next clause announced that he left and devised and bequeathed to his
daughter Maud, absolutely and for ever, the residue of his property of
all kinds, sorts, and descriptions whatever, subject to the bequests
above mentioned; and the payment of all just debts and demands for which
the testator was liable at the time of his death; and the cost of his
funeral, which latter he desired to be simple and unostentatious, and
yet not unbecoming the house of which he was head. The residue was not
to be paid over to the legatee, but held in trust for her until she had
attained the full age of twenty-two. It was the testator's wish that his
daughter should not marry until she had attained the full age of
twenty-two: but married or single, to her the residue was to go when she
attained her twenty-second year. With regard to her marriage, the
testator would make no restrictions. He felt sure his daughter would
make no unworthy selection, and she would remember that although the
title and estates were passing away to a younger branch of the family,
she was the only representative of the elder branch now surviving. The
testator desired that, should she not marry before her twenty-second
year, she should lean upon her guardian for advice at any time later
than her twenty-second year. The testator desired it to be clearly
understood that the guardian's power extended absolutely only to the
property of the residuary legatee; and that she, being at the time of
executing this will and testament, full twenty years of age, in all her
personal movements, and in the marrying or not marrying, or in the
choice of a husband, was free from the greetings of these presents. That
is to say, the guardianship of the residuary legatee, as constituted
herein, was that of administering her fortune, and of looking after her
welfare, without, except in the matter of the property, power of
constraint or interference in matters personal to the residuary legatee.
The testator, however, reposed the most unlimited confidence in the
guardian, and advised the residuary legatee to be largely guided in
matters personal by the advice of the aforesaid guardian.
Following this paragraph came one reciting the property of the deceased
man, the most important passage of it being this:
"And such Consols as may be found registered in my name in the books of
the Bank of England, an account of which, and the Consols themselves,
are in the custody of Henry Walter Grey aforenamed, to the value at this
date of five hundred and fifty thousand pounds sterling."
Then came the final paragraph:
"And I hereby elect and appoint Henry Walter Grey, of the Manor House,
Daneford, banker (hereinbefore described as Henry Walter Grey), executor
and trustee to this my last will and testament, to hold authority, and
to act in all matters connected with my property at his own sufficient
discretion, with the limitations herein aforesaid. And I hereby elect
and appoint the same Henry Walter Grey, of the Manor House, Daneford,
banker, to be and to act as the sole guardian, with the limitations
hereinbefore set forth, of my only daughter Maud, hereinbefore described
as of the Castle of Warfinger, the residuary legatee in this my last
will and testament. And to the aforesaid Henry Walter Grey I leave the
burden of the safe guarding of my daughter's fortune, and the care of
her orphanhood. I leave to his charge the savings of half a lifetime,
and the last of a noble house. I pray that, as Henry Walter Grey may do
by them and me, the God Almighty may do by him. Amen."
The old solicitor then read out the formal ending of the will, looked
up, shut his eyes, and said:
"That is the only will which has been found of the late Sir Alexander
Midharst, Baronet, of Warfinger Castle."
He opened his eyes for a moment, and then shut them again, adding while
they were closed:
"The will is in my handwriting. I drew it at the late baronet's
dictation, using almost his identical words."
He turned over the document, and scrutinised it closely.
"There is no codicil or addition of any kind," bowing to Miss Midharst.
There was a moment's silence, during which every one present looked
down.
It was only by the most powerful effort Grey could prevent himself from
shouting aloud under the intolerable relief. Although he had expected
the will to be in some such terms, he could scarcely believe that, after
his days and nights of agonised dread, all had come right. He felt like
one who, after long durance in a dim and choking cave, is lifted into a
sunlit flowery valley, over which larks are singing, and through which
flows a bright silver stream, along which he may wander with
unquestioned feet.
Now all was secure. This girl and her whole fortune had, within the past
half-hour, been signed and sealed into his possession. True, he had no
control over her personal actions. But he soon should have control, the
most potent of all--the control of husband over wife. According to the
will, she might marry as soon as she pleased. There was nothing now in
the world to prevent her being his wife in twelve months.
Nothing to interfere with his marrying this girl and blotting out the
trace of his crime. Already she liked him. As they came into that room
to hear that will read, by which he became sole executor, trustee, and
guardian, did she not lean on him? Already she liked him. Soon she
should love him. Soon she should marry him.
Considering her position, the world would approve of her marrying; for
she had no one to protect her but a guardian, no kin near enough to take
any interest in her. In her solitary situation, every one would approve
of her marrying soon.
There was a rustle, and all the men rose to their feet upon perceiving
Miss Midharst in the act of rising.
Grey looked across for a moment at her, as she stood upon the right hand
of the vacant chair.
"She mine!" he thought. "She will be my salvation! There is nothing now
to keep her from me! Nothing between her and me!"
"Miss Midharst," said a deep grave voice at the other side of the table,
"I fear there is no one here who can introduce me to you, so that I
shall be obliged to introduce myself."
Grey started, and looking across the table, saw the stranger advancing
towards Miss Midharst.
The banker threw one glance around, by which he plainly told the other
men that he intended resenting so unwarrantable an intrusion on the
grief and privacy of the occasion. All his fears had vanished into air.
The only feeling he now experienced was that a pushing stranger was
seeking to occupy the unwilling attention of his legally constituted
ward, and the woman who was to be his wife.
Grey crossed the room rapidly at the back of the vacant chair, and
placing himself beside Miss Midharst, bowed and offered her his arm.
She took it, and for a second no one moved.
Maud looked up and saw in front of her a tall, broad, dark-visaged,
black-haired, sad-featured man, with dark and dreamy eyes.
She shrank back slightly, and clung to the stalwart arm on which her
small white hand lay.
"I beg your pardon, sir," said the banker blandly, "I shall be happy to
place myself at your disposal when I have led Miss Midharst to her
private apartment. May I request you to take a seat until then?"
"Thank you, sir. Your name is Grey."
"It is. And as you have heard the will, you know I am in a position to
tell you that anything you have to say to Miss Midharst may, under
present circumstances, be more reasonably said to me." The banker
advanced his foot, and Maud, still clinging to him, moved to go.
Again the stranger bowed low to Miss Midharst. It was impossible,
without downright rudeness, for Grey to move until the stranger should
have recovered an erect attitude, as evidently there was something else
he wished to say.
"Miss Midharst," at last the stranger said, "I am William Midharst, your
cousin;" he held out his hand to her.
"The new baronet!" murmured the servants, in whispers. All the men
looked keenly at the tall dark young man, who with a grave smile stood
holding out a brown right hand to the fair, shrinking, timid, pale,
beautiful girl.
She took her white trembling hand off the banker's arm and held it out
to him. She was cold and trembling, and she felt as though she should
faint.
He took the fingers of her white hand respectfully between the fingers
and thumb of his own brown hand, and bending low with the homage of a
chivalric age, and the simple sincerity of our own, kissed the white
hand he held. Then, inclining his head towards the banker, he said
gravely:
"Will you, sir, upon this occasion of my first meeting my cousin, forego
your privilege, and allow me to take her to her apartment?"
The mind of the banker was dazed and paralysed, and in silence he
signified his assent.
Placing the hand on the black sleeve of his left arm, Sir William
Midharst, of Warfinger Castle, led his orphan cousin Maud down the room,
and through the doorway.
As they disappeared Grey's face shrivelled up. Fortunately for him all
present were too much occupied with the new baronet's arrival to notice
him.
The whole fabric of Grey's rearing seemed to topple over and tumble
into dust as these two figures went through the doorway. He was
guardian it was true, but his power did not extend to his forbidding her
to take that arm, to go through that doorway with that young man, to
walk up to the altar-rails with any man whatever.
"Idiot that you have been, Alexander Midharst; you deserve nothing
better than that your daughter's fortune should be lost!"
Then he stood a long time immovable.
At last the thought of the stake he had put down in this game rushed in
upon his mind, and he was once more on the top of that Tower of Silence,
under the dull sky with the Dead.
He now stood in the awful solitude of blood. He strode on through a
realm of endless silence and limitless sand. For him there could never
be any change here; always that maddening silence--always those
unconquerable leagues of sand. Never any variety except----
He suddenly started and shouted. There had been a change in the
monotony; for over his shoulder--not the one at which Maud had
stood--over the right shoulder suddenly peered the face of his murdered
victim.
With a pang of apprehension he became alive to his situation, and looked
suddenly round. He was alone. All the others had left, and it was
growing dark.
CHAPTER III.
"COUSIN MAUD----" "NO; MAUD."
When the young baronet reached the corridor he said in a grave sedate
voice:
"I knew your name was Maud; and I knew your poor father did not like me.
I am sure you will believe me when I tell you I never saw him in all my
life, never saw you until to-day, and never gave him any reason I know
of to dislike me. It so happened I was heir to the property; it so
happened I was poor. I could not help the former; I tried to do all I
could to help the latter, and took an appointment in Egypt. It was such
an appointment as a gentleman might take. You, Cousin Maud, had no
feeling against me because I happened to be next to the title and
estates?"
"Oh, no," answered the girl quickly, in a tremulous half-frightened
voice, without looking up.
"And now that I have come to see you, cousin, you have no feeling
against me?"
"Not the least. Why should I?"
"When you did not know who I was, you refused to see me to-day. Now that
you know I am your cousin, the nearest relative you have on earth, will
you do me a favour?"
"If I can, I will."
"Walk with me a while in the grounds; I have much to say to you. The air
will do you good, and what I have to say will keep your mind off the sad
business of to-day. Grant me this favour, if you do not feel too weak."
"I do not feel weak; only--only confused and frightened. I will go with
you."
They had both halted at the foot of the grand staircase. She looked up
into his face as she spoke. She had never seen one of her house but her
father before. It was strange to think this man should be so unlike her
father and yet related to her. He spoke as if he meant to be kind, and
in any case she ought not to refuse so slight a favour to the only
member of her father's family now living. As a child she had stood in
mortal terror of this cousin--this cousin whom her father never lost an
opportunity of abusing. But when she had grown older, she knew the young
man did not, because he happened to be heir-presumptive to the property
and title, deserve on that account solely to be vilified. Her father had
always led her to think that towards her this cousin William would
behave brutally, simply because her father had racked the property to
the very uttermost penny. It had seemed natural that the next tenant for
life would regard the acts of her father with strong resentment; and,
taking into account the object for which the property had been swept
clean, she felt William Midharst, when he came to be Sir William, could
not look on her in a friendly spirit. But now that the worst had
arrived, and he as a factor in the worst, it did not seem that he should
have received such elaborate consideration, or have been the cause of
any great dread. He was dark and gloomy-looking, but then he had been
very polite.
While these thoughts were jostling one another in Maud Midharst's head,
she was in her own room, preparing for that stroll with her cousin. The
young baronet was walking softly up and down the great hall, and Wat
Grey was standing transfixed by a new terror in the library the two
young people had just left.
Presently Maud came down the great staircase. The young baronet looked
up and saw a sweet, white, childish face, full of sadness in the midst
of crape, and beneath that face a lithe graceful figure, moving as
though the ground had nothing to do with her movements, her step was so
free and light.
"My cousin Maud," thought the young man, "is too fair for health. Little
cousin Maud--lonely little orphan cousin Maud--looks as if she and her
father will not be long separated. I hope she is sufficiently clad. But
then I must not forget I am used to swarthy faces and warmer skies. My
little cousin Maud may live to wear a brighter look and gayer colours."
She was at his side now. All the other women in the world were nothing
to him. She was his cousin. Back to the first litigious Sir John they
both traced their lines--the great family of Midharst, which had come
down through the noble house of Stancroft. His cousin Maud. They two
were the last of the great house, they two. She, the pale, fragile,
griefful lady, with the wonderful soft eyes, and shy half-frightened air
and the pure young beauty. Good Heavens, how she sanctified the place!
How she illumined the past! All the ladies of the Midharst house but her
were dead: their portraits hung here and there upon the walls of this
old historic castle. There was on the walls no lady of the Midharst line
as beautiful as Maud. They were all dead and passed away. Around the
walls hung the extinguished lamps of beauty in the Midharst house; here
by his side stood the lamp clear and burning bright, the most beautiful
and the only burning lamp in the house of Midharst--his beautiful
cousin Maud.
"Cousin Maud," he said.
She looked up into his swarthy face, into his deep dark eyes, to show
that she was attending, but did not speak.
"When I touched your hand first in all my life, a little while ago,
there were many present, and you gave me your hand; it may have been
merely to show those around us that you recognised me as the head of the
family--the family of two. Will you now give me your hand as a private
sign that you know of no reason why we should not be friends?"
She held out her hand to him. Not only was he not to be unfriendly, but
he was going to be very kind, she thought.
He took her hand, and bending over it kissed the glove, and once more
placing that hand on his arm, led her into the open air of the
courtyard, under the great brown archway, and out into the shrubless
bare grounds.
When they had got a little distance from the castle he broke silence:
"That tall good-looking gentleman, your guardian, Mr. Grey, was very
nearly right in saying I was in Egypt; I have just returned. I have been
only a few days in England. Upon my arrival I heard what had taken
place, and came on as soon as possible. I got to Daneford last night,
and put up at the Warfinger Hotel. It was then too late to call upon
you, Cousin Maud. I did not send up my name to-day, because I feared, if
you knew my name, you might, out of respect to the old feeling, refuse
to see me."
He paused a moment as if to arrange his thoughts.
She, without raising her eyes from the ground, murmured,
"You were very kind."
She did not in saying this mean he had displayed kindness in his past
action, but that he was displaying kindness to her now.
He understood her, and went on:
"I shall have to go back to Egypt immediately, and I cannot possibly
return to England for some months. I shall be here again as soon as I
can. Before I go away I want to establish a great friendship with you. I
want you to make up your mind to disregard anything you have ever heard
to my disadvantage, and look upon me as the head of the family of two,
and your best and truest friend. I want you to promise me that at once,
to-day--before I leave you--now."
His manner was very fervid and intense as he came towards the end. At
the word "now" he ceased to walk.
She looked up. What a change had taken place in that placid, grave, sad
face of a few moments before! The dark eyes were full of fire, the
delicate nostrils moved, and the swarthy cheek was flushed. He rose up
over her, tall and broad and fierce and strong. She trembled, but could
not take her eyes from his. She had never met any man like this before.
He fixed her attention upon him and upon his words beyond the power of
her control. She was frightened and surprised.
"What am I to do?" she asked fearfully.
"You are always to look on your cousin William Midharst as your best
friend. Will you promise me that here and now?"
"Yes."
"You promise."
"I promise."
"Very well, that is settled," he said in a quick way. "Let us move on.
Now I have other things to say to you of as great importance. You must
listen to me very patiently. When you do not understand what I say, you
are to stop me and ask me to explain. Won't you?"
"Yes," very timidly.
"Now, from the little I have seen of your guardian, I like him very
well, and I have no doubt no wiser selection could have been made. Those
people I met in Daneford had something to say about events here, and
every one who spoke said good things of him; when every one says good
things of a man he must be a good man. Do you like your guardian? I
believe you know him some time?"
"I know him since I was a child and I like him very much. No one could
have been more kind or considerate than he; and I know my poor father
had the greatest confidence in him."
She said this with more animation and earnestness than she had yet
shown. Her gratitude to Grey was profound, and she did not wish her
cousin should be for a moment in doubt of her feelings in the matter.
"That is all right: I am delighted to hear you say so. Now Mr. Grey has
full and complete control of your fortune; that is a mere trifle."
She looked up at him in some surprise and said,
"I understood that Mr. Grey had a large sum."
"I did not mean that your fortune is a mere trifle, but that the fact of
its being in his hands rather than any other honest man's is a mere
trifle. What I wished to do was to draw a contrast between the
comparatively triviality of the guardianship of your money compared with
that of another thing."
His eyes were now fixed, staring ahead; and although she looked up into
his face, he did not glance down, and she could gather no information
through her eyes.
She said, in a tone of faint wonder:
"I do not know what you mean. My father always told me I should have
nothing but the money."
Still keeping his eyes fixed ahead, he said, in a dull, slow, dreamy
way:
"Well, there was one thing in your father's gift, for a time at all
events, and the will gives it to no one. Supposing the guardianship of
that thing were in your gift now, would you, considering that I am the
only relative you have alive, and that you have agreed to look on me as
your best friend,--would you, I ask, give me the guardianship of that
thing?"
"But is there any such thing? I certainly never heard of it," she said,
in greater wonder.
"There is such a thing."
"And it is in my power to give you the guardianship?" she asked.
"Absolutely, Cousin Maud."
"And you really wish to take the troublesome care of this, whatever it
may be?"
"I do."
"Then I give it to you freely."
"And you will give me as absolute control over it as if it had been
formally made over to my care by the will of your dead father?"
He had now paused in his walk once more, and was standing looking down
on her, not with the fiery eyes of a few moments ago, but with deep,
careful, anxious eyes, as though matter of great moment depended on her
answer.
Under his steady glance she felt her head grow confused and hot. She did
not know quite clearly what was passing, but she knew he had asked her
to do something, and she must do it. "I promise," she said, very
faintly.
This time he spoke with the most elaborate clearness of articulation,
slowly and with emphasis:
"You promise to make over to me the guardianship of the thing to which I
allude as absolutely as though it had been made over to me by your
father's will."
"I do."
"Then it is the guardianship of my cousin, Maud Midharst."
"The guardianship of me! But Mr. Grey is my guardian!"
"Yes and no. He is the guardian of your fortune absolutely. But with
respect to your own personal action you are left free. You are
recommended by your father to apply to him for advice, but you are not
bound to do any one thing he asks you, or to accept his advice beyond
money matters. In all matters except money you are to consult me. You
have promised, and you will do so?"
"I will keep my promise, but it is strange." She dropped her eyes, and
again the two moved forward.
His face gradually lost its intense expression, and assumed its usual
dreamy far-away look. In a few moments he spoke:
"Yes, it is strange, and to me, Cousin Maud, very sweet, that I should
be able to do the least thing for you. You must now rely on me wholly.
You must take no important step without consulting me. You are as much
under my charge now as if you were my daughter. My only regret in the
matter is that I am compelled to leave England almost immediately, but I
shall be back in as short a time as possible; in the meanwhile you may
look to Mr. Grey for the advice you want from day to day. But if
anything of importance should arise, you must write and tell it to me,
and I will write back and tell you what to do. You understand?"
"Yes. You are very good to one you know so little of."
"Know so little of! Know so little of! Do I not know you through the
history of our house? Is it because we never met, and I never set foot
on the Island before, that we do not know much of one another? When I
look at those old walls; when I think of the great house of Fleurey from
which we are both come; when I think that you and I bear the one name,
and that the very walls which protected your infancy and girlhood are
mine in my manhood; when I learned that my cousin Alexander had died,
and left my cousin Maud alone in the world with a huge fortune and no
natural guardian but myself; when I saw my cousin Maud, and found her
pale and timid and tearful--I knew her through the past and in the
present; and, Cousin Maud, with the help of Heaven and a resolute will,
I shall know her in the future, to the last hour I can be of the least
service to her. Why, child, I was horrified to think of you all alone
and unfriended, save for the friendship of a middle-aged busy man, who
had no natural claim upon the privilege of your safe-guarding. I feared
something might come between you and me to prevent my getting close to
you as I am now, in your confidence, and in the consequence of your
promise."
She had raised her eyes to his after the first few sentences. She had
noted again the flush in the swarthy cheek, again the fire in the large
dark eye. She caught the voice of passionate chivalry that rang out
through his words, clear and sharp as the voice of the cornet when it
alone holds up the theme to the melodious confluence of harmonious
strains flowing from orchestra and stage.
"Cousin Maud----"
"No; Maud."
"Maud."
They paused again. He was still in thought, and looked into her eyes,
not with the sight of intelligence, but with the sight of the physical
eye merely.
He had aroused her confidence, her gratitude, her interest. She was
looking at him with as much astonishment as though, upon turning her
back, she found not the Weeslade and the Plain of Spears, but the
streams and fertile land that lie around Damascus, and the long low line
of the city's ruined walls against the northern sky.
Mutely she held out her hand to him. He took it in silence, shook off
his absorbed manner, smiled softly on her, then the two resumed their
walk. From that moment, from that hand-pressure, from that smile, from
the soft sigh which greeted that smile, and the firm breathing and
measured step with which he resumed the walk, it was plain their
friendship had been sealed. He knew he had inspired her with confidence,
and she knew she felt faith in this new cousin-friend, who had been a
source of disquiet to her in her childhood, and was destined to be a
source of sustentation and strength to her in her maiden years.
For a while they walked on in silence.
"And now, Maud, there is some detail I wish to speak to you about."
"Yes."
"You will of course continue to live here----"
"But I am no longer----" she interrupted.
"You will, _of course_, continue to live here. I shall not set out for
Egypt for a few days, and in that time I will see that all things are
put in order for you here. I understand that the lady who sat upon your
right is the Mrs. Grant alluded to in the will?"
"Yes. She is my only friend----"
"Maud, your only friend!"
"I mean, of course, William, after you."
"That's a good child. Call me William always, and learn to think of Mrs.
Grant as your _second_ friend. I hope she will continue to stay with
you. Do you think she will?"
"Oh, yes; she has promised. She is and has been a great and a good
friend to me. I do not know what I should have done all through the last
few months but for her. She has promised to stay with me as long as I
like, and I know I shall like her to stay with me always."
He looked fixedly at the slender graceful figure by his side, the figure
of the only woman in the world in whom he felt interest--the interest of
blood. The idea that he was head of the family felt new to him. He had
often tried to realise it before, but never until now did he know what
it was to have any one dependent upon his protection; and the person so
depending being his beautiful cousin Maud, the feeling was not only new,
but sweet and purifying as well.
At length he said: "I wish I had not to go abroad; but, Maud, when I
came away from Egypt I had intended to return, and left matters in such
a state that my not going back would cause the greatest confusion, and I
must not, because I have now become rich, treat badly the office so
useful to me when I was poor. But I will be back to see that you are
all right as soon as ever I can. Has your guardian, Mr. Grey, any sons?"
"No. He has no child. He never had a child."
"He is married, of course?"
"Yes, but he lost his wife in a dreadful accident that happened to a
river steamboat some months ago."
"Then he is a widower?"
"Yes."
Sir William's brows fell, and he bent his eyes on the ground for a few
seconds. He raised his head, and, partly closing his lids, looked dead
ahead for a few seconds more.
"Your father's will was dated the 9th of June in this year. Had Mr. Grey
lost his wife then?"
"No. Not, I think, for some months after. Now I remember, Mr. Grey was
here at the moment the steamboat, on which his wife was, blew up. I
remember now. That day we sent for Mr. Grey; Sir Alexander was raving
about him and other things, and Mr. Grey was on the Island when the
vessel blew up. That night father became delirious finally. I now
recollect it all."
"So that your father, while in possession of his senses, did not hear
Mr. Grey had lost his wife?"
"No. Does it make any difference? Cannot a widower be guardian in a
will?" She dreaded to lose the protection she had been taught to rely
on.
"Oh, indeed, he can. It makes not the least difference in the eyes of
the law whether a man has a wife or not, as far as his appointment of
guardian in a will goes. I was asking merely for information's sake. And
now, Maud, I think you had better go in. It is getting dark already, and
I should like to have a little conversation with your guardian--your
other guardian--before I leave. By the way, at first I was puzzled to
think why Sir Alexander did not leave yourself under the absolute
control of Mr. Grey, but I think I guess the reason. When the will was
made you were old enough to take care of yourself in all ordinary
everyday matters, and his feelings would not allow a daughter of his, a
daughter of this house, to be under the control of a banker. I know that
your father was a little peculiar, and had no friends or associates of
his own rank. He made Mr. Grey guardian of Miss Midharst's fortune, but
not of Miss Midharst herself. It is my lucky chance to occupy the latter
flattering position. Good-bye, now, Maud. I am staying at the
"Warfinger," in Daneford. I shall come over every day of the few I am in
this place to see you."
They had now arrived at the library-door. It opened slowly, and a man
appeared on the threshold, and stood still as if transfixed. Neither of
the others noticed the presence of the man in the doorway.
Sir William went on: "Our meeting was very formal, and our greetings
were very formal too. But we are good friends now, and loyal cousins.
Cousins may be more affectionate, Maud, than strangers in blood.
Good-day, Maud," said he, stooping and kissing her white forehead
lightly. "Good-bye; and remember to take great care of yourself, and
rely on me."
She moved slowly away.
He turned briskly to the library-door, and seeing the man on the
threshold, said gravely:
"Mr. Grey, I am glad to have met you, and shall feel much obliged if
you will favour me with a few moments' conversation."
Without saying a word Grey re-entered the library; the baronet followed
him.
CHAPTER IV.
THE TWO GUARDIANS.
When the two men found themselves in the library it was quite dusk
outside, and a deep gloom filled the room. There was no one else in the
place, and no candle or lamp illumed the dark and cavernous recesses of
shadows lying here and there remote from the great window.
"I will not detain you long, Mr. Grey. Do you wish for lights?"
"Not at all, Sir William."
This man, who had come in the morning as a stranger, and whom he, Grey,
promised himself he would quickly eject if he made himself unpleasant
or pushed himself upon Miss Midharst after the reading of the will, was
now treating him, Grey, as a guest in that house! And not only that, but
he had pushed himself upon Miss Midharst, and seemed to have got on very
well with her, judging from the parting which had just taken place
between them. The tables were turned on him, Grey, and the less light
there was to expose his discomfiture the pleasanter for him. The gold
was still leading, still leading, but only by a head; and the lead was
gaining, hair's-breadth by hair's-breadth, every minute.
"Suppose we sit near the window, where the most light is," said Sir
William.
They both moved towards the window, and, having taken chairs, the
younger man began:
"In the first place, Mr. Grey, let me thank you most cordially for all
your great kindness and care shown to Miss Midharst during this
troublesome time. I assure you I shall never forget the debt of
gratitude I owe you for your generosity and devotedness under the trying
circumstances."
"I feel greatly flattered by your approval, Sir William. I have tried in
my humble way to do my duty, and if I have failed I have failed through
no want of desire to do my duty by the child of--if I may be permitted
to call him so--my old friend Sir Alexander Midharst."
There was a strange mixture of emotions in Grey's voice as he spoke.
Sarcasm and fear mingled freely, and the young man was for a moment in
doubt as to how he should proceed. Mr. Grey, now alone and in the dark,
did not impress him quite so favourably as earlier in the day, when
others were present, and when the man's face and figure could be seen.
The young man paused a while, and made up his mind not to inquire into
the constituents of that tone if it were not repeated.
"It," he thought, "may have been accidental."
Aloud he said, "I did not come into this neighbourhood until last night,
and since then every one I met seems to have done nothing but sing your
praise. All the people at the "Warfinger Hotel" have spoken in unstinted
terms of respect. You must not think they knew who I was, for I gave no
name. I was and am greatly delighted at this, for I hope from it you and
I may get on well together, out of consideration to my cousin's
comfort."
"I sincerely trust we may always get on well together. I certainly will
not deliberately risk losing your good opinion."
This time there was nothing unusual or disquieting in the tone. Grey had
himself caught the import of his own voice in his previous reply, and
felt he had made a great mistake. It was very hard though for him, Grey,
a man of his position and standing, to sit there and be blandly approved
of by this young man--by this young man who seemed to take his own
success in all things as a foregone conclusion. He, Grey, must play his
cards carefully, and above all things he must not show the direction in
which it was necessary for him to force the game. But he was in the
dark; and if denied the expression of his feelings to his voice, he
might allow them to run riot over his face, and it was a relief to frown
and scowl and sneer in silence.
"I have first of all a favour to ask you, Mr. Grey."
"I am sure, Sir William, if it is in my power to grant it, I shall be
only too happy to do so." This was said in the banker's most urbane
accents.
"Well, I understand that your bank has kept the Midharst account for a
long time; will you be kind enough to accept the keeping of mine?"
"The Midharst has been the most important of all our accounts for a long
time, and we shall feel honoured and delighted if you will favour us
with yours."
There was nothing very dreadful about this. It seemed as if the young
baronet would turn out as confiding and uninquisitive as the old one. So
far this looked promising.
"And now," said Sir William, "will you do me another favour?"
"If," returned the banker, in a gay tone of badinage, "the second
_favour_ at all resembles the first, I think I could go on granting you
such favours all the night."
This young man was not only simple and confiding, but downright amiable
and sociable.
"You must not think I am extravagant when I have said what I am going to
say."
"My dear Sir William, if you want any money, you draw on us, as a matter
of course, for any sum you may require. That is an affair of ordinary
business, not favour; and it was quite unnecessary for you to say
anything about it."
Things were growing more comfortable as they got along.
"Why, I should not wonder," thought Grey, with a smile that almost
developed into a laugh,--"I should not wonder if he gave away the
bride."
"But the sum I require is large."
"Draw on us for it in the morning."
"I don't think you would say so if you knew the sum."
"Try us. Draw on us to-morrow."
"Twenty thousand?"
"Only? I thought the sum was a serious one! You really must not think of
attaching any importance to such a matter. My dear Sir William, you can
draw on us for fifty thousand without notice. If you have the least
occasion for more than fifty, just tell me four days before you draw, so
that there may be no chance of a disappointment to you."
Grey thought, "Clearly this young man is in debt. How lucky! When a man
is in debt and wants money badly he will do----" He paused, thought of
his own case, shuddered, and whispered in the innermost solitude of the
desert of crime where he and his spectre dwelt,--"he will do
anything--murder!"
"You must not think I am in debt. I do not owe a shilling. I never did."
"That is highly creditable in a young man of your expectations," said
Grey, in a tone of high admiration. To himself he said, "I'm sorry it
isn't for debts he wants the money. What can he want the money for?
Nothing good, I'll swear."
"You see, Mr. Grey, I may seem abrupt to you, but I do not mean to be
so."
"I assure you I cannot guess why you for a moment imagine I could find
reason to think you abrupt."
"Ah, well, yes! What I said about abruptness has rather to do with what
I am about to say than with anything I have yet said. I am very quick to
decide upon things, and very prompt to act, and I may say without
boasting that once I take a thing in hand I usually make it turn out as
I wish; I like to do things that seem difficult; but I never undertake
anything when I do not clearly see my way to realisation."
"Most useful, positively invaluable qualities," said Grey, in a tone of
admiration; mentally he thought, "If what this man says of himself is
true, my life depends upon the direction this cursed activity of his
takes."
"I have to leave the country for a time. I must go back to Egypt for
some months."
"Indeed!" ejaculated Grey. He could scarcely repress a cry of joy. To be
rid, and rid quickly, of this dreamy energetic man was a mercy for which
he did not dare to hope. "Do you leave England soon?" Grey asked in a
tone of gentle sorrow.
"In a few days. Ten days at the outside, and before I leave I want the
money, and to put the thing I have decided upon in trim."
"Can I be of any further assistance to you than financially?"
"Yes, I think you can, if you will be kind enough. You take a great
interest in Miss Midharst?"
"Aha!" exclaimed Grey, as though he had been struck. The question of the
young man caused the terrible importance of Miss Midharst to present
itself suddenly to his mind. He saw at one glance the stakes he had put
down, and the prize for which he was playing; and thus coming suddenly
upon a bird's-eye view of his position, he received a violent shock,
which forced the exclamation from him.
"What's the matter?" cried the young man, rising quickly and approaching
the banker. "Are you hurt?"
"Pray excuse me. It is nothing, Sir William. Do be seated. I am very
sorry for having alarmed you. Some little time ago I injured my knee--as
I thought at the time, slightly; but it often gives me a single pang of
most acute pain, and in crossing my legs just as you spoke that pang
came, and I could not but cry out, if my life depended on not doing so.
I know you will excuse me, Sir William; the pain is all gone. I think
you were saying, when I so unhappily interrupted you, that you and I
take a deep interest in Miss Midharst."
"You are sure you are all right?"
"Yes, quite sure."
"Did you ever hear the death-scream of a horse?"
"No, never."
"Your shout frightened me; it was like that. Well, as I was saying, we
both take an interest in Miss Midharst. You know the way Sir Alexander
treated this place. I heard of it, and to-day I see it."
"Yes; it is naked enough."
"Well, it is not a fit place for Miss Midharst to reside in now."
"I have been thinking, of course, of getting a suitable house for her
until we are able to buy or build one."
"Oh, I don't mean anything of that kind. She is to stay here."
"Stay here! You do not know that from me, Sir William. It is not my
intention. My intention was to place my own house at her disposal, and
live in my town house."
"Oh, but it is all settled: she is to stay here."
"All settled! All settled, Sir William, and by whom?"
"By Miss Midharst and me."
"But--but--" Grey was trembling all over now, he knew not why--"but, Sir
William, one would think Miss Midharst's guardian might have been
consulted on the matter before all was settled."
"I assure you he was."
"But I pledge you my word, Sir William, this is the first I have heard
of it."
"My dear Mr. Grey, there is some mistake. You surely do not imagine you
are Miss Midharst's guardian?"
"Then, in the name of Heaven," cried Grey feebly, "if I am not, who is?"
"I."
"_You!_ But the will does not mention your name!"
"Nor yours, as guardian of her person. You will take charge of Miss
Midharst's fortune, as by will appointed. I will take charge of Miss
Midharst herself, by position as head of the house. You did not catch
the full drift of the meaning of the will. I paid particular attention
to that paragraph."
"No doubt you are right, Sir William. I did not pay particular attention
to that paragraph. I gathered that I was the only guardian named, and I
concluded the conditions were the usual ones."
It was with the utmost difficulty Grey could prevent himself from
betraying his conflicting passions. Now came personal anger against the
young and determined baronet; now despair at the thought of having Maud
removed from his personal custody. Sir Alexander had certainly given him
to understand that he, Grey, was to be guardian to the girl; and here
was he, after all he had done and risked, after he had died his hands in
blood----Bah! that kind of thing would drive him mad. He must keep calm
now if he did not wish to hang next month.
The young man continued: "That twenty thousand I want for putting this
place to rights. I see already what I wish done to the grounds; before I
leave I shall know what I want done to the building and furniture."
"By-and-by, I daresay," thought Grey, "you will find out what you want
done with me."
The interview lasted little longer, and nothing of importance followed.
As Grey went home that night he thought:
"He will be months away. I will be all these months here. Before he can
be back she shall be mine. I know it, I feel it. I am not now very nice
in the means I employ. She shall be mine before he returns by--some
means or other."
CHAPTER V.
THE INDEFINITE PRESENT.
The morning after the funeral Mrs. Grant and Maud walked up and down one
of the long, silent corridors for an hour. The evening before, when the
widow and the young girl sat together in the firelight, Maud had told
the other the main features of the facts in the interview between
herself and Sir William. Beyond expressing a guarded and general
approval of the baronet, Mrs. Grant said little. She had been too tired,
and Maud too exhausted from fretting and anxiety, to allow of close
inquiry or elaborate statement. Now they were less fatigued, the worst
day of the bereavement had passed, and they were quietly discussing
matters.
"You know, Maud, my dear, no matter how kind Sir William may be to you,
it will not do for you to forget Mr. Grey," said Mrs. Grant, very
gravely. "You must not think of defying him or going to law with him, or
anything of that sort."
"Indeed, Mrs. Grant, I am thinking of nothing of the kind," replied the
girl, looking with troubled eyes and anxious face at her only female
friend.
"Because you know," continued the woman, without heeding the
interruption or the appealing face--"you know very well the Greys have
served the family faithfully for many years; and now the present Mr.
Grey has sworn to serve you, and to take care of you, and to be good and
kind to you; and I am sure he will; for though he is not such a
gentleman by birth as your father or Sir William, still he's a most
respectable man."
The widow had the feminine trick of taking the bit in her teeth and
going straight on, no matter who pulled right or who pulled left.
"You may rely on my doing nothing of the kind. How can you think I
would!" cried the girl fervently.
"Yes, but you mustn't," repeated the widow vehemently. "You must not
throw over the friend of years for a man you never saw until yesterday."
"You ought not to say I am going to do anything so wicked--indeed you
ought not. But remember that the man I met for the first time yesterday
was my cousin, and the head of the Midharsts."
"But your father never liked him."
"My poor father never knew him."
"But he could have known him if he liked, and he didn't."
"That was prejudice."
"Maud!" cried the widow, in a tone of reproach.
The girl burst into tears.
"I did not mean to say anything disrespectful; but I can't bear to think
my cousin insincere."
Mrs. Grant pressed the girl in her arms, and said:
"You must not cry; you must not weep, my love. I did not mean you had
been disrespectful to your father's memory. Heaven forbid! But you must
not be too hasty, and like everyone at first sight. That will never do
for a young heiress who has no right guardian."
The girl ceased to weep, and said in an unsteady voice:
"But I never told you I liked him."
"You do like him, Maud; you know you do."
"How could I like him in one meeting?"
"But, Maud, you do like him, and that is why I feel so uneasy."
"Indeed I don't like him. I am afraid of him: he makes me feel smaller
and helpless. I never feel helpless when Mr. Grey is near me, for he can
always tell me what to do; but I feel as if I must do what my cousin
says, and after only one meeting too. I was ashamed to confess this
until you made me."
Her luminous candid spirit looked out of the large soft eyes into the
eyes of the woman.
Mrs. Grant stole her arm round Maud's waist, and for a while both walked
on in silence. At length Mrs. Grant spoke:
"I am glad to hear that."
"To hear what?" asked Maud, in a tone of abstraction.
"That you take no interest in Sir William."
"What!" with a start. The eyes of the girl were once more fixed on the
eyes of the widow. "I did not say that. On the contrary, he _does_
interest me."
Mrs. Grant looked bewildered, and glanced helplessly around her, as if
seeking someone to bear out what she was about to say.
"Why, child, you told me a moment ago that you did not like him, and
that he frightens you!"
"That is true, but a lion frightens me, and I can't say that I like
lions; but they interest me more than a King Charlie."
Maud smiled at the bewilderment of the other.
"But, my dear," said Mrs. Grant, with a look of grave trouble in her
eyes, "what you say about lions and King Charlie is all nonsense. When
you have a King Charlie you play with him, and feed him out of your
hand. When you have a lion, you look at him through the bars of a cage.
Besides, Maud, it is absurd and romantic to think of an English baronet
as a lion. Suppose he was a lion, and he got loose, what should you do?"
"Run away as fast as I could," answered the girl, with a faint laugh.
"But if he caught you?"
"Oh, if he caught me I don't think I could do much."
"There now, Maud, I told you so."
Mrs. Grant had not told Maud anything about her chance of not being
able, single-handed, to defend herself against a lion. When she said, "I
told you so," she had suddenly lost sight of the monarch of the forest,
and come upon the mental image of the baronet of the Island, in whom
this girl had admitted she took an interest, which, in the illustration
afforded by the lion, proved to be full of the gravest danger.
Miss Midharst had forgotten the baronet in the allegory, and was
thinking only of the lion; so that when Mrs. Grant triumphantly said, "I
told you so," Maud believed Mrs. Grant was contemplating the same image
as herself--that is, her own disappearance down the lion's throat. So
that Maud smiled and said:
"Fortunately there are very few lions in this part of the world, and one
very seldom gets loose."
"On the contrary, there are very many lions in this part of the country,
and they all go about seeking whom they may devour."
Michael the servant entered, and announced, "Sir William Midharst and
Mr. Grey."
"You will see Mr. Grey first, of course, Maud?" said Mrs. Grant, in a
low voice.
Miss Midharst looked perplexed, and by way of reply said:
"Why?"
"Oh, you will surely see your guardian before a man you met only
yesterday?"
"Don't you think it would look strange, Mrs. Grant, if I did not see my
cousin before Mr. Grey?"
"Certainly not. Mr. Grey was appointed to take care of you. He has known
you since you were a child, and you owe him every respect," said Mrs.
Grant, speaking so low that Michael could not hear. Her manner was very
earnest.
"But Sir William is my kinsman, and, Mrs. Grant, you and I are his
guests in this place. You really would not have the owner of this place
wait while I, his guest, received even my guardian? No; my cousin must
come first. Michael, ask Sir William to walk this way."
As soon as the door closed on the servant, the girl turned to Mrs.
Grant, and said: "Will you see Mr. Grey and apologise for delaying him?
Please do, Mrs. Grant."
As the new owner of Island Castle entered the room he met Mrs. Grant
going out.
When greetings and ordinary formalities had been disposed of, and the
cousins were alone, the man spoke.
"I had an interview with Mr. Grey yesterday evening, and I am glad to
say that I found him most reasonable and agreeable. I had two things to
speak to him about, neither of which was likely to please him, and he
behaved admirably."
"I am sure the more you meet him the more you will like him," said Maud,
looking up thankfully to her cousin's face. She felt herself under a
personal obligation to her cousin for his frank approval of so old and
valuable a friend of her father and herself. The desire to be governed,
common to all women, had suddenly sprung up in her nature when her
cousin spoke to her last evening of his claims upon the guardianship of
his only cousin, and she was now greatly relieved to find respect to the
wishes of her father's successor did not clash with fealty to her
father's only friend, one on whom she looked as having a strong claim
upon her regard and attention.
Sir William did not seem to hear her words. He was standing at the
window looking down on the Weeslade with dreamy inattentive eyes.
She was seated on a low chair at the other side of the window. Her eyes
were timidly fixed on his face. He had come from Egypt, the land of the
inexplicable Pyramids and the inscrutable Sphynx. To her this cousin
William's inner life was as dark a mystery as the riddle of the
Pyramids, and his face as baffling as the face of the Sphynx. Until now
she had heard men speak, and had attended to their words. When he spoke
now she regarded less the words than the unuttered thoughts attending
upon them. The "How d'ye do?" of other men required only a
straightforward answer, without thought beyond the scope of the
question. The "How d'ye do?" of her cousin came to her attended by
veiled figures of strange aspect, that gave the simple question a volume
and depth the mightiest questions never had before.
Was it because he who had been the ogre of her younger years had become
the protector of her orphan maidenhood, and the air of the ogre still
hung vaguely around him in her mind? Was it the influence of remote
consanguinity operating, as blood does, between those of the same stock
who have met for the first time when grown up? Was it the background
afforded by the Nile and the sacred crocodile, and the mysterious barren
silent rows of the Pyramids, with those features of men and women lying
hid in folds of linen and layers of asphaltum, with, save the eyes, all
the features, the lips that were kissed by lover or mother, still
unchanged, still the same lip, the same dimple in the cheek, the same
curve in the temple as when Thebes and Memphis conned the stars, the
Paris and the London of three thousand years ago, and taught the world
all the world knew?
Then before her mind rolled forth the plains of purposeless white sand,
overhung by the plains of unbroken blue sky, and, blazing in the blue
sky, the fierce sun. And here, against the homely sash of that old
familiar window, that commonplace sash and frame, down which she had
seen the dreary rain of weary winter days slide to the sodden ground, he
leaned; on his face and hands the brown harvest of Egyptian suns, in his
dark eyes the strange knowledge of awful arts and rites wrought in
labyrinth and in cave by Egypt's ancient priests, and in his tones the
softness of a land where no waves beat and no winds blow loudly enough
to drown the timid whispers of a maid.
"Are you thinking of Egypt?" she asked in a low voice.
"No. I am thinking of Maud," he answered, without moving. Then, rousing
from his reverie, he said: "Yes, Mr. Grey was most agreeable last night,
and I am sure we shall get on very well together. One of the things I
had to speak to him about was a matter of business detail. The other,
Maud, was of the first moment, the arrangement you and I came to
yesterday about my acting as your personal guardian."
"What did he say about that?" asked Maud aloud. She thought he had not
been thinking of Egypt. His mind had not been far away, as she had
supposed, but close at home, near where they were, busy with thoughts of
her. Was it strange a man who had that dark sad face, and those deep
eyes, and those mystic memories, and so short a knowledge of her,
should, while looking so out of that old familiar window, think of her,
who knew nothing of the world and was so commonplace? Was that strange?
No doubt, in her, in this secluded place, and with her humdrum life, the
objects entering into which were all around her clad in the threadbare
interest of daily use, it was not strange that, being who he was, and
coming as he did, she felt a great interest in him. But that he should
concern himself so much about her was inexplicable. Egypt had been to
her, since first she knew how to hold a book, the land of her dreams.
Her only wish for travel sprang from a desire to see the site and
monuments of the race which gave the arts and sciences to Europe. And
here was her cousin William come back from that land, and, while lost in
a reverie which looked proper to the country of the Nile, thinking of
her, Maud.
The young man paused awhile before answering her question. Still his
face wore the same abstracted look as he replied:
"At first Mr. Grey seemed surprised and shocked. I think it appeared to
him as if he had been slighted. I intended no slight to him, and I don't
think my manner showed anything of the kind. At all events, all went
well, and he seemed quite satisfied once the first surprise had passed.
How did he hurt his knee, Maud?"
"I do not know. I am very sorry to hear he has hurt himself. When did it
happen?"
"He said some time ago. It gave him dreadful pain last evening. I never
shall forget the shout it wrung from him. It was like the shout I once
heard of a man who awoke in the jaws of a crocodile."
"I never heard anything about it. I hope it is not serious, and that all
he has been doing for us of late has not made it worse."
"I hope not. By-the-way, he is waiting to see you, Maud. Shall I tell
him he may come up? I have told some tradesmen to be here about this
time. When you have finished with Mr. Grey come into the courtyard. I
shall be there. I am going to have vases for flowers put up, and I want
to consult you about them."
He turned round and glanced down at her. The vacant look faded from his
eyes, a deep gentleness stole into them, and from them spread like light
over the rest of his features as he took her hand, and said, in tone of
deep solicitude:
"Are you always so white, Maud? Are you sure you are well?"
"I am quite well," she answered.
"You must not fret, dear Maud. I will send Mr. Grey to you. You are more
used to him than me. But you will get used to me some day very soon,
won't you, child?"
"Yes."
"Mr. Grey and I will take great care of you. He shall act as my deputy
while I am away, and when I come back I will take care of you. I will go
now; I do not intend letting those tradespeople disturb anything for
some time; I only want to show them what I mean to have done. For my
sake, Maud, you will not brood? Promise me that."
"I promise."
"And you will show me where you would like the vases placed?"
"Yes."
He kissed her hand first and then her forehead, and left her.
CHAPTER VI.
THE TYRANNICAL PAST.
When Mrs. Grant went out of the drawing-room she sought and found Mr.
Grey in the waiting-room off the grand entrance-hall. She closed the
door, and going up to the banker in haste said:
"I want to have a few private words with you, Mr. Grey."
"I am completely at your service, Mrs. Grant," answered the banker, in
his most amiable manner.
He looked worn and haggard to-day. The strain was telling on him. He now
knew what sleepless nights were, and days haunted by the phantoms of
memory, and slight rustling sounds of hideous import. He had learned to
start suddenly and look hastily over his shoulder. It was not the dread
of the hangman disordered his peace, but the faint rustle of a woman's
dress, and the plunge into the darkness and the sense of suffocation
under a burden, and the strange twanging of the arteries in his temples.
"You know," began Mrs. Grant in an excited manner, "that I love Miss
Midharst, and would do anything I could for her."
Mrs. Grant had been very much shocked and excited by what had passed
between Maud and her about Sir William, and the excitement still
survived.
"I am quite confident of that," answered the banker, with a grave look.
He saw Mrs. Grant had something serious to say.
"Will you promise me to keep what I say to yourself?" she asked quickly.
He paused awhile and looked down.
"My position is peculiar," he said. "Although I am not Miss Midharst's
guardian in the usual signification of the word, I really feel bound by
my promise to Sir Alexander to do all I can for her, and that being so I
could not undertake to keep to myself anything which it might be to her
advantage to disclose."
He said this in his most deliberate manner, and with his eyes fixed
solemnly on the face of the widow.
"I know I may trust you, Mr. Grey. My only reason for asking you not to
speak is, that if you mentioned my name in the matter I should be in an
awkward position."
"I promise you not to mention your name in connection with anything you
may say to me."
"That will do. I want to speak about Sir William Midharst."
"The new baronet!" cried Mr. Grey, with a start and suddenly intensified
interest.
"Yes. Do you know anything of him?"
"No. Nothing. He has not yet established his identity, but there can be
no doubt he is the right man. As what you have to say concerns him, and
as I am under no pledge to guard his interests (though of course I
should not sit still and see them injured), you may speak quite freely.
I promise to mention what you say to no one."
They were sitting by the table. As Mr. Grey spoke he drew his chair
closer to his companion's, and, by his manner, showed he had sincerely
resolved to respect her confidence, and attend most carefully to
anything she might say.
"Have you any idea that Sir William is in want of money?"
Mr. Grey started. A more unexpected or disquieting question could hardly
have been addressed to him. This was the first time Mrs. Grant had
mentioned the word money to him, and now she uttered it in connection
with this young man who had already to a great extent come between him
and the heiress. He answered:
"I may tell you in strict confidence he has applied to me for a large
sum of money, and of course I promised it. May I know your reason for
asking?"
"I'll tell you my reason by-and-by. The money he asked you for is not to
come out of Miss Midharst's fortune?"
Again Grey started. Then he knit his brows and braced himself together,
and, fixing his eyes resolutely on the carpet, answered in a firm voice:
"No; I could not think of touching Miss Midharst's money for anyone but
Miss Midharst herself."
He did his best to control himself, still at the words "but Miss
Midharst herself" he shuddered. Had Mrs. Grant discovered anything about
the Midharst Consols? She was the last person of his acquaintance he
would imagine likely to come upon a clue to the fact. But no one could
tell who might pick up the thread. If he had known matters would take
turns like these he should never have touched those Consols. He would
have shut the door first. What a fool, what a poor fool he had been not
to have taken his mother's advice and shut the door.
"But if he wants money he must be poor?"
"He will have a fine income now."
"Miss Midharst has a large fortune, Mr. Grey."
"Very large."
"And you are the guardian of it."
"Yes." What on earth was she driving at?
"Well, I think it only right to tell you that if Sir William is now in
want of money which is not Miss Midharst's fortune, he will very soon be
in want of the money which _is_." She rose and fixed her excited eyes
upon him.
He rose too, passed his hand absently across his brow, grew pale, and
said in a voice of perplexity:
"I forget part of it. I forget part of it. But you know I was looking at
the Witch's Tower of the Castle, the Tower of Silence, when the
steamboat blew up."
"So I have heard," whispered Mrs. Grant in a tone of awe. The change in
his face was terrible.
"And they never found the body of Bee. They never looked in the right
place. It is on the top of the Tower of Silence, blown there when the
boiler of the _Rodwell_ burst. I saw the body blown up there through the
smoke and steam."
"Mr. Grey! Mr. Grey! are you ill?" said Mrs. Grant, when she could find
her voice.
Gradually the fixed look left his eyes. The hands, which had been feebly
beating on the table, ceased to move, the sensation of tightness left
his forehead, and pale and with a gentle sigh he sank on a chair.
"Are you ill, Mr. Grey?" asked Mrs. Grant, in a less alarmed tone now
that she saw his mind was clear again.
He answered feebly:
"I have not been very well, and of late I suffer from sleeplessness, a
very bad thing for a business man, because when he lies awake at night
he is always thinking of his business, and that wears one greatly. Did
I faint?"
"No."
"Pray do not ring. I am all right now. I do not want anything. I feel
quite well again. It was only a passing weakness. You would greatly
oblige me if you will not speak of what has occurred to Miss Midharst,
or to any one else. Did I say anything?"
"Something I did not catch. You spoke of the sad death of Mrs. Grey in
the _Rodwell_. You said, I think, that you saw the _Rodwell_, in which
your wife was, blow up. Really, I was too much alarmed for yourself to
think of what you said."
"Ah," sighed Grey in a tone of profound relief. "You were telling me
something that interested me very much when I had the misfortune to
interrupt you. Let me see. What was it?"
His face was gradually regaining its ordinary look; the haggard aspect
of a while ago did not come back so strongly marked, still he looked
worn.
"Perhaps you are not quite well enough to-day to be troubled with what
may after all be only a wrong guess of mine. But I feel it strange, when
I come to think of it, that Miss Midharst should accept a man Sir
Alexander did not like as a guardian, when all knew Sir Alexander wished
you to have all the power he would give to any one. I spoke to Miss
Midharst, and she certainly means to take the advice of Sir William in
matters regarding herself. Well, then, I thought, Sir Alexander has
stripped the land and the town house and this place, and has rack-rented
and injured the estates, and saved up the money, with your help, for his
daughter. Then I wondered to myself if Sir William was in want of
money; for if he is in want of money, what could be better for him than
to make himself agreeable to Miss Midharst, insist upon her staying in
this place, become her guardian and--marry her."
"Aha!" exclaimed Mr. Grey in a half cough, half groan. "But do you think
there is a likelihood of such a thing occurring?"
"Do you, Mr. Grey, believe in love at first sight?"
"Yes; that is, I believe in something which may grow into love."
"Well, this may be a case of it."
"But have you any reason for thinking Miss Midharst has conceived a--a
tender feeling towards her cousin in so short a time?"
"No, no. I don't say Miss Midharst is in love with her cousin, but she
told me this morning he interests her, and that is a good beginning.
You know she has never met a young man of her own rank closely. Beyond a
bow and half-hour's chat once a month when she and I slipped into town,
she has met no one but you and her father. She has a craze about Egypt,
and this cousin is just home from Egypt--that's another thing in his
favour. I don't want any one to marry Maud for her money only, and this
is the reason I speak to you. She's too good and beautiful to be married
for anything but her own amiable lovely self, and I hope you will
prevent any fortune-hunter from snatching her up before the grave is
closed over her father."
"I--I--I," stammered Mr. Grey, "I do not feel quite well. I fear I am
growing dizzy again."
The door opened.
"I beg your pardon, Mrs. Grant. Good-day, Mr. Grey, I may not meet you
again to-day. You are not looking very well. Miss Midharst will be
delighted to see you. She told me to tell you so. Go to her. You will
find her in her own little drawing-room; the Lancaster room I think they
call it. I hope your knee is better. By the way, when and how did you
hurt it?"
"I--I am a little tired."
"The leg?"
"Yes."
"How did you do it?"
"Strained it."
"Long ago?"
"The night my wife was lost." He shuddered and leaned upon the back of
the chair.
"It is his head that troubles him and not his knee," whispered Mrs.
Grant.
"Take my arm and come into the air. The air will do you good," said the
young man in a voice of grave solicitude and kindness.
"Thank you," said Grey, accepting the offer.
The two left the room together, the banker upon the baronet's arm.
Neither the knee nor the head of Grey was suffering at that moment; but
he felt a deadly faintness come over him when Mrs. Grant made the appeal
to him to protect Miss Midharst against fortune-hunters.
"The blows come too quickly and too heavily; too quickly and too
heavily; too quickly and too heavily for me."
The open air and soothing landscape calmed Grey. He always felt better
out of doors now than between walls. Rooms had furniture, and furniture
cast shadows, and no matter what part of a room you sat in you could
not command a view of the whole. The atmosphere indoors was heavy,
depressing, and often laden with scents a man's wife might use, had used
once; and these perfumes, coming suddenly upon the sense of smell,
brought memories of long ago and half-awakened expectation of seeing a
certain woman of pleasing aspect the love-bearer of one. But with the
dying breath of the perfume the loved familiar figure of the olden time
faded away, and in its place came a ghastly face with open dead eyes and
open dead lips, and temples dark with the blue veins of suffocation.
When that thing came in the house no one could avoid it. It seemed in
all places at the same time, and if one raised eyes no matter to what,
that thing met the eyes somewhere. Even when it had not followed the
dying perfume of the musk, so long as one was in the house one might
come upon it anywhere, leaning against the wall in the darkness between
the double doors, huddled in the shadow of the great oak chimney-piece
in the hall, lying across the mat on one's bedroom-door when one was
retiring for the night.
Across the threshold of that bedroom-door this jaw-dropped thing never
came. That room was one's only sanctuary. The old love of the long ago
never left that place with the dying of the perfume. Here one's wife
moved about the room and stood by the bedside as God had made her,
comely, and as love had made her, happy; not as indifference had made
her, wretched, and the devil's agent had made her, dead.
And yet to live in that sanctuary for happy memories was almost worse
than wandering with a dim light through corridors against the walls of
which stood shrouded indictments for the intolerable crime. It was hard
to wake and smell the musk, and find one's young wife standing at the
glass, with the golden-topped vial in her hand, and a smile upon her
face, then to see her fade slowly away, to spring up, ask why she was
taken from young and loving arms, and to be able to get no answer; until
one opened the door, and found there one's own middle age, and that
terrible thing across the threshold.
Yes; the open air was much better than the house. Out of doors one could
keep at a distance from shadows, and, when there is the rustle of a
dress, soon find out it is not hers. Then, when the worst comes to the
worst, one, when out of doors, could run. Indoors, you cannot run any
distance, and jumping through a window would attract attention and
inquiry, neither of which could be endured now.
Leaning heavily on the arm of the young baronet, Grey walked up and down
the terrace in front of the northern face of the Castle. In about a
quarter of an hour he said:
"I am very much obliged to you, Sir William. You have been exceedingly
kind to me. May I ask you to do one more little favour for me?"
"Certainly."
"Will you kindly make my excuses to Miss Midharst, and say that I will
not intrude upon her to-day. I--I--I do not feel quite equal to it. I am
unstrung a little. I shall drive home; and a drive always does me good."
His voice was unsteady and his manner restless.
The baronet saw the banker safely into the ferry-boat, and then
returned to the Castle with the message.
Wat Grey got into his fly, thinking, "I'll go to see my mother."
END OF VOL. II.
CHARLES DICKENS AND EVANS, GREAT NEW STREET, FETTER LANE, E.C.
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