CHAPTER VIII.
A little after eleven o'clock, Mrs. Adair and Marie returned from the convent, and, as the latter opened the drawing-room door, she started back, exclaiming "Mrs. Adair, see Flore!"
"Good heavens!" cried Mrs. Adair, as she rushed over to the sofa, where Flora still lay unconscious; "what can have happened!" She guessed that this fainting fit must in some way or other be connected with Mr. Earnscliffe, and therefore she felt that it would be better not to call the maid; so she said, "Marie, run and bring me cold water and eau de Cologne, but do not tell any one of this."
Marie hastened away to get the desired restoratives, and when she returned Mrs. Adair bathed Flora's temples with the cold water, and held the eau de Cologne to her nostrils, whilst Marie rubbed her hands to try and bring a natural heat back to them.
When, at length, Flora opened her eyes, she found herself in her mother's arms, and saw Marie kneeling beside her, chafing her hands. She looked at them vacantly for a moment, then with a shiver reclosed her eyes; but by degrees a slight colour came to her cheeks, and the icy cold of her hands began to yield to the warmth of returning circulation. Mrs. Adair saw that she was now really reviving, and she told Marie to take away the cold water, and leave them alone. "Now, my child," she said, as she kissed Flora, and smoothed back her tossed hair, "try to tell me what has happened."
"He called me cold, passionless; he does not believe in me any longer," murmured Flora, as if to herself.
"Flora, darling, what is it all about? Has Mr. Earnscliffe proved unworthy of you?"
Unconsciously Mrs. Adair had done the best thing in the world to rouse Flora thoroughly, by thus seeming to blame Mr. Earnscliffe. She raised her head, and for the first time looked at her mother intelligently, as she said, "No, no; but it is all over between us;" and she sank back into her mother's arms.
Mrs. Adair's heart bled for her idolised child as she clasped her to it; yet she thought that it would be better to force her to speak at once, and that she would be better afterwards, so she continued, "But what has caused this, dearest? You must endeavour to tell me collectedly all about it, as Edward must be told immediately; and if it is right that he should do so, he will apply to Mr. Earnscliffe for an explanation of his conduct, which certainly appears to me to be most strange, for of course the cause of this break rests with him."
"Mamma," cried Flora, excitedly, "do not say a word against him,—he is the soul of truth and honour. I—I am the only one in fault." She stopped for a moment, and pressing her hands nervously together, she added, "But you are right; I must try to give a collected account of it all, or you will blame him, though heaven knows he deserves it not. Oh, Edwin, Edwin!" her voice died away in a low wail, and she trembled violently all over.
Mrs. Adair threw her arms round her again, and said, "My precious child, I see that it is too much for you now. Let me take you to your room, and after you have had some hours of rest you will be able to tell me."
Flora made no objection; she seemed to be utterly indifferent as to what she was to do, and without giving her mother any answer, she let her take her to her room, and settle her as comfortably as she could on the bed. Mrs. Adair arranged the quilt over her, and then, closing the shutters, she said, "Now, darling, I am going to get you some quieting drink, and when you have taken it, you will go to sleep, and awake quite well."
Flora shivered—the thought of that awaking was so dreadful; but she remained silent, and Mrs. Adair left the room. She returned, however, after a short absence, with a strong sedative, which she made Flora take, and then she seated herself beside the bed.
Flora was completely worn out by want of rest and violent agitation, so that the sedative, aided by exhausted nature, caused her soon to fall into a deep sleep; and when Mrs. Adair heard her heavy regular breathing continue for some time, she stood up softly, and stole away. She went to Marie, who was anxiously waiting to hear of Flora, and told her that she had fallen asleep; then Mrs. Adair repaired to the drawing-room to see her son, who had just come from his hotel.
In answer to his question of where the girls were, and what it was that made her look so sad, she told him as much as she knew about this unfortunate affair of Flora's. It quite enraged him, and he hotly declared that no matter what Flora said, Mr. Earnscliffe must have behaved in some very strange manner, for that he never saw a girl so desperately in love as his sister was; therefore it was evident that she would never have broken off the marriage unless Mr. Earnscliffe himself had forced her to do it. He would go at once to Mr. Earnscliffe, and demand a full explanation.
Mrs. Adair was endeavouring to induce him to wait until Flora could give them a tolerably clear account of what had occurred, for as yet they were completely in the dark about it all, when the servant came in, and handed Mrs. Adair a letter. It was from Mr. Earnscliffe, and commenced—
"Madam,
"I feel that it is due to myself to write you a statement of what my conduct to your daughter has been from the time that I declared my love to her. Before I obtained from her a promise that she would become my wife, I told her the history of my life, although any allusion to the past was intensely painful to me; but I was determined that she should know what the great misfortune of my life had been before she accepted me.
"I told Miss Adair accordingly that years ago I had loved a beautiful girl and won her, but no sooner had I done so than I found that I was betrayed for another, and without ever seeing her again, I hurried out of England, leaving everything in my lawyer's hands. Miss Adair treated me then with angelic trustfulness, and, as you are aware, consented to be mine.
"Consequently I supposed that she accepted me fully understanding that it was after my marriage that I had been betrayed, and that I had got a divorce, for I had not the slightest idea that your Church arrogated to itself the power of making laws even for those who do not belong to it. But it seems that Miss Adair misunderstood me; she imagined that it was my betrothed, and not my wife, who had been false to me, until last night, when chance revealed to her the true state of the case; and this morning she deliberately informed me that she preferred to obey one of her Church's most daring and unreasonable fiats,—which declares that there is no such thing as divorce, even outside of its jurisdiction,—rather than act according to the dictates of reason, honour, and love, by fulfilling her promise to me.
"I have written this letter of explanation in order to show that I had not, as appearances would lead one to believe, any intention of concealing my wretched marriage from Miss Adair; this would have been base deceit; and from such a charge you will, I am sure, as Miss Adair does most fully, exonerate me. Early in life one woman betrayed me; ten years later another heartlessly sacrifices me to prejudice! Truly I owe women no gratitude!
"Edwin Earnscliffe.
"Hotel de Douvres,
"Rue de la Paix, Paris, June 14th."
"Poor, poor Flora! God help her!" exclaimed Mrs. Adair, as she finished reading the letter, and handed it to her son, who in his turn exclaimed, after having read it, "But how was it ever allowed to go so far without your knowing that Earnscliffe had been married?"
"Edward, all retrospection is useless now," answered Mrs. Adair, sadly; "but I do not think that any one has been to blame in this unhappy case. Mrs. Elton introduced us to Mr. Earnscliffe, in Rome, as an unmarried man, with whose father and mother her family had been very intimate, but they had died many many years ago, and she had lost sight of their son—he was a baby at the time of their death—until she met him on the Continent. She spoke in high terms of his personal abilities, his social position and fortune, and of these two latter advantages we know she thinks a great deal. How could I suppose then that it was necessary to make any further inquiries about him? And, as he says in his letter, he gave Flora a history of his life before he asked her to engage herself to him, which history she told me, but of course as she understood it, or, indeed, misunderstood it. All this misery has been caused by her unfortunate mistake; yet it was a most natural one. Mr. Earnscliffe evidently did not distinctly say that it was his wife who had been false to him; and Flora, supposing everybody to know that the Church does not recognise the divorce law, took it for granted that he had not been married, or else that he would not have thought of asking her—a Catholic—to be his. The only thing about which I was not satisfied was as to Mr. Earnscliffe's sentiments upon religion, and I besought of Flora not to marry him unless he would become a professed believer in Christianity, and at all events to wait a year, and thus let him have time to study its doctrines. But she would listen to nothing of the kind; he was in the true faith, she declared, because he had such an ardent desire of the knowledge of truth. From the first he consented to all the conditions required by the Church. Poor child, she could not bear to insist upon his waiting a year, and now she is obliged to send him away for ever. You, yourself, Edward, would scarcely have been able to keep up, if you had seen her as I did when we came in."
"Poor Flo! when can I see her?" he said, and furtively brushed away a tear; then he added, "I see now, mother, that you are right,—no one has been to blame; but it is one of the strangest and saddest occurrences imaginable; it is really worthy of Lady Georgiana Fullerton's title, 'Too Strange not to be True.' But tell me, when will poor Flo be visible?"
"Not till the evening, at all events; it will be better for her to remain perfectly quiet all day. You will come to dinner, of course."
"Yes; and there is nothing to be done now, I suppose; there would be no object in my seeing Earnscliffe?"
"None in the world; it would only give him an opportunity of railing at religion, and, as he says, at Flora's heartless sacrifice of his love to prejudice."
"Then I may as well go away, and try to kill time as well as I can until dinner; for of course you and Marie will be occupied with poor Flo. Good-bye, then, for the present."
As soon as he was gone, Mrs. Adair sat down and wrote:—
"My dear Mr. Earnscliffe,
"I beg to acknowledge the receipt of your letter, and to assure you that we all exonerate you perfectly from having had any intention to deceive us. Poor Flora's mistake was a most unfortunate one; but as soon as she learned what the reality was—how she learned it I do not yet know, for she has been unable to tell me anything—she could not have acted otherwise than she has done.
"However great your sufferings may be, hers far surpass them;—she has a double weight of sorrow to bear: her own, and the greater one—that of knowing that she has inflicted pain on one whom she loves, and that he has ceased to believe in her. Her first words on being roused from the fainting fit in which I found her when I came in were, 'He called me cold, passionless; he does not believe in me any longer;' and then she relapsed into insensibility. If this is heartlessness, I leave it to you to judge.
"Adieu, and believe me to be very sincerely yours,
"Caroline Adair.
"Paris, June 14th."
Having directed her letter, and desired it to be taken immediately to the Hotel de Douvres, for Mr. Earnscliffe, she went up to Flora's darkened room, where she found Marie watching beside the poor sleeper.
Mrs. Adair's note was handed to Mr. Earnscliffe, as he sat in his room with folded arms and his head drooping upon his breast. He seized it eagerly, tore it open, and glanced his eye over it; then crushing it up in his hand, and with his teeth firmly set together, he muttered, "Psha! let her Church, to whose senseless maxims she sacrifices me, console her! But I will show what that Church is, how its teaching is destructive of all the best qualities of the human heart and mind, since it can make such a creature as Flora Adair was act in direct contradiction to reason and love. It is too foolish to say that when a man is married only according to the laws of the established Church of England, that that Church has not the right to annul its own act. If Rome had had anything to do with my marriage, one could understand it; but as it is—damnation, it is unbearable!" and he stamped about the room,—then rang the bell furiously.
His servant came up with a startled look in his face, and the expression of surprise to be read there increased as his master said, "Desire my bill to be prepared, and have everything ready to start by the night train for Strasbourg."
"That's done," he exclaimed, as the servant retired. "By to-morrow I shall be in the Black Forest, and there I can stay for a day or two, and draw out the plan of my book; then if I settle myself in the neighbourhood of one of the large university towns, I shall not want for help in the way of books; and converse with the German philosophers will be pleasant and useful relaxation for me, so that in six months I may hope to have it in the publisher's hands. Now I must write letters to England, to countermand all my orders. Poor Earnscliffe Court! thou art doomed ever to be deserted! ever to be without a mistress!"
Sighing deeply, Mr. Earnscliffe opened his desk and began to write.