"I WAS THE MORE DECEIVED."
Milly Harrington had passed two months at Birchmead, and her grandmother's neighbors were beginning to speculate on the probabilities of her staying over the summer.
"Poor soul; it's lonely for her," Mrs. Chigwin said to her friend, Elizabeth. "I do hope that Mr. Beadon, or whatever her husband's name is, will come back before very long. She must be fretting for him, and fretting's so bad for her."
"You think there is a husband to come, do you?" asked Mrs. Bundlecombe, mysteriously.
"Why not, Bessy? She says she's married, and she wears a wedding-ring; and her clothes is beautiful."
"I'd like to see her marriage lines," said Mrs. Bundlecombe. "But, there! maybe I'm hard on her, poor thing, which I ought not to be, seeing that I know what trouble is, and how strangely marriages do turn out sometimes. But if there is a husband in the case, it's shameful the way he neglects her, never coming to see her, and going abroad on business, as she says, while she stays with her grandmother!"
"She pays Mrs. Harrington," remarked Mrs. Chigwin, reflectively, "and she always seems to have plenty of money; but she do look sad and mournful now and then, and money's not everything to those that want a little love."
As she concluded her moral observation, she started up, for a shadow darkened the open doorway: and on looking up, she saw that Milly herself was standing just outside. The girl's beautiful face was pale and agitated; and there were tears in her eyes. The old woman noticed that she was growing haggard, and that there were black lines beneath her eyes; they exchanged significant looks, and then asked her to step in and sit down.
"You run about too much and fatigue yourself," said Mrs. Chigwin. "Now you sit there and look at my flowers, how still they keep; they wouldn't be half so fine if I was always transplanting them. You want a good, quiet home for yourself: not to be moving about and staying with friends, however fond of you they may be."
Milly had sunk into the chair offered to her, with a look of extreme exhaustion and fatigue, but at Mrs. Chigwin's words she sat up, and her eyes began to grow bright again.
"I think so myself, Mrs. Chigwin. I shall be glad to get back to my own nice quiet home again. As for looking tired, it is only because I have been packing up my things and getting ready to go. Mr. Beadon has written to me to join him in London, and I am going to start this very afternoon."
The rosy color came back into her face: she smiled triumphantly, but her lips quivered as she smiled.
"That's right, my dear. I don't approve of young husbands and wives living separate, unless there's some very good cause for it," said Mrs. Bundlecombe, thinking of her beloved Alan. "It always gives occasion to the enemy, and I think you're very wise to go back. Perhaps you had some little bit of a tiff or misunderstanding with Mr. Beadon——"
"Oh no," said Milly. The color in her face was painfully hot now. "Mr. Beadon is always very good and kind. But," she continued, looking down and pushing her wedding-ring to and fro, "he is very busy indeed, and he is obliged to go abroad sometimes on business. He travels—I think he calls it—for a great London house. He is getting on very well, he says, in his own particular line."
"Ah, that is nice!" said Mrs. Chigwin, comfortably. "And how glad you will be to see each other."
"Oh, yes," faltered Milly. There was a curiously pathetic look in her great blue eyes such as we sometimes see in those of a timid child. "Yes—very glad."
"And you'll bring him down here to see your grandmother, I suppose? She's not set eyes on him yet, has she? And how nice it will be for you to come down now and then—especially when you have a family, my dear, Birchmead being so healthy for children, and Mrs. Harrington such a good hand with babies——"
Suddenly, and to Mrs. Chigwin's infinite surprise, Milly burst into tears. The loud, uncontrolled sobs frightened the two old women for a moment; then Mrs. Chigwin got up and fetched a glass of water, clicking her tongue against the roof of her mouth, and audibly expressing her fear that Milly's exertions had been "too much for her." But Mrs. Bundlecombe sat erect, with a look of something like disapproval upon her comely old face. She had her own views concerning Milly and her good fortune; and soft and kind-hearted by nature as she was, there were some things that Aunt Bessy never forgave. The wickedness of Alan's wife had hardened her a little to youthful womankind.
"I'm better, thank you," said Milly, checking her sobs at last, and beginning to laugh hysterically. "I don't know what made me give way so, I'm sure."
"You're tired, love," said Mrs. Chigwin, sympathetically, "and you're not well, that's easy to see. You must just take care of yourself, or you'll be laid up. You tell your good husband that from me, who have had experience, though without a family myself."
Milly wiped the tears away, and rose from her chair.
"I'll tell him," she said. "But—oh, there's no need: he takes an awful lot of care of me, you've no idea! Why, it was he that said I had better come to my grandmother while he was away: he knew that granny would take care of me; and now, you see"—with hasty triumph—"he wants me home again!"
She pocketed her handkerchief, and raised her head.
"I thought you said he had been abroad?" said Mrs. Bundlecombe.
"Of course I did, because he has been abroad," the girl said, laughing nervously. "But he's in London now. Well, good-bye, Mrs. Chigwin; good-bye, Mrs. Bundlecombe; you'll go in and comfort granny a bit when I'm gone, won't you? She's been fretting this morning about my going away."
"Bless you, love," said Mrs. Chigwin. "I'll go in every day if you think it will do her any good. And if you write to her, Milly, she'll be pleased, I'm sure."
"I will write," said Milly, in rather a shame-faced way. "I was so busy—or I'd have written oftener. Good-bye."
She looked at them wistfully, as if reluctant to take her leave; and her expression so wrought upon Mrs. Chigwin's feelings that she kissed the girl's cheek affectionately.
"Good-bye, love," she said; "you know where to find us when you want us, you know."
Milly departed, and the two friends remained silent until her light figure had passed the window, and the click of the garden gate told them that she was well out of hearing. Then Mrs. Chigwin began, in rather a puzzled tone:
"You weren't very hearty with her, Elizabeth. You looked as if you had something against her."
"I've this against her," said Mrs. Bundlecombe, smoothing down her black apron with dignity, "that I believe there's something wrong about that marriage, and that if I were Mrs. Harrington I wouldn't be satisfied until I'd seen her marriage lines."
"Perhaps she has seen them," said Mrs. Chigwin, the pacific. "And we've nothing to go upon, Bessy, and I'm sure the idea would never have entered my head but for you."
"Why did she burst out crying when you talked of her husband and children coming down here?" asked Mrs. Bundlecombe, acutely. "It may be that she isn't to blame; but there's something wrong somewhere. She's hurried and flurried and worried."
And this was true. The summons which Milly had received was of the briefest and least intelligible character. It was in a handwriting that she knew well, and although it was unsigned she was tremulously ready and eager to obey it at once. "Come back to your old lodgings at Hampstead," the writer said. "Do not stay any longer at Birchmead: I want you in London." And that was almost all.
Milly hovered all day long between alternations of wild hope and wild despair. If she had been accustomed to self-analysis, she herself might have been surprised to see how widely her present moods differed from those which had dominated her when she lived at Maple Cottage. She was then a vain, self-seeking little damsel, affectionate and uncorrupted, with an empty head, indeed, but an innocent heart. Now both self-seeking and vanity were being scourged out of her by force of the love which she had learnt to feel. She was little changed in manner, and an observer might have said that she was as childishly pleased as ever with a new gaud or a pretty toy; but behind the self-sufficiency of her demeanor, and the frivolity of her tastes, there was something new—something more real and living than mere self-indulgence and conceit. The faculty of giving and spending herself for others had sprung into being with the first love she had known. For the man with whom she had gone away from Lettice's house she was willing to lay down her life if he would but accept the gift. And when he seemed loath to accept it, Milly became conscious of a heart-sick shame and pain which had already often brought tears that were not unworthy to her pretty childish eyes. The strength of her own feelings frightened her sometimes: she did not know how to resist the surging tide of passion and longing and regret that rose and fell within her breast, as uncontrollable by her weak will as the waves by the Danish king of history. Poor Milly's soul had been born within her, as a woman's soul is often born through love, and the acquisition cost her nothing but pain as yet, although it might ultimately lead her to a higher life.
She arrived at the lodgings in Hampstead which had formerly been hers, about five o'clock in the afternoon. The landlady received her cordially, saying that "the gentleman had bespoke the rooms," and Milly was taken at once into the sitting-room, which looked west, and was lighted by a flood of radiance from the setting sun. Milly sank down on a sofa, in hopeless fatigue.
"Did he say that he would be home to-night?" she asked of the landlady.
"No, Mrs. Beadon, he didn't; but he said that he was very busy in the city and would write or send if he couldn't come himself."
"How was he looking?"
"Oh, very well, but a bit worried, I thought," said Mrs. Capper. "Now let me take your things, ma'am, and then I'll bring up the tea: you don't look as if your stay in the country had done you much good after all."
"Oh, I'm very well," said Milly, unfastening her mantle and coloring with nervousness under the woman's sharp eye. "I daresay Mr. Beadon will come to-morrow, if he doesn't come to-night."
But nobody came, although she sat up watching and waiting for many hours after Mrs. Capper had betaken herself to her bed. What did this silence and absence mean? Her heart contracted with a curious dread. She loved, but she had never believed herself capable of retaining love.
About eleven o'clock next day, she was informed that a gentleman wanted to speak to her. "A young-looking, fair gentleman, like a clerk," said Mrs. Capper. "Shall I show him up? It's from your good 'usband, most likely, I should think."
Milly started from the chair by the window, where she had been sitting. "Oh, show him up, at once, please."
With one hand on the table, and her delicate face flushed, she presented a picture of loveliness such as the man who entered did not often see. He even paused for a moment on the threshold as if too much amazed to enter, and his manner was somewhat uneasy as he bowed to her, with his eyes fixed in a rather furtive manner on her face.
He was a man of thirty-five, although his smooth-shaven face and fair hair made him look younger than his years. It was a commonplace countenance, shrewd and intelligent enough, but not very attractive. There was a certain honesty in his eyes, however, which redeemed the plainness of his insignificant and irregular features.
"Mrs. Beadon, I think?" he said. "My name's Johnson. I come from Mr.—Mr. Beadon with a message."
"Yes?" said Milly, her hand upon her side. "What is it, please? Tell me quickly—is he coming to-day?"
The man looked at her oddly. There was something like pity in his eyes.
"Not to-day, madam," he replied.
Milly sank down on her chair again and sighed deeply. The color left her cheeks.
"I have a communication to make, madam," said the clerk, rather hesitatingly, "which I am afraid may be a little painful, though not, Mr. Beadon tells me, unexpected by you. I hope that you will be prepared——"
"Go on," said Milly, sharply. "What is it? Why have you come?"
"Mr. Beadon wishes you to understand, madam, that he is going abroad again very shortly. He advises you to inform the landlady of this fact, which will explain his absence. But he also commissions me to put into your hands a sum for your present expenses, and to inform you that he will be quite willing to assist you at any time if you make application to him through me—at the address which I am to give you. Any personal application to himself will be disregarded."
"But, do you mean," said Milly, her cheeks growing very white, "that he is not coming—to say good-bye—before he goes abroad?"
"He thinks it better to spare you and himself an interview that might be unpleasant," said Mr. Johnson. "You understand, I suppose—a—that Mr. Beadon—my principal, that is—wishes to close his relations with you finally."
Milly started to her feet and drew herself to her full height. Her cheeks were blazing now, her eyes on fire. "But I am his wife!" she cried.
Johnson looked at her for a moment in silent admiration. He had not liked the errand on which he was sent, and he liked it now less than ever.
"Pardon me, madam," he said, in some embarrassment; "but Mr. Beadon is under the impression that you understand—that you have understood all along—that you were not legally in that position——"
"You mean," she said, her whole form quivering in her excitement, "that what he told me was false?—that when he said that our declaration before witnesses that we were man and wife was a true marriage—you mean that that was a lie?"
Johnson looked at the walls and the ceiling—anywhere but at poor Milly's agonized face.
"It was not a marriage, madam," he said, in a regretful tone.
"Then he—he—deceived me—purposely? Oh, he is wicked! he is base! And I thought myself—I thought myself——"
Her fingers clutched at the neck of her dress, as if to tear it open, and so relieve the swelling of her throat.
"Does he think that he can make it up to me with money? Oh, I'll take nothing from him any more. Let him go if he will, and his money too—I shall die and be forgotten—I won't live to bear the shame of it—the pain—the——"
She did not finish her sentence. Her slight form was swaying to and fro, like a reed shaken by the wind; her face had grown whiter and whiter as she went on: finally she flung up her arms and fell senseless to the floor. The end of all her hopes and fears—of all her joys and longing and desire, was worse to her than death.
Johnson lifted her to the sofa, with a sort of awkward tenderness, which perhaps he would not have liked to acknowledge to his master; and then, before summoning Mrs. Capper, he thrust into Milly's pocket the envelope containing the banknotes and the address which he had brought with him. He knew that his master was "doing the thing handsomely," as far as money was concerned, and he had no doubt but that the forsaken woman would see, when she had got over her first mad frenzy of despair, that she had better accept and use his gifts. So he stowed the envelope away in her pocket, so that it might not attract the curious eyes of prying servant or landlady.
Then he called to Mrs. Capper, and gave her a brief explanation of Milly's swoon. "The lady's a little overcome," he said. "Mr. Beadon has got to go abroad, and couldn't find time to see her before he went."
"Hard-heated brute!" said the landlady, as she chafed Milly's hands, and held a smelling-bottle to her nose.
"Oh, dear, no!" said Mr. Johnson, briskly. "Family ties must not stand in the way of business. I wish you good-day, and hope the lady will soon be better."
And he left the house rather hurriedly, for he had no desire to encounter the despairing appeal of Milly's eyes when she recovered from her swoon.
"It is a little too bad to make me his messenger," he said to himself. "He may do his dirty work himself another time. I thought she was quite a different sort of person. Poor thing! I wonder how he feels about her, or whether he feels anything at all."
He had an opportunity of putting his master's equanimity to the test when he made his report of the interview—a report which was made that very afternoon, in spite of his representations that Mr. Beadon had already gone abroad.
"Well, you saw her?" he was asked.
"Yes, sir. I said what you desired, and gave her the money."
"Any fuss?"
"She fainted—that was all," said Johnson, grimly.
"But she kept the money?"
"She had no choice. I put it into her pocket while she was unconscious, and then summoned the landlady."
"Ah, yes, that was right. And she understands——"
"Everything that you wish her to understand," said the clerk, with a touch of disrespect in his manner, which his employer noticed, and silently resented.
"Well, it had to be done, and the sooner the better," he said, turning away.
"So I suppose," said Johnson.