CHAPTER XXVIII. NIGHT ALARMS.
“Chris, what does this mean?”
Wyngham House being so near, Mrs. Abercarne and her daughter had returned on foot. They had not exchanged a single word on the way. It was not until they had reached the Chinese-room, and had sat down before the fire there, that Mrs. Abercarne thus broke the silence portentously.
Chris looked the picture of despair. The colour had again left her pretty cheeks; there were lines brought by anxiety in her fair young face; the tears were gathering in her eyes. And yet there was something comical in the look of resignation with which she deliberately sat down as soon as her mother had done so, determined to brave the matter out, and get her confession and her scolding over and done with. At her mother’s question, therefore, she drew a sigh which sounded like one of relief.
“It means, mother dear,” she began, frankly, “that—oh! dear, I know you’ll be so angry! And it will worry you besides! I wish you wouldn’t ask me. You might take it for granted I haven’t done anything dreadful, nothing more than I used to do when I was twelve, when I used to find love letters from Willie Mansfield behind the scraper, and answer them in the holly-bush so that he might prick his fingers when he got them.”
She ended with another sigh, as she rested her little round chin in her hand, and looked plaintively at the fire.
But Mrs. Abercarne was not to be put off like this.
“Christina,” she said solemnly, drawing herself up another inch, and looking at the fire herself, lest her daughter’s sighs should mollify her too soon, “I insist upon a full explanation. You have given me none. All I know at present is, that my daughter has so far forgotten what is due to herself as a gentlewoman, as to carry on a clandestine correspondence with some unknown person. I insist upon knowing at once who the person is.”
Chris looked at her dolefully.
“Oh, mother, won’t it do if I promise not to write again, and not to receive any more letters?”
“No, Christina, it will not do,” said Mrs. Abercarne, obstinately. “It is a matter of course that you will cease this correspondence. But, in the meantime, I insist on knowing the name of the person who has induced you to jeopardise your own self-respect.”
Whereupon Chris jumped up with a gesture indicating restlessness and despair.
“All right, mother! Now, don’t scream; it’s Mr. Richard—there!”
If a servant had suddenly appeared with the news that an invading army had landed at the pier-head, and was now surrounding the house, or that Lord Llanfyllin had poisoned Lady Llanfyllin and married his cook, poor Mrs. Abercarne would have been less utterly shocked and struck dumb than she was by this intelligence. For a few moments she could only stare at her daughter, who now, that the crisis was over, began to laugh half hysterically.
“Mr.—Richard,” the poor lady at last gasped out. “Mr. Richard—the lu—lu—lunatic? Oh! it isn’t possible! It’s too awful—too appalling! I—I—I shall die if it’s true!”
But Chris was getting better already. She slid down on her knees, and put her arm round her mother’s neck, unable now to restrain a wild inclination to laugh at her mother’s hopeless terror.
“No, you won’t, mother. Of course I couldn’t help knowing you’d be awfully angry, and so I put off telling you. But it’s not half as bad as you think. Dick’s no more mad than you or I.”
“Dick!” cried poor Mrs. Abercarne, with a shriek, which subsided into a moan. “To think of my daughter—my Christina, calling a m—m—madman Dick!”
“But when I tell you that he’s not mad, not mad at all,” insisted Chris, raising her voice a little to emphasise her words.
The words were hardly out of her mouth when she sprang up with a little cry.
Mr. Bradfield was in the room.
Chris became in an instant as red as she had been white before.
“Have you been listening?” she asked, impulsively.
“Sh-sh, Christina,” said her mother’s reproving voice.
But the intruder answered with great meekness:
“Well, I did hear what you were saying when I came in; and what’s more, I’m very glad I did, for you were making a statement which it’s my business to disprove. You were saying that somebody was not mad. Now, of course, you mean my unhappy ward, Richard.”
“Your unhappy ward!” retorted Chris, with spirited emphasis. “Yes, I do mean him.”
“You think he is not mad?”
“Not mad enough to be shut up, at any rate.”
He seemed taken aback by the girl’s boldness and straightforwardness, and he did not immediately answer, but left Mrs. Abercarne time to read her daughter a little lecture on the impropriety of her present behaviour, which, she said, was only the sequel to be expected to her conduct in deceiving her mother. Chris began to look distressed, but, before she could answer this accusation, Mr. Bradfield broke in:
“Never mind what she says, Mrs. Abercarne. She’s only a foolish girl, and it’s lucky we’ve found out this affair before he’s found an opportunity of dashing her silly brains out. He’s been worse than usual the last few days, and I’m expecting some sort of dangerous outbreak every day. Let us be thankful things have gone no further.”
And, affecting to take no further notice of Chris, he shook hands with Mrs. Abercarne, bade her good-night, and left the room with a curious look of sullen determination on his face, which frightened the younger lady so much that she was silent for some minutes.
At last she said, in a frightened whisper:
“Mother, what do you think he’s going to do? I never saw him look like that before.”
But she got no sympathy. Mrs. Abercarne was entirely on John Bradfield’s side, and expressed her opinion that whatever he did would be the proper thing to do. But, on the promise of Chris to cease all correspondence at once with Mr. Richard, a truce was patched up between mother and daughter, and the subject of contention was allowed to drop.
Poor Chris, however, felt that she could not so suddenly break off all communication with the unhappy Dick without one word of explanation. So she contrived to meet Stelfox that very night before she retired to her room, and without hiding the fact that she had been exchanging communications with his charge, begged him to tell Mr. Richard that she had been obliged to promise to do so no longer.
Stelfox, as usual, showed no surprise. He said he would deliver her message, and that was all.
It is not to be wondered at that, after such an exciting evening, Chris was unable to sleep. She now occupied a little bed in the same room with her mother’s large one; and presently, finding her own sad thoughts intolerable, she got up and very quietly crossed the corridor to the Chinese-room in search of a book.
Just as she reached the door, a noise, which seemed to come from the east wing at the opposite end of the house, caused her to turn her head quickly. There was no light in the corridor, so that she could see nothing. Her first idea was that burglars had got into the house, and she was on the point of running back to rouse her mother, and give the alarm, when she heard the unlocking of a door. It then flashed into her mind that it was, perhaps, Stelfox coming out of the east wing that had attracted her attention. Being determined to find out which of these two surmises was correct, and not wishing to alarm the household without cause, she went to the end of the corridor, without, however, venturing too near the spot whence the noise came. Chris was not particularly courageous, and the fear of meeting a real live burglar, caused her to tremble from head to foot. The noise went on all the time, until she reached the railing which surrounded the well of the staircase, and from here she could see a dark mass, which might have been anything, but which must, she supposed, be a human being, disappearing out of her sight from the bottom of the staircase into the hall. That was all she could see; and as she still leaned over the railing, the last sound died away, without her being able to tell whether the figure she had seen had left the house or not.
For a few moments she was absolutely paralysed with terror, and remained quite still in the cold, not daring to move, or to cry out, afraid even to turn round, lest she should find the hand of a burglar laid upon her mouth. At last, however, as she heard nothing more, she began slowly to recover her wits, and to wonder what it was she had seen, what she should do, and whether she was not making a great fuss about nothing.
Then followed shame at her own alarm, until at last she went back along the corridor, telling herself that the cause of her fright must have been a visit paid by Stelfox to his charge in the east wing. Of course, it might have been a burglar that she had seen, but then, on the other hand, it seemed more likely that it was not, for burglars usually find out, before entering a house, in what part of it the most valuable portable property is kept, and it was certainly not kept in the east wing.
So Chris, reassured, went into the Chinese-room, though not without a feeling that this was an exceedingly daring thing for her to do, after the fright she had had.
She had chosen her book, and was opening the door, when, her ears being more on the alert than usual, she heard another unusual noise, proceeding this time from the outside of the house. Kneeling upon the ottoman under the window at the west end of the corridor, she looked out, and saw to her horror a man staggering along across the grass in the direction of the sea, with a shapeless mass hanging over his shoulder; and as this shapeless mass defined itself, when her eyes became accustomed to the gloom, she saw that it was the body of a man.