Volume Four—Chapter Sixteen.
The Flight.
“I am so weak, my child,” sighed Mrs Hallam, “that my heart fails me. What shall I do?”
Julia stood over her dressed for flight, and a chill of despair seized her.
“Oh, mother, try—try,” she whispered.
“I am trying, Julie. I am fighting so hard, but you cannot realise the step I am trying to take; you cannot see it, my child, as it is spread before me.”
“Let us stay then,” whispered Julie, “and to-morrow I will appeal to Sir Gordon to come to our help.”
“No,” said Mrs Hallam, firmly, as if the words of her child had given her strength, “we can ask help of no one in such a strait as this, Julie; the act must be mine and mine alone; but now the time has come, my child, I feel that it is too much.”
“Mother!” sobbed Julie, “that man horrifies me. You heard all that my father said. I would sooner die than become his wife.”
Mrs Hallam caught her arm with a sharp grip, and remained silent for a few moments. “Yes,” she said at last, “and much as I love you, my own, I would sooner see you dead than married to such a man as he. You have given me the courage I failed in, my darling. For myself, I would live and bear until the end; but I am driven to it—I am driven to it. Come.”
They were standing in the dark, and now for the time being Mrs Hallam seemed transformed. Gathering her cloak about her, she went quickly to the door and listened, and then turned and whispered to Julia.
“Come at once,” she said. “Follow me down.” Julia drew a long breath and followed her, trembling, the boards of the lightly-built house cracking loudly as she passed quickly to the stairs. And again in the silence and darkness these cracked as they passed down.
In the hall Mrs Hallam hesitated for a moment, and then, putting her lips to Julia’s ear:
“Stop!” she whispered.
Julia stood listening, and with her eyes strained towards where a light shone beneath the ill-fitting study-door from which, in the stillness, the heavy stertorous breathing of Hallam could be heard. She could hear, too, the faint rustle of Mrs Hallam’s dress as she paced along the hall; and as Julia gazed in the direction she had taken, the light that streamed from beneath, and some faint rays from the side, showed indistinctly a misty figure which sank down on its knees and remained for a few moments.
The silence was awful to the trembling girl, who could not repress a faint cry as she heard a loud cough coming from beyond the dining-room.
But she, too, drew her breath hard, and set her teeth as if the nearness of her enemy provoked her to desperate resistance, and she stood waiting there firmly, but wondering the while whether they would be able to escape or be stopped in the act of flight by Crellock, whom she knew to be watching there.
She dare not call, though she felt that her mother was again overcome by the terrors of the step they had resolved to take, and the moments seemed interminable before there was a change in the light beneath the door, and a faint rustle mingled with the heavy breathing. Then her hand was clasped by one like ice in its coldness, and, as if repeating the prayer she had been uttering, Julia heard her mother say in a faint whisper:
“It is for her sake—for hers alone.”
Julia drew her into the drawing-room as they had planned, and closed the door. Then Mrs Hallam seemed to breathe more freely.
“The weakness has passed,” she said softly. “We must lose no time.”
They crossed the room carefully to where a dim light showed the French window to be, and Mrs Hallam laid her hand upon it firmly, and turned the fastening after slipping the bolt.
“Keep a good heart, my darling,” she said. “You are not afraid?”
“Not of our journey, mother,” said Julia in agitated tones; “but of—a listener.”
“Hist!” whispered Mrs Hallam, drawing back; and the window which she had opened swung to with a faint click, as the firm pace of Crellock was heard coming along the verandah; and as they stood there in the darkness they could see the dim figure pass the window.
Had he stretched forth a hand, he would have felt the glass door yield, and have entered and found them there; and, knowing this, they stood listening to the beating of their hearts till the figure passed on and they heard the step of the self-constituted sentry grow faint on the other side of the house.
“Julie, are you ready?”
“Yes, mother; let us go—anywhere, so that I may not see that man again.”
Mrs Hallam uttered a sigh of relief, for her child’s words had supplied her once more with the power that was failing.
“It is for her sake,” she muttered again. Then, in a low whisper: “Quick! your hand. Come.” And they stepped out into the verandah, drew the door to without daring to stop to catch it, and the next minute they were threading their way amongst the trees of the garden, and making for the gate.
The darkness was now intense, and though the faint twinkling of lights showed them the direction of the town, they had not gone far before they found themselves astray from the path, and after wandering here and there for a few minutes, Mrs Hallam paused in dread, for she found that there was now another enemy in her way upon which she had not counted.
She spoke very calmly, though, as Julia uttered a gasp.
“The wind is rising,” she said, “and it will soon grow lighter. Let us keep on.”
They walked on slowly and cautiously in and out among the trees of what was, in the darkness, a complete wilderness. At times they were struggling through bushes that impeded their progress, and though time after time the track seemed to be found, they were deceived. It was as if Nature were fighting against them to keep them within reach of Hallam and his friend, and, though they toiled on, a second hour had elapsed and found them still astray.
But now, as they climbed a steep slope, the wind came with a gust, the clouds were chased before it, there was the glint of a star or two, and Mrs Hallam uttered an exclamation.
“There!” she cried, “to the left. I can see the lights now.”
Catching Julia’s hand more firmly, she hurried on, for the night was now comparatively light, but neither uttered a word of their thoughts as they gave a frightened glance back at a dim object on the hill behind, for they awoke to the fact that they had been wandering round and about the hill and gully, returning on their steps, and were not five hundred yards away from their starting-point.
At the end of a quarter of an hour the stars were out over half the vault of heaven, and to their great joy the path was found—the rough track leading over the unoccupied land to the town.
“Courage! my child,” whispered Mrs Hallam; “another hour or two and we shall be there.”
“I am trying to be brave, dear,” whispered back Julia as the track descended into another gully; “but this feeling of dread seems to chill me, and—oh! listen!”
Mrs Hallam stopped, and plainly enough behind them there was the sound of bushes rustling; but the sound ceased directly.
“Some animal—that is all,” said Mrs Hallam, and they passed on.
Once more they heard the sound, and then, as they were ascending a little eminence before descending another of the undulations of the land, there came the quick beat of feet, and mother and daughter had joined in a convulsive grasp.
“We are followed,” panted Mrs Hallam. “We must hide.”
As she spoke they were on the summit of the slope, with their figures against the sky-line to any one below, and in proof of this there was a shout from a short distance below, and a cry of “Stop!”
“Crellock!” muttered Mrs Hallam, and she glanced from side to side for a place of concealment, but only to see that the attempt to hide would be only folly.
“Can you run, Julie?” she whispered.
For answer Julia started off, and for about a hundred yards they ran down the slope, and then stopped, panting. They could make no further effort save that of facing their pursuer, who dashed down to them breathless.
“A pretty foolish trick,” he cried. “Mercy I found you gone, and came. What did you expect would become of you out here in the night?”
“Loose my hand,” cried Julia angrily; “I will not come back.”
“Indeed, but you will, little wifie. There, it’s of no use to struggle; you are mine, and must.”
“Julia, hold by me,” cried Mrs Hallam frantically. “Help!”
“Hah!”
That ejaculation was from Crellock, for as Mrs Hallam’s appeal for help rang out amongst the trees of the gully into which they had descended, there was the dull sound of a heavy blow, and their assailant fell with a crash amongst the low growth of scrub.
“This way,” said a familiar voice. “Do you want to join Thisbe King?”
“Yes, yes,” cried Julia, sobbing now; “but how did you know?”
“How did I know!” was the reply, half sadly, half laughingly. “Oh, I have played the spy: waiting till you wanted help.”
“Christie Bayle!” wailed Mrs Hallam; “my friend in need.”
He did not answer. He hardly heard her words as Mrs Hallam staggered on by his side, for two little hands were clinging to his arm, Julia’s head was resting against him, as she nestled closer and closer, and his heart beat madly, for it seemed to him as if it was in his breast that Julia Hallam would seek for safety in her time of need.