TEMPTED.
"Man is the creature of circumstances," is a remark that few will deny. Those, however, who remember that "not a sparrow falls to the ground without our heavenly Father's knowledge" name these said circumstances "providences." If even a sparrow cannot fall unnoticed, will not the great Creator trouble Himself about the movements and actions of His creatures in a higher state of being, and for whom Christ died?
It was a mysterious providence which in so sudden and painful a manner removed the second wife of Arthur Franklyn from the evil to come, but it led to important results, and influenced the future of more than one of the persons mentioned in our story.
The pendule on the mantelpiece of the drawing-room pointed to ten minutes to six on the day of this sad occurrence, and Mrs. Armstrong, who had still some misgivings about Mary and her pony carriage, began to feel very anxious. She rose and entered the dining-room, where the parlourmaid was laying the cloth. "Margaret," she said, "I fear something has happened to detain your master and Miss Mary. Where is Rowland? send him at once to the station; they ought to have been home half an hour ago."
The girl turned to obey, but she had scarcely left the room, when Mrs. Armstrong saw the pony carriage drive to the gate, and hastened out to meet its occupants. "What has detained you? Oh, how glad I am to see you here safe and well!"
"Of course we are all safe and well," said her husband, in a cheerful voice, as he led her to the drawing-room, "but the fact is, a lady was taken ill in our railway carriage, and this caused some delay; so make yourself comfortable, dearest, while we get ready for dinner; you shall hear all about it by-and-by."
Jack had recovered himself during the drive home, but he hastened at once to his room, and remained there till he heard his mother go downstairs, for he feared being questioned by Mrs. Armstrong after her husband's caution to him.
Although unaccustomed to give way to fine lady nervousness, Mr. Armstrong knew that his wife had not quite lost the natural timidity which once nearly cost Maria St. Clair her life.
But Mary knew her mother best: after the rest had left the drawing-room she placed her arm tenderly round her neck, and said, "Mamma darling, you need not wait for 'by-and-by,' I will tell you the worst at once. A poor lady who sat opposite cousin Sarah in the railway carriage was taken ill on the journey and died before they arrived at the station."
"Oh, how very shocking!" said Mrs. Armstrong. "Was she alone?"
"No, her husband was with her, but he appeared too stunned to do anything, so cousin Sarah held the poor dying lady in her arms till the train stopped, and then papa went to find a doctor."
"I am glad you have told me, my dear," said Mrs. Armstrong, "anything is better than suspense, and I should have pictured to myself all sorts of horrors."
"Yes, mamma, I knew that, or I should not have told you, but I must go and prepare for dinner; I have only three minutes, so it is well I changed my dress before I started for the station."
No one at the table noticed the effects on cousin Sarah of the shock she had received; yet she was a woman of warm deep feelings, railway travelling was a comparative novelty to her, and the terrible delay from the impossibility of stopping the train, added to the awe she felt when the poor woman died in her arms, had greatly shaken her nerves.
Very little, however, was said on the subject during dinner, but in the evening, when Mrs. Armstrong listened with painful interest to her description of what had occurred, she could perceive how acutely cousin Sarah felt the effects of the scene she had witnessed.
By degrees the conversation turned upon the persons mixed up with these sad circumstances, and then Mrs. Armstrong heard with surprise the name of the messenger Mary had sent to look for her father, and his close relationship to the husband of the lady so suddenly deprived of life.
"Mr. Henry Halford had but one sister living when we first became acquainted with his family," remarked Mrs. Armstrong, "and she died in Australia two years ago."
"This must be a second wife, then," said cousin Sarah, who had her own reasons for wishing to know all that could be learnt respecting Mr. Halford's family; "do you remember the name of Miss Halford's husband, Mary?"
"Here is his card," said Mr. Armstrong, looking up from his newspaper and throwing the harmless missive on the table as he spoke; "you will receive a visit from him to-morrow, no doubt; he asked to be allowed to call and thank me for my kindness, and so forth; so you can accept these thanks, cousin Sarah, they belong to you by right."
"Franklyn," said Mrs. Armstrong, taking up the card and reading it, "is that the name, Mary?"
"Yes, mamma," she replied, in a quiet voice, for her father held his paper on one side to look at her while she spoke. "I read a notice of Mrs. Franklyn's death in the Times, and it also stated that she was the daughter of Dr. Halford of Englefield Grange."
Mr. Armstrong then continued his reading. Cousin Sarah had noticed the look of fierce inquiry on his face as his daughter spoke, and recalling Mary's troubled countenance and her father's remarks about the Halfords, she felt more than ever determined to interfere.
She made one remark, however, which brought a sudden flush to Mary's face—
"This Mr. Franklyn told Dr. West in my presence that he and his wife had recently arrived in England from Melbourne, and that they were on their way to visit the father of his first wife, Dr. Halford, at Englefield Grange, with whom his children were now staying, so no doubt this gentleman was the husband of Dr. Halford's daughter, and the father of the young people we saw on Sunday."
In spite of a look of disgust which passed over the countenance of Mr. Armstrong, his wife could not resist a few approving remarks about the young people referred to, till at length Mr. Armstrong exclaimed, "Come, Mary, give us a little music, we have heard quite enough of our unfortunate fellow-passenger and his antecedents; if he comes to-morrow you can treat him with politeness, and there the matter will end."
Mary rose hastily to obey, she was glad to turn her back on those present, for the explanation respecting the young visitors at Englefield Grange had lifted a weight from her heart and made her eyes brighter, and the colour on her cheeks deeper than they had been for months. Yes, she could sing now; and as Jack listened, and remembered that this was his last evening at the Limes, he inwardly resolved that when he was old enough, and had made a fortune like Cousin Armstrong, he would marry a wife exactly like Cousin Mary.
Altogether it had been a day of excitement; and when Mary entered her bedroom a feeling of hope—the foundation of which she could scarcely account for—seemed to fill her heart. She lay awake for some time, trying to realise certain causes from which this hope seemed to spring. Her meeting with Henry Halford at the station—the absence of displeasure in her father's manner, which she dreaded would follow her sudden impulse to send him as a messenger—above all, the discovery that she had mistaken one of Mr. Henry Halford's nieces for perhaps his intended wife—and last, but not least, an impression that Cousin Sarah was favourable to the Halfords, and in some way able to influence her father—these reflections, added to the certainty in her own mind that Henry Halford had taken his degree and would soon go up for ordination, seemed so full of hope that they acted with a soothing influence on the young girl's heart, till at length she slept.
Very different from the innocent hopes of Mary Armstrong were the reflections that haunted the chamber of Arthur Franklyn that night at Englefield Grange. The painful event of his second wife's sudden death, and the necessity for an inquest, had spread consternation over the household, and excited great sympathy.
To his surprise, no one sympathised with him more deeply than his eldest daughter, for he remembered how openly she had resented his second marriage. But to the memory of this resentment he now owed Clara's sympathy; remorse for having been at times rude and unkind to the woman who must have suffered so much to cause such a sudden death, filled the young girl's heart.
But even her gentle cares and attentions could not soothe the father's sorrow till he observed that this apparently great grief for his second wife created some little surprise among the relatives of Fanny Halford, who was the mother of his children.
On discovering this he roused himself, and as some excuse for his sorrow, acknowledged the fact of his having hurried her to the train.
"I feel almost as if I were Louisa's murderer," he said "for I remember now how she gasped for breath when we reached the platform."
"No, no, Arthur, do not think anything so painful," said Dr. Halford; "she had never spoken to you of her heart being diseased, or I am sure you would have been more careful, yet I can quite understand how the circumstance troubles you."
Troubled him! Yes, we must do Arthur Franklyn the justice to own that the recollection pained him greatly, but what was that memory compared to the fact that his wife's death before signing certain documents would inevitably cause his utter ruin?
He had that day obtained from his lawyer a document signed by the two trustees of his wife's property, authorizing her to draw out 2000l. for her husband's use.
On the strength of this he had taken furnished apartments for three months, and he and his wife were on their way to fetch the children from Englefield Grange on the day which had ended so fatally.
The lawyer, Mr. Norton, to whom Henry had introduced his brother-in-law, resided at Kilburn, and an arrangement had been made for him to meet his clients at the Grange and for Henry to witness Mrs. Franklyn's signature.
All this Arthur Franklyn remembered as he paced his bedroom long after midnight, and knew that the fortune, to obtain which he had married a second time, was lost to him for ever.
Had he only secured for himself the 2000l. he might have been saved from ruin, but now even that was denied him—that which had already cost him so much. To obtain the consent of the trustees he had made false statements of his position in Melbourne, and of the merchants whom he affirmed were ready to receive him as a partner.
Mrs. Franklyn had herself proved at first his greatest difficulty. She was a woman who thought only of self; she had been a widow for six years, and during that time had saved from her income several hundred pounds, which in the first happy days of her marriage she had made over to Arthur, and afterwards regretted the generous impulse. She had concealed from him the fact that her property was vested in the power of trustees, and when the hundreds in the Melbourne bank were being transferred to her husband's name she had said laughingly, "There is nothing to thank me for, Arthur, what is mine is yours now."
Arthur Franklyn would never have made a good lawyer, even had he continued to follow his profession; but he knew well enough that his power over the property of his intended wife should have been secured before their marriage, and this he dared not attempt to do in an open and straightforward manner, because his own affairs were in a state of hopeless insolvency.
Not only so, but he quickly discovered that he had a rival in the affections of the lady he wished to marry, and that rival was money. To ask her the question whether her property was at her own disposal was one he dared not venture upon. With his usual want of prudence, therefore, he determined to chance it, and trust to his own power of persuasion to obtain money when he wanted it, even should there be trustees looming in the distance.
And now, just as all difficulties had been overcome, and his most sanguine hopes realised, comes this terrible destruction to all his schemes.
"Had Louisa only lived another day," he said to himself, "all might have been well; but now—ruin, poverty, and disgrace are all that are left for me and my children." Yet even at this critical moment, had he been truthful and candid instead of trusting with his usual self-sufficiency that he should overcome this difficulty as he had done others before—had he made a confidant of his brother-in-law, and told him the whole truth, what a terrible amount of sorrow and remorse he might have been spared.
But no, he could not so humiliate himself to his first wife's relations. What! own his real position, and ask for help and sympathy after boasting of the style in which he and Fanny had lived, and of the superior education he had given his children?
No, never! Something he must do to prevent this, but what?
Is there an evil spirit at hand ready to answer such a question from the man or woman who hesitates to follow the right path?
Alas! too often yes. At least, it was so in the case of Arthur Franklyn; at this moment an evil suggestion arose in his mind from which he recoiled with a shudder. Ah! had he then fallen on his knees and prayed for power to resist the fearful temptation that now presented itself, that power would have been given him, and by peaceful sleep the nerves which were overwrought after the exciting events of the day would have been calmed and soothed.
But Arthur Franklyn had yet to learn the weakness and treachery of his own heart, through a fiery ordeal which he was now about to prepare for himself.
A gas burner projected from the wall on either side of the dressing-table; one of these only he had lighted on entering, and shrinking from the glare, he had lowered it nearly out while pacing the room in an agony of thought.
Now he approached the dressing-table, turned the one gas burner on full, and lighted the other. Then he started back at the reflection of his own face in the glass; pale and haggard, eyes aflame with excitement, and lips reddened and parched with fever. For a moment fear made him pause—only for a moment. Flinging sober thought to the winds, he drew a chair to the table, pushed aside pincushion, toilet-cover, and ornaments, and took from his pocket a pencil and two letters.
For at least an hour he continued to write on scraps of paper torn from his pocket-book.
The dawn of a May morning was stealing through the staircase windows as Arthur Franklyn descended cautiously to the hall. On a table, near the entrance, as he well remembered, stood an inkstand and pens; these he carried upstairs and re-entered his room, in which the gas still burnt brightly, and closed the door carefully, to exclude the fast-increasing light of day. He was white now even to the lips as he again seated himself at the table, and drew from his breast coat pocket a document on which he signed, two names with different pens.
Even in the midst of his evident excitement his hand was firm. Then he dashed down the pen, to the great detriment of the toilet-cover, turned off the gas, and threw himself on the bed dressed as he was, to try and lose in the sleep of forgetfulness for a time a memory of what he had done.
The old school-bell for breakfast woke him next morning from a heavy sleep, and also awoke in him painful memories of olden times, when a happy innocent lad, he had so often answered its summons.
He rose hastily, bathed his face, and battled for a time with the emotions that overpowered him. Strange to say, the memories of his youthful days strengthened, his determination to carry out what he had last night begun.
"Could he allow the children of his lost Fanny to starve in poverty, or to feel that their father could support them no longer?"
No! impossible! he must carry it through—she, his second wife, would have done it had she lived; no one would be injured, the money was his morally, and if not quite legally, that was of no consequence.
This decision produced a kind of calm, like the effects of an opiate, so that when he appeared at breakfast the haggard look of excitement was gone; the pale, calm face created a feeling of sympathy, more especially in the warm heart of Kate Marston, whom Fanny's children had already learnt to love.
During the day when he attended the inquest he listened with almost stoical indifference to a detail of the circumstances attending his wife's death. He answered the questions put to him by the coroner calmly and truthfully; not even the examination of the medical man, from whose evidence he learnt that a post-mortem examination had taken place, could rouse in him the slightest interest.
Yet the pale and sorrowful expression of his face excited the sympathy of those present, especially while being questioned by the coroner.
"You were then not aware that your wife was suffering from disease of the heart, Mr. Franklyn?"
"No," he replied, "not in the least; she never gave me reason to suppose that such was the case, even by a hint."
"And I believe you hurried to the station on the day of the occurrence?"
A kind of spasm passed over the face of Arthur Franklyn, and his lips quivered as he replied—
"I have reason to remember that we did so, owing to my watch being five minutes too fast."
"We will not pain you with any further questions, Mr. Franklyn," said the coroner; and Arthur bowed as he moved to give place to Mrs. John Armstrong, feeling conscious that he did not deserve the sympathy too evident in the looks of those around him.
What did they know of the terrible results to him of that hurried run to the train? What could any one know of the one absorbing thought which seemed to banish all others from his mind, and make him speak and move like a man in a dream?
Nothing, not a shadow of the truth; and yet, while conscious that, like the somnambulist, he was steadily making his way to certain destruction, all power to stop his downward progress seemed to have deserted him; he had taken the first false step, and the result appeared inevitable.
During that sad week, in the darkened rooms, with the coffin containing the lifeless form of his second wife occupying the room which once belonged to Fanny Halford, he still wore that look of forced submission which is so much like despair.
On the day of the funeral, when the playground voices at Englefield Grange were silent and subdued, when the children of his first wife shed tears of childish sorrow by the coffin of the second, when his father-in-law and Henry looked with pitying eyes for the last time at the shrouded form of Louisa Franklyn, still beautiful even in death, Arthur showed no sympathy, no change in face or manner; not even when he saw Kate Marston weeping over the little Albert, the motherless boy of her lost Fanny.
Indeed, Mrs. Halford's death had been too recent for any in that house to look with indifference so soon after on the insignia and trappings of woe. Arthur alone seemed callous and indifferent, while all around were in tears. Yet although they pitied him, not one in that family circle could have guessed his secret.
In the midst of all these exciting events and mournful surroundings Henry Halford did not forget that the appointed day for his ordination was drawing near. He avoided all reference to it, however, although Arthur Franklyn had more than once missed him, and knew that an efficient substitute had been provided to take his place in the schoolroom during his absence at the bishop's examination.
A week's respite from school duties occurring at Whitsuntide, Henry had previously promised to spend that time with his friend Horace Wilton. He had hesitated, in consequence of recent events, to speak of leaving home till after the funeral, and still felt reluctant to desert Arthur while he remained at the Grange. From one of the children, however, the matter became known to Arthur on the Friday evening before Whit-Sunday. Henry had tempted his brother-in-law to a walk round the garden, and was speaking to him of his approaching ordination, and other matters connected with it, when they were joined by Mabel.
The little girl had become very fond of her uncle, and as she clung to his arm while they slowly paced the garden walk she listened to the conversation between the gentlemen with great interest.
Presently, in a pause, Mabel said—
"Uncle Henry, are you not going to Oxford tomorrow?"
"Well, my dear," he replied, "I have not quite made up my mind; the truth is, Arthur," he added, turning to his brother-in-law, "my friend Horace Wilton has invited me to spend a few days with him during Whitsuntide."
"Then why not go?" said Arthur; "the change will be of benefit to you, and brace up your nerves for the ordeal on Sunday week."
"It seems so ungracious to leave you in your trouble for the gratification of myself; perhaps, however, I may run down to Oxford to-morrow and return on Monday."
"No, Henry, pray do not shorten your visit on my account; I shall very likely be in London nearly all next week—go in, Mabel," he added, observing his little daughter's earnest face; and as she obeyed, Henry replied earnestly to his remark: "Indeed, Arthur, you ought not to think of leaving us yet—you require a week or two longer of perfect rest before returning to business. I suppose there is nothing that requires immediate attention?" he asked, without a shadow of suspicion that the question would inflict a pang on the heart of his brother-in-law.
Controlling himself, he replied, "Nothing more important than examining poor Louisa's papers. I have put off the ordeal for a week, I had not sufficient fortitude even to think of it. But it must be done very shortly, and her desk and other matters are at our apartments in London. I shall perhaps only stay a few days this time, but I must rouse myself soon and return to business for the sake of my children."
"Then shall I find you at the Grange on my return?" said Henry.
"I shall no doubt remain in town at least a week," replied Arthur, "therefore you need not put off your visit on my account; and there is the summons to tea," he exclaimed as Mabel reappeared. "Your uncle and I are coming presently, my dear; go in and tell Miss Marston," and then, in a low hurried voice as soon as they were alone, he said: "Henry, pray don't speak of my visit to London before your father or Kate; I could not endure to discuss the subject with them."
Henry promised to be silent, yet wondering at the request. To him no relief could be greater than to unburden his heart to a true friend in any pressing anxiety. But Arthur's anxiety was not of a nature to be confided to another, and as they walked to the house he inwardly resolved that he would escape as quickly as possible from the scrutiny of the anxious eyes at the Grange, and from the memories which were revived by its associations, and rendered more painful by recent sad events.