CHAPTER V.
Not Ariadne passioning for Theseus’ flight ever felt such grief as mine was then. Felix must have gone back to town in one of the trains that whizzed past mine as I made the dreadful journey home. I had lost my last chance by missing that earlier train at Waterloo. Thirty-five minutes earlier, and we should not have whizzed past each other in silent misery, and I might have been saved. If only I could have seen him! I should have thrown myself upon his bosom, and clung to him and entreated him. I should have poured out to him the whole story of my wickedness and my sorrow, have forced him to believe in my remorse and my love. I would have held him fast and never let him go. And he who loved me so much, seeing my misery, seeing my real love, would have been unable to tear himself away. But now, he had gone, he had said good-bye, and all was over. I staggered where I stood, and the frightened dressmaker came over to me and supported me. There was no strength left in me any more. She led me upstairs, and took off my wet things, and put me to bed like a baby.
Mute and unresisting I let her do as she would with me. Then she fetched the charwoman to light my fire, and they whispered together, and through my chilled stupor I could feel both were full of deep concern. They brought me some hot drink later on, and I drank it after they had implored me long, drank it just to be left in peace.
All through the night I lay there, cold, quiet, stupid. There had come upon me a frost, a killing frost, and dead were the tender leaves of hope. Sleep fled far away, and left me a watcher of mine own heart’s sorrow. My bright day was done. I was for the dark; and no glimpse was given to me, as to Charmian, of the far-off break in the clouds, and the eastern star.
Never once during the miserable Sunday that followed that endless night did I leave the house. I feared lest by some chance Felix might come back and find me again absent. All the day long I watched from the window, straining my eyes across the wide common even after light had waned. Vain effort! No dark figure came towards me, such as I had seen many a time before when waiting eagerly for Felix.
A second night. Again no sleep came near me. I think I was touched with madness that second night. Whenever I closed my eyes I saw the wide dreary common, and far away a dark figure which came on and on, yet never drew nearer. On the Monday, although I knew it would be a fruitless watch, I again set myself to stare out of the window across the common. When the luncheon hour approached Anne came and forcibly drew me away.
“Miss Gwynne,” she said, “I really must not allow you to go on like this any longer. You will have a serious illness. Will you not tell me what is wrong? Do, dear child; in some way I might be able to help. When we are in trouble we never know from what quarter help may come. Tell me, tell me, dear!”
“I have lost Felix,” I said, breaking down suddenly into wild sobs. “I have lost Felix. He has said good-bye to me. He will never come back to me again.”
“Oh! my dear, I hope it is not so bad as that.”
“Hope! There is no hope. I have been guilty of a base and cruel sin, and this is my punishment. God is punishing me: there is no hope when He punishes.”
“Oh, my dear! don’t say that. I think there is more hope than when man does. Let us try to do something better for you than staring out of that window. Can’t we go after Mr. Felix? He’s so fond of you I am sure if he could see your poor changed face he’d forgive you anything!”
Could there yet be hope? Oh, Eastern Star! are you there, behind the clouds? My heart beat wildly at the thought.
“Oh, yes! let us do that, let us go at once after Felix,” I cried, a fever of impatience rising within me, and taking the place of the cold numbness which had possessed me before.
“Very well,” said Anne, “we will go, but not until you have eaten a solid luncheon. I will take no step from here until you have done that.”
I saw by her face she was determined, so followed her into the dining-room. So deep a horror did I now feel of the great city, I had not the courage to start off by myself. I forced some solid food down my throat, the barouche was ordered, and in half an hour we were on the weary way to London. It was half past two when we reached Waterloo. Two days ago the place had breathed to me of pleasant anticipation, now it was full of distressing associations. The bench against the wall wore a terrible look of familiarity, so did the loungers who stared at me on the wide platform. The face of the clock was as the face of an inexorable enemy. “Too late,” it had said to me when I was striving to hasten away from London, and then it had lagged through the minutes which lost me Felix. “Too late,” it said now to my anxious heart, when I was hastening back. It seemed to me ages before we could get a cab, and again did miles and miles of streets seem to lie twixt me and my goal.
I flew up the stairs when I reached the house where Felix lodged, on and on towards the top where he had often said he lived. The first door I came to I opened. The room within was small and had a deserted look. A fire was dying in the grate, pieces of brown paper and lengths of twine lay about on the floor. One who had inhabited it had been packing there and had gone. Flushing all over with almost unbearable misery I tore at the bell. The landlady had been following me upstairs, and entered now with Anne. A stout woman with a big pale face and dark eyes that looked curiously at me.
“You are too late if you want to see Mr. Gray,” she said. “He has just left. He gave up these rooms suddenly and has gone abroad to join a relation; his grandmother, I think he said.”
As she spoke her face seemed to me to change, and to become enormously big and white like that of my inexorable enemy the clock. I think I was near swooning at that moment.
“Has he left any address?” asked Anne, divining by instinct the question I had not strength to put myself.
“None whatever. He made up his mind very suddenly; in fact I don’t think on Saturday he had any intention of going abroad at all. I heard nothing of it until Sunday at any rate. All yesterday he was very busy arranging his affairs, and this morning he paid his bill, and a week’s rent instead of notice. He took everything away with him and said he should not be returning. Poor gentleman! He looked very ill. There was some trouble I am sure, but he was not one to talk about himself. I’m sorry I can’t give you his address, but he gave me no hint of where he was going any more than of why he was going. All I know for certain is that he drove off to catch the club train, 3 P.M. from Victoria. Perhaps if you drove after him at once you might be just in time to say good-bye. You are not far from Victoria Station here.”
Strength came back to me at this suggestion. “Come,” I cried, seizing hold of Anne’s cloak, and almost dragging her out of the room. Almost as excited as I, she rushed after me down the stairs, and a moment later we were tearing along the streets to Victoria. We wasted five precious minutes by going first to an utterly wrong part of the station. I was nearly frantic when I discovered this mistake, and no porter seemed to have time to attend to us. At length a gentleman took pity on our helplessness, and offered us his services.
“The club train, for going abroad—I must catch it,” I said feverishly.
“You are on quite a wrong platform. This is the Brighton and South Coast line, you want the London, Chatham, and Dover. I doubt if you’ll catch the club train, but we’ll see. Follow me—this way.”
We followed quickly where he led but it seemed a long way from the one line to the other.
“Ah! Just in time! There’s your train!” exclaimed our guide when at last we reached the right platform.
Yes, there it was, just a little ahead, to the right. I ran wildly forward, my heart beating almost to suffocation. The others followed me.
“Oh, by Jove! Hard luck, the train’s off!” exclaimed the stranger-friend behind me.
My knees trembled beneath me and I came suddenly to a full stop.
“And there he is!” screamed Anne. “Oh, look Miss, in that saloon carriage, bending down. Oh, somebody, stop the train!”
Just for an instant, as the train sped by, I caught sight of Felix. A desolate man in a grey suit sitting by the window with his face buried in his hands. Oh! why did he not look up and see me standing there in helpless misery? Only for an instant was I given this last glimpse of my lover, then I found myself gazing at the back of the departing train.
“Oh, dear! Oh, dear!” cried Anne, wringing her hands. “How unfortunate to miss him again and by so little. You are just too late every time. I never saw such hard luck.”
“No,” I said, feeling quite numb with despair, “not hard luck. It is the punishing hand, the punishing hand which has kept me back every time. It is no use to struggle against the punishing hand. Take me home, Anne, take me home.”
She took me home. Good kind woman, she would not let me succumb to despair. The whole way back she kept telling me that Matthew would be with me that evening, and that he would be surely able to do something, he was so clever. So constantly did she give me this assurance that at length I began to believe in it a little myself. A faint hope crept back into my heart. Matthew might yet save me, Matthew who was so clever, so ingenious, so full of resource; Matthew who was such an experienced man, who had such a wonderful talent for knowing the right thing to do in a difficulty. If anyone in the world could help me, surely Matthew could. I dwelt upon this thought until it grew and grew in my mind, and became a conviction that Matthew was to save me. How, I knew not, unless by following Felix over the world himself, but somehow he was to save me.
I watched for his coming as a drowning man watches for a spar which the waves are tossing to his side. Two hours after our return from London he came, with his master. The barouche drove up gaily to the door, and the two men got out, both looking radiant. This was the hour to which two days ago I had so looked forward, and now it was all I could do to come forward and greet the home-comers at all, so unbearable was my grief and anxiety.
“Ah! Here she is! Here’s the Valkyrie!” cried my uncle, skipping up to me, spotless, fresh, and bland as ever. “My dear, I have much pleasure in shaking hands with you again. It is most pleasant to return to the castle, and to feel I am once more on my own property. Not that I haven’t enjoyed my visit immensely. Of course you know that I’ve been on a pleasant visit, don’t you?”
Here he peered sharply and suspiciously into my face. Matthew gave me a nudge. I knew what it meant. I was to ignore the lunatic asylum, and converse with my uncle as if he had simply been away on a visit. The old insupportable life was beginning again; beginning again without Felix.
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Transcriber’s Note
This book uses inconsistent spelling and hyphenation, which were retained in the ebook version. Ditto marks used to represent repeated text have been replaced with the text that they represent. Some corrections have been made to the text, including normalizing punctuation. Further corrections are noted below:
p. [10]: its just like one I once made -> it's just like one I once made
p. [28]: I shouldn't care a tuppeny damn -> I shouldn't care a tuppenny damn
p. [48]: the awful hunted look of that women -> the awful hunted look of that woman
p. [210]: But suddenly the consciusness -> But suddenly the consciousness