ARE YOU MY WIFE?
BY THE AUTHOR OF “PARIS BEFORE THE WAR,” “NUMBER THIRTEEN,” “PIUS VI.,” ETC.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE SEARCH NEARLY OVER.
It was one of those exquisitely lovely mornings that we sometimes see in early spring. The night had been frosty, and had hurried to meet the dawn, leaving her moonlight mantle behind her, frozen to silver, on every field or hill-side. The sky was of a heavenly blue—liquid turquoise, swept with feathery dashes of pink, that set off the glistening landscape like a velvet curtain spread for the purpose. The sun was shining through a pearly mist that hung, a silver gauze veil, in the air and made everything look dreamy and vision-like. The meadows were silvered with frost; so were the hedges—every twig and thorn finished like a jewel. The trees stood up like immense bouquets of filigree against the pink and blue curtain. No wonder Franceline, who had been awake and watching the sunrise from her window, stole a march on Angélique, and hastened out to enjoy the beauty of the morning. It was impossible it could hurt her; it was too lovely to be unkind. But besides this outward incentive, there was another one that impelled her to the daring escapade. She felt an irresistible longing to go to church this morning—one of those longings that she called presentiments, and seldom rejected without having reason to regret it. It was not that she was uneasy, or alarmed, or unhappy about anything. Nothing had occurred to awake the dormant fires that were still smouldering—though she thought them dead—and impel her to seek for strength in a threatened renewal of the combat. Sir Simon’s disappearance the morning after the dinner-party, some few days ago, had not surprised her; that was his way, and this time she had been prepared for it. It was true that ever since then her father had been more preoccupied, more inseparable from his work. It was a perfect mania with him for the last three or four days. He scarcely let the pen out of his hand from morning till night. He seemed, moreover, to have got to a point where he could no longer use her as an amanuensis, but must write himself. Franceline was distressed at the change; it deprived her of the pleasure of helping him and of their daily walk together, which had of late become the principal enjoyment of her life. But he could not be persuaded to go beyond the garden gate, and then only for ten minutes to take a breath of air. He was in a hurry to get back to his study, as if the minutes were so much gold wasted. Franceline was obliged to accept this sudden alteration in his habits, with the assurance that it would not be for long; that the great work was drawing to a close; and that, when it was finished, he would be free to walk with her as much as she liked, and in more beautiful places than Dullerton. This last she did not believe. No place could ever be so beautiful as this familiar one, because none would ever be hallowed by the same sweet early memories, or sanctified by the same sufferings and regrets. There was a spirit brooding over these quiet sylvan slopes that could never dwell, for her, elsewhere. She looked around her at the leafless woods that lay white and silent in the near distance, and at the river winding slowly towards them like an azure arm encircling the silver fields, and she sighed at the thought of ever leaving them. The sigh escaped from her lips in a little column of sapphire smoke; for the air was as clear as crystal, but it was cold too, and the bell was already ringing; so she drew her shawl closer and hurried on. What was that fly doing before the presbytery door? Who could have business with Father Henwick at such an unearthly hour as seven A.M.? When people live in a small place where everybody’s life is a routine as well known as their own to everybody else, the smallest trifle out of the usual way is magnified into an event. Franceline was not very curious by nature; she passed the mysterious fly with a momentary glance of interest, and then dismissed it from her thoughts. The little white-washed church was never full on week-days, its congregation being mostly of the class who can only afford the luxury of going to church on Sundays. A few kindly glances greeted her as she walked up to her place near the sanctuary. Since her health had become delicate, it was a rare occurrence to see her there during the week, so her presence was looked on as of good omen. She answered the welcoming eyes with a sweet, grateful smile, and then knelt down and soon forgot them.
We talk of magnetic atmospheres where instinct warns us of a presence without any indication from our senses. I don’t know whether Franceline believed in such influences; but her attitude of rapt devotion as she knelt before the altar, seemingly unconscious of anything earthly near her, her soul drawn upwards through her eyes and fixed on the Unseen, did not suggest that there was any human presence within reach which had power to move her. When Father Henwick had left the altar, she rose and went to the sacristy door to ask if she could see him. She wanted to speak to him about a poor woman in the village. It was not the clerk, but Father Henwick himself, who came to answer her message. He did not welcome his young penitent in his usual gracious, affectionate manner, but asked sharply “who gave her leave to be out at that hour?”
“The morning was so sunny I thought it would do me no harm to come,” replied the culprit, with a sudden sense of having done something very wicked.
“You had no business to think about it at all; you should not have come without your father’s permission. Go home as fast as you can.”
Franceline was turning away, when he called her back.
“Come this way; you can go out through the house.” Then he added in a mollified tone: “You foolish child! I hope you are warmly clad? Keep your chest well covered, and hold your muff up to your mouth. Be off, now, as quick as you can, and let me have no more of these tricks!”
He shook hands with her, half-smiling, half-frowning, and, opening the sacristy door that led into the presbytery, hurried her away. Franceline was too much discomfited by the abrupt dismissal to conjecture why she was hustled out through the house instead of being allowed to go back through the church, the natural way, and quite as short. She could not understand why Father Henwick should have shown such annoyance and surprise at the sight of her. This was not the first time she had played the trick on them at home of coming out to church on a sunny morning, and it had never done her any harm. She was turning the riddle in her mind, as she passed through the little sitting-room into the entry, when she saw the front door standing wide open, and a gentleman outside speaking to the fly-man. The moment he perceived Franceline he raised his hat and remained uncovered while he spoke.
“Good-morning, mademoiselle! How is M. de la Bourbonais?”
“Thank you, my father is quite well.”
She and Clide looked at each other as they exchanged this commonplace greeting; but they did not shake hands. Neither could probably have explained what the feeling was that held them back. Franceline went on her way, and Clide de Winton entered the presbytery, each bearing away the sound of the other’s voice and the sweetness of that rapid glance with a terrible sense of joy.
Franceline’s heart beat high within her as she walked on. What right had it to do so? How dared it? Poor, fluttering heart! No bitter upbraidings of indignant conscience, no taunts of womanly pride, could make it stop. The more she tried to silence it, the louder it cried. She was close by The Lilies, and it was crying out and throbbing wildly still. She could not go in and face her father in this state; she must gain a few minutes to collect and calm herself. The snow-drops grew in great profusion on a bank in the park at the back of the cottage. Raymond was fond of wild flowers; she would go and gather him some: this would account for her delay. She laid her muff on the grass. It was wet with the hoar-frost melting in the sun; but Franceline did not see this. She stooped down and began to pluck the snow-drops. It was a congenial task in her present frame of mind. Snow-drops had always been favorites with her. In her childish days of innocent pantheism she used to fancy that flowers had spirits, or some instinct that enabled them to enjoy and to suffer, to be glad in the sunshine and unhappy in the cold and the rain. She fancied that perfume was their language, and that they conversed in it as birds do in songs and chirpings. She used to be sorry for the flowers that had no perfume, and called them “the dumb ones,” connecting their fate in some vague, pitying way with that of two deaf and dumb little children in the village. But the snow-drops she pitied most of all. They came in the winter-time, when everything was cold and dreary and there were no kindred flowers to keep them company; no roses; no bees and butterflies to make music for them; no nightingales to sing them to sleep in the scented summer nights; no liquid, starry skies and sweet, warm dews to kiss them as they slept; their pale, ascetic little slumbers were attuned to none of these fragrant melodies, and Franceline loved them all the more for their loveless, lonely life. But she was not pitying them now, as, one by one, she plucked the drooping bells and the bright green leaves under the silver hedge; she was envying them and listening to them. Every flower and blade of grass has a message for us, if we could but hear it; the woods and fields are all tablets on which the primitive scriptures of creative love are written for us. “Your life is to be like ours,” the snow-drops were whispering to Franceline. “We dwell alone in cold and silence—so must you; we have no sister flowers to make life joyous, no roses to gladden us with their perfume and their beauty—neither shall you; roses are emblems of love, and love is not for you. You must be content with us. We are the emblems of purity and hope; take us to your heart. We are the heralds of the spring; we bring the promise, but we do not wait for its fulfilment. You are happier than we; you will not have the summer here, but you know that it will come hereafter, and that the flowers and fruits will be only the more beautiful for the waiting being prolonged. Look upwards, sister snow-drop, and take courage.” Franceline listened to the mystic voice, and, as she did so, large tears fell from her eyes on the white bells of the messengers, as pure as the crystal dew that stood in frozen tears upon their leaves.
M. de la Bourbonais had not heard her go out; and when she came in and handed him her bouquet, fresh-gathered, he took for granted she had gone out for the purpose, and did not chide her for the slight imprudence. Angélique was not so lenient; she was full of wrath against the truant, and threatened to go at once and inform on her, which Franceline remarked she might have done an hour ago, if she had any such intention; and then, with a kiss and two arms thrown around the old woman’s mahogany neck, it was all made right between them.
Franceline did not venture out again that day. She was afraid of meeting Clide. She strove hard to forget the morning’s incident, to stifle the emotions it had given rise to, and to turn away her thoughts from even conjecturing the possible cause of Mr. de Winton’s presence at Dullerton and at Father Henwick’s. But strive as she might, the thoughts would return, and her mind would dwell on them. She was horrified to see the effect that Clide’s presence had had on her; to find how potent his memory was with her still, how it had stirred the slumbering depths and broken up the stagnant surface-calm of her heart, filling it once more with wild hopes and ardent longings that she had fondly imagined crushed and buried for ever. Was her hard-earned self-conquest a sham after all? She could not help fearing it when she saw how persistently the idea kept returning again and again to her, banish it as she would: “Had he come to tell Father Henwick that he was free?” Then she wondered, if it were so, what Father Henwick would do; whether he would come and see her immediately, or let things take their course through Sir Simon and her father. Then again she would discard this notion as impossible, and see all sorts of evidence in the circumstances of the morning’s episode to prove that it could not be. Why should Father Henwick have tried so hard to prevent their meeting, if the one obstacle to it were removed? and why should Clide have been so restrained and distant when she came upon him suddenly? If only she could ask this one question and have it answered, Franceline thought she could go back again to her state of stagnation, and trample down her rebellious heart into submission once more.
She slept very little that night, and the next morning she determined that she would go out at any risk. Sitting still all day in this state of mind was unbearable; so about eleven o’clock, when the sun was high and the frost melted, she put on her bonnet and said she was going for a walk to see Miss Merrywig. As the day was fine and she had not taken cold yesterday, Angélique made no difficulty. Franceline started off to the wood, and was soon crushing the snow-drops and the budding lemon-colored primroses as she threaded her way along the foot-paths.
For some mysterious reason which no one could fathom, but which the oldest inhabitant of the place remembered always to have existed, you were kept an hour waiting at Miss Merrywig’s before the door was opened. You rang three times, waited an age between each ring, and then Keziah, the antediluvian factotum of the establishment, came limping along the passage, and, after another never-ending interval of unbarring and unbolting, you were let in. It was not Keziah who opened the door for Franceline this morning; it was Miss Merrywig herself, shawled and bonneted, ready to go out.
“O my dear child! is it you? I am so delighted to see you! Do come in! No, no, I am not going out. That is to say, I am going out. It’s the luckiest thing that you did not come two minutes later, or you would not have found me. I am so glad! No, no, you are not putting me about the least bit in the world. Come and sit down, and I’ll explain all about it. I cannot imagine what is keeping Keziah, and she knows I am waiting to be off, and that the negus will be getting cold, though it was boiling mad, and I have only this moment put it into the flask. But what can be keeping her? It didn’t so much matter; in fact, it didn’t matter at all, only I have promised little Jemmy Torrens—you know Mary Torrens’ boy on the green?—well, I promised him I would make the negus for him myself and take it to him myself. He won’t take anything except from me, poor little fellow! You see he’s known me since I was a baby—I mean since he was—and that’s why, I suppose; and Keziah knows it, and why she dallies so long I cannot conceive! She knows I can’t leave the house unprotected and go off before she comes in—there are so many tramps about, you see, my dear. It is provoking of Keziah!”
“Let me take the negus to Jemmy,” said Franceline, when there was a break in the stream and she was able to edge in a word. “I will explain why you could not go.”
“Oh! that’s just like you to be so kind, my dear; but I promised, you see, and I really must go myself. What can Keziah be about?”
“Then go, and I will wait and keep the house until either of you comes back,” suggested Franceline.
“Oh! that is a bright idea. That is as witty as it is kind. Well, then, I will just run off. I shall find you here when I return. I won’t be twenty minutes away, and you can amuse yourself looking over Robinson Crusoe till I come back; here it is!” And the old lady rooted out a book from under a pile of all sorts of odds and ends on the table, and handed it to Franceline. “Sit down, now, and read that; there’s nothing I enjoyed like that book when I was your age, and, indeed, I make a point of reading it at least once every year regularly.”
With this she took up her wine-flask, well wrapped in flannel to protect her from the scalding-hot contents, and bustled away.
“If any one rings, am I to let them in?” inquired Franceline, running into the hall after her.
“Oh! no, certainly not, unless it happens to be Mr. Langrove; you would not mind opening the door to him, would you?”
“Not the least; but how shall I know it is he?”
“You will be sure to hear the footsteps first and the click of the gate outside, and then run out and peep through this,” pointing to the narrow latticed window in the entry; “but you must be quick, or else they will be close to the door and see you.”
Franceline promised to keep a sharp lookout for the warning steps, closed the door on Miss Merrywig, and went back to Robinson Crusoe; but she was not in a mood to enjoy Friday’s philosophy, so she sat down and began to look about her in the queer little apartment. It was much more like a lumber-room than a sitting-room; the large round table in the middle was littered with every description of rubbish—the letters of two generations of Miss Merrywig’s correspondents, old pamphlets, odds and ends of ribbon and lace, little boxes, bags of stale biscuits that were kept for the pet dogs of her friends when they came to visit her, quantities of china cats and worsted monkeys, samplers made for her by great-grandnieces, newspapers of the year one, tracts and books of hymns, all huddled pell-mell together. Fifty years’ smoke and lamp-light had painted the ceiling all over in dense black clouds, and the cobwebs of innumerable defunct spiders festooned the cornices. The carpet had half a century ago been bright with poppies and bluebells and ferns; but these vanities, like the memory of the unrighteous man, had been blotted out, and had left no trace behind them. Franceline was considering how singular it was that anything so bright and simple and happy as Miss Merrywig should be the presiding genius of this abode of incongruous rubbish, and wishing she could make a clean sweep of it all, and tidy the place a little, when her attention was roused by a sound of footsteps. She ran out at once to look through the lattice; but she had waited too long. There was only time to shrink behind the door when the visitors had come up and the bell was sounding through the cottage. There were two persons, if not more; she knew this by the footsteps. Presently some one spoke; it was Mr. Charlton. He was continuing, in a low voice, a conversation already begun. Then another voice answered, speaking in a still lower key; but every word was distinctly audible through the open casement, which was so covered by an outer iron bar and the straggling stem of a japonica that no one from the outside would see that it was open, unless they looked very close. The words Franceline overheard had nothing in them to make her turn pale; but the voice was Clide de Winton’s. What fatality was this that brought them so near again, and yet kept them apart, and condemned her to hide and listen to him like an eavesdropper? There was a pause after the first ring. Mr. Charlton knew the ways of the house; he said something laughingly, and rang again. Then they reverted to the conversation that had been interrupted. Good God! did Franceline’s ears deceive her, or what were these words she heard coupled with her father’s name? She put her hand to her lips with a sudden movement to stifle the cry that leaped up from her heart of hearts. She heard Clide giving an emphatic denial: “I don’t believe it. I tell you it is some mistake—one of those unaccountable mistakes that we can’t explain or understand, but which we know must be mistakes.”
She could not catch what Mr. Charlton said; but he was evidently dissenting from Clide, and muttered something about “being convicted on his own showing,” which the other answered with an impatient exclamation the drift of which Franceline could not seize; neither could she make sense out of the short comments that followed. They referred to some facts or circumstances that were clear to the speakers, but only bewildered her more and more.
“It strikes me the old lady does not mean to let us in at all this time,” said Mr. Charlton; and he gave another violent pull to the bell.
“There can’t be any one in the house,” said Clide, after a pause that exhausted the patience of both. “We may as well come away. I will call later. I must see her before.…”
The rest of the sentence was lost, as the two speakers walked down the gravel-walk, conversing in the same low tones.
Franceline did not move even when the sound of their steps had long died away. She seemed turned to stone, and did not stir from the spot until Keziah came back. She gave her a message for Miss Merrywig, left the cottage, and went home.
She found her father just as she had left him—busy at his desk, with books and papers strewn on the table beside him. She saw this through the window, but did not go in to him. She could not go at once and speak to him as if nothing had happened in the interval. She went to her room, and remained there until dinner-time, and then came down, half-dreading to see some alteration in him corresponding with what had taken place in her own mind. But he was gentle and serene as usual. No mental disturbance was visible on his features; at least, she did not see it. Looking at him, nevertheless, with perceptions quickened by what she had heard since they parted, it struck her that his eyes were sunk and dim, as if from overwork and want of sleep combined; but there was no cloud of shame or humiliation on his brow. Never had that dear head seemed so venerable, never had such a halo of nobleness and goodness encircled it, in his daughter’s eyes, as at this moment.
She did not tease him to come out to walk with her, but asked him to read aloud to her for an hour while she worked. It was a long time—more than a week—since they had had any reading aloud. Raymond complied with the request, but soon returned to his work.
Franceline expected that Father Henwick would call, and kept nervously looking out of the window from time to time; but the day wore on, and the evening, and he did not come. She did not know whether to be glad or sorry. She was in that frame of feeling when the gentlest touch of sympathy would have stung her like the bite of a snake. It was not sympathy she wanted, but a voice to join with her in passionate contempt for the liars who had dared to slander her father, and in indignant denunciation of the lie. She wanted to fling it in the teeth of those who had uttered it. If Father Henwick would help her to do this, let him come; if not, let him leave her alone. Let no one come near her with words of pity; pity for her now meant contempt for her father. She would resent it as a lioness might resent the food that was thrown to her in place of the cubs she had been robbed of. No love—no, not the best and noblest she had ever dreamed of—would compensate her for the absence of reverence and respect for her father.
But Clide did not suspect him. She had heard him indignantly spurn the idea. “He no more stole it than you did,” he had said. Stolen what? Would no one come to tell her what it all meant? Would not Clide come? Was he still at Dullerton? Was there any fear—or hope?—of her meeting him again if she went out? She might have gone with impunity. Clide was far enough away, on a very different errand from that which had brought him yesterday across her path.
On coming back to the Court from his abortive attempt to see Miss Merrywig, Clide found Stanton in great excitement with a telegram that had arrived for his master that instant. It was from Sir Simon, summoning him back by the first train that started. Some important news awaited him. He did not wait to see Miss Merrywig, but took the next train to London, and arrived there in the early afternoon. The news that awaited him was startling enough to justify Sir Simon’s peremptory summons. One of the detectives, whose sagacity and coolness fitted him for delicate missions of the kind, had been despatched to gather information in the principal lunatic asylums of England and Scotland. He had come that morning to tell Sir Simon Harness that he thought he had found Mrs. de Winton in one of them. Sir Simon went straight to the place, and, after an interview with the superintendent, telegraphed for Clide, as we have seen.
It was an old-fashioned Elizabethan manor-house in the suburbs of London, situated in the midst of grounds almost large enough to be called a park. There was nothing in the outward aspect of the place to suggest its real character. Everything was bright and peaceful and well ordered as in the abode of a wealthy private family. The gardens were beautifully kept; the shrubbery was trim and neat; summer-houses with pretty climbing plants rose in shady places, inviting the inmates of the fine old mansion to sit out of doors and enjoy the sunshine unmolested; for there was sunshine in this early spring-time, and here in this sheltered spot some bits of red and gold and blue were peeping through the tips of closed flower-cups. Nothing externally hinted at the discord and disorder that reigned in so many human lives within the walls. The sight of the place was soothing to Clide. He had so often pictured to himself another sort of dwelling for his unhappy Isabel that it was a great relief to him to see this well-ordered, calm abode, and to think of her being a resident there. A lady-like matron received him, and conversed with him kindly and sensibly while they were waiting for the doctor to come in. The latter accosted him with the same reassuring frankness of manner.
“I hope,” he said, “that your informant has not exaggerated matters, as that class of people are so apt to do, and that you are expecting to see the right person. All I dare say to you is that you may hope; the points of coincidence are striking enough to warrant hope, but by no means such as to establish a certainty.”
“I am too much taken by surprise to have arrived at any conclusion,” replied Clide; “and I have been too often disappointed to do so in a hurry. Until I see and speak to the patient I can say nothing.”
“You can see her at once. As to speaking to her, that is not so easy. The sun is clouding over. That is unlucky at this moment.”
His visitor looked surprised.
“Oh! I forgot that I had not explained to you the nature of the delusion which this lady is suffering from,” continued the medical man. “It is one of the most poetic fancies that madness ever engendered in a human brain. She is enamored of the sun, and fancies herself beloved of him; she believes him to be a benign deity whose love she has been privileged to win, and which she passionately responds to. But there is more suffering than joy in this belief. She fancies that when the sun shines he is pleased with her, and that when he ceases to shine he is angry; the sunbeams are his smiles and the warmth his kisses. At such times she will deck herself out with flowers and gay colors, and sit and sing to her lover by the hour, pretending to turn away her face and hide from him, and going through all the pretty coyness of love. Then suddenly, when the sun draws behind a cloud, she will burst into tears, fling aside her wreath, and give way to every expression of grief and despair. It is at such moments, when they are prolonged, that the crisis is liable to become dangerous. She flings herself on the ground, and cries out to her lover to forgive her and look on her kindly again, or she will die. Very often she cries herself to sleep in this way. I fear you have come at an unfortunate moment, for the sun seems quite clouded; however, he may come out again, and then you will get a glimpse of the patient at her best.”
He rose and led the way upstairs along a softly-carpeted corridor with doors opening on either side. Pointing to one, he motioned Clide to advance. One of the panels was perforated so as to admit of the keeper’s seeing what went on inside when it was necessary to watch the patient, without irritating her by seeming to do so or remaining in the room. At first the occupant was standing up at the window, her hands clasped, while she conversed with herself or some invisible companion in low tones of entreaty. Then, uttering a feeble cry, she turned mournfully away, laid aside the flowers that decked her long black hair, and, taking a large black cloak, drew it over her dress, and sat down in a dark corner of the room, with her face to the wall, crying to herself like a child. Clide watched her go through all this with growing emotion. He had not yet been able to catch a glimpse of her face, but the small, light figure, the wayward movements, the streaming black hair, all reminded him strikingly of Isabel. The voice was too inarticulate, so far, for him to pronounce on its resemblance with any certainty; but the low, plaintive tones fell on his ear like the broken bars of an unforgotten melody. He strained every nerve to see the features. But, stay! She is moving. She has drawn away her hands from her face, and has turned it towards him. The movement did not, however, dispel his doubts; it increased them. It was almost impossible to discover any trace of beauty in that worn, haggard face, with its sharp features, its eyes faded and sunk, and from which the tears streamed in torrents, as if they were melting away in brine. The skin was shrivelled like an old woman’s—one, at least, double the age that Isabel would be now. Was it possible that this wreck could be the bright, beautiful girl of ten years ago?
“Are you my wife?” was Clide’s mental exclamation, as he looked at the sad spectacle, and then, with a shudder, turned away.
“I see you are unable to arrive at any conclusion,” said the doctor when they were out of ear-shot in an adjoining room.
“I will say nothing till I have spoken to her,” replied the young man evasively. “When can I do this?”
“I cannot possibly fix a time. She is not in a mood to be approached now; any violent shock in her present state might have a fatal result. It would, in all probability, quench for ever the feeble spark of light that still remains, and might bring on a crisis which no skill could alleviate. On the other hand, if we could apply the test at the right moment, the effect might be unexpectedly beneficial. I say unexpectedly, because, for my own part, I have not the slightest hope of any such result.”
“Has her memory quite gone, or does she recall any passages of her past life accurately?”
“Not accurately, I fancy; she seems to have some very vivid impressions of the past, but whether they be clear or not I cannot say. The balance of the mind is, I believe, too deeply shaken for clearness, even on isolated points, to survive in any of the faculties. She talks frequently of going over a great waterfall with her nurse, and describes scenery in a way that rather gave me a hope once. I spoke to her guardian, however, and he said she had never been near a waterfall in her life; that it was some picture which had apparently dwelt in her imagination.”
“He might have his own reasons for deceiving you in that respect,” observed Clide. “His name, you say, is Par…?
“Percival—Mr. Percival.”
“Humph! When people change their names, they sometimes find it convenient to retain the initial,” remarked Clide.
He went home and desired Stanton to look out for a lodging as near as possible to the asylum. A tolerably habitable one was found without delay, and he and his valet installed themselves there at once. The very next day he received a letter from Sir Simon Harness, informing him that Lady Rebecca seemed this time in earnest about betaking herself to a better world, and had desired him, Sir Simon, to be sent for immediately. The French dame de compagnie who wrote to him said they hardly expected her to get through the week.
M. de la Bourbonais had never been a social man since he lived at Dullerton. He said he did not care for society, and in one sense this was true. He did not care for it unless it was composed of sympathetic individuals; otherwise he preferred being without it. He did not want to meet and talk with his fellow-creatures simply because they were his fellow-creatures; there must be some common bond of interest or sympathy between them and him, or else he did not want to see them. When, in the early days at The Lilies, Sir Simon used to remonstrate with him on being so “sauvage,” and wonder how he could bear the dulness, Raymond would reply that no dulness oppressed him like uncongenial company. He had no sympathies in common with the people about the neighborhood, and so he would have no pleasure in associating with them. There was truth in this; but Sir Simon knew that the count’s susceptible pride had influenced him also. He did not want rich people to see his poverty, if they were not refined and intelligent enough to respect it and value what went along with it. He had studiously avoided cultivating any intimacies beyond the few we know, and had so persistently kept aloof from the big houses round about that they had accepted his determination not to go beyond mere acquaintanceship, and never stopped to speak when they met him out walking, but bowed and passed on. But of late Raymond began to feel quite differently about all this. He longed to see these distant acquaintances as if they had been so many near friends; to meet their glance of kindly, if not cordial, recognition; to receive the homage of their passing salutation. It was the dread of seeing these hitherto valueless greetings refused that prevented him stirring beyond his own gate. He marvelled himself at the void that the absence of them was making in his life. He did not dream they had filled such a space in it; that the reflection of his own self-respect in the respect of others had been such a strength and such a need to him. Up to this time Franceline had more than satisfied all his need of society at home, with the pleasant periodical addition of Sir Simon’s presence, while his work had amply supplied his intellectual wants; but suddenly he was made aware of a new need—something undefined, but that he hungered for with a downright physical hunger.
Franceline’s spirit and heart were too closely bound up in her father’s not to feel the counter-pang of this mental hunger. She could not help watching him, though she strove not to do it, and, above all, not to let him see that she was watching him. She might as well have tried not to draw her breath or to stop the pulsations of her heart. Her eyes would fasten on him when he was not looking, and she could not but see that the expression of his face was changed. A hard, resolved look had come over it; his eyebrows were always protruded now, and his lips drawn tight together under the gray fringe of his mustache. She knew every turn of his features, and saw that what had once been a passing freak under some sudden thought or puzzling speculation in his work had now become a settled habit. She longed to speak; to invite him to speak. It would have been so much easier for both; it would lighten the burden to them so much if they could bear it together, instead of toiling under it apart. But Raymond was silent. It never crossed his mind for a moment that Franceline knew his secret. If he had known it, would he have spoken? Sometimes the poor child felt the silence was unbearable; that at any cost she must break it and know the truth of the story which had reached her in so monstrous a form. But the idea that her father knew possibly nothing of it kept her back. But supposing he was silent only to spare her? Perhaps he was debating in his own mind what the effect of the revelation would be on her; wondering if she, too, would join with his accusers, or, even if she did not do this, whether she might not be ashamed of a father who was branded as a thief. When these thoughts coursed through her mind, Franceline felt an almost irresistible impulse to rush and fling her arms around his neck and tell him how she venerated him, and how she scorned with all her might and main the envious, malignant fools who dared to so misjudge him. But she never yielded to the impulse; the inward conflict of lodgings and shrinkings and passionate, tender cries of her heart to his made no outward sign. Raymond sat writing away at his desk, and Franceline sat by the fire or at the window reading and working, day after day. The idea occurred to her more than once that she would write to Sir Simon; but she never did. She did not dare open her heart to Father Henwick. How could she bring herself to tell him that her father was accused of theft? It was most probable—she hoped certain—that the abominable suspicion had not travelled to his ears; and if so, she could not speak of it. This was not her secret; it was no breach of confidence towards her spiritual father to be silent, and the selfish longing to pour out her filial anger and outraged love into a sympathizing ear should not hurry her into a betrayal of what was, even in its falsity, humiliating to Raymond. It was hard to refrain from speech when speech would have been a solace; but Franceline knew that the sacrifice of the cup of cold water has its reward, just as the bestowal has. Peace comes to us on surer and swifter wing when we go straight to God for it, without putting the sympathy of creatures between us and his touch.
Mr. Langrove had never been a frequent visitor at The Lilies; but Franceline never remembered him to have been so long absent as now, and she could not but see a striking coincidence in the fact. She knew he had been one of the party at Dullerton that night; and if, as she felt certain, that had been the occasion of the extraordinary mistake she had heard of, the vicar, of course, knew all about it. He believed her father had committed a theft, and was keeping aloof from him. Did everybody at Dullerton know this? Mr. Langrove was not a man to spread evil reports in any shape. Franceline knew him well enough to be sure of that; but her father’s reputation was evidently at the mercy of less charitable tongues. She did not know that the six witnesses had promised Sir Simon to keep silence for his sake; but if she had known it, it would not have much reassured her. A secret that is known to six people can scarcely be considered safe. The six may mean to guard it, and may only speak of it among themselves and in whispers; but it is astonishing how far a whisper will travel sometimes, especially when it is malignant. A vague impression had in some inexplicable way got abroad that the count had done something which threw him under a cloud. The gentlemen of the neighborhood were very discreet about it, and had said nothing positively to be taken hold of, but it had leaked out that there was a screw loose in that direction. Young Charlton had laughed at the notion of his friend Anwyll thinking of Mlle. de la Bourbonais now; and the emphasis and smile which accompanied the assurance expressed pretty clearly that there was something amiss which had not been amiss a little while ago.
Franceline had gone out for her usual mid-day walk in the park. It was the most secluded spot where she could take it, as well as warm and sheltered. She was walking near the pond; the milk-white swans were sailing towards her in the sunlight, expecting the bits of bread she had taken a fancy to bring them every day at this hour, when she saw Mr. Langrove emerge from behind a large rockery and step out into the avenue. She trembled as if the familiar form of her old friend had been a wild animal creeping out of the jungle to pounce upon her. What would he do? Would he pass her by, or stop and just say a few cold words of politeness? The vicar did not keep her long in suspense.
“Well! here, you are enjoying the sunshine, I see. And how are you?” he said, extending his hand in the mild, affectionate way that Franceline was accustomed to, but had never thought so sweet before. “Is the cough quite gone?”
“Not quite; but I am better, thank you. Angélique says I am, and she knows more about it than I do,” replied the invalid playfully. “How is everybody at the vicarage?”
“So-so. Arabella has one of her bad colds, and Godiva is suffering from a toothache. It’s the spring weather, no doubt; we will all be brisker by and by. Are you going my way?”
“Any way; I only came for a walk.”
They walked on together.
“And how is M. de la Bourbonais?” said the vicar presently. “I’ve not met him for a long time; we used to come across each other pretty often on the road to Dullerton. He’s not poorly, I hope?”
“No, only busy—so dreadfully busy! He hardly lets the pen out of his hand now; but he promises me there will soon be an end of it, and that the book will soon be finished.”
“Bravo! And you have been such a capital little secretary to him!” said Mr. Langrove. “The next thing will be that we shall have you writing a book on your own account.”
Franceline laughed merrily at this conceit; her fears were, if not banished by his cordial manner, sufficiently allayed to rid her of her momentary awkwardness. They were soon chatting away about village gossip as if nothing were amiss with either.
“Angélique brought home news from the market a few days ago that Mr. Tobes was going to marry Miss Bulpit; is it true?” inquired the young girl.
“Far too good to be true!” said the vicar, shaking his head. “The report has been spread so often that this time I very nearly believed in it. However, I saw Miss Bulpit, and she dispelled the illusion at once, and, I fear, for ever.”
“But would it have been such a good thing if they got married?”
“It would be a very desirable event in some ways,” said Mr. Langrove, with a peculiar smile; “it would give her something to do and some one to look after her.”
“And it would have been a good thing for Mr. Tobes, too, would it not? He is so poor!”
“That’s just why she won’t have him, poor fellow! When he proposed—she told me the story herself, and I find she is telling it right and left, so there is no breach of confidence in repeating it—when he proposed, Miss Bulpit asked him point-blank how much money he had; ‘because,’ she said, ‘I have only just enough for one!’”
“Oh! but that was a shame. She has plenty for two; and, besides, it was unfeeling. Don’t you think it was?” inquired Franceline, looking up at the vicar. But he evidently did not share either her indignation against Miss Bulpit or her pity for the discarded lover. He was laughing quietly, as if he enjoyed the joke.
They reached the gate going out on the high-road while thus pleasantly chatting.
“Now I suppose we must say good-by,” said Mr. Langrove. “This is my way; I am going to pay a sick visit down in the valley.”
They shook hands, and Franceline turned back.
“Mind you give my compliments to the count!” said the vicar, calling after her. “Tell him I don’t dare go near him, as he is so busy; but if he likes me to drop in of an evening, let him send me word by you, and I’ll be delighted. By-by.”
He nodded to her and closed the gate behind him.
“He did not dare because he is so busy!” repeated Franceline as she walked on. “How did he know papa was busy? It was I who told him so a few minutes ago. That was an excuse.”
She gave the message, nevertheless, on coming home, scarcely daring to look at her father while she did so.
“May I tell him to come in one of these evenings, petit père?”
“No; I cannot be disturbed at present,” was the peremptory answer, and Franceline’s heart sank again.
She told him the gossip about Miss Bulpit and Mr. Tobes, thinking it would amuse him; he used to listen complacently to the little bits of gossip she brought in about their neighbors. Raymond had the charming faculty, common to great men and learned men, of being easily and innocently amused; but he seemed to have lost it of late. He listened to Franceline’s chatter to-day with an absent air, as if he hardly took it in; and before she had done, he made some irrelevant remark that proved he had not been attending to what she was saying. Then he had got into a way of repeating himself—of saying the same thing two or three times over at an interval of an hour or so, sometimes even less. Franceline attributed these things to the concentration of his thoughts on his work, and to his being so entirely absorbed in it as not to pay attention to anything that did not directly concern it. She was too inexperienced to see therein symptoms of a more alarming nature.
M. de la Bourbonais had all his life complained of being a bad sleeper; but Angélique, who suffered from the same infirmity, always declared that he only imagined he did not sleep; that she was tossing on her pillow, listening to him snoring, when he said he had been wide awake. The count, on his side, was sceptical about Angélique’s “white nights,” and privately confided to Franceline that he knew for a fact she was fast asleep often when she fancied in the morning she had been awake. Some people are very touchy at being doubted when they say they have not “closed an eye all night.” Angélique resented a doubt on her “white nights” bitterly, and Franceline, who from childhood had been the confidant of both parties, found an early exercise for tact and discretion in keeping the peace between them. The discrepancies in the two accounts of their respective vigils often gave rise to little tiffs between herself and Angélique, who would insist upon knowing what M. le Comte had said about her night; so that Franceline was compelled to aggravate her whether she would or not. She “knew her place” better than to have words with M. le Comte, but she had it out with Franceline. “Monsieur says he didn’t get to sleep till past two o’clock this morning, does he? Humph! I only wish I had slept half as well, I know. Pauvre, cher homme! He drops off the minute his head is on the pillow, and then dreams that he’s wide awake. That’s how it is. Why, this morning I was up and lighted my candle at ten minutes to two, and he was sleeping as sound as a wooden shoe! I heard him.” Franceline would soothe her by saying she quite believed her; but as she said the same thing to M. le Comte, and as Angélique generally overheard her saying so, this seeming credulity only aggravated her the more. Laterly Raymond had taken up a small celestial globe to his room, for the purpose, he said, of utilizing his long vigils by studying the face of the heavens during the clear, starry nights; and he would give the result of his nocturnal contemplations to Franceline at breakfast next morning—Angélique being either in the room pouring out the hot milk for her master’s coffee, or in the kitchen with the door ajar, so that she had the benefit of the conversation. The pantomimes that were performed at these times were a severe trial to Franceline’s gravity: Angélique would stand behind Raymond’s chair, holding up her hands aghast or stuffing her apron into her mouth, so as not to explode in disrespectful laughter. Sometimes she would shake her flaps at him with an air of despondency too deep for words, and then walk out of the room.
“I heard M. le Comte telling mam’selle that he saw the Three Kings (the popular name for Orion’s belt in French) shining so bright this morning at three o’clock. I believe you; he saw them in his sleep! I was up and walking about my room at that hour, and it so happened that I opened my door to let in the air just as the clock in the salon was striking three!”
As ill-luck would have it, Raymond overheard this confidential comment which Angélique was making to Franceline under the porch, not seeing that the sitting-room window was open.
“My good Angélique,” said the count, putting his head out of the window, “you must have opened the door two seconds too late; it was striking five, most likely, and you only heard the last three strokes. I suspect you were sound asleep at the hour I was looking at the Three Kings.”
“La! as if I were an infant not to know when I wake and when I sleep!” said Angélique with a shrug. “It was M. le Comte that was asleep and dreaming that he saw the Three Kings.”
“Nay, but I lighted my candle; it was pitch-dark when I got up to set the globe,” argued M. de la Bourbonais.
“When M. le Comte dreamt that he got up and lighted his candle,” corrected the incorrigible sceptic. Raymond laughed and gave it up. But it was true, notwithstanding Angélique’s obstinate incredulity, that he did pass many white nights now, and the wakefulness was insensibly and imperceptibly telling on his health. It was a curious fact, too, that the more the want of sleep was injuring him, the less he was conscious of suffering from it. He had been passionately fond of astronomy in his youth, and he had resumed the long-neglected study with something of youthful zest, enjoying the observation of the starry constellations in the bright midnight silence with a sense of repose and communion with those brilliant, far-off worlds that surprised and delighted himself. Perhaps the feeling that he was now cut off from possible communion with his fellow-men threw him more on nature for companionship, urging him to seek on her glorious brow for the smiles that human faces denied him, and to accept her loving fellowship in lieu of the sympathy that his brothers refused him.
But rich and inexhaustible as the treasures of the great mother are, they are at best but a compensation; nothing but human love and human intercourse can satisfy the cravings of a human heart. Raymond was beginning to realize this. His forced isolation was becoming poignantly oppressive to him. He longed to see Sir Simon, to hear his voice, to feel the warm clasp of his hand; he longed, above all, to get back his old feeling of gratitude to him. Raymond little suspected what a moral benefactor his light-hearted, worldly-minded friend had been to him all those years when he was perpetually offering services that were so seldom accepted. Sir Simon was all the time feeding his heart with the milk of human kindness, making a bond between the proud, poor brother and the rest of the rich and happy brotherhood who were strangers to him. Raymond loved them all for the sake of this one. Nothing nourishes our hearts like gratitude. It widens our space for love, and enlarges our capacity for kindness; it creates a want in us to send the same happy thrills through other hearts that are stirring our own. We overflow with love to all in thankfulness for the love of one. This is often our only way of giving thanks, and the good it does us is sometimes a more abiding gain than the service that has called it forth. It was all this that Raymond missed in Sir Simon. In losing his loving sense of gratefulness he seemed to have lost some vital warmth in his own life. Now that the source which had fed this gratitude was dried up, all that was tender and kind and good in him seemed to be running dry or turning to bitterness. The estrangement of one had estranged him from all; he was at war with all humanity. Would any sacrifice of pride be too great to win back the old sweet life, with its trust, and ready sympathy, and indulgent kindness? Why should he not write to Sir Simon? He had asked himself this many times, and had written many letters in imagination, and some even in reality; but Angélique had found them torn up in the waste-paper basket next morning, and had been surprised to see the fresh sheets of note-paper, which she recognized as her master’s, wasted in that manner and thrown away. He knew what he was doing, probably; it was not for her to lecture him on such matters, but she could not help setting down the unnatural extravagance as a part of the general something that was amiss with her master.
One morning, however, after one of those white nights that gave rise to so much discussion in the family, Raymond came down with his mind made up to write a letter and send it. He could stand it no longer; he must go to his friend and lay bare his heart to him, so that they might come together again. If Sir Simon’s silence was an offence, Raymond’s was not free from blame. He sat down and wrote. It was a long letter—several sheets closely filled. When it was finished, and Raymond was folding it and putting it into the envelope, he remembered that he did not know where the baronet was. If he sent it to the Court, the servants would recognize the handwriting and think it odd his addressing a letter there in their master’s absence. He thought of forwarding it to Sir Simon’s bankers; but then, again, how did matters stand at present between him and them? He might have gone abroad and not left them his address, and the letter might remain there indefinitely. While Raymond was debating what he should do he closed up and stamped the blank envelope, making it ready to be addressed; then he laid it on the top of his writing desk, and wrote a few lines to the bankers, requesting them to forward Sir Simon’s address, if they had it or could inform him how a letter would reach him.
He seemed relieved when this was done, and, for the first time for nearly a month, called Franceline to come and write for him. She did so for a couple of hours, and noticed with thankfulness that her father was in very good, almost in high, spirits, laughing and talking a great deal, as if elated by some inward purpose. Her glad surprise was increased when he said abruptly:
“Now, my little one, run and put on thy bonnet, and we will go for a walk in the park together.”
The day was cold, and there was a sharp wind blowing; but the sun was very bright, and the park looked green and fresh and beautiful as they entered it, she leaning on him with a fond little movement from time to time and an exclamation of pleasure. He smiled on her very tenderly, and chatted about all sorts of things as in the old days of a month ago before the strange cloud had drawn a curtain between their lives. He talked with great animation of his work, and the excitement it would be to them both when it was published.
“We shall go to Paris for the publication, and then I will show thee the wonderful sights of the great city: the Louvre, and the Museum of Cluny, and many antiquities that will interest thee mightily; and we will go to some fine modiste and get thee a smart French bonnet, and thou wilt be quite a little élégante!”
“Oh! how nice it will be, petit père,” cried Franceline, squeezing his arm in childish glee; “and many learned men will be coming to see you, will they not, and writing articles in praise of your great work?”
“Ha! Praise! I know not if it will all be praise,” said the author, with a dubious smile. “Some will not approve of my views on certain historical pets. I have torn the masks off many soi-disant heroes, and replaced others in the position that bigotry or ignorance has hitherto denied them. I wonder what Simon will say to it all?”
Raymond smiled complacently as he said this. It was the first time he had mentioned the baronet. Franceline felt as if a load were lifted off her, and that all the mists were clearing away.
“He is sure to be delighted with it!” she exclaimed. “He always is, even when he quarrels with you, petit père. I think he quarrels for the pleasure of it; and then he is so proud of you!”
They walked as far as the house, and then Raymond said it was time to turn back; it was too cold for Franceline to stay out more than half an hour.
An event had taken place at The Lilies in their absence. The postman had been there and had brought a letter. Raymond started when Angélique met him at the door with this announcement, adding that she had left it on the chimney-piece.
He went straight in and opened it. It was from Sir Simon. After explaining in two lines how Clide de Winton had arrived in time to save him at the last hour, the writer turned at once to Raymond’s troubles. Nothing could be gentler than the way he approached the delicate subject. “Why should we be estranged from one another, Raymond? Do you suppose I suspect you? And what if I did? I defy even that to part us. The friendship that can change was never genuine; ours can know no change. I have tried in every possible way to account satisfactorily for your strange, your suicidal behavior on that night, and I have not succeeded. I can only conclude that you were beside yourself with anxiety, and over-excited, and incapable of measuring the effect of your refusal and your conduct altogether. But admitting, for argument’s sake, that you did take it; what then? There is such a thing as momentary insanity from despair, as the delirium of a sick and fevered heart. At such moments the noblest men have been driven to commit acts that would be criminal if they were not mad. It would ill become me to cast a stone at you—I, who have been no better than a swindler these twenty years past! Raymond, there can be no true friendship without full confidence. We may give our confidence sometimes without our love following; but when we give our love, our confidence must of necessity follow. When we have once given the key of our heart to a friend, we have given him the right to enter into it at all times, to read its secrets, to open every door, even that, and above that, behind which the skeleton stands concealed. You and I gave each other this right when we were boys, Raymond; we have used it loyally one towards the other ever since, and I have done nothing to forfeit the privilege now. All things are arranged by an overruling Providence, and God is wise as he is merciful; yet I cannot forbear asking how it is that I should have been saved from myself, and that you should not have been delivered from temptation—you, whose life has been one long triumph of virtue over adversity! It will be all made square one day; meantime, I bless God that the weaker brother has been mercifully dealt with and permitted to rescue the nobler and the worthier one. The moment I hear from you I will come to Dullerton, and you and Franceline must come away with me to the south. I will explain when we meet why this letter has been so long delayed.” Then came a postscript quite at the bottom of the page: “Send that wretched bauble to me in a box, addressed to my bankers. Rest assured of one thing: you shall be cleared before men as you already are before a higher and a more merciful tribunal.”
Many changes passed over Raymond’s countenance as he read this letter; but when his eye fell on the postscript, the smile that had hovered between sadness, tenderness, and scorn subsided into one of almost saturnine bitterness, and a light gathered in his eyes that was not goodly to see. But the feelings which these signs betrayed found no other outward vent. M. de la Bourbonais quietly and deliberately tore up the letter into very small pieces, and then, instead of throwing them into the waste-paper basket, he dropped them into the grate. The fire was low; he took the poker and stirred it to make a blaze, and then watched the flame catching the bits one by one and consuming them.
“It is fortunate I did not send mine!” was his mental congratulation as he turned to his desk, intending to feed the dying flame with two more offerings. But where were they? Raymond pushed about his papers, but could not find either of the letters. Angélique was called. Had she seen them?
“Oh! yes; I gave them both to the postman,” she explained, with a nod of her flaps that implied mystery.
“How both? There was only one to go. The other had no address on it,” said Raymond.
“I saw it, M. le Comte.” Another mysterious nod.
“And yet you gave it to the postman?”
“Yes. I am a discreet woman, as M. le Comte knows, and he might have trusted me to keep a quiet tongue in my head; but monsieur knows his own affairs best,” added Angélique in an aggrieved tone.
“My good Angélique, explain yourself a little more lucidly,” said M. de la Bourbonais with slight impatience. “What could induce you to give the postman a letter that had neither name nor address on it?”
“Bless me! I thought M. le Comte did not wish me to know who he was writing to!”
“Good gracious!” exclaimed Raymond, too annoyed to notice the absurdity of the reply. “But how could the postman take it when he saw it was a blank envelope?”
“I did not let him see it; I slipped the two with my own hands into the bag,” said Angélique.
M. de la Bourbonais moved his spectacles, and shrugged his shoulders in a way that was expressive of anything but gratitude for this zeal. He hesitated a moment or two, debating what he should do. The only way to ensure getting back his letter immediately was to go off himself to the post-office, and claim it before it was taken out to be stamped with the postmark, when it would be opened in order to be returned to the writer. There might be no harm in its being opened; the postmaster was not a French scholar that Raymond knew of, but he might have a friend at hand who was, and who would be glad to gratify his curiosity, as well as exhibit his learning, by reading the count’s letter.
Raymond set off at once, so as to prevent this. It was the first time for some weeks that he had shown himself in or near the town; and if his mind had not been so full of his errand, he would have been painfully conscious and shy at finding himself abroad in open daylight in his old haunts and within the observation of many eyes that knew him. But he did not give this a thought; he was calculating the chances for and against his arriving at the post-office before the postman had come back from his rounds and handed in the out-going letters to be marked, and his imagination was running on to the wildest conclusions in the event of his being too late. He walked as if for a wager; not running, but as near to it as possible. The pace and his intense look of preoccupation attracted many glances that he would have escaped had he walked on quietly at his ordinary pace. He was not a minute too soon, however, just coming up as the postman appeared with his replenished bag. M. de la Bourbonais hastened to describe the shape and color of his blank envelope, and to explain how it had come to be where it was, and was most emphatic in protesting that he did not mean the letter to go, and that he was prepared to take any steps to prevent its going. There was no need to be so earnest, about it. The postmaster assured him at once that the letter would be forthcoming in a moment, and that his word would be quite enough to identify it and ensure its being returned to him. It seemed an age to Raymond while the letters were being turned out and sorted, but at last the man held up the blank envelope, with its queen’s head in the corner, and exclaimed jubilantly: “Here it is!”
The count seized it with avidity, and hurried away, leaving the postmaster half-amused, half-mystified, at his excited volubility and warm expressions of thanks. There was no necessity to rush home at the same pace that he had rushed out, but Raymond felt like a machine wound up to a pitch of velocity that must be kept up until the wheel stopped of its own accord. His hat was drawn over his eyes, and his head bent like a person walking on mechanically, neither seeing nor hearing what might be going on around him. He was soon beyond the streets and shop-windows, and back amidst the fields and hedges. There was a clatter of horses coming down the road. M. de la Bourbonais saw two gentlemen on horseback approaching. He recognized them, even in the distance, at a glance: Sir Ponsonby Anwyll and Mr. Charlton. Raymond’s heart leaped up to his throat. What would they do? Stop and speak, or cut him dead? A few seconds would decide. They were close on him now, but showed no sign of reining in to speak. Ponsonby Anwyll raised his hat in a formal salutation; Mr. Charlton looked straight before him and rode on. All the blood in his body seemed to rush at the instant to Raymond’s face. He put his hand to his forehead and stood to steady himself; then he walked home, never looking to the right or the left until he reached The Lilies.
Angélique called out from the kitchen window to know if he had made it right about the letter; but he took no heed of her, only walked in and went straight up to his room. She heard him close the door. There certainly was something queer come to him of late. What did he want, going to shut himself in his bedroom this time of day, and then passing her without answering?
Franceline was in the study, busy arranging some primroses and wild violets that she had been gathering under the hedge while her father was out. A noise as of a body falling heavily to the ground in the room overhead made her drop the flowers and fly up the stairs. Angélique had hastened from the kitchen to ask what was the matter; but a loud shriek rang through the house in answer to her question.
“Angélique, come! O my God! Father! father!”
Raymond was lying prostrate on the floor, insensible, while Franceline lifted his head in her arms, and kissed him and called to him. “Oh! What has happened to him? Father! father! speak to me. O my God! is he dead?” she cried, raising her pale, agonized face to the old servant with a despairing appeal.
“No! no! Calm thyself! He has but fainted; he is not dead,” said Angélique, feeling her master’s pulse and heart. “See, put thy hand here and feel! If he were dead, it would not beat.”
Franceline laid her finger on the pulse. She felt the feeble beat; it was scarcely perceptible, but she could feel it.
“We must lift him on to the bed,” said Angélique, and she grasped the slight form of her master with those long, brown arms of hers, and laid it gently on the bed, Franceline assisting as she might.
“Now, my petite, thou wilt be brave,” said the faithful creature, forgetting herself in her anxiety to spare and support Franceline. “Thou wilt stay here and do what is necessary whilst I run and fetch the doctor.”
She poured some eau-de-cologne into a basin of water, and desired her to keep bathing her father’s forehead and chafing his hands until she returned. This, after loosing his cravat and letting in as much air as possible, was all her experience suggested.
Franceline sat down and did as she was told; but the perfect stillness, the deathlike immobility of the face and the form, terrified her. She suspended the bathing to breathe on it, as if her warm breath might bring back consciousness and prove more potent than the cold water. But Raymond remained insensible to all. The silence began to oppress Franceline like a ghastly presence; the cooing of her doves outside sounded like a dirge. Could this be death? His pulse beat so faintly she hardly knew whether it was his or the pulse of her own trembling fingers that she felt. A chill of horror came over her; the first vague dread was gradually shaping itself in her mind to the most horrible of certainties. If he should never awake, never speak again, never open those closed eyes on her with the old tender glance of love that had been as familiar and unfailing as the sunlight to her! Oh! what a fearful awakening came with this first realization of that awful possibility. What vain shadows, what trivial empty things, were those that she had until now called sorrows! What a joy it would be to take them all back again, and bear them, increased tenfold in bitterness, to the end of her life, if this great, this real sorrow might be averted! Franceline dropped on her knees beside the bed, and, clasping her hands, sent up one of those cries that we all of us find in our utmost need, when there is only God who can help us: “O Father! thy will be done. But if it be possible, … if it be possible, … let this cup pass from me!”
There were steps on the stairs. It was Angélique come back. She had only been ten minutes away—the longest ten minutes that ever a trembling heart watched through—but Franceline knew she could not have been to the doctor’s and back so quickly. “I met M. le Vicaire just at the end of the lane, and he is gone for the doctor; he was riding, so he will be there in no time.”
Then she made Franceline go and fetch hot water from the kitchen, and busied her in many little ways, under pretence of being useful, until Dr. Blink’s carriage was heard approaching. The medical man was not alone; Mr. Langrove and Father Henwick accompanied him.
Angélique drew the young girl out of her father’s room, and sent her to stay with Father Henwick, while the doctor, assisted by Mr. Langrove and herself, attended to M. de la Bourbonais.
“Oh! what is it? Did the doctor tell you?” she whispered, her dark eyes preternaturally dilated in their tearless glance, as she raised it to Father Henwick’s face.
“He could say nothing until he had seen him. Tell me, my dear child, did your father ever have anything of this sort happen him before?” inquired Father Henwick, as unconcernedly as he could.
“Never, never that I heard of, unless it may have been when I was too little to remember,” said Franceline; and then added nervously, “Why?”
“Thank God! It is safe, then, not to be so serious,” was the priest’s hearty exclamation. “Please God, you will see him all right again soon; he has been overdoing of late, working too hard, and not taking air or exercise enough. The blade has been wearing out the sheath—that’s what it is; but Blink will pull him through with God’s help.”
“Father,” said Franceline, laying both hands on his arm with an unconscious movement that was very expressive, “do you know it seems to me as if I were only waking up, only beginning to live now. Everything has been unreal like a dream until this. Is it a punishment for being so ungrateful, so rebellious, so blind to the blessings that I had?”
“If it were, my child, punishment with God is only another name for mercy,” said Father Henwick. “Our best blessings come to us mostly in the shape of crosses. Perhaps you were not thankful enough for the great blessing of your father’s love, for his health and his delight in you; perhaps you let your heart long too much for other things; and if so, God has been mindful of his foolish little one, and has sent this touch of fear to teach her to value more the mercies that were vouchsafed to her, and not to pine for those that were denied. We seldom see things in their true proportions until the shadow of death falls on them.”
“The shadow of death!” echoed Franceline, her white lips growing still whiter. “Oh! if it be but the shadow, my life will be too short for thanksgiving, were I to live to the end of the world.”
“Ha! here they come,” said Father Henwick, opening the study-door as he heard the doctor’s steps, followed by Mr. Langrove’s, on the stair.
Franceline went forward to meet them; she did not speak, but Dr. Blink held out his hand in answer to her questioning face, and said cheerfully: “The count is much better; he has recovered consciousness, and is doing very nicely, very nicely indeed for the present. Come! there is nothing to be frightened at, my dear young lady.”
Franceline could not utter a word, not even to murmur “Thank God!” But the dead weight that had been pressing on her heart was lifted, she gasped for breath, and then the blessed relief of tears came.
“My poor little thing! My poor Franceline!” said the vicar, leading her gently to a chair, and smoothing the dark gold hair with paternal kindness.
“Let her cry; it will do her good,” said Dr. Blink kindly; and then he turned to speak in a low voice to Father Henwick and Mr. Langrove.
He had concluded, from the incoherent account which Mr. Langrove had gathered from Angélique, that he should come prepared for a case of apoplexy, and had brought all that was necessary to afford immediate relief. He had recourse to bleeding in the first instance, and it had proved effective. M. de la Bourbonais was, as he said, doing very well for the present. Consciousness had returned, and he was calm and free from suffering. Franceline was too inexperienced to understand where the real danger of the attack lay. She fancied that, since her father had regained consciousness, there could be nothing much worse than a bad fainting fit, brought on by fatigue of mind and body, and, now that the Rubicon was past, he would soon be well, and she would take extra care of him, so as to prevent a relapse. Her passionate burst of tears soon calmed down, and she rose up to thank her visitors with that queenly self-command that formed so striking a part of her character.
“I am very grateful to you for coming so quickly; it was very good of you,” she said, extending her hand to Dr. Blink: “May I go to him now?”
“No, no, not just yet,” he replied promptly. “I would rather he were left perfectly quiet for a few hours. We will look in on him later; not that it is necessary, but we shall be in the neighborhood, and may as well turn in for a moment.” He wished them good-afternoon, and was gone.
“And how did you happen to come in just at the right moment?” said Franceline, turning to Father Henwick. “It did not occur to me before how strange it was. Was it some good angel that told you to come to me, I wonder?”
“The very thing! You have hit it to a nicety!” said Mr. Langrove. “It was an angel that did it.”
“Yes,” said Father Henwick, falling into the vicar’s playful vein, “and the odd thing was that he came riding up to my house on a fat Cumberland pony! Now, we all know S. Michael has been seen on a white charger, but this is the first time, to my knowledge, that an angel was ever seen mounted on a Cumberland pony.”
“Dear Mr. Langrove, how good of you!” said Franceline, with moistened eyes, and she pressed his hand.
“Had you not better come out with me now for a short walk?” said the vicar. “I sha’n’t be more than half an hour, and it will do you good. Come and have early tea at the vicarage, and we will walk home with you before Blink comes back. What do you say?”
“Oh! I think I had better not go out, I feel so shaken and tired; and then papa might ask for me, you know. I shall not go near him unless he does, after what Dr. Blink said.”
“Well, perhaps it is as well for you to keep quiet. Good-by, dear. I will look in on you this evening.”
“And so will I, my child,” said Father Henwick, laying his broad hand on her head; and the two gentlemen left the cottage together.
TO BE CONTINUED.