CHAPTER XLV.
Mrs. Hazleton found the inconvenience of having a dear friend. It was in vain that she tried to get rid of her visitor. The visitor would not be got rid of. She was deaf to hints; she paid no attention to any kind of inuendoes; and she looked so knowing, so full of important secrets, so quietly mischievous, that Mrs. Hazleton was cowed by that most unnerving of all things, the consciousness of meditated crime. She could not help thinking that the fair widow saw into her thoughts and purposes—she could not help doubting the impenetrability of the veil behind which hypocrisy hides the hideous features of unruly passion—she could not help thinking that the keen-sighted and astute must perceive some of the movements at least of the rude movers of the painted puppets of the face—the smile, the gay looks, the sparkling eyes, the calm placid brow, the dignified serenity, which act their part in the glittering scene of the world, too often worked by the most harsh, foul, and brutal of all the motives of the human heart. But she was irritated too, as well as fearful; and there was a sort of combat went on between impatience and apprehension. Had she given way to inclination she would have ordered one of her servants to take the intruder by the shoulders and put her out of doors; but for more than an hour after the time she had fixed for setting out, vague fears—however groundless and absurd—were sufficiently powerful to restrain her temper. She was not of a character, however, to be long cowed by any thing. She had great confidence in herself—in her own resources—in her own conduct and good fortune likewise. That confidence might have been a little shaken indeed by events which had lately occurred; but anger soon rallied it, and brought it back to her aid. She asked herself if she were a fool to dread that woman—what it was she had discovered—what it was that she could testify. She had merely seen her doing what almost every lady did a hundred times in the year in those day—preparing some simples in the still-room; and gradually as she found that gentle hints proved unsuccessful, she resumed her natural dignity of demeanor. That again gave way to a chilling silence, and then to a somewhat irritable imperiousness, and rising from her chair, she begged her visitor to excuse her, alledging that she had business of importance to transact which would occupy her during the whole day.
Not one of all the variation of conduct—not one sign, however slight, of impatience, doubt, or anger—escaped the keen eye that was fixed upon her. Mrs. Hazleton, under the influence of conscience, did not exactly betray the dark secrets of her own heart, but she raised into importance, an act in itself the most trifling, which would have passed without any notice had she not been anxious to conceal it.
As soon as her visitor, taking a hint that could not be mistaken, had quitted the room and the house, with an air of pique and ill-humor, Mrs. Hazleton returned to the still-room and recommenced her operations there; but she found her hand shaking and her whole frame agitated.
"Am I a fool," she asked herself, "to be thus moved by an empty gossip like that? I must conquer this, or I shall be unfit for my task."
She sat down at a table, leaned her head upon her hand, gazed forth out of the little window, forced her mind away from the present, thought of birds and flowers, and pictures and statues, and of the two sunshiny worlds of art and nature—of every thing in short but the dark, dark cares of her own passions. It was a trick she had learned to play with herself—one of those pieces of internal policy by which she had contrived so often and so long, to rule and master with despotic sway the frequent rebellions of the body against the tyranny of the mind.
She had not sat there two minutes, however, ere there was a tap at the door, and she started with a quick and jarring thrill, as if that knock had been a summons of fate. The next instant she looked quickly around, however, and was satisfied that whoever entered could find no cause for suspicion. She was there seated quietly at the table. The vial was out of sight, the fatal powder hidden in the palm of her hand, and she said aloud, "Come in."
The butler entered, bowing profoundly and saying, "The carriage is at the door, madam, and Wilson has just come back from the house of Mr. Shanks, but he could not find him."
The man hesitated a little as if he wished to add something more, and Mrs. Hazleton replied in a somewhat sharp tone, "I told you when I sent it away just now that I would tell you when I was ready. I shall not be so for half an hour; but let it wait, and do not admit any one. Mr. Shanks must be found, and informed that I want to see him early to-morrow, as I shall go to London on the following day."
"I am sorry to say, madam," replied the butler, "that if the talk of the town is true, he will not be able to come. They say he has been apprehended on a charge of perjury and forgery in regard to that business of Sir Philip Hastings, and has been sent off to the county jail."
Mrs. Hazleton looked certainly a little aghast, and merely saying "Indeed!" she waved her hand for the man to withdraw.
She then sat silent and motionless for at least five minutes. What passed within her I cannot tell; but when she rose, though pale as marble, she was firm, calm, and self-possessed as ever. She turned the key in the lock; she drew a curtain which covered the lower half of the window, farther across, so that no eye from without, except the eye of God, could see what she was doing there within. She then drew forth the vial from its nook, opened out the small packet of powder, and poured part of it into a glass. She seemed as if she were going to pour the whole, but she paused in doing so, and folded up the rest again, saying, "That must be fully enough; I will keep the rest; it may be serviceable, and I can get no more."
She gazed down upon the ground near her feet with a look of cold, stern, but awful resolution, as if there had been an open grave before her; and then she placed the packet in her glove, poured a little distilled water into the glass, shook it, and held the mixture up to the light. The powder had in great part dissolved, but not entirely, and she added a small quantity more of the distilled water, and poured the whole into the vial, which was already about one-third full of a dark colored liquid.
"Now I will go," she said, concealing the bottle. But when she reached the door, and had her hand upon the lock, she paused and remained in very deep thought for an instant, with her brow slightly contracted and her lip quivering. Heaven knows what she thought of then,—whether it was doubt, or fear, or pity, or remorse—but she said in a low tone, "Down, fool! it shall be done," and she passed out of the room.
She paused suddenly in the little passage which led to the still-room, by a pair of double doors, into the principal part of the house, perceiving with some degree of consternation that she had been unconsciously carrying the vial with its dark colored contents in her hand, exposed to the view of all observers. Her eye ran round the passage with a quick and eager glance; but there was no one in sight, and she felt reassured. Even at that moment she could smile at her own heedlessness, and she did smile as she placed the bottle in her pocket, saying to herself, "How foolish! I must not suffer such fits of absence to come upon me, or I shall spoil all."
She then walked quietly to her dressing-room, arranged her dress for the little journey before her, and descended again to the hall, where the servants were waiting for her coming. After she had entered the carriage, however, she again fell into a fit of deep thought, closed her eyes, and remained as if half asleep for nearly an hour. Perhaps it would be too much to scrutinize the state or changes of her feelings during that long, painful lapse of thought. That there was a struggle—a terrible struggle—can hardly be doubted—that opportunity was given her for repentance, for desistance, between the purpose and the deed, we know; and there can be little doubt that the small, still voice—which is ever the voice of God—spoke to her from the spirit-depth within, and warned her to forbear. But she was of an unconquerable nature; nothing could turn her; nothing could overpower her, when she had once resolved on any act. There was no persuasion had effect; no remonstrance was powerful. Reason, conscience, habit itself, were but dust in the balance in the face of one of her determinations.
She roused herself suddenly from her fit of moody abstraction, when the carriage was still more than a mile from the house of Sir Philip Hastings. She looked at the watch which hung by her side, and gazed at the sky; and then she said to herself, "That woman's impertinent intrusion was intolerable. However, I shall get there an hour before the twenty-four hours have passed, and doubtless she will have kept her word and refrained from speaking till she has seen me; but I am afraid I shall find her woke up from her mid-day doze, and that may make the matter somewhat difficult. Difficult! why I have seen jugglers do tricks a thousand times to which this is a mere trifle. My sleight of hand will not fail me, I think;" and then she set her mind to work to plan out every step of her proceedings.
All was clearly and definitely arranged by the time she arrived at the door of Sir Philip Hastings' house. Her face was cleared of every cloud, her whole demeanor under perfect control. She was the Mrs. Hazleton, the calm, dignified, graceful Mrs. Hazleton, which the world knew; and when she descended from the carriage with a slow but easy step, and spoke to the coachman about one of the springs which had creaked and made a noise on the way, not one of Sir Philip Hastings' servants could have believed that her mind was occupied with any thing more grave than the idle frivolous thoughts of an every-day society.
The shrewdest and most successful of politicians has given us the secret of his policy in the words, Follow the public so closely that you shall seem to lead it.