CHAPTER XXVII.
Mr. Rayner slept that night in the dressing-room leading out of the large front room which his wife now occupied. I met him coming out of it as I went downstairs to breakfast the next morning. I spent the hours until dinner-time in my own room, packing and preparing for the journey the next day.
It was curious, I thought, that I had not heard again from my mother, who would naturally be overflowing with excitement about such a great event. I had written a long letter to her on Monday, and put it into the post-bag, with no misgivings as to its safety now that my enemy Sarah was ill. It was a very pleasant thing to think that I should soon be with my mother again, and that in a few days I should see Laurence; but there was a less bright view to be taken of the expedition, and from time to time, in the midst of my happy anticipation, it troubled me.
It seemed an unkind thing, in spite of her obstinate refusal to quit the Alders, to leave delicate Mrs. Rayner alone in this dreary place, the gloom and damp of which had evidently had much to do with the morbid state of mind she was in, with no companions, and no other inmates of the house, except a weird child who was not fond of her, two servants, a sick-nurse, and a delirious invalid. I had noticed faint signs of nervous agitation in her manner lately when the coming journey was alluded to, and I had caught her eyes fixed upon mine sometimes as if she had something to say to me which she could not bring herself to the point of uttering; and the strange perversity of the poor lady, who seemed now mad, now sane, puzzled me more and more.
The Doctor, for whose verdict Mr. Maynard was waiting, did not come that day until just before dinner; and then his report was as gloomy as possible. He did not think it probable that Sarah would ever recover her reason, and the only change she was likely to get from her sick-room was to the county lunatic asylum. On hearing this, the detective, who had spent the morning in making inquiries, in searching Sarah’s boxes, and even her room, at Mr. Rayner’s suggestion, in examining every corner of the housekeeper’s room in which she generally sat, and of the store-cupboard under the stairs, which was also under her charge—but I do not think he went into the left wing, where the large store-room was—having failed to make any discovery, wished to return to town that afternoon; but Mr. Rayner pressed him to stay, saying that he would drive him over to Denham village that afternoon, and, in the character of a friend of his, come down from town for a few days, he could examine the scene of the robbery and make inquiries without any one’s suspecting who he was, and perhaps pick up some scraps of information which would save him from the reproach of having made a journey in vain.
“Do you know enough about railways to pass for an engineer, or inspector, or anything of that sort?” asked Mr. Rayner. “You know, of course, that suspicion has fallen upon a gang of navvies who are at work upon the line near there; but, although there have been detectives among them since, not one has been sharp enough to discover anything yet.”
The man seemed a little shy at first of interfering in a branch of the work of watching which had been put into other hands. But he was rather put upon his mettle by the allusion to the fact that his journey had been so far a failure. And Mr. Rayner whispered to me in the hall, with his eyes twinkling, when the detective was already seated in the dog-cart at the door, that he had put that fellow up to discovering something—it did not matter what, wrong or right. He said they should be back early, as the fog was rising already, and, in order to repay Mr. Maynard for detaining him, there was to be dinner at half-past six, instead of the usual tea at half-past five. And, in the very highest spirits, Mr. Rayner patted my shoulder, told me to save myself up for next day, and that he had a present to give me on the journey, and jumped into the dog-cart.
I went back into the dining-room, where the cook was clearing away the luncheon; Jane, as she had predicted, not having come back yet. Mrs. Rayner was sitting by the fire, with Haidee on her lap.
“Are you unhappy at the thought of losing her so soon?” said I softly, leaving my seat and kneeling by her side, as soon as the cook had left the room.
Mrs. Rayner looked at me earnestly, and then whispered—