Original Penny Readings: A Series of Short Sketches

by George Manville Fenn

I shut the fly-door myself, and then stood alone, not knowing whether to be happy or sorry; but I was soon aroused by the parting of our visitors; and then, entering the house with my aunt and my tiny bridesmaid cousin, I caught the infection from them, and, forgetting my fifteen years’ old manliness, sat down and had a hearty cry.

Time slipped by. The trip was over, and the couple returned; the cottage occupied, and things shaken down into the regular country-town routine. After the first Sunday or two no one turned to gaze at Fred and Annie—much to my annoyance—and the young couple ceased to form the theme of conversation.

I was very proud of my post in the office, having just been emancipated from school, and always felt very manly and important whenever I could feel that Mr French had not his eye upon me—the effect of that eye being to make me turn to a boy in an instant. Fred and he were very intimate, and French often went up to the cottage to have a cigar and game of chess; and, somehow, I always used to feel jealous of his smooth, oily civilities, and could see that they were anything but agreeable to Annie. On more than one occasion I found him lolling upon the sofa when I went in, at times when I had left Fred busy over correspondence which French had asked him to finish for that night’s post. At such times I always found Annie sitting close to the window, and apparently much relieved by my entrance; while French greeted me with a mocking, strained civility, which almost drove me away. But the knowledge that he wanted to be rid of me always determined me to stay, for I felt that I was acting as a protector to my brother’s wife.

After a while Fred would stroll in, and French and he take to the chess-board; Annie to her work; while I in a corner with a book would alternately read and watch the stealthy glances French kept casting towards his friend’s wife.

At the end of six months an unspoken feud had sprung up between French and myself. I could see that Annie was pained at the fellow’s presence, but she evidently forbore to speak to Fred, who held him in high estimation; and in the nobleness of his heart was beyond suspicion. But one autumn evening, when the winter seemed to be sending monitory warnings of his coming in the wailing winds and cutting blasts which began to strip the trees, I saw a figure pass the office window that I made sure was French. It was about six o’clock, and we had been detained later than usual, while even then Fred had several more letters to write. French had left the office about a quarter of an hour before, telling Fred he should look him up in the evening; to which a cheery “all right” was returned.

Upon seeing him hurry past the window, I rose to go; but Fred kept me fully another quarter of an hour; and then, telling me to call on my way to my lodging and tell Annie he would be home in a quarter of an hour, he settled down again quietly to his writing.

An unpleasant feeling that all was not right made me quicken my steps; and, going round by the back, I entered the cottage, and had reached the parlour door when the sound of a voice somewhat raised in pitch arrested me. Then followed the low muttering of a deep masculine voice saying something with great earnestness; and, thinking nothing of honour or being unmanly, I quietly turned the handle of the back parlour door, and entered. A pair of folding doors separated it from the front room; and, as I had hoped, they were ajar, so that, unobserved, I could see and hear all that passed.

French had his back to me, and was standing with Annie in the centre of the room; he holding her hand with both his, and she gazing with a scared, half-angry, half-frightened look in his face.

As I stood trembling there, he drew her towards him, and tried to pass one of his arms round her waist, but with a sharp cry, with eyes sparkling, and rage in every feature, she struck him sharply across the cheek with her disengaged hand, and I believe in his rage he would have returned the blow had I not sprung into the room and caught his arm.

Not a word was spoken; but, shaking me off, he looked at Annie with a malevolent glance in his eye; and then, holding up his finger in a threatening way, which seemed to say, “Speak of it if you dare!” he strode out of the house as Annie sank sobbing and hysterical into a chair.