The Cryptogram: A Novel

by James De Mille

"Won't you walk in, then?" said the General, in a kindly voice, feeling a strange commiseration for the poor creature, whose face, manner, and voice exhibited so much wretchedness.

The General held the door open, and waited for her to enter. Then closing the door he offered her a chair, and resumed his former seat. But the housekeeper declined sitting. She stood looking strangely confused and troubled, and for some time did not speak a word. The General waited patiently, and regarded her earnestly. In spite of himself he found that feeling arising within him which had occurred in the morning-room--a feeling as if he had somewhere known this woman before. Who was she? What did it mean? Was he a precious old fool, or was there really some important mystery connected with Mrs. Hart? Such were his thoughts.

Perhaps if he had seen nothing more of Mrs. Hart the Earl's account of her would have been accepted by him, and no thoughts of her would have perplexed his brain. But her arrival now, her entrance into his room, and her whole manner, brought back the thoughts which he had before with tenfold force, in such a way that it was useless to struggle against them. He felt that there was a mystery, and that the Earl himself not only knew nothing about it, but could not even suspect it. But _what_ was the mystery? That he could not, or perhaps dared not, conjecture. The vague thought which darted across his mind was one which was madness to entertain. He dismissed it and waited.

At last Mrs. Hart spoke.

"Pardon me, Sir," she said, in a faint, low voice, "for troubling you. I wished to apologize for intruding upon you in the morning-room. I did not know you were there."

She spoke abstractedly and wearily. The General felt that it was not for this that she had thus visited him, but that something more lay behind. Still he answered her remark as if he took it in good faith. He hastened to reassure her. It was no intrusion. Was she not the housekeeper, and was it not her duty to go there? What could she mean?

At this she looked at him, with a kind of solemn yet eager scrutiny. "I was afraid," she said, after some hesitation, speaking still in a dull monotone, whose strangely sorrowful accents were marked and impressive, and in a voice whose tone was constrained and stiff, but yet had something in it which deepened the General's perplexity--"I was afraid that perhaps you might have witnessed some marks of agitation in me. Pardon me for supposing that you could have troubled yourself so far as to notice one like me; but--but--I--that is, I am a little--eccentric; and when I suppose that I am alone that eccentricity is marked. I did not know that you were in the room, and so I was thrown off my guard."

Every word of this singular being thrilled through the General. He looked at her steadily without speaking for some time. He tried to force his memory to reveal what it was that this woman suggested to him, or who it was that she had been associated with in that dim and shadowy past which but lately he had been calling up. Her voice, too--what was it that it suggested? That voice, in spite of its constraint, was woeful and sad beyond all description. It was the voice of suffering and sorrow too deep for tears--that changeless monotone which makes one think that the words which are spoken are uttered by some machine.

Her manner also by this time evinced a greater and a deeper agitation. Her hands mechanically clasped each other in a tight, convulsive grasp, and her slight frame trembled with irrepressible emotion. There was something in her appearance, her attitude, her manner, and her voice, which enchained the General's attention, and was nothing less than fascination. There was something yet to come, to tell which had led her there, and these were only preliminaries. This the General felt. Every word that she spoke seemed to be a mere formality, the precursor of the real words which she wished to utter. What was it? Was it her affection for Guy? Had she come to ask about the betrothal? Had she come to look at Zillah's portrait? Had she come to remonstrate with him for arranging a marriage between those who were as yet little more than children? But what reason had she for interfering in such an affair? It was utterly out of place in one like her. No; there was something else, he could not conjecture what.

All these thoughts swept with lightning speed through his mind, and still the poor stricken creature stood before him with her eyes lowered and her hands clasped, waiting for his answer. He roused himself, and sought once more to reassure her. He told her that he had noticed nothing, that he had been looking out of the window, and that in any case, if he had, he should have thought nothing about it. This he said in as careless a tone as possible, willfully misstating facts, from a generous desire to spare her uneasiness and set her mind at rest.