Edina: A Novel

by Mrs. Henry Wood

Margaret, turning hot and cold, and red and white, made her escape from the room, and took refuge in her own. In that first moment of awakening, she felt as though her heart must break with its bitter pain. Jealousy, baleful jealousy, had taken possession of her: and no other passion in this life can prey upon our bosoms so relentlessly, or touch them with so keen a sting.

[CHAPTER XIV.]

IN THE CHURCHYARD

Trennach churchyard was lonely at all times, but it looked particularly so in the twilight of a dull evening. The trees took fantastic shapes; the headstones stood out like spectres; the grave-mounds reminded you unpleasantly that you yourself must sometime lie beneath them.

Especially grey were the skies this evening; for, though it was summer weather, the day had been gloomy: and Mr. Blase Pellet, sitting in the middle of the churchyard on the stump of an old tree, looked grey and gloomy as the weather and the graves.

Since the departure from Trennach of Rosaline Bell—for whom Mr. Blase Pellet did undoubtedly entertain a fond and sincere affection, whatever might have been his shortcomings generally—he had found his evening hours, when the chemist's shop was closed for the night, hang heavily on his hands. With the absence of Rosaline, the two chief relaxations in which Mr. Blase had employed his leisure were gone: namely, the cunning contrivances to meet her, either at home or abroad; and watching the movements of Frank Raynor. The young man's jealousy of the latter and Rosaline burnt as fiercely as ever, tormenting him to a most unreasonable degree: though, indeed, when was jealousy ever amenable to reason? There was no longer any personal intercourse between Frank Raynor and Rosaline; Blase knew quite well that could not be, for Frank was at Trennach, and she was at Falmouth; but he had felt as sure, ever since she went, that their intercourse was carried on by letter, as that he was now sitting on the stump of the old tree.

Jealousy needs no proof to confirm its fancies: our great master-mind has told us that it makes the food it feeds on. And upon this airy, unsubstantial kind of food had Mr. Pellet been nourishing his suspicions of the supposed correspondence—which existed in his imagination alone. He had watched the postman in a morning, he had waylaid him, and by apparently artless questions had got him to disclose to whom the letter was addressed which he had just left at Dr. Raynor's: and the less proof he could find of the suspected postal intercourse, the brighter his jealousy burned. For it was not often that the postman could say the letter, which he might have chanced to leave at the doctor's house, was for Mr. Frank Raynor. Sometimes it would be for the doctor himself, sometimes for Miss Raynor; but very rarely for Frank. Frank's correspondence did not seem to be an extensive one. This might possibly have satisfied an ordinary young man; it only tended to strengthen Mr. Blase Pellet's raging doubts: and now, on this ill-favoured evening, those doubts had received "confirmation strong as proofs of holy writ."

Since, like Othello, he had found his occupation gone, Mr. Blase Pellet was rather at a loss to know what to do with his evenings. To render him justice, it must be admitted that he did not follow the fashion, and spend them, however soberly, at the Golden Shaft. He was a steady, well-conducted young man, superior to his apparent position, and better in some respects than many of his neighbours. Finding the hours lying on his hands, he took to looking in unceremoniously at the houses of his acquaintances, so to pass a more or less agreeable interlude. This evening he had so favoured Clerk Trim; and it was in crossing the churchyard, after quitting that functionary's dwelling, that he had come to an anchor on the tree-stump. Bitter anger was aroused within him; raging jealousy; a tumultuous thirst for revenge. For, in the clerk's house he had just been furnished, as he believed, with the confirmation yearned for.

When Frank Raynor had so lightly sent Clerk Trim to Tello, to inquire for certain imaginary letters at the post-office there, he little thought what grave consequences would arise from it in the future. Simply for the sake of getting the clerk out of the way during the ceremony of the stolen marriage, he had invented this fruitless errand. When the clerk came back in the course of the day, and reported that no letter was lying for him at the post-office at Tello, the man added, "And I've taken care not to mention to a soul, sir, where I have been, as you desired; neither will I." "Oh, thank you, but I don't in the least mind now whether you mention it or not," rejoined Frank, in the openness of his heart. For, his object attained, it did not matter to him if the whole world knew that he had sent the clerk to Tello.

Clerk Trim, naturally a silent man, had experienced no temptation to mention it, in spite of the release given him: but on this evening, talking with Blase Pellet of Tello, he chanced to say that he had been there not long ago. Mr. Blase expressed some surprise at this, knowing that journeys were rare events with the clerk; and then Trim mentioned what he had gone for: to inquire for a letter at the Tello post-office for Mr. Frank Raynor.