Oswald Cray: A Novel

by Mrs. Henry Wood

WEARY DAYS.

The cold, bitter, biting winter passed away, and when the lovely spring came round again little trace was left of its effects, save in the remembrance of those in whose homes sickness, or privation, or death, had been busy.

Two of those visitations had been rife in the poor house of Caroline Cray: sickness and privation. Perhaps you noticed Caroline's reply to Dick's question of whether Mark had no money: there was a little left, she said, not much. Left from what? Dick did not ask.

If ever an unfortunate company had come to grief more completely than other unfortunate companies, it was surely that noted one, the Great Wheal Bang. Sympathising friends--Barker's and Mark's--were wont to assure those gentlemen that they had "managed wretchedly:" and if we may dare to assume that the reproach was levelled at the fact of having secured nothing for themselves, it was a right one. On the day that Mark Cray went up to the offices for the last time he had but a trifling sum of money about him: Caroline had even less in her own purse; and that was all. Barker's word of precaution had secured the diamond ring and studs, and these were converted into money, Mark and Barker equally dividing the spoil. Barker, with his share, took a little tour abroad while the cloud blew over; Mark, as you have seen, went into hiding, and lived upon his part as long as it held out.

Yes, it was an unhappy fact, very debasing indeed after all the glory of Grosvenor Place, lowering as you may feel it to be to this history, Mr. Mark Cray hid himself by day, and slipped out to take the air at dusk in a moustache and blue spectacles. Mark Cray could but be a coward in the hour of trial; he ran from the danger instead of facing it. Had Mark but looked the angry shareholders and the trouble in the face, he need not have been so very fearful; but to look a difficulty in the face was not in the nature of Mark Cray. He scarcely understood what he was afraid of; he did not know what they could do to him--whether imprison him, or make him a bankrupt, or what; and Mark would rather have jumped into the sea than ascertain. He was exactly like a child who runs away screaming from a dark closet, and dare not look to see whether cause for terror is there. Some of us, my friends, have been sadly frightened at shadows.

When this state of affairs was to end, and what was to get Mark out of his difficulty, he did not at present see. As long as the money lasted he was not unduly anxious. He had great faith in something "turning up," he had unlimited faith in Barker; and Barker's letters were pretty frequent, and in the highest degree cheering. Barker happened to have a cousin, about the nineteenth remove, settled at Honfleur, in Normandie, and Barker had steered for the same port, and seemed to be living at ease there. Towards the close of the winter he wrote word to Mark that he had something good in contemplation, connected with Paris, and if it came to anything Mark should share in it.

But when Mark's money was gone things changed. He grew restless and gloomy. He could not starve, he could not go to the workhouse: he must do something. Miss Bettina Davenal would not help them: she said she could not--perhaps with justice. Leopold Davenal had been an expense to her, and was still; he went back to school after the Christmas holidays with Dick, but he was not strong yet, and sundry expensive extras were provided for him out of her pocket. That was not much: but a heavier expense had fallen upon her: for she had repaid Mr. Wheatley the two hundred pounds borrowed by Sara. Sara had disclosed to her aunt the fact of borrowing it, and in her pride Miss Bettina had made a sacrifice and repaid the sum. She had none left to bestow on Mark; there was clearly no help to be had from her.

And Caroline? You can take a look at her as she sat in the sun, which was shining into the room this bright day in early April. Perhaps you remember a remark Dr. Davenal once made--that Caroline was not one, as he believed, to bear well the adversities of life. Dr. Davenal was quite right: neither physically nor mentally did they agree with poor Caroline.

I don't know whether anybody gets ill at once under a great shock. Caroline had not. When it fell upon her she was too stunned, too entirely surprised, to be anything but bewildered. It may be questioned if a change so sudden--from seemingly assured prosperity to hiding and disgrace and poverty--has ever fallen. You may feel inclined to question it in this instance; nevertheless, I repeat that I am telling you the simple truth. The reaction had come now, and Caroline Cray gave way sadly. Her cough, that Dick remarked upon, had got well; but she would lie back in her chair all day, and it seemed next to impossible to get her out of it.

But if the body was at rest the mind was only the more active. Caroline's hours, in point of fact, were pretty equally divided between outward complaining and inward lamentation. Such lamentation is nearly always rebellious, and so was hers. The blow had been so complete; the change was so very great! All that pomp and vanity, all the luxuries, the carelessness, the pleasure attendant on that one past sunshiny wave in life's current, to have given place to this! Perhaps the worst mortification, looking back, was that the play now seemed to have been so unreal; as if they had had no right to indulge in it, were such fools to have embarked in it, worse than fools to have believed in it. Mortified, fretful, miserable, Caroline Cray seemed to live but in repining and repentance. Mark was different He neither repined nor repented; he was always restless, always expecting something to turn up; and he would stalk up and down the room, giving tongue to all sorts of wild visions of what he would do were he but clear of the world and the Great Wheal Bang.