“Oh, my dear leddy, my own mistress,” cried Gilchrist, “think—think before you do that! He will ask ye for the evidence, if I am not to ask for it. He’s a fine, independent-spirited young gentleman, and he will just shake his head, and say he’ll lippen to nobody again. Oh, dinna deceive the young man! Ye might find out after——”
“What, Gilchrist? Do you think I would change my mind about my own son, and abandon him, like this woman, at the last?”
“I never knew you forsake one that trusted in ye, I’m not saying that; but there might come one after all that had a better claim. There might appear one that even the like of me would believe in—that would have real evidence in his favour, that was no more to be doubted than if he had never been taken away out of your arms.”
Miss Bethune turned round quick as lightning upon her maid, her eyes shining, her face full of sudden colour and light. “God bless you, Gilchrist!” she cried, seizing the maid by her shoulders with a half embrace; “I see now you have never believed in that story—no more than me.”
Poor Gilchrist could but gape with her mouth open at this unlooked-for turning of the tables. She had presented, without knowing it, the strongest argument of all.
After this, the patient, whom poor Harry had left to the happy influences of quiet and darkness, with all the blinds drawn up and the afternoon sunshine pouring in, went through an hour or two of restless occupation, her mind in the highest activity, her thoughts and her hands full. She promised finally to Gilchrist, not without a mental reservation in the case of special impulse or new light, not to disclose her conviction to Harry, but to wait for at least a day or two on events. But even this resolution did not suffice to reduce her to any condition of quiet, or make the rest which he had prescribed possible. She turned to a number of things which had been laid aside to be done one time or another; arrangement of new possessions and putting away of old, for which previously she had never found a fit occasion, and despatched them, scarcely allowing Gilchrist to help her, at lightning speed.
Finally, she took out an old and heavy jewel-box, which had stood untouched in her bedroom for years; for, save an old brooch or two and some habitual rings which never left her fingers, Miss Bethune wore no ornaments. She took them into her sitting-room as the time approached when Harry might be expected back. It would give her a countenance, she thought; it would keep her from fixing her eyes on him while he spoke, and thus being assailed through all the armour of the heart at the same time. She could not look him in the face and see that likeness which Gilchrist, unconvincible, would not see, and yet remain silent. Turning over the old-fashioned jewels, telling him about them, to whom they had belonged, and all the traditions regarding them, would help her in that severe task of self-repression. She put the box on the table before her, and pulled out the trays.
Nobody in Bloomsbury had seen these treasures before: the box had been kept carefully locked, disguised in an old brown cover, that no one might even guess how valuable it was. Miss Bethune was almost tempted to send for Dora to see the diamonds in their old-fashioned settings, and that pearl necklace which was still finer in its perfection of lustre and shape. To call Dora when there was anything to show was so natural, and it might make it easier for her to keep her own counsel; but she reflected that in Dora’s presence the young man would not be more than half hers, and forbore.
Never in her life had those jewels given her so much pleasure. They had given her no pleasure, indeed. She had not been allowed to have them in that far-off stormy youth, which had been lightened by such a sweet, guilty gleam of happiness, and quenched in such misery of downfall. When they came to her by inheritance, like all the rest, these beautiful things had made her heart sick. What could she do with them—a woman whose life no longer contained any possible festival, who had nobody coming after her, no heir to make heirlooms sweet? She had locked the box, and almost thrown away the key, which, however, was a passionate suggestion repugnant to common sense, and resolved itself naturally into confiding the key to Gilchrist, in whose most secret repositories it had been kept, with an occasional furtive interval during which the maid had secretly visited and “polished up” the jewels, making sure that they were all right. Neither mistress nor maid was quite aware of their value, and both probably exaggerated it in their thoughts; but some of the diamonds were fine, though all were very old-fashioned in arrangement, and the pearls were noted. Miss Bethune pulled out the trays, and the gems flashed and sparkled in a thousand colours in the slant of sunshine which poured in its last level ray through one window, just before the sun set—and made a dazzling show upon the table, almost blinding Janie, who came up with a message, and could not restrain a little shriek of wonder and admiration. The letter was one of trouble and appeal from poor Mrs. Hesketh, who and her husband were becoming more and more a burden on the shoulders of their friends. It asked for money, as usual, just a little money to go on with, as the shop in which they had been set up was not as yet producing much. The letter had been written with evident reluctance, and was marked with blots of tears. Miss Bethune’s mind was too much excited to consider calmly any such petition. Full herself of anticipation, of passionate hope, and visionary enthusiasm, which transported her above all common things, how was she to refuse a poor woman’s appeal for the bare necessities of existence—a woman “near her trouble,” with a useless husband, who was unworthy, yet whom the poor soul loved? She called Gilchrist, who generally carried the purse, to get something for the poor little pair.
“Is there anybody waiting?” she asked.