“Good God!” he cried, and rose to his feet in sudden blind misery and bewilderment, driven wild for the moment by a horrible doubt, which brought up before him in a second of time half-a-dozen scenes and suggestions. He had seen Amanda live through so many paroxysms of passion—why should she have died of that one? And Innocent had fled like a hunted creature from the house; why had she fled? These questions, that never occurred to him before, fell upon him now all at once. He seemed to see again the darkened house, the sudden excitement and horror falling into the ordinary stillness of night, the sudden change from ordinary events and the usual tenor of existence to death—confusion and trouble for the survivors; eternal silence for the one who had been the most exuberant, the most violent in her vitality. God in heaven! was the child mad and raving; or could this horrible confession be true?
Innocent sat very still in her chair, looking at him with fixed eyes. She had made her confession, and calm had returned to her. Her pale, slender hands lay loosely clasped in her lap, relieved against the black dress which she wore as mourning for Amanda. Her eyes were anxious, following his every look and gesture, but perfect calm had fallen upon her slight figure, her habitual attitude. Her secret was told, and all her embarrassment and uneasiness gone. To look at her so, and to believe that she was an actor in any such tragedy was impossible. Frederick was overcome; his eyes filled with tears. He was surprised by an overflow of feeling which he did not know how to restrain. He went to the back of her chair and bent over her, putting down his hand upon hers.
“Innocent,” he cried, “you are dreaming, you are raving; it is impossible, anything is possible but this.”
She lifted her face to him, searching into the expression of his with her anxious eyes. “Oh, do not be angry,” she said, like a child that had done some petty wrong.
The incongruity of the appeal, the words so foolishly simple, the look so tragically anxious, had such an effect upon Frederick as nothing in his life had ever had before. Was the murder of which she accused herself no more to this child than the breaking of a piece of china, the neglect of some trifling duty? God help them all! Wonder, horror, pity, love, all complicated with the mystery of a doubt which could not be shaken off, and a certainty which was above all doubt, distracted the very soul of the man, who could no more understand Innocent than she could understand him. He took her uplifted face in his hands and kissed the forehead again and again. “Innocent, forget this madness,” he said, “you make me wretched as well as yourself, for I love you—I love you better than anything in the world.”
“Ah!” she cried, freeing herself and turning away; “but I cannot forget, I can never forget. For I did it; I did not mean it, but I did it. Do not be angry; but you must never say you love me again.”
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
INTO FURTHER DEEPS.
When Mrs. Eastwood came back she found that Innocent had gone to bed with a headache, and Frederick, with an agitated face, sat silent, brooding over the fire by himself. He had no book nor paper to occupy him, and his face was clouded, as it had been in the days of excitement before his marriage, or those of unhappiness which followed after. He said little while Nelly was in the room, but suggested crossly that she should go and look after Innocent. “If you will take the trouble,” he said. His tone was full of irritation, as it had been in the old times, but seldom in the new. Mrs. Eastwood made Nelly a sign to obey. She saw at once what had happened. She went and stood by her son’s side as Nelly went up-stairs.
“What does this mean, mother?” he said, turning moody eyes, which looked red and feverish, upon her. “What does it mean? Innocent has been raving about something I don’t understand. Surely anything which concerns me so much might have been told me. For God’s sake! what does it mean?”
“A delusion,” said Mrs. Eastwood quietly, laying her hand upon his shoulder.