“It will cost him the eyes out of his head,” Algy said. “Lucky beggar, he don’t mind what he spends now.”
“Why?” the doctor asked, and was laughed at for not knowing that Charlie had run off with old Tredgold’s daughter, who was good for any amount of money, and, of course, would soon give in and receive the pair back again into favour. “Are you so sure of that?” the doctor said. And Algy had replied that his friend would be awfully up a tree if it didn’t turn out so. The doctor shook his head in relating this story to Katherine. “I have my doubts,” he said; but she knew nothing on that subject, and was thinking of nothing but of Stella herself, and the dreadful thought that she might see her no more.
The vicar, on his side, had been busy with his inquiries too, and he had found out everything with the greatest ease; in the first place from Andrews, the young coachman, who declared that he had always taken his orders from Miss Stella, and didn’t know as he was doing no wrong. Andrews admitted very frankly that he had driven his young mistress to the little church, one of the very small primitive churches of the island near Steephill, where the tall gentleman with the dark moustaches had met her, and where Miss Stevens had turned up with a big basketful of white chrysanthemums. They had been in the church about half an hour, and then they had come out again, and Miss Stevens and the young lady had got into the brougham. The chrysanthemums had been for the decoration of the ballroom, as everybody knew. Then he had taken Miss Stevens to meet the last train for Ryde; and finally he had driven his young ladies home with a gentleman on the box that had got down at the gate, but whether he came any further or not Andrews did not know. The vicar had gone on in search of information to Steephill Church, and found that the old rector there, in the absence of the curate—he himself being almost past duty by reason of old age—had married one of the gentlemen living at the Castle to a young lady whose name he could not recollect further than that it was Stella. The old gentleman had thought it all right as it was a gentleman from the Castle, and he had a special licence, which made everything straight. The register of the marriage was all right in the books, as the vicar had taken care to see. Of course it was all right in the books! Katherine was much surprised that they should all make such a point of that, as if anything else was to be thought of. What did it matter about the register? The thing was that Stella had run away, that she was gone, that she had betrayed their trust in her, and been a traitor to her home.
But a girl is not generally judged very hardly when she runs away; it is supposed to be her parents’ fault or her lover’s fault, and she but little to blame. But when Katherine thought of her vigil on the cliff, her long watch in the moonlight, without a word of warning or farewell, she did not think that Stella was so innocent. Her heart was very sore and wounded by the desertion. The power of love indeed! Was there no love, then, but one? Did her home count for nothing, where she had always been so cherished; nor her father, who had loved her so dearly; nor her sister, who had given up everything to her? Oh, no; perhaps the sister didn’t matter! But at least her father, who could not bear that she should want anything upon which she had set her heart! Katherine’s heart swelled at the thought of all Stella’s contrivances to escape in safety. She had carried all her jewels with her, those jewels which she had partly acquired as the price of abandoning Sir Charles. Oh, the treachery, the treachery of it! She could scarcely keep her countenance while the gentlemen came with their reports. She felt her features distorted with the effort to show nothing but sorrow, and to thank them quietly for all the trouble they had taken. She would have liked to stamp her foot, to dash her clenched hands into the air, almost to utter those curses which had burst from her father. What a traitor she had been! What a traitor! She was glad to get the men out of the house, who were very kind, and wanted to do more if she would let them—to do anything, and especially to return and communicate to Mr. Tredgold the result of their inquiries when he woke from his long sleep. Katherine said No, no, she would prefer to tell him herself. There seemed to be but one thing she desired, and that was to be left alone.
After this hot fit there came, as was natural, a cold one. Katherine went upstairs to her own room, the room divided from that other only by an open door, which they had occupied ever since they were children. Then her loneliness came down upon her like a pall. Even with the thrill of this news in all her frame, she felt a foolish impulse to go and call Stella—to tell Stella all about it, and hear her hasty opinion. Stella never hesitated to give her opinion, to pronounce upon every subject that was set before her with rapid, unhesitating decisions. She would have known exactly what to say on this subject. She would have taken the girl’s part; she would have asked what right a man had because he was your father to be such a tyrant. Katherine could hear the very tone in which she would have condemned the unnatural parent, and see the indignant gesture with which she would have lifted her head. And now there was nobody, nothing but silence; the room so vacant, the trim bed so empty and cold and white. It was like a bed of death, and Katherine shivered. The creature so full of impulses and hasty thoughts and crude opinions and life and brightness would never be there again. No, even if papa would forgive—even if he would receive her back, there would be no Stella any more. This would not be her place; the sisterly companionship was broken, and life could never more be what it had been.
She sat down on the floor in the middle of the desolation and cried bitterly. What should she do without Stella? Stella had always been the first to think of everything; the suggestion of what to do or say had always been in her hands. Katherine did not deny to herself that she had often thought differently from Stella, that she had not always accepted either her suggestions or her opinions; but that was very different from the silence, the absence of that clear, distinct, self-assured little voice, the mind made up so instantaneously, so ready to pronounce upon every subject. Even in this way of looking at it, it will be seen that she was no blind admirer of her sister. She knew her faults as well as anyone. Faults! she was made up of faults—but she was Stella all the same.
She had cried all her tears out, and was still sitting intent, with her sorrowful face, motionless, in the reaction of excitement, upon the floor, when Simmons, the housekeeper, opened the door, and looked round for her, calling at last in subdued tones, and starting much to see the lowly position in which her young mistress was. Simmons came attended by the little jingle of a cup and spoon, which had been so familiar in the ears of the girls in all their little childish illnesses, when Simmons with the beef-tea or the arrowroot, or whatever it might be, was a change and a little amusement to them, in the dreadful vacancy of a day in bed. Mrs. Simmons, though she was a great personage in the house and (actually) ordered the dinners and ruled over everything, notwithstanding any fond illusions that Katherine might cherish on that subject, had never delegated this care to anyone else, and Katherine knew very well what was going to be said.
“Miss Katherine, dear, sit up now and take this nice beef-tea. I’ve seen it made myself, and it’s just as good as I know how. And you must take something if you’re ever to get up your strength. Sit up, now, and eat it as long as it’s nice and hot—do!” The address was at once persuasive, imploring, and authoritative. “Sit up, now, Miss Katherine—do!”
“Oh, Simmons, it isn’t beef-tea I want this time,” she said, stumbling hastily to her feet.
“No,” Simmons allowed with a sigh, “but you want your strength kep’ up, and there’s nothing so strengthening. It’ll warm you too. It’s a very cold morning and there’s no comfort in the house—not a fire burning as it ought to, not a bit of consolation nowhere. We can’t all lay down and die, Miss Katherine, because Miss Stella, bless her, has married a very nice gentleman. He ain’t to your papa’s liking, more’s the pity, and sorry I am in many ways, for a wedding in the house is a fine thing, and such a wedding as Miss Stella’s, if she had only pleased your papa! It would have been a sight to see. But, dear, a young lady’s fancy is not often the same as an old gentleman’s, Miss Katherine. We must all own to that. They thinks of one thing and the young lady, bless her, she thinks of another. It’s human nature. Miss Stella’s pleased herself, she hasn’t pleased Master. Well, we can’t change it, Miss Katherine, dear; but she’s very ’appy, I don’t make a doubt of it, for I always did say as Sir Charles was a very taking man. Lord bless us, just to think of it! I am a-calling her Miss Stella, and it’s my Lady she is, bless her little heart!”