“Oh, hush, hush!” said Helen, frightened by the sound of her voice.
He was standing behind the curtains waiting for them.
“How long you have been!” he said to her in a low, stern voice; but he opened his arms to the child. “My little Janey—my little darling!” he said, bending down on his knees to bring himself within her reach. Janey clasped her arms round his neck, and kissed him, with open-mouthed childish kisses.
“Where are you doing to take me, papa?” she said, her dark eyes dancing with excitement. He raised himself up, holding her closely clasped to his breast, and carried her out into the night.
What a strange night-walk it was—through the country lanes, all heavy and muddy after the storm, and dark as the darkest midnight; brushing against the rustling, thorny hedges, stumbling over heaps of stones, through the pools at the roadside, and upon the slippery grass; here and there crossing a stile at haphazard, with no guide but instinct; here stealing past a cottage, shrinking from the lamps of the doctor’s gig, which threw a suspicious light upon them. Helen, following, dragging her weary feet through the muddy ways, holding up the long skirts not intended for such usage in her arms, her veil over her face, felt herself shrink, too, when the light flashed upon them. But who could have supposed that it was the master of Fareham and his children that were out there in the muddy lanes? Once at the turnpike, where they were all as well known as the day, her father, whom she always saw before her, a vague, dark shadow with the child in his arms, replied in a gruff feigned voice, with a fictitious country accent, which gave Helen a sharp shock, to the good-night of the gatekeeper. To avoid notice was one thing, to tell a practical lie was another. This, in the midst of her confused wretchedness, gave her a painful prick of sensation. Janey in her excitement had begun to prattle at first, but had been summarily silenced by her father, and now drooped upon his shoulder fast asleep, her face half hidden in the rough collar of his coat. Between the other two not a word passed. Helen was too miserable and too much bewildered to ask any questions; she followed submissively.
The little station was within about a mile of Fareham, but a mile is long when trudged through mud and rain by unaccustomed feet, in a gloomy night, and with a heavy heart. A late train going express to town which otherwise would have scorned this little station, had been arranged to stop there for the convenience of the man of business, the well-known Mr Goulburn, whose affairs were on too colossal a scale to be managed by the ordinary means of communication open to everybody. Sometimes he had special parcels to send by the guard: sometimes a clerk who had “run down” for some special directions, or an associate acting with him on some great city board, whose time was too valuable to permit the loss of a moment, took advantage of this train; and sometimes he himself, jumping into a dogcart the moment the latest guest had departed after a sumptuous dinner, had rushed up to town by it. The station-master and the porters were like his own servants, and the whole place all but kept for his convenience. He crept up to it now, keeping carefully in the shadow, out of the glare of its poor paraffin lamps.
“Keep yourself muffled up, and your veil down, and go and get the tickets,” Mr Goulburn said, in the low and peremptory tone in which he had throughout addressed Helen. She went without a word; she who had never in her life done any such thing for herself. The clerk peered at her through his wicket; the solitary porter stared as she stood alone on the little platform. She was left there by herself until the train came up, and the three persons who formed the personnel of the station had nothing to do but to stare at her, and ask about the luggage which she did not possess. When the train stopped with its usual little fret and commotion, Mr Goulburn suddenly came forward and plunged into an empty carriage. His high coat-collar, the slouch of his hat, and finally, the figure of the child asleep upon his shoulder concealed him effectually. Helen could not help wondering whether she were as effectually disguised, and the thought once more gave her a sharp pinch of pain. Why were they hiding themselves? There was not a word spoken while the train rushed on, tearing through that darkness which they had just traversed so slowly and painfully. Only once, and that when they were but just started, did any communication pass between the father and daughter. They both looked out towards the home they had left, though it was invisible as they left the little station. Upon the road close by the lights of a carriage were visible, slowly approaching. It was the carriage which, when Mr Goulburn was absent, was despatched to meet the last train on Saturday nights. The last train from London was not due for half an hour, and the coachman came along at a leisurely pace, slowly climbing the road to meet his master, who was flying, disguised and shameful, in the other direction. The contrast was so strange that he looked at Helen, and their eyes met. Something piteous was in his look. It contained a whole world of misery, of consciousness, of appeal which was almost humorous, amidst the profundity of pain. She had asked no questions, she had scarcely ventured to form to herself an idea of what the cause of this flight could be, but for the first time her heart was touched.
“Does she not tire you, lying on your shoulder? I could take her a little, papa,” she said. She could think of no other way of showing her sympathy. He shook his head and pressed the child closer to him. Was it that the touch of her innocence made him feel less guilty? Was it that to convince himself of the strength of the natural affection in him made him think himself a better man? or was it only the one real and true sentiment which may still preserve the least worthy from perdition? Helen looked somewhat wistfully at her little sister, lying in all the abandon of childish sleep, helpless yet omnipotent, across her father’s breast. She had never been a favourite like little Janey. No passion of parental affection had ever been lavished upon her, and, in consequence, she knew her father better, and perhaps secretly trusted him less, than children ought to do—though she had never said this even to herself. But for the moment, she sitting alone opposite to them, carried off from all her anchors, swept into some wild sea of the unknown, looked at them wistfully, and envied the father and the child.
In a few hours more Helen understood much more perfectly what the metaphor meant which we have just employed. At midnight they embarked in a steamer which, after feeling its way down the river through a thousand dangers, plunged into the Channel just as daybreak made the rough waves and flying foam visible. It was a small, old, almost worn-out boat, and the voyage was one of the longer and cheaper ones which tempt the passengers from the ordinary routes, to their profound suffering and repentance. Helen had never been at sea before. She lay trembling while the vessel creaked and plunged, not knowing what to reply to Janey’s inquiry why the ship went up and down. Why, indeed? It seemed to do so on purpose, tossing them up one moment and down the other with that sickening repetition which helps to make up the agony of a voyage to the inexperienced. In the morning, in the perplexing and painful daylight of which Helen felt afraid, she did not know why, they landed on foreign soil. Her father had changed during the night, she could not tell how. Was it possible that already on the previous evening he had worn the large whiskers and carefully smoothed hair which seemed to have grown lighter, redder, than it used to be? She scarcely knew him when he came on deck, and he gave her an uneasy look when he met her eye. She did not, however, suspect the truth as yet, nor did she in the least understand his disguise. She was only full of alarm and wonder, not knowing what to think.