A spasmodic shiver ran through Janet; she could hardly keep silent, and yet her mind was busy inventing devices to protect him. She stood there longing to fly from them all—to be alone, and able to relax her self-bondage. But Janet felt that she dared not go away. He might betray himself—or worse, and more likely still—he might betray her. He might tell Gussy what share she had in the matter. It was what men did—to punish a woman, regardless what trouble might fall upon themselves. She stood with her hands firmly clasped, like a sentinel on guard.
This dreadful evening, however, came to an end, as all evenings do. The crowd was made to pass on, to leave the house in quiet, though there were still an unusual number of passengers and people loitering about till far on in the night, notwithstanding the policeman who was on duty near to keep them unmolested. And within all became quiet, except in so far as dangerous illness in a house disturbs its habitual repose. A nurse had been installed in the room in which Meredith lay, and Gussy came and went throughout the night, holding occasional whispered conferences in the hall with the doctor, who remained too.
The patient still lay insensible, entirely unconscious of what had happened to him, with that utterly mournful and pathetic look which a face that is unconscious takes. He had concussion of the brain, as well as external injuries of a serious description, but it was as yet impossible to pronounce whether he would die, or if he might yet recover. Two of the servants were up in case anything might be wanted during the night, a quite unnecessary precaution—one of the results of the great and unusual excitement which had convulsed the house—but except these women, who appeared now and then at the end of the passage which led to the kitchen, very sleepy and with an air of conscious self-sacrifice on their faces, no one else was suffered to be about. Janet had asked to stay to be of use, but had been dismissed by Miss Harwood—not unkindly.
“It’s not that I am not grateful, Janet. You stood by me this evening in a way which I shall not forget; but you’re too young,” said Gussy, with a sigh, “to sit up, unless it was a case in which your heart was concerned.”
This speech of his sister’s for the first time roused Dolff a little. He had been sitting all the evening with a stupefied air, saying nothing, calling forth much sympathy and admiration from his mother, who whispered to Janet how tender-hearted he was, how much he felt it. But Gussy’s words roused him. He glanced at Janet, as Janet had glanced at him with the same impulse, to say, “She’s the cause of it all,” as she had felt to say, “That is the man.”
Their eyes met, and they both read what was in the other’s looks; a certain fear, yet defiance, awoke between them. They were in each other’s power. Janet had Dolff’s life in her hands, and he had her reputation in his. They were both liable to all the risks of a sudden impulse, to let the truth slip in a moment of provocation.
Janet watched the hardening and darkening of the face which had once expressed only devotion and admiration, with a sinking of her heart. He was more dangerous to her than she was to him. It was evident that to see his sister’s trust in her was more than he could bear. After this, however, they withdrew into their rooms with their different burdens. Dolff sat smoking and dozing in his, not knowing what he was to do, or how to meet the morrow. He was still stupid with misery, unable to use his faculties, or to think for himself, as, poor fellow, he was but little used to do at any time. He could not think, but only sit miserable, feeling the night to be a century long, yet without any desire for the morning. As for sleep, it was impossible, and yet, though it was so impossible, he slept the greater part of the night.
As for Janet, there was no rest at all for her; the shock of the terrible events which she had witnessed, which she knew she was the cause of, had affected her nerves, and more than she was aware of: but she had been obliged to thrust it aside from her, to control herself with a hand of iron, to act with an independence and energy which she did not know she possessed, which she had never had occasion to employ before. How could she have had occasion to display them? could such a horrible emergency ever occur twice? could it be possible that ever again she should be placed in such a situation? Even now, when alone and free from all immediate alarm, it was a continual struggle to keep from giving vent to hysterical sounds, crying, or screaming aloud; or convulsive sobbing, which runs into horrible pretence of laughter.
She was not a girl who had ever been humiliated by any such mastery of her nerves over her will and mind. But a hundred frantic impulses seized her during this terrible night. Sometimes she felt as if she must precipitate herself from the window and escape for ever and ever into the darkness; sometimes she felt disposed to tear everything about her, even herself, in wild rage and excitement. Sometimes she walked about—walked, run, flew, from one end of her room to another—unable to calm herself down. And in calmer intervals she stole out of her room and stood looking over the banisters, seeing Gussy come out of the room where she was keeping watch, holding whispered conferences with the doctor at the door, passing in for a moment to the other room where the patient lay, from which the white-capped nurse, with her large apron creating a high light in the partial darkness we aid out to get something that was wanted.
All these noiseless movements of the watchers Janet looked upon from above as if they were the incidents of a dream. It was all going on before her in dumb show—an awful little dream, significant in its silence. And the strange thing was that she felt no interest in the patient round whose unseen bed these watchers were coming and going. All the facts stood out before her. The horrors of the attempt, the touch as she thought of sudden death, the panic of all that might follow, the dreadful fear of being mixed up in it and exposed in her rôle of traitor to all the world, to the people at Clover who were fond of her—but any other sentiment was wholly wanting.