A Woman Perfected

by Richard Marsh

He wanted something more than air; he wanted a vent for the feelings which filled his breast, as it seemed to him, to bursting point. He tore up and down the front; he had it to himself at that hour, so that the unusual pace at which he strode along did not attract inconvenient attention. The promenade at Littlehampton is not a very long one, but he walked ever so many miles before he had done with it. It was easy enough to blame Lady Jane; he felt strongly that that lady had not behaved so well as she might have done; keeping a letter from him while the weeks stretched out into months seemed to him to be a course of action for which there was no excuse; but, all the same, he was perfectly well aware that the fault was originally his. The parable of the grain of mustard-seed came into his mind as he thought of the Upas-tree of disaster which had sprung from a beginning which was apparently so insignificant; he thought he had put the letter in his suit-case and he had left it in one of his pockets instead; because of that slight misadventure ruin had come to Nora; such ruin! His aunt had punished him severely. He could not recall the coat even then; the only explanation of which he could think was that he had supposed he had packed the coat itself in his suitcase. If Lady Jane had but dropped so much as a hint! He did not know how much cause he had to rejoice because the letter was not where he had believed it to be; if Mr. Morgan had only found it when he reclaimed the suit-case it might have provided him with the means of keeping Nora Lindsay out of her own for an indefinite length of time; the tragedy might have become a tragedy indeed.

In the morning, when Mr. Spencer reached the station, on the platform were two familiar figures. He advanced to greet them.

"Why, Mr. Nash, and Miss Harding! this is an unexpected pleasure; I didn't expect to find such pleasant memories of Cloverlea at Littlehampton."

"Miss Harding," exclaimed the gentleman, "is now my wife; she is Mrs. Nash. We"--he hesitated, and then went on--"we are just finishing our honeymoon."

Mr. Spencer's face expressed astonishment which was hardly flattering to either of the parties concerned.

"You--don't say so; then--that's another unexpected pleasure. Mrs. Nash, you must allow me to offer you my congratulations."

He was about to go with some of the banal remarks which are made on such occasions when he was struck by the look which was on the young wife's face, and by the singularity of her attitude. She seemed to be in mortal terror. Shrinking back, cowering, she clung to her husband's arm, as if she was afraid that Spencer would have struck her. Nor did Herbert Nash wear the expression of beatitude which is supposed to be proper to a bridegroom who is returning from his honeymoon. It was apparently with an effort that he said to Robert Spencer--

"If you are going up by this train, Mr. Spencer, will you allow my wife and me to travel with you? If--if we can get a compartment to ourselves we have something to tell you, touching Miss Lindsay's affairs, which--which I think we ought to tell you."

The separate compartment was found; and, as a consequence, between Littlehampton and London, Robert Spencer read human nature, as it were, by flashes of lightning. Both husband and wife laid bare their breasts to him; and what they left unsaid he saw between the lines. It was a journey neither of the trio ever forgot. By the time the train entered the terminus his soul shuddered at the thought of the mountain of wrong which had been laid upon the woman he loved; who, after all, was the merest girl. Yet, acutely though he felt for her, he felt also for the miserable pair who were in front of him; already they had probably suffered even more than Nora; and the worst of their sufferings were still to come.

The three got into a four-wheeled cab and drove to Memorial Buildings. Mr. Clifford was out. Then, the clerk who received them asked if they were Messrs. Morgan and Nash.