A couple of days went by, and I became fairly puzzled. All the ordinary verbal tests when applied to my patient proved complete failures. Her memory was excellent, and indeed in this respect she was far better than her husband, who was constantly forgetting things. As to her judgment, it struck me as above the average, for she was a widely-read woman, and we had a stiff argument one night as to the merits of our favourite authors. She managed her own housekeeping, and capitally she did it too; and, in fact—not to exhaust the reader’s patience by entering into details—the only visible outcome of her mental aberration was this extreme terror in which she lived, and for which I could find no reason. (I may remark parenthetically that the mad undoubtedly have rules of their own by which they are influenced. Experience thus teaching me that Mrs Crawford had some reason for this, to us, inexplicable dread—even though it might be but a fear of her own shadow—it became my business to solve this reason.) What baffled me most was the fact that while it was Crawford himself who primarily excited this terror, she was undeniably fond of him. Indeed, the word ‘fond’ is hardly suitable, for she simply adored him. I never heard him express the slightest wish as to the household arrangements but it was instantly fulfilled; while every whim—and he was the most whimsical of men—was implicitly obeyed. In fact, at the end of a week I was precisely in the same state as when I first entered the house. But that my amour propre was piqued, and I felt angry at my non-success, I should have been paying a very enjoyable visit. Arthur Crawford made a capital host; and although, as I have already said, he was a very whimsical man, and was subject to unaccountable fits of depression, he and I got on excellently together.
At the end of the week, something happened which had the double effect of lowering me several inches in my own estimation, and of placing matters in a totally different light. It was an exceedingly hot night; and after we had all gone to bed, I was tempted to leave my room, and seating myself by the open window in the corridor, to indulge in an extra cigar. The fact that it was a fine moonlight night, and that while the corridor window boasted a lovely view, that of my own room looked into the stables, amply justified my choice of a seat. I had been there for perhaps an hour, when I heard the Crawfords talking in their room, which was on a level with my own. The tones were excited and eager; and fearing that Mrs Crawford might be lashing herself into a fury, and that her husband might be ignorantly increasing it, I stole down to their door and stood listening.
‘Arthur, dear, give it to me. You don’t want it to-night. Why not wait until the morning?’
These were the first words that I caught spoken in Mrs Crawford’s usually gentle tones.
‘Give it to you?—No; not I! I know a trick worth two of that. Ah, you think I don’t know that you and that confounded mealy-mouthed doctor are in league against me.’
Crawford’s voice, shrill and mocking, but undoubtedly his. Good heavens! was the man drunk? There was a moment’s pause, and then he began again, this time more gently.
‘Come, come, Beatrice. Drop this stupid joking. I only want to have a little cut at Bertie, just a little cut; and look! the knife is so bright and sharp, it cannot hurt him much.’
The wall seemed to reel around me as I leaned against it for support. In a flash of revelation that nearly blinded me, as I realised the full horror of the situation, I understood for the first time how matters actually stood. Crawford himself was the madman, and the devoted wife, whom I had been taught to look upon as insane, had known the truth all this time; and knowing it, for some inscrutable woman’s reason, had shielded him, perhaps at the cost of her very life. In a moment the meaning of his many whims, his loss of memory, his fits of depression, were made clear to me; and as I thought of the martyrdom through which his girl-wife had passed, I cursed myself for the readiness with which I had been duped.
While these thoughts were rushing through my brain, I had noiselessly opened the outer door, and now stood in the dressing-room, peering into the bedroom beyond. The door between the two was standing open; but a heavy curtain hung in the aperture, and by making a little slit in it by means of my penknife, I was enabled to command a view of the interior. At the farther end of the apartment lay Bertie asleep in his cot. Standing before him, clad in a long white wrapper, and with her auburn hair flowing over her shoulders, was the young mother herself; while at some paces from her stood Crawford, still in evening dress, and balancing in his fingers a long glittering dagger, that I recognised as one that usually hung in the library below. By this time he had dropped his angry tones, and was speaking in his accustomed pleasant fashion. ‘You know, dear,’ he was saying, ‘it really is necessary that we both drink some. Half a glassful of young and innocent blood, and we both shall keep young and happy for ever.’
‘Won’t my blood do?’ asked the girl desperately. She stretched her bare arms towards him and forced a smile to her poor quivering lips. ‘You are much fonder of me, aren’t you, dear? I shall do much better.’