Kitabı oku: «An Isle of Surrey: A Novel», sayfa 13

CHAPTER XXII.
WILLIAM CRAWFORD'S NIGHTMARE

"Hetty," said Alfred Layard to his sister at breakfast that same morning, "you know I am not a discontented man."

"Indeed, I know that very well, Alfred. See how you put up with me!"

"Hetty," said he severely, "in this house jokes are my prerogative."

"I am not joking in the least, Alfred. I know I am not anything like as good as I ought to be to you. But I'll try to be better in future, Alfred. Indeed I will!"

Her tone was full of sorrow.

"Hetty," said he sternly, "in this house pathos is my prerogative also. Mind what you're about. If you make me laugh or yourself cry you will oblige me to do something I should be extremely loath to do."

"And what is that?" she asked, struggling to repress a smile.

"Hold my tongue. Bad as my loquacity is, my silence would be a thousand times worse. How would you like me to sit at the table and only point at the things I wanted? Suppose there was some one here, how would you like me to make a motion for a slate, and write on it with a squeaking pencil, 'Hetty, your hair is down!' You would not like it a bit. No, Hetty; I was not thinking of you when I said I was not a discontented man. I was thinking of Crawford, our landlord-tenant."

"Of Mr. Crawford! O, what were you thinking of him?"

"I was thinking that I am not too well satisfied with our arrangements about this house. I fancy I am almost sorry I entered into the agreement at all."

"But why? Surely we are saving money: twenty pounds a year or more by the house, and Mr. Crawford is no trouble, or next to none."

"He's very little trouble in the house, I own. But he troubles me in my mind. There is something about the man I don't like. I can't tell you for certain what it is, but I think it is because he is a coward."

"A coward, Alfred! A coward! Good gracious! is it the man who saved Mrs. Crawford from the burning house at the risk of his own life? Don't you think you are very unjust?"

"Perhaps. But for goodness' sake, don't say anything about Bayard!"

"It was you who called him a Bayard."

"I don't think it was; and if it was, I meant it sarcastically. That man is in good bodily health, and yet he is afraid of something or some one. Now, when a man in good bodily health goes about in fear you may be certain he has good cause for being afraid, and you may be equally sure that whatever he is afraid of is not to his credit."

Layard rose to go. Freddie was in the kitchen with Mrs. Grainger.

"Isn't a good deal of, or all, this fancy?" asked Hetty, as she too rose.

"It may be fancy that he is afraid of something discreditable; but I am certain he is afraid."

"How can you tell that?" asked the girl, in incredulous wonder.

"By his eyes and the motion of his hands. That man could not for a thousand pounds sit in a room the door of which had opened at his back without turning round."

"Upon my word, you are growing quite fanciful, Alfred. And did you notice that he was very much afraid of us?" she said in a bantering tone.

"He is afraid of every one until he is assured of what that person is."

"Of Mrs. Grainger and me, for instance?"

"Yes, he would be afraid of you until he saw your face and discovered who you were."

"Alfred, I never felt so proud in all my life before. To think that a strong man like him should go about shaking in his shoes at sight of me is quite romantic. I must cultivate all kinds of dark and forbidding looks. I feel that I could act the bravo if I only had a cloak and a dagger and the divided skirt."

"Well, good-morning, Hetty. I am glad you will have no chance of terrifying him for a fortnight, anyway;" and off he went.

"That brother of mine," thought the girl, as she prepared to remove the breakfast-things, "is the very best man in the world. He is the most kind-hearted and generous fellow that ever breathed. But with respect to this Mr. Crawford, he has some strange prejudice which I cannot understand. I never knew him absolutely dislike a man before. He has not gone so far as to say that he absolutely dislikes him, but I feel sure he does."

As soon as the breakfast-things were removed and washed up, it was time to go out on the wharf and hand Freddie to Bramwell. This was now so well-established a custom that it created little excitement even in Freddie's mind. At about half-past ten Bramwell pushed the floating-stage across the bay, went over, said a few words to Hetty, took the boy, and returned with him. Then he hauled the stage back to its moorings on the Ait, put Freddie into the timber-yard, where Frank was already, fastened the gate, and went to his work in his study. At half-past two he restored the boy to Hetty. The Layards breakfasted late, and had not their midday meal till three. For the convenience of the children, Bramwell adopted the same hour for his midday meal.

"Mr. Bramwell," said Hetty that day as she handed the boy to him, "I am sure I do not know how we are to allow this to continue longer. Freddie goes over to you every day, and you will not let Frank come over to us once even. I am afraid either of us is selfish."

"Selfish? How, selfish?" He smiled as he looked up from the stage into the girl's face.

"Well, we seem to give you all the trouble of these two boys, which makes us seem selfish in one way, and you seem to wish to take all the trouble of them, which is selfish in another way. I am afraid we are both very bad. I give you one more chance," she said, shaking a warning finger at him. "To-morrow I am going to a toy-shop a little bit down the Welford Road, and I intend to take Freddie with me to buy him a Noah's ark in place of the one he lost-"

"The cat flew away with it and ate the elephant and lion," said Freddie.

"And, of course, Freddie can't go over-"

"Not even after dinner?" cried the boy.

"No. Nor must you go over again unless Frank is allowed to come with us to the toy-shop."

"I'll bring him," said the boy confidently. "Frank will come with me. We'll play Frank is a canal boat, and that I'm a horse, and I'll tow him all the way."

"But if his father won't give him leave?" said Hetty.

"O, he'll come!" said Freddie, with decision. "Frank always plays what I ask him. And will you get a Noah's ark for Frank too, Aunt Hetty?"

"Of course. Mr. Bramwell, you will let the child come? You will, won't you?" She held both her hands out to him pleadingly.

His eyes were still upon her face. She looked so bright and strong and full of spirits, it appeared as though the touch of her hand upon his boy must benefit the child. He hesitated for a moment, and said, "Very well, and thank you heartily, Miss Layard," and so the interview ended.

Bramwell carried the boy along the stage and put him into the yard, where Frank was impatiently waiting. Then he came back, drew the stage to its position alongside the islet, and moored it to the ring in the ground. After this he went back to the cottage and buried himself in his work. Unless something unusual occurred in the yard he might count on three-and-a-half uninterrupted hours. From where he sat he could hear the voices of the children at play. If anything went amiss he would be at once apprised by his ears.

As Hetty got into the small back hall from which the door opened on the quay there was a sound at the front-door. A key had been thrust into the latch and was being turned.

"Alfred coming back for something he has forgotten," thought Hetty, hurrying to meet him.

The door swung open and Mr. William Crawford pulled out his key, took off his hat, and bowed.

Hetty stepped back with an exclamation of surprise.

"You are surprised to see me, Miss Layard. Of course you are surprised; but I hope you are not displeased?"

He bowed with grave deference to her.

"Displeased?" she said, with a gallant attempt at a smile. "O dear, no! Why should I be displeased? When I heard the key in the door I made sure it was my brother coming back for something he had forgotten; and you know I had no reason to expect you." She now smiled without effort. She had recovered self-possession. "Will you come in here, or would you prefer going to your own rooms?"

"I do not want to go to my own lair to-day, Miss Layard," he said, as he followed her into their own sitting-room. "In fact, I am here by the merest accident, and I do not know that you will not laugh at me when I tell you why." He thought, "By Jove! what a contrast to some one in Singleton Terrace, Richmond! She is much more lovely than I thought her. I never saw her look so beautiful. Exquisite, exquisite Hetty!"

"Why do you think I shall laugh?" she asked.

"Because I came here owing to a dream I had last night. A most horrible dream! I am not superstitious, but this dream impressed me." Crawford did not act on the principle that all women are alike. He always considered every woman who interested him as a being the like of whom he had never met before, one requiring special study and special treatment. When he wooed his wife he always kept before him the idea that she was tender and affectionate. Of Hetty he said to himself, "She is imaginative and ardent."

"A dream? It must have been a very remarkable dream that made you come so far."

"Yes, a most remarkable and unpleasant dream. I thought in my sleep that some one-I knew not whom at first-had wandered out of the house through the door on the Bay by night, and, turning to the left, went near the open door of that flooded ice-house. There are two doorways to the ice-house and no door. I thought I was standing at the further one from this. The figure drew close to the nearer doorway, and I saw that the wanderer was a somnambulist, and was quite unaware of any danger. I thought I tried to cry out, but could not utter a sound. I thought I tried to rush forward, but could not move. I was half mad with terror, for as the figure drew near me I recognised who it was. The figure kept on until it reached the raised threshold of the ice-house. It stepped upon the sill of the doorway, and all at once I heard a scream and a splash; and I looked in and saw the figure struggling in the water. I strove with all my might to wrest myself free from the leaden weights that held my feet. The face of the figure was turned up to me, and I could see the golden hair and the lovely cheek and the wonderful blue eyes, and I heard a voice, the sweetest and dearest voice I ever heard, cry out in agony, 'Save me! Save me! O, Mr. Crawford, won't you try to save me?' and I wrenched and struggled, and at last I tore myself free, and with a great shout I awoke, terrified and trembling, and in a cold perspiration. And I could not sleep again."

"What a horrible dream!" cried the girl, with blanched face, and eyes wide open with dismay.

"It was terrible, indeed. But, Miss Layard, all I have told you was to me nothing compared with what I have yet to tell."

She drew back trembling, and feeling faint.

"Do you know who the drowning person that I could not succour was?"

"No," whispered the girl.

"You."

"I?"

"Yes; you!"

The girl drew back another pace, and shuddered; she seemed about to faint.

"It was your face I saw, and you were in peril of death! and I-I was looking on and could not help you. Great heavens! fancy my finding you in want of aid in my view, and I not able to help you! All the horrible dreams of my life put together would not equal the anguish, the insupportable agony, of that."

He took out his handkerchief, breathed heavily-as though the memory of his nightmare was almost as bad as the nightmare itself-and then wiped his forehead laboriously with the handkerchief. After this he sat for a while, leaning back in his chair with a hand resting on each knee, as though to recover himself. In a few seconds he rose with the affectation of an affected briskness, intended to convey that he was struggling against emotions that overcame him. He said, with a wan smile:

"So I came straight here to have doors put on those hateful doorways. I knew you would laugh at me."

"Indeed, I do not laugh at you! That dream was enough to upset any one."

He shook his head, conveying by the shaking of his head and the expression of his face the idea that, great as might be her power of realising his sufferings, they were infinitely greater than she could imagine.

Then he shook the whole of his body to rouse himself out of his lethargy, and establish himself in her mind as a man of action. He begged of her to get him a piece of string, and when she had found him some he asked her to favour him by accompanying him to the ice-house, and aid him in taking measurements for the doors to block up the yawning death traps, as he called the doorways.

He could not reach the lintel of the doors without something on which to stand. He asked her to hold the string for him till he came back, and went to the kitchen and fetched a chair. He mounted on the chair, and asked her to draw the string taut to the ground, and knot the point at which the string touched the raised threshold.

"There were double doors here once, but single doors will do now," he said.

When he had completed his measurement he said:

"I shall go from this to the carpenter and leave orders for the doors. I shall come back in a week to see them put up."

For a few minutes he seemed to fall into a profound reverie, and then, waking up all at once, looked at her with eyes full of terror, and, pointing into the flooded ice-house said hoarsely:

"Hetty, it was in there I saw you drowning! Do you know what that sight meant to me, girl?" He bent close to her ear and answered his own question in a whisper:

"Madness!"

Then, without another word, he hurried away, leaving her amazed, breathless, not knowing what to think of him, and all he had been saying, and not able to think of anything else.

CHAPTER XXIII.
"MAN OVERBOARD!"

When Hetty recovered from the astonishment into which Mr. William Crawford's words and manner had cast her, the first fact which struck her memory was that he had called her Hetty. That might, no doubt, be excused in a man of his time of life to a girl of hers (she considered his thirty-six years entitled him to be considered quite middle-aged). But she would have felt more comfortable if the question had not been raised at all. It was, she urged in mitigation, to be taken into account that he spoke under great excitement and in haste. But, after all, the thing was not worth a moment's thought.

There was, however, a fact worth considering. This man, sleeping or waking, did seem to have a special care of the lives of others. Had he not rescued his wife from fire? – and here now was this dream, this dreadful dream about the odious old ice-house. No doubt some men were born with a natural taste for encountering risks, but her inclination did not lead her to plunge into burning houses or flooded ice-houses. For her part she would rather run away twenty miles.

And then what were these words he had said about herself? Now that they came back to her they seemed foolish, impertinent, and she ought to have been angry with him for laughing at her. But no; he had not been laughing at her. He could not laugh at anything on earth after having such an awful dream, and no doubt what he had said of herself was only his exaggerated way of describing how terribly hard he had wanted to save the drowning woman. But there was no person really drowning, and it would be nonsense not to forget the whole interview with him.

Yet it could hardly be got rid of in that way, for how would Alfred take it? The whole affair was very provoking and horrible, and she felt disposed to cry. Perhaps Alfred was right in his first estimate of Crawford, and he was a little mad.

Yes, clearly the man ought to be in a lunatic asylum, and not allowed to go about the country dreaming and terrifying people.

She had no doubt that in a few minutes a procession of men, carrying planks on their shoulders and bags of tools in their hands, would arrive and make the place unbearable with noise and chips.

Hetty would have made her mind quite easy on the last score if she could have seen into the mind of William Crawford as he left the door. For he had no more notion of going to any carpenter that day about the job than he had of flinging himself off Welford Bridge into the South London Canal. What he did intend doing was, to come back in a week and say he found the wretched carpenters to whom he had given the order had wholly misunderstood him and botched the job. This would be economical as far as the doors were concerned, and would give him another interview with Hetty.

He had no notion of keeping his promise to his wife either. What could be easier and more pleasant than to enjoy a few hours' freedom in town, and tell her on his return to Richmond that the difficulties to be overcome at the ice-house were much greater than he had anticipated, and that he had been most grievously delayed against his will.

From a map he had discovered, since his former visit, that he could come or go by water. At the end of one of the Pine Groves lay the Mercantile Pier, and Crawford turned in that direction, resolved to get to town by river.

It pleased him to know that there were two ways of approaching his office, and the line from Crawford's House to the Mercantile Pier was directly away from Camberwell, whereas the route by road was only at right angles to it.

"I think what I said to Hetty must create some effect," he thought, as he walked with brisk footstep and alert body. "It did all I intended anyway. She may, when she gets over her surprise, be either pleased or indignant; but she cannot be indifferent, she is too imaginative for that."

He passed by the Neptune public-house, and entered the Pine Grove leading to the Mercantile Pier. He had no need to ask his way: he carried the map of the place in his head.

Here on either side of him rose the tall black palings. The path between them was only a footway, and wound along sinuously for half a mile between the great docks on either side. The path bent so acutely that it was impossible to see further than a hundred yards before or behind.

To Crawford, who was always expecting to find Philip Ray spring forth, feel a burning sting, hear a report, and know that vengeance had overtaken him at last, this characteristic had one great advantage: it left both his sides protected. He could be approached only from the front or rear.

The place was very secret and retired. There was not a sound beyond the far-off hum of the city. Spying through the chinks in the palings one could see nothing but broken dark grey ground littered with all kinds of odds and ends of timber and metal objects, looking as dreary and deserted and forlorn as a locked-up and deserted graveyard. Overhead spread the faint blue sky, with the sun behind a dull grey cloud, and above the paling to right and left, and, as it were, rising from hulls lying far off inland, the lofty motionless spars of great ships in the stillness of the upper air.

From the time Crawford entered the Pine Grove until he had got more than half-way through he encountered no one. Then all at once he became aware that he was gradually overtaking a woman who was walking in front, and that footsteps which he had heard for some time behind him were gradually gaining upon him.

With him every unknown woman was an object of curiosity: every unknown man Philip Ray. The woman in front was poorly clad, and walked with lagging step and dejected head. She did not promise to interest him. He turned round. The man was not Philip Ray. Without further thought of either he continued his walk.

Presently the man was level with him, and said, "Beg pardon, sir, but I saw you pass the Neptune, and I thought I'd ask you if you had any odd job hereabout on your property."

Crawford started and looked sharply at the man out of his dark furtive eyes. The speaker he recognised as the man who had acted as his guide, and explained to him the means of Philip Ray's mysterious disappearance from the tow-path.

"No," he said sharply, "I have no job," and turned away to show he did not wish to be spoken to again.

"Perhaps, sir, you don't know the stage is off?"

"What!" cried Crawford, stopping and confronting the man. "What do you mean by the stage being off?" He remembered that Red Jim had told him about the floating stage at Boland's Ait. Could it be that the floating bridge had been removed, and that Ray's visit to the islet and its idiotic owner had ceased? or that the owner had taken himself away?

Jim pointed down the Grove. "The stage that goes from the land to the pier had to be taken away for repairs, and you have to get from the shore to the pier in a small boat, and when the tide is low, as it is now, you have to go down a long ladder so as to get to the bed of the river, and from the bed of the river to the small boat; and people with plenty of money don't care about doing that. So when I saw you turn into the Grove I thought I'd come and tell you, as I felt sure if you knew you wouldn't think of going by boat, and I remembered you gave me two tanners a fortnight ago."

"Then I won't give you anything now," said Crawford sharply, as he resumed his way. His anger had been aroused by the hopes raised and cast down by Red Jim's two speeches about the stage.

"Not as much as a tanner?"

"Not as much as half a farthing. I made a very bad bargain the last time, and this must be given in with what you did before. Besides, this is no use to me, for I intend going by boat all the same. Good-day. If you beg again I shall call the police."

The man abated his pace with a malediction, and Crawford went on, Red Jim followed him slowly, cursing his own luck.

The delay caused by the dialogue with Red Jim had given the woman a good start, and by the time Crawford reached the head of the ladder the woman was in the act of being handed into the small boat.

When Crawford looked down he was very sorry he had not given Red Jim sixpence for his news and advice, and gone back by land. But it was too late to retrace his steps. He felt a dogged determination not to give Jim anything or be jeered at by him.

Half the descent was easy enough, as it was by rude wooden stairs; but the other half had to be accomplished by means of a broad ladder of very muddy, slippery, and rotten looking steps. The foreshore, too, looked muddy, slimy, uninviting, and here and there was steaming in an unpleasant manner under the influence of the sun, now shining clearly between vast plains of pale grey clouds.

Crawford hated boats for two reasons. First, he couldn't pull; and, second, he always felt nervous in them, and he could not swim.

However, there was not much time for liking or disliking, for the men in the small boat beckoned him to come on. There were already in the boat the crew of two men, the woman who had preceded him down the lane, and six other women.

With repugnance he descended to the foreshore, and with repugnance and difficulty got into the boat. All the passengers except one were aft.

Crawford took a seat on the starboard side, next to the woman who had preceded him down the Grove.

She took no notice of his coming aboard. She appeared unconscious of everything round her. She wore a thick black veil, and kept her head bowed upon her chest, giving him the idea that she suffered from some deformity, or disease, or dire calamity. She clasped her elbow in one hand, her arm across her chest, and her other hand across her eyes. The moment she entered the boat she had assumed this posture, and had not moved since.

Her attitude was the result of two causes: her eyes were weak from recent illness, and she was suffering from incurable sorrows.

Her clothes were worn and betokened poverty, her purse penury. Under her thin frayed dress her shoulders bore marks of recent scratches; under the bosom of her dress her heart bore open wounds of anguish. She was on her way to a free hospital about her eyes.

Disease had lately threatened her life, but even Death refused to have her. At what she believed to be her last hour she provided for her only child, the apple of her eye, her solitary joy, by placing him in safety, but beyond the power of a recalling cry from her lips. She had then put aside money for her sepulchre.

Death had disdained her, and she was now wandering about alone with the vast world as a tomb and a solitude, and a broken heart and the fate of an outcast, and the undying gnawing remorse for company, with for the sustentation of her living body the money she had devised for its decay. An illness had taken away her voice, which was her bread.

Just as the boat shoved off, Red Jim reached the head of the stairs, and stood there regarding the progress of his patron. He noticed that the ebb tide was running very fast, and that the men kept the boat heading a little up stream to make allowance for leeway. He noticed that Crawford was the last passenger on the starboard side, and that, therefore, he would be on the inside when the boat got alongside. "I hope," thought Red Jim, "that there's some nice fresh paint or a nice long nail waiting for him when he's going up the side."

He saw the boat touch the side, and Crawford stagger instantly to his feet. He saw him sway to and fro, and then suddenly fall back against the hulk, boom the boat off with his legs, and drop overboard between the boat and the hulk.

Red Jim uttered a loud shout of triumph, and then began shouting and dancing like mad for joy.

"He'll shoot in under the hulk and be drowned!" cried Red Jim exultingly.

Then an oath:

"That – woman's got him!

"Catch him! Hold him!" cried the boatmen. "Hold on for your life or he'll be sucked under!"

The veiled woman had seized the sinking man and thrown herself on her knees-was holding on with all the power of her enfeebled arms.

"Trim the boat! Trim the boat, – you, or she'll capsize! On deck, there!" shouted the boatman to the hulk.

By this time aid had come from the deck, and the submerged man had been seized by the hooks and had hold of a line. Up to this the boatmen had been completely powerless, for all the women had crowded to the starboard side, and bore down the boat's gunwale until it washed level with the water, and if the men attempted to get near the starboard side aft the boat must have gone over at once. And now the passengers went on board the hulk.

When the woman who had saved him was relieved of his weight, she gave a loud cry, and fell back fainting in the boat.