Kitabı oku: «A Witch of the Hills, v. 2», sayfa 8

CHAPTER XXIV

When I joined Mrs. Ellmer and her daughter that evening, I found that the former lady was oppressed by the conviction that 'something had happened,' something interesting of which there was an evil design abroad to keep her in ignorance. She had been questioning Babiole I felt sure, and getting no satisfactory replies; for while there was a suspicious halo of pale rose-colour—which in my sight did not detract from her beauty—about the younger lady's eyes, her mother made various touching references to the cruelty of want of confidence, and at last, after several tentative efforts, got on the right track by observing that my 'young lady' was not very exacting, since I had not been near her that day. This remark set both her daughter and me blushing furiously, and Mrs. Ellmer, figuratively speaking, gave the 'view halloo.' After a very short run I was brought to earth, and confessed that—er—Miss Farington and I—er—had had a—in fact a disagreement—a mere lover's quarrel. It would soon blow over—but just at present—that is for a day or two, why–

Mrs. Ellmer interrupted my laboured explanation with a delighted and shrill little giggle.

'And so you've had a quarrel! Well, really, Mr. Maude, as an old friend, you must allow me to take this opportunity—before you make it up again, you know—to tell you that really I think you are throwing yourself away.'

The truth was that the poor little woman had been smarting, ever since Miss Farington's visit, from the supercilious scorn with which that well-informed young lady had treated her. I protested, but very mildly; for, indeed, to hear a little gentle disapprobation of my late too matter-of-fact love gave me no acute pain.

'I wouldn't for the world have said anything before, you know, for if, of course, a person's love affairs are not his own business, whose are they? But having known you so long, I really must say, now that I can open my lips without indiscretion, that the moment I saw that stuck-up piece of affectation I said to myself: "She must have asked him!"'

I assured Mrs. Ellmer that was not the case, but she paid little heed to my contradiction. She had relieved her feelings, that was the great thing, and it was with recovered calmness that she inquired after the friends who had made my yearly shooting party in the old times. I knew little more of them than she did; for that last gathering, when Fabian won my pretty witch's heart, had indeed been the farewell meeting predicted by Maurice Brown. That young author having shocked the public with one exceedingly nasty novel, had followed it up by another which would have shocked them still more if they had read it; this, however, they refrained from doing with a unanimity which might have proved disastrous to his reputation if a well-known evening paper had not offered him a good berth as a sort of inspector of moral nuisances, a post which the clever young Irishman filled with all the requisite zeal and indiscretion. As for Mr. Fussell, he had done well for himself in the city, and now leased a shooting-box of his own. While Edgar, my dear old friend and chum, had fallen back into the prosperous ranks of the happily married, and was now less troubled by political ambition than by a tendency to grow fat.

The ten days which followed the rupture of my engagement to Miss Farington passed in a great calm, troubled only by a growing sense of dread, both to Babiole and me, of what was to come after. She got well rapidly, quite well, as nervous emotional creatures do when once the moral atmosphere about them is right. For it was the loving sympathy of every living being round her, from her mother down—or up to Ta-ta, which worked the better part of her cure, though I admit that the hills and the fir-trees and the fresh sweet air had their share in it. She went out every day, sometimes with her mother and me, oftener with me and Ta-ta, as Mrs. Ellmer's strong dislike to walking exercise did not decrease as the years rolled on. As for Babiole, I thank God that the pleasure of those walks in the crisp air up the hills and through the glens was unallayed for her. The tarnish which want of warmth and sympathy had breathed on her childlike and trusting nature was wearing off; and her old faith in the companion to whom she had graciously given a place in her heart as the incarnation of kindness had only grown the stronger for the glimpses she had lately had of something deeper underneath. I even think that in the languid and irresponsible convalescence of her heart and mind from the wounds her unlucky marriage had dealt to both, she cherished a superstitious feeling that now I had returned from my travels it would come all right, and that I should be able to mend the defects of the marriage by another exercise of the magical skill which had brought it about. So she chattered or sang or was silent at her pleasure, as we walked between the now bare hedges beside the swollen Dee, or climbed on a thick carpet of rustling brown oak leaves up Craigendarroch, and noticed how day by day the mantle of snow on Lochnagar grew wider and ampler, and how the soft wail of the wind among the fir-trees in summer-time had grown into an angry and threatening roar, as if already hungering for those days and nights of loud March when the tempest would tear up the young saplings from the mountain-sides like reeds and hurl them down pell-mell over the decaying trunks which already choked up the hill-paths, and told of the storms of past years. She would look into my face from time to time to see if I was happy, for she had got the trick of reading through that ugly mask; if the look satisfied her, she either talked or was silent as she pleased, but if she fancied she detected the least sign of a cloud, she never rested until, by sweet words and winning looks, she had driven it away.

I, poor devil, was of course happy after a very different fashion. The blood has not yet cooled to any great extent at six and thirty, and blue eyes that have haunted you for seven years lose none of their witchery at that age, when the demon Reason throws his weight into the scale on the side of Evil, and tells you that the years are flitting by, carrying away the time for happiness, and that the beauty which steeps you to the soul in longing has been left unheeded by its possessor like a withered flower. But Babiole's perfect confidence was her safeguard and mine, and like the wind among the pines, I kept my tumults within due bounds. I was, however, occasionally distressed by a consideration for which I had never cared a straw before—what the neighbours would say. If I, an indifferent honest man, really had some trouble in keeping unworthy thoughts and impulses down within me, what sort of conduct these carrion-hunting idiots would ascribe to a man, whom they looked upon as an importer of foreign vices and the type of all that was godless and lawless, was pretty evident. They would all, in a commonplace chorus, take the part of the commonplace Miss Farington, and unite in condemnation of poor Babiole. Now no man likes to let the reputation of his queen of the earth be pulled to pieces by a cackling crew of idiots, and, therefore, though I had not enough strength of mind to suggest giving up those treasured walks, I began, torn by my struggling feelings, to look forward feverishly to the letter which Fabian had promised to send off as soon as he knew on what date he would be free to come north. His wife herself showed no eagerness.

'He is the very worst of correspondents,' she said. 'He will probably write a letter to say he is coming just before starting, post it at one of the last stations he passes through, and arrive here before it.'

It did not comfort me to learn thus that he might come at any moment. My conscience was pretty clear, but I wanted to have a fair notice of his arrival, that I might receive him in such a manner as to prepare the peccant husband for the desperately earnest sermon I had made up my mind to preach him on what his wife called neglect, but what I felt sure was infidelity.

A very serious addition to the cares I felt on behalf of my old pupil came upon me in the shape of a rumour, communicated by Ferguson in a mysterious manner, that a strange figure had been seen by the keepers in the course of the past week, wandering about the hills in the daytime and hovering in the vicinity of the Hall towards evening. I spoke with one of the men who had seen him, and from what he said I could have no doubt that the wanderer was the unlucky Ellmer who, as I found by sending off a telegram to the lunatic asylum where he had been for some time confined, had been missing for four days and was supposed to be dangerous. I at once gave orders for a search to be made for him, being much alarmed by the possibility of his presenting himself suddenly to either of the two poor ladies, who were not even aware of his condition. The first day's scouring of the hills and of the forest proved fruitless, however, while Babiole was much surprised at the pertinacity with which I insisted that the wind was too keen for her to go out. On the second day I think she began to have suspicions that something was being kept from her, for on my suggesting that she had better stay indoors again, as the keepers were out shooting very near the Hall, she gave me a shy apprehensive glance, but made no remonstrance. As I started to 'make a round with the keeper,' as I truly told her, though I did not explain with what object, she came to the door with me, making a beautiful picture under the ivy of the portico, her white throat rising out of her dark gown like a lily, and the pink colour which the mountain air had brought back again flushing and fading in her face.

'Well,' said I, looking at her with a great yearning over the fairness and brightness which were so soon to disappear from my sight, to be swallowed up in the fogs and the fever of London life, 'Well, I shall call at the post-office, and see if I can't charm out of the post-mistress's fingers a letter from Fabian.'

'Ah, you want to get rid of us!' said she, half smiling, half reproachful.

'No-o,' said I, looking down at my gaiters, 'Not so particularly.'

Then we neither of us said any more, but stood without looking at each other. I don't know what she was thinking about, but I know that I began to grow blind and deaf even to the sight of her and the sound of the tapping of her little foot upon the step; the roar of the rain-swollen Muick in the valley below seemed to have come suddenly nearer, louder, to be thundering close to my ears, raising to tempest height the passionate excitement within me, and shrieking out forebodings of the desolation which would fall upon me when my poor witch should have fled away. I was thankful to be brought back to commonplace by the shrill tones of Mrs. Ellmer, who had followed her daughter to the doorstep, and who encouraged me with much banter about my shooting powers as I set off.

The gillie who accompanied me was a long, lank, weedy young Highlander, silent and shrewd, who was already a valuable servant, and who promised to develop into a fine specimen of stalwart Gaelic humanity before many years were over. We made the circuit of that part of the forest near the Hall which had been appointed our beat for the day, but failed to find any trace of the fugitive. Jock was not surprised at this.

'A mon wi' a bee in's bonnet's nae sa daft but a' can mak' the canny ones look saft if a' will,' said he with a wise look.

And his opinion, which I apprehensively shared, was that the fugitive would not be secured until he had given us some trouble.

It was a cold and gloomy day. The chilling penetrating Scotch mist shrouded the whole landscape with a mournful gray veil, and gave place, as the day wore on and the leaden clouds grew heavier, to a thin but steady snow-fall. I left Jock, as the time drew near for the arrival of the train that brought the London letters, to return to the Hall without me, and got to Ballater post-office just as the mail-bag was being carried across from the little station, which is just opposite. In a few minutes I had got my papers, and a letter for Babiole in her husband's handwriting. The snow was falling faster by this time, and already drifting before the rising wind into little heaps and ridges by the wayside and on the exposed stretch of somewhat bare and barren land which lies between Ballater and the winding Dee. I walked back at a quick pace, scanning the small snow-drifts narrowly, measuring with my eyes the progress the soft white covering was making, and wondering with the foolish heart-quiver and miracle-hunger of a school-boy on the last day of the holidays, whether that snow-fall would have the courage and strength of mind to go on bravely as it had begun, and snow us up! If only the train would stop running—it did sometimes in the depths of a severe winter—and cut off all possibility of my witch being taken away from me for another month. I had worshipped her so loyally, I had been so 'good,' as she used to say—I couldn't resist giving myself this little pat on the back—that surely Providence might trust me with my wistful but well-conducted happiness a little longer. And all the time I knew that my solicitous questionings of sky and snow were futile and foolish, that I was carrying the death-warrant of my dangerous felicity in my pocket, and that if I had a spark of sense or manliness left in my wool-gathering old head, I ought to be heartily glad of it.

The notion of the death-warrant disturbed me, however, and when I burst into the drawing room where Mrs. Ellmer was darning a handsome old tapestry curtain, and looking, with her worn delicate face, pink with interest, rather pretty over it, I felt nervous as I asked for Babiole. She entered behind me before the question was out of my mouth, and I put the letter into her hands without another word, and retreated to one of the windows while she opened and read it. She was moved too, and her little fingers shook as they tore the envelope. I felt so guiltily anxious to know whether she was pleased that I was afraid if I glanced in her direction she would look up suddenly and detect my meanness. So I looked out of the window and watched the snow collecting on the branches of the firs outside, while Mrs. Ellmer, without pausing in her work, wondered volubly whether Fabian wasn't ashamed of himself for having left his wife so long without a letter, and would like to know what he had got to say for himself now he had written. Then suddenly the mother gave a little piercing cry, and I, turning at once, saw that Babiole, standing on the same spot where I had seen her last, and holding her husband's letter tightly clenched in her hands, seemed to have changed in a moment from a young, sweet, and beautiful woman into a livid and haggard old one. She had lost all command of the muscles of her face, and while her eyes, from which the dewy blue had faded, stared out before her in a meaningless gaze, the pallid lips of her open mouth twitched convulsively, although she did not attempt to utter a word.

Her mother was by her side in a moment, while I stood looking stupidly on, articulating hoarsely and with difficulty—

'The letter! Is it the letter!'

Mrs. Ellmer snatched the paper out of her daughter's hands so violently that she tore it, and supporting Babiole with one arm, read the letter through to the end, while I kept my eyes fixed upon her in a tumult of feelings I did not dare to analyse. As she read the last word she tossed it over to me with her light eyes flashing like steel.

'Read it, read it!' she cried, as the paper fell at my feet. 'See what sort of a husband you have given my poor child!'

The words and the action roused Babiole, who had scarcely moved except to shiver in her mother's arms. She drew herself away as if stung back to life, and a painful rush of blood flowed to her face and neck as she made two staggering steps forward, picked up the letter, and walked quietly, noiselessly, with her head bent and her whole frame drooping with shame, out of the room. Mrs. Ellmer would have followed, but I stopped her.

'Don't go,' I said in a husky voice. 'Leave her to herself a little while first. If she wants comforting, it will come with more force later when she has got over the first shock. What was it?'

'Oh, nothing,' said Mrs. Ellmer, who had become more acid on her daughter's behalf than she had ever been on her own. 'Nothing but what every married woman must expect.'

'Well, and what's that?'

She gave a little grating laugh.

'You a man and you ask that!'

'I'm a man, but not a married man, remember. Don't impute to me the misdemeanours I have had no chance of committing. Now what was it? Fabian wrote unkindly, I suppose.'

'Oh, dear no. It was very much the kindest letter from him I have ever seen.'

'Did he put off his coming then?'

'Not at all. He made an appointment to meet his darling in Edinburgh.'

'Edinburgh!' I echoed in amazement. 'Why Edinburgh?'

'Why not, Mr. Maude?' said she, in a harder voice than ever. 'It's a very pretty place, and two people who are fond of each other may spend a pleasant enough time together there. Only Mr. Scott spoilt his nice little plan by a stupid mistake. Into the envelope he had addressed to his wife he slipped his letter to another woman!'

With a glance of disgust at me which was meant to include my whole sex, Mrs. Ellmer, with the best tragic manner of her old stage days, left me stupefied with rage and remorse, as she sailed out of the room.

CHAPTER XXV

At the time when the mind is oppressed by a long-gathering cloud of passionate yet scarcely defined anxiety, the awakening crash of an event, even of an event tragic in its consequences, is a relief. This miserable letter, therefore, exposing as it did in unmistakable terms Fabian's infidelity, shook me free of the morbid imaginings and unwholesome yearnings to which I had lately been a prey, and set me the more worthy task of devising some means of helping both my friends out of the deadlock to which I myself had unwittingly helped them to come.

For the first time I was sorry for Fabian. A serious fault committed by a person whom accidents of birth or circumstance have brought near to one's self sets one thinking of one's own 'near shaves,' and after that the tide of mercy flows in steadily. How was I, who had never been able to conquer my own love for an unattainable woman, to blame this man of much more combustible temperament, whom I had myself induced to form a marriage with a girl whom I had no means of knowing to be first in his heart? I would take no high moral tone with him now; I would speak to him frankly as man to man, hold myself blameworthy for my own share in the unlucky matrimonial venture, and appeal to the sense and kindness I knew he possessed not to let the punishment for my indiscretion fall upon the only one of us three who was entirely free from blame. There crossed my mind at this point of my reflections an unpleasant remembrance of the manner in which Fabian had received a somewhat similar appeal from me years ago, and down at the bottom of my heart there lurked a conviction that he would hear whatever I might say without offence, and neglect it without scruple. However, it was impossible to be silent now; and as the gray day dissolved into darkness, and the only light in the study, to which I had retreated, came from the glowing peat-fire, I got up from the old leather chair which was consecrated to my reveries, and with one glance through the eastern window out at the great woolly flakes of snow that were now falling thickly, I left the room and went in search of Mrs. Ellmer.

I heard her voice in her daughter's room, and knocking at the door, called to her softly. She came out at once, and by her gentle manner I judged that she was already contrite for having treated me so cavalierly at our late interview.

'How is Babiole?' I asked first.

'She is quiet now and much better, Mr. Maude. Would you like to see her?'

'Well, no; I couldn't do her so much good as you can. I wanted to speak to you. I've been thinking; of course Fabian wrote two letters, and put them into the wrong envelopes. Then the letter he intended for his wife told her when he was coming, while the other letter made an appointment on the way. Can you find out by the letter which has come to your hands when he expects to arrive here?'

'It was written the night before last; the appointment was for last night,' answered she with a fresh access of acidity.

'Then he probably meant to come on here to-day. I think I'll go to Ballater and meet the six o'clock train; I shall just have time. And if he doesn't come by that I'll telegraph to Edinburgh. What address does he give there?'

'Royal Hotel. But you don't suppose that he will dare to come on here when he finds out what he has done?'

'I don't suppose he will find out till he gets here.'

'I hope, Mr. Maude, if he does come, you will persuade Babiole to show a little spirit. She seems inclined at present to receive him back like a lamb.'

I was sorry to hear this, because it suggested to me that her feeling for her husband had declined even below the point of indifference. I left Mrs. Ellmer and went downstairs to put on my mackintosh and prepare for my tramp in the snow. The lamp in the hall had not yet been lighted, and I was fumbling in the darkness for my deer-stalker on the pegs of the hat-stand when I heard my name called in a hoarse whisper from the staircase just above me. I turned, and saw the outline of Babiole's head against the faint candle-light which fell upon the landing above through the open door of her room.

'Mr. Maude,' she repeated, trying to clear and steady her voice. 'Where are you going?'

'Only as far as the village,' said I in a robust and matter-of-fact tone.

'Are you going to meet Fabian?'

'Yes, if he is anywhere about.'

'Ah, I thought so!' burst from her lips in a sharp whisper. She came down two more steps hurriedly: 'You are not to reproach him, Mr. Maude, you are not to plead for me, do you hear? What good can you do by interceding for a love which is dead? I was jealous when I read that letter, but not so jealous as shocked, wounded. And now that I have thought a little I am not jealous at all; so what right have I to be even wounded? This lady he wrote to he has admired for a long time, and though I never knew anything before, I guessed. She is a beauty, her photograph is in all the windows, and a little fringe of scandal hangs about her. She has dash, éclat, brilliancy; I have heard him say so. So he is consistent, you see, after all. I can acknowledge that now, and I don't feel angry.'

Her voice was indeed quite calm, although unutterably sad. But I noticed and rejoiced in the absence of that bitterness which had jarred on me so painfully in London.

'I do though,' I said gruffly.

'But you must not show it. You cannot reconcile us through the heart, for you cannot make him a different man. You must be satisfied with knowing that you have made me a better wife. I am just as much stronger in heart and mind as I am in health since I have been up here; I wanted to tell you that while I had the opportunity, to tell you that you have cured me, and to—thank you.'

As she uttered the last words in a low, sweet, lingering tone, a light burst suddenly upon us and showed me what the darkness had hidden—an expression on her pale face of beautiful strength and peace, as if indeed the quiet hills and the dark sweet-scented forests and the two human hearts that cared for her had poured some elixir into her soul to fortify it against indifference and neglect.

A little dazzled and befooled by her lovely appearance, I stood gazing at her face without a thought as to where the idealising light came from, until I heard at the other end of the hall a grating preliminary cough, and turning, saw that it was Ferguson, entering with the lamp, who had brought about this poetical effect. He had something to say to me evidently, since instead of advancing to place the light on its usual table, he remained standing at a distance still and stiff as a statue of resignation, as his custom was when his soul was burning to deliver itself of an unsolicited communication.

'Well, Ferguson!' said I.

'Yes, sir,' said he, with another cough.

But he did not come forward. Now I knew this was a sign that he considered his errand serious, and I moved a few steps towards him and beckoned him to me.

'Anything to tell me?' I asked; and as he glanced at Babiole I came nearer still.

'Jock has just been in to say, sir, that a gun has been stolen from his cottage.'

Babiole, who had not moved away, overheard, and must have guessed the import of this, for I heard behind me a long-drawn breath caused by some sudden emotion.

'When did he miss it?' I asked in a very low voice.

'Just now, sir. He came straight here to tell you of it. It must have been taken while he was out on his rounds this afternoon.'

I did not think the poor crack-brained creature whom I guessed to be the thief was likely to do much mischief with his prize. But I told Ferguson to put all the keepers on their guard, and to take care that such crazy old bolts and bars as we used in that primitive part of the world should be drawn and raised, so that the unlucky fugitive should not be able to possess himself of any more weapons. I also directed that the search about the grounds should be kept up, and that if the poor wretch were caught, he was to be treated with all gentleness, and taken to the now disused cottage to await my return.

It was now so late that if Fabian had come by the four o'clock train he must by this time be half way from the station. But it was possible that he had already discovered the mistake of the letters, and had felt a shyness about continuing a journey which was likely to bring him to a cold welcome; so I stuck to my intention of going to Ballater either to meet him if he had arrived, or to telegraph to him if he had not. When I had finished speaking to Ferguson, I found that Babiole had disappeared from the hall. I was rather glad of it; for I had dreaded her questioning, and I hurried the preparations for my walk so that in a few moments I was out of the house and safe from the difficult task of calming her fears.

It was already night when I shut the halldoor behind me and stepped out on to the soft white covering which was already thick on the ground. The snow was still falling thickly, and the only sound I heard, as I groped my way under the arching trees of the avenue, was the occasional swishing noise of a load of snow that, dislodged by a fresh burden from the upper branch of a fir-tree, brushed the lower boughs as it fell to the earth. I am constitutionally untroubled by nervous tremors, and I was too deeply occupied with thoughts of Fabian and his wife to give much grave consideration to possible danger from the unhappy lunatic who was now in all probability hidden somewhere in the neighbourhood with a weapon in his possession; but when in the oppressive darkness and stillness the tramp of footsteps in the soft snow just behind me fell suddenly on my ears, I confess that it was with my heart in my mouth, as the dairymaids say, that I turned and raised threateningly the thick stick I carried. It was, however, only Jock, gun in hand as usual, who had run fast to overtake me, and had come upon me sooner than he expected, the small lantern he carried in his hand being of little use in the darkness.

'What made you come, Jock?' I asked, not, to tell the truth, sorry to have a companion upon the lonely forest road which seemed on this night, for obvious reasons, a more gloomy promenade than usual.

'Mistress Scott bid me gang wi' ye, sir,' answered he. 'She said the necht was sae dark ye might miss the pairth by the burn.'

We walked on together in silence until, having left the avenue far behind us, we were well in the hilly and winding road which runs through the forest from Loch Muick to the Dee. At one of the many bends in the roadway Jock suddenly stopped and stood in a listening attitude.

'Deer?' said I.

'Nae,' answered he, after a pause, in a measured voice, 'It's nae deer.'

He said no more, but examined the barrels of his gun by the light of the lantern, and walked on at a quicker pace. I had heard nothing, but his manner put me on the alert, and it was with a sense of coming adventure that, peering before me in the darkness and straining my ears to catch the faintest sound, I strode on beside the sturdy young Highlander. Warned as I was, it was with a sickening horror that, a moment later, I too heard sounds which had already caught his keener ears. Muffled by the falling snow, by the intervening trees, there came faintly through the air the hoarse yelping cries of a madman. I glanced at the stolid figure by my side.

'Was that what you heard, Jock?' I asked stupidly, more anxious for the sound of his voice than for his answer.

'I dinna ken, sir, if ye heard what I heard,' said he cautiously.

All the while we were walking at our best pace through the snow. It seemed a long time before, at one of the sharpest turns of the road, Jock laid his hand on my shoulder and we stopped. There was nothing to be seen but trees, trees, the patch of clear snow before us and the falling flakes. But we could plainly hear the noise of tramping feet and hoarse guttural cries—

'I've done it, I've done it! I said I would, and I've kept my word! I've done it, I've done it, I've done it!'

The tramping feet seemed to beat time to the words. I had hardly distinguished these cries when I started forward again, and dashing round the angle of the road with a vague fear at my heart, I came close upon the wild weird figure of the unhappy madman who, with his hat off and his long lank hair tossed and dishevelled, was dancing uncouthly in the deep shadow of the trees and chanting to himself the words we had heard. On the ground at one side of him lay the stolen gun, and at the other, close to the bank which bordered the road on the left, was some larger object, which in the profound darkness I could not at first define. With a sudden spring I easily seized the lunatic and held him fast, while Jock lifted the lantern high so as to see his face. As the rays of light fell upon me, however, Mr. Ellmer, who had been too utterly bewildered by the sudden attack to make sign or sound, gave forth a loud cry, and staring at me with starting eyeballs and distorted shaking lips stammered out—