Kitabı oku: «The Time of Roses», sayfa 16
CHAPTER XLIII.
MRS. AYLMER'S WILL
Nothing would induce Florence to go to Aylmer's Court and Mrs. Aylmer the less, in great distress of mind, was forced to remain with her in her flat that evening.
Florence gave her the very best that the flat contained, sleeping herself on the sofa in her sitting-room.
Mrs. Aylmer sat up late and talked and talked until she could talk no longer. At last Florence got her into bed, and then went to visit Edith in her room.
"You don't look well," said Edith; "your engagement has not improved you. What is the matter?"
"I don't exactly know what is the matter," said Florence. "I am worried about mother's visit. My aunt, Mrs. Aylmer, is dying. She is a very rich woman. Mother is under the impression that, if she and I went to Aylmer's Court, Mrs. Aylmer might leave me her property. I don't want it; I should hate to have it. I have learned in the last few months that money is not everything. I don't want to have Aunt Susan's money."
"Well," replied Edith, staring her full in the face, "that is the most sensible speech you have made for a long time. I have closely studied the question of economics, and have long ago come to the conclusion that the person of medium income is the only person who is truly happy. I am even inclined to believe that living from hand to mouth is the most enviable state of existence. You never know how the cards will turn up; but the excitement is intense. When I am a doctor, I shall watch people's faces with intense interest, wondering whether, when their next illness comes on, they will send for me; then there will be the counting up of my earnings, and putting my little money by, and living just within my means. And then I shall have such wide interests besides money: the cure of my patients, their love and gratitude to me afterwards. It is my opinion, Florence, that the more we live outside money, and the smaller place money takes in the pleasures of our lives, the happier we are; for, after all, money can do so little, and I don't think any other people can be so miserable as the vastly rich ones."
"I agree with you," said Florence.
"It is more than Tom does," replied Edith, looking fixedly at her. "After all, Florence, are you not in some ways too good for my brother?"
"In some ways too good for him?" repeated Florence. She turned very white. "You don't know me," she added.
"I don't believe I do, and, it occurs to me, the more I am with you the less I know you. Florence, is it true that you have a secret in your life?"
"It is quite true," said Florence, raising her big dark eyes and fixing them on the face of her future sister-in-law.
"And is it a secret that Tom knows nothing about?"
"A secret, Edith, as you say, that Tom knows nothing about."
"How very dreadful! And you are going to marry him holding that secret?"
"Yes; I shall not reveal it. If I did, he would not marry me."
"But what is it, my dear? Won't you even tell me?"
"No, Edith. Tom marries me for a certain purpose. He gets what he wants. I do not feel that I am doing wrong in giving myself to him; but, wrong or right, the thing is arranged: why worry about it now?"
"You are a strange girl. I am sorry you are going to marry my brother. I do not believe you will be at all happy, but, as I have said already, I have expressed my opinion."
"The marriage is to take place quite quietly three weeks from now," said Florence. "We have arranged everything. We are not going to have an ordinary wedding. I shall be married in my travelling-dress. Tom says he can barely spend a week away from his editorial work, and he wants me to live in a flat with him at first."
"Oh, those flats are so detestable," said Edith; "no air, and you are crushed into such a tiny space; but I suppose Tom will sacrifice everything to the sitting-rooms."
"He means to have a salon: he wants to get all the great and witty and wise around us. It ought to be an interesting future," said Florence in a dreary tone.
Edith gazed at her again.
"Well," she said, after a pause, "I suppose great talent like yours does content one. You certainly are marvellously brilliant. I read your last story, and thought it the cleverest of the three. But I wish you were not so pessimistic. It is terrible not to help people. It seems to me you hinder people when you write as you do."
"I must write as the spirit moves me," said Florence, in a would-be flippant voice, "and Tom likes my writing; he says it grows on him."
"So much the worse for Tom."
"Well, I will say good-night now, Edith. I am tired, and mother will be disturbed if I go to bed too late."
Florence went into her own flat, shut and locked the door, and, lying down, tried to sleep. But she was excited and nervous, and no repose would come to her. Up to the present time, since her engagement, she had managed to keep thought at bay; but now thoughts the most terrible, the most dreary, came in like a flood and banished sleep. Towards morning she found herself silently crying.
"Oh, why cannot I break off my engagement with Tom Franks? Why cannot I tell Maurice Trevor the truth?" she said to herself.
Early the next day Mrs. Aylmer the less received a telegram from Bertha Keys. This was to announce the death of the owner of Aylmer's Court. Mrs. Aylmer the less immediately became almost frantic with excitement. She wanted to insist on Florence accompanying her at once to the Court. Florence stoutly refused to stir an inch. Finally the widow was obliged to go off without her daughter.
"There is little doubt," she said, "that we are both handsomely remembered. I, of course, have my fifty pounds a year – that was settled on me many years ago – but I shall have far more than that now, and you, my poor child, will have a nice tidy fortune, ten to twelve or twenty thousand pounds, and then if you will only marry Maurice Trevor, who inherits all the rest of the wealth, how comfortable you will be! I suppose you would like me to live with you at Aylmer's Court, would you not?"
"Oh, mother, don't," said poor Florence. "I have a feeling which I cannot explain that Mrs. Aylmer will disappoint everyone. Don't count on her wealth, mother. Oh, mother, don't think so much of money, for it is not the most important thing in the world."
"Money not the most important thing in the world!" said Mrs. Aylmer, backing and looking at her daughter with bright eyes of horror. "Flo, my poor child, you really are getting weak in your intellect."
A few moments afterwards she left, sighing deeply as she did so, and Florence, to her own infinite content, was left behind.
The next few days passed without anything special occurring; then the news of Mrs. Aylmer's extraordinary will was given to Florence in her mother's graphic language.
"Although she is dead, poor thing, she certainly always was a monster," wrote the widow. "I cannot explain to you what I feel. I have begged of Mr. Trevor to dispute the will; but, would you believe it? – unnatural man that he is, he seems more pleased than otherwise.
"My little money is still to the fore, but no one else seems to have been remembered. As to that poor dear Bertha Keys, she has not been left a penny. If she had not saved two or three hundred pounds during the time of her companionship to that heathenish woman, she would now be penniless. It is a fearful blow, and I cannot think for which of our sins it has been inflicted on us. It is too terrible, and the way Maurice Trevor takes it is the worst of all."
When Florence read this letter, she could not help clapping her hands.
"I cannot understand it," she said to herself; "but a great load seems to have rolled away from me. Of course, I never expected Aunt Susan's money, but mother has been harping upon it as long as I can remember. I don't think Maurice wanted it greatly. It seemed to me that that money brought a curse with it. I wonder if things are going to be happier now. Oh, dear, I am glad – yes, I am glad that it has not been left to any of us."
Florence's feelings of rapture, however, were likely soon to be mitigated. Her wedding-day was approaching.
Mrs. Aylmer the less, who had at first told Florence that she could not on any account marry for three or four months, owing to the sad death in the family, wrote now to say that the sooner she secured Tom Franks the better.
"Maurice Trevor is a pauper," she said, "not worth any girl's serious consideration. Marry Mr. Franks, my dear Florence; he is not up to much, but doubtless he is the best you can get. You need not show the smallest respect to Susan Aylmer; the wedding need not be put off a single hour on her account."
Nor did Flo nor Tom intend to postpone the wedding. Mrs. Aylmer had not been loved by Florence, and, as the couple were to be married quietly, there was not the least occasion why the ceremony should be delayed. Florence had not a trousseau, in the ordinary sense of the word.
"I have no money," she said, looking full at Edith.
Tom Franks happened to come into the room at the time.
"What are you talking about?" he said. "By the way, here is a letter for you."
As he spoke, he laid a letter on the table near Florence's side. She glanced at it, saw that it was in the handwriting of Bertha Keys, and did not give it a further thought.
"Flo is thinking about her trousseau; all brides require trousseaux," said Edith, who, although unorthodox in most things, did not think it seemly that a bride should go to the altar without fine clothes.
"But why should we worry about a trousseau?" replied Tom. "I take Florence for what she is, not for her dress; and I can give you things in Paris," he added, looking at her. "I have some peculiar ideas, and my own notions with regard to your future dress. You want a good deal of rich colour, and rich stuffs, and nothing too girlish. You are very young, but you will look still younger if you are dressed somewhat old, as I mean to dress you. We will get your evening dress in Paris. I am not a rich man, but I have saved up money for the purpose."
"I don't really care about clothes at all," said Florence.
"I know that; but you will change your mind. With your particular style, you must be careful how you dress. I will manage it. Don't waste your money on anything now. I want you to come to me as you are."
Tom then sat down near Florence, and began to give her particulars with regard to several flats which he had looked over. He was a keen man of business, and talked £. s. d. until the girl was tired of the subject.
"I shall take the flat in Fortescue Mansions to-morrow morning," he said finally; "it will just suit us. There is a very fine reception-room, and, what is still better, all the reception-rooms open one into the other. We must begin to give our weekly salons as soon as ever you return from your wedding tour, Florence."
"Surely you will wait until people call on Florence?" interrupted Edith. "You are too quick, Tom, for anything. You must not transgress all the ordinary rules of society."
Tom looked at his sister, shut up his firm lips, and turned away; he did not even vouchsafe to answer.
A moment later, he left the room. It was his custom when he met Florence to kiss her coldly on the forehead, and to repeat this ceremony when he left her. He did not neglect this little attention on the present occasion. As his steps, in his patent-leather boots, were heard descending the stairs, Edith saw Florence raise her handkerchief to her forehead and rub the spot which Tom's lips had touched.
"How heartily you dislike him!" said Edith. "I would not marry him if I were you."
Florence made no reply. She took up her letter and prepared to leave the room.
"Why do you go? There is a good fire here, and there is none in your room. Sit by the fire, and make yourself comfy. I am going out for a little."
CHAPTER XLIV.
BERTHA CHANGES HER TONE
Edith pinned on her hat as she spoke, and a moment later left the flat. Florence looked around her. She sank into an easy-chair, and opened the letter. It was, as she already knew, from Bertha. She began to read it languidly, but soon its contents caused her to start; her eyes grew bright with a strange mixture of fear, relief, and apprehension. Bertha had written as follows: —
"My Dear Florence —
"You will doubtless, long ere this, have been told of the fearful blow which the late Mrs. Aylmer of Aylmer's Court has inflicted on us all. Kind as we have been to her, and faithfully as we have served her – I allude especially here to myself – we have been cut off without a farthing whereas two monstrous establishments have been left the benefit of her wealth. The clergyman, Mr. Edwards, is responsible for this act of what I call sacrilege. She made him write a will for her just after poor Mr. Wiltshire had departed. It is, I believe, quite in proper form, and there is not a loophole of escape. Mr. Edwards knew what he was about. Mrs. Aylmer gave her money, as she thought, back to God: a very queer way of doing charity – to leave those nearest to her to starve.
"However, my dear Florence, to come to the point, I, who have spent the last five years of my life absolutely devoted to this woman, serving her hand and foot, day and night, at all times and all seasons, have not even had a ten-pound note left to me for my pains. It is true that I shall receive my salary, which happens to be a very good one, up to the end of the present quarter. After that, as far as I am concerned, I might as well never have known Aylmer's Court nor its mistress. Fortunately I was able to feather my nest to a very small extent while with her, and have a few hundred pounds with which to face the world.
"Now, Florence, I hope you are somewhat prepared for what is about to follow. It is this: I shall be obliged in the future to use my talent for my own aggrandisement. I find that it is a very marketable commodity. A few months' use of it has placed you in great comfort; it has also brought you fame, and, further, a very excellent husband. What the said future husband will say when the dénouement is revealed to him – as of course revealed it will be – is more than I can say. But you must face the fact that I can no longer supply you with stories or essays. I myself will write my own stories, and send them myself to the different papers, and the golden sovereigns, my dear, will roll into my pocket, and not into yours. You will naturally say: 'How will you do this, and face the shame of your actions in the past?' But the fact is, I am not at all ashamed, nor do I mind confessing exactly what I have done. My talent is my own, and it is my opinion that the world will crowd after me all the more because I have done this daring thing, and you, my poor little understudy for the time being, will be my understudy no longer. I take the part of leading lady once for all myself. I am coming up to London to-morrow, and will call to see you, as, on consideration, I think that fourth story which you are preparing for the Argonaut might as well appear with my name to it.
"Yours very sincerely,"Bertha Keys."
Florence perused this letter two or three times; then she put it in her pocket and entered her bed-room. She did not quite know what she was doing. She felt a little giddy, but there was a queer, unaccountable sense of relief all over her. On her desk lay her own neat copy of the story which she was preparing for the Argonaut. By the side of the desk also was quite a pile of letters from different publishers offering her work and good pay. These letters Tom Franks insisted on her either taking no notice of or merely writing to decline the advantageous offers. She took them up now.
"Messrs. So-and-so would be glad to see Miss Aylmer. They could offer her…" And then came terms which would have made the mouths of most girls water. Or Florence received a letter asking her if she would undertake to write three or four stories for such a paper, the terms to be what she herself liked to ask. She looked at them all wistfully. It is true she had not yet lighted a fire in her room, but she put a match to it now, in order to burn the publishers' letters. The story she was copying was about half-done. She had meant to finish it from Bertha's manuscript before she went out. She smiled to herself as she looked.
"I need never finish it now," she thought.
Just as this thought came to her she heard a tap at her door. It was a messenger with a note. She told him to wait, and opened it. It was from Franks.
"I quite forgot when I saw you an hour ago to ask you to let me have manuscript of the next story without fail this evening. Can you send it now by messenger, or shall he call again for it within a couple of hours? This is urgent.
"Thomas Franks."
Florence sat down and wrote a brief reply.
"I am very sorry, but you cannot have manuscript to-night.
"Florence Aylmer."
The messenger departed with this note, and Florence dressed herself to go out, and she went quickly downstairs. She walked until she saw the special omnibus which she was looking for. She was taken straight to Hampstead, and she walked up the steep hill until she found the little cottage which she had visited months ago in the late summer-time. Florence went to the door, and a neat servant with an apple-blossom face opened it.
"Is Mrs. Trevor in?" asked Florence.
"Yes, miss; what name shall I say?"
Florence gave her name: "Miss Florence Aylmer."
She was immediately ushered into the snug drawing-room, bright with firelight. She shut her eyes, and a feeling of pain went through her heart.
"The way of transgressors is very, very hard," she thought. "Shall I ever keep straight? What a miserable character I must be!"
Just then Mrs. Trevor entered the room. She had not been pleased with Florence; she had not been pleased with her manner to her son. Mothers guess things quickly, and she had guessed Maurice's secret many months ago.
Florence held out her hand wistfully, and looked full at the little widow.
"I have come to speak to you," she said. "I want to know if you will" – her lips trembled – "advise me."
"Sit down, my dear," said Mrs. Trevor. She motioned Florence to a seat, but the girl did not take it.
"I have come to you, as the only one in all the world who can help me," continued Florence. "I have something very terrible to say, and I thought perhaps you would listen, and perhaps you would advise. May I speak to you just because I am a very lonely girl and you are a woman?"
"If you put it in that way, of course you may speak," said Mrs. Trevor. "To tell you the truth, I have been displeased with you; I have thought that you have not been fair."
"To whom?" asked Florence.
"To my son Maurice."
Florence coloured; then she put her hand to her heart.
"You never replied to my letter, Mrs. Trevor."
"What was there to say?"
"Will you tell me now what you thought of it?"
Mrs. Trevor had seated herself by the fire. She held out her small hands to the grateful blaze; then she looked round at the girl.
"Sit down, child," she said; "take off your hat. If you wish to know what I really thought, I imagined that you were a little hysterical and that you had overstated things. Girls of your age are apt to do so. I was very sorry, for Maurice's sake, that you did not accept my offer; but otherwise I prefer to be alone."
"I see. Well, I must tell you now that I did not exaggerate. I have been bad through and through: quite unworthy of your attention and care: quite unworthy of Mr. Maurice's regard."
"That is extremely likely," said the mother of Mr. Maurice, drawing herself up in a stately fashion.
"Oh, don't be unkind to me; do bear with me while I tell you. Afterwards I shall go away somewhere, but I must relieve my soul. Oh, it is so sinful!"
"Speak, child, speak. Who am I that I should turn away from you?"
"Years ago," began Florence, speaking in a dreary tone, "I was at a school called Cherry Court School. While there I was assailed by a very great temptation. The patron of the school, Sir John Wallis, offered a prize on certain conditions to the girls. The prize meant a great deal, and covered a wide curriculum.
"It was a great opportunity, and I struggled hard to win; but Sir John Wallis, although he offered the prize to the school, in reality wanted a girl called Kitty Sharston, who was the daughter of his old friend, to get it.
"Kitty Sharston was supposed to be most likely to win the prize, and she did win it in the end; but let me tell you how. In the school was a girl as pupil teacher, whose name was Bertha Keys."
"What!" cried Mrs. Trevor: "the girl who has been companion to Mrs. Aylmer: whom my son has so often mentioned?"
"The very same girl. Oh, I don't want to abuse her too much, and yet I cannot tell my terrible story without mentioning her. She tempted me; she was very clever, and she tempted me mightily. She wrote the essay for me, the prize essay which was hers, not mine. Oh, I know you are shocked, I feel your hand trembling; but let me hold it; don't draw it away. She wrote the essay, and it was read aloud before all the guests and all the other girls as mine, and I won the Scholarship; yes, I won it through the essay written by Bertha Keys."
"That was very terrible, my dear. How could you bear it? How could you?"
"I went to London. You remember how I came to see you. I had very little money, just twenty pounds, and mother, who had only fifty pounds a year, could not help me, and I was so wretched that I did not know what to do. I went from one place to another offering myself as teacher, although I hated teaching and I could not teach well; but no one wanted me, and I was in despair, and I used to get so desperately hungry too. Oh, you cannot tell what it is to want a meal – just to have a good dinner, say, once a week, and bread-and-butter all the rest of the days. Oh, you do feel so empty when you live on bread-and-butter and nothing else! Then I had a letter from Bertha, and she made me a proposal. She sent with the letter a manuscript. Ah! I feel you start now."
"This is terrible!" said Mrs. Trevor. She stood up in her excitement; she backed a little way from Florence.
"You guess all, but I must go on telling you," continued the poor girl. "She sent this manuscript, and she asked me to use it as my own. She said she did not want any of the money, and she spoke specious words, and I was tempted. But I struggled, I did struggle. It was Miss Franks who really was the innocent cause of pushing me over the gulf, for she read the manuscript and said it was very clever, and she showed it to her brother, the man I am now engaged to, and he said it was clever, and it was accepted for the Argonaut almost before I knew what I was doing; and that was the beginning of everything. I was famous. Bertha was the person who wrote the stories and the essays. I was wearing borrowed plumes, and I was not a bit clever; and, oh, Mrs. Trevor, the end has come now, for Mrs. Aylmer has died and has left all her great wealth to the hospitals, and I have had a letter from Bertha. You may read it, Mrs. Trevor: do read it. This Is what Bertha says."
As Florence spoke, she thrust Bertha's letter into Mrs. Trevor's hand.
"I will ring for a light," said the widow. She approached the bell, rang it, and the little rosy-faced servant appeared.
"Tea, Mary, at once for two, and some hot cakes, and bring a lamp, please.
"I am glad and I am sorry you have told me," she said. "I will read the letter when the lamp comes. Now warm yourself.
"You poor girl," she said. "I will not touch this letter until I see you looking better.
"I will read this in another room," she said; "you would like to be alone for a little."
She left the room softly with Bertha's letter, and Florence still sat on by the fire. She sat so for some time, and presently, soothed by the warmth, and weary from all the agony she had undergone, the tired-out girl dropped asleep.
