An Isle of Surrey: A Novel

A thin film of cloud dulled the glare of the afternoon sun. The whole expanse of heaven was radiant with diaphanous white clouds; a barge laded with wood indolently glided by to the clank-clank of the horse's hoofs on the tow-path; the sounds from Welford Bridge, which in the mornings came sharp and clear, were now dulled by the muffled hum of larger noises from afar. There was an air of silence and solitude over Boland's Ait. Notwithstanding the griminess of the surroundings and the dilapidations of the buildings on the holm, there was an aspect of peace and retirement in the place.

Hetty had not told her brother anything of Crawford's visit save as much as was necessary to explain the admission of Red Jim to the house and quay.

After a few sentences, Layard said, "You must know, Mr. Bramwell, I don't think I shall stay in this house a minute longer that I can possibly help."

"Indeed!" said Bramwell, feeling as though the sunlight from the sky had been suddenly dulled, and the things upon which his eyes fell had grown more squalid.

"To be candid with you, I don't care about my landlord. He is, to say the least of it, eccentric; and after the affair of to-day I shall never be easy. You see, the house is quite isolated, and no one ever by any chance passes the door."

"It must be very lonely for Miss Layard," Bramwell said, forgetting in his sympathy for the girl his own two years of absolute seclusion.

"She says, and I believe her, that she does not feel the want of company; but after to-day she will, I am afraid, dread the place. Of course, I must get some person to stay with her all the time I am out of the house. Could any one have been more helpless than she was to-day?"

"What you say has a great deal of force in it; but," said he, trying to restore the full complement of sunlight to the sky, "don't you think with a second person in the house all would be safe?"

"Well, I should imagine so; but one does not like to be continually saying, 'all is safe.' One likes to take it for granted, as one takes the sufficiency of air or the coming of daylight with the sun."

They walked for a few seconds in silence, and then Bramwell said, "No barge ever comes through the Bay now, but, owing to my habit with the floating-stage on the canal, I moor the second stage to the Ait every afternoon when Freddie has gone home, and haul it across in the morning. For the future I shall leave it across permanently, so that Miss Layard may feel I am as near to her as some one living next door. I hope and trust, and believe, she will never have any need of my help, but it may give her a little confidence to know that I can be with her instantly in case of need."

"It is extremely kind of you to think of that. It seems you are determined to place me under obligations I can never discharge. The worst of it is that when I came over here I had it in my mind to ask you a favour, and now you have offered to do one unasked."

"If what you came to ask is anything in the world I can do, you may count on me, Mr. Layard. For, remember, that although this is the first time we have met, I am quite well acquainted with you through Philip Ray."

"And I with you, through him also, or I should not speak so freely."

"Isn't Ray a fine fellow?" asked Bramwell enthusiastically.

"The finest fellow I know," answered Layard cordially.

"He is a little enthusiastic, or hot-headed, or fierce, I know, but he will calm down in years. Indeed, I find that of late he is calming down a good deal. As I said before, I treat you as an old friend. I suppose I have been so long an eremite that once I come forth and open my mouth I shall never stop talking. What I have in my mind about Philip, who was the only friend of my solitude, is that if he got a good sensible wife it would be the making of him."

"I have no doubt it would."

"But the worst of it is that I don't think he ever once regarded one woman with more favour than another. In fact, I have always put him down as a man who will never marry."

"Indeed!" said Layard. "I wonder does Ray himself share that notion. If he does, he is treating Hetty badly," he thought.

"And the pity of it is, that if he would only marry he would make the best husband in England."

"It is indeed a pity," said Layard, but he did not say what constituted the pity. To himself, "I don't think anything has been said between them yet, but it seems to me Hetty or he will have some news for me very soon." He said aloud, "The little favour I told you I had to ask-"

"Of course; and I told you if it lay within my power I'd do it."

"Yes; and it does lie easily within your power, and I will take no excuse. Come over and spend an hour with us this evening."

"But I cannot!" cried Bramwell.

"But you must. We will take no excuse."

He wavered. His views of all things had greatly altered since he was first invited to Crawford's House. "Still the boy. I cannot leave him alone." He felt half inclined to go.

"The boy will not be alone. Why, now that you have decided to leave the stage across all night, your house and ours may be looked on as one."

What a pleasant fancy it was that Crawford's House, where she lived, and Boland's Ait, where he lived, might be looked on as one!

"If," went on Layard, "you are uneasy about your boy, at any moment you can run across and see him. You really have no excuse. Our sons have been friends some time, and now you have placed me under a great obligation to you, and you refuse to make the obligation greater. Is that generous of you?"

Bramwell smiled. "I am conquered, fairly conquered."

"Very well; and mind, not later than eight o'clock. Now, where's this young savage of mine? His aunt will imagine you have sold the two of us into slavery."

CHAPTER XXVII.

A LAST RESOLVE

"Good gracious, Mrs. Mellor, you don't mean to say you have been to the hospital and got back again since! But why do I say such a thing? If you had wings you couldn't do it," exclaimed kind-hearted Mrs. Pemberton as Kate Mellor walked into the greengrocer's shop in Leeham, hard by Welford, the same day William Crawford jumped aboard the moving steamboat after his immersion and scene with the invalid woman at the Mercantile Pier.

"No," answered Mrs. Mellor wearily. She did not remove her veil on entering the shop. "I hadn't the heart to go to-day. I got as far as the pier and then turned back." She did not care to enter into any further explanation.

"Hadn't the heart, dear child! And why hadn't you the heart?" said the sympathetic woman, raising her ponderous bulk with deliberation from the chair, and going quickly with outstretched hands to her unfortunate lodger.

"I didn't feel equal to it, and so I came back."

"Well, dear if you didn't go to the hospital I'm very glad you came back here straight, for the house seems queer and lonesome when you're not in it. You don't feel any worse, do you, dear?"

"No worse, thank you, Mrs. Pemberton, but I think the heat tired me a little, and that I'll go up and lie down awhile."

"The very best thing you could do, dear. There's nothing to freshen you up when you're hot and tired like a nice quiet rest in a cool room; and the sun is off your room now. I was just saying to Mrs. Pearse here, that I was sure you'd come in half-dead of the heat. Is there anything I could get you, dear, before you lie down?"

"No, thank you, Mrs. Pemberton," and Kate Mellor passed out of the shop and up to her bedroom on the first floor.

"That's just the way with her always," said Mrs. Pemberton to Mrs. Pearse. "She never complains of anything but being tired, and she never wants anything. If ever there was a broken heart in this world it's hers. She has said to me over and over again it was a mistake that she recovered. What makes me so uneasy about her is that I am afraid her money won't last her much longer, and that when it's gone she'll run away. Though, goodness knows, she's welcome to stay as long as she likes, for she's a real lady, and it's almost as easy to keep two as one, particularly as she isn't a bit particular about what she eats or drinks; and I don't want to let her room unless I could get some one as nice as she, and I'd go far before I could find her equal."

"The loss of the child is preying upon her mind," said Mrs. Pearse. "I remember when I lost my little Ted, I thought I should never be able to lift my head again."

"Ah, but you lost your little Ted in a natural though a sad way; but poor Mrs. Mellor lost her boy by an accident, as it were, and by her own act, too. You know, she is very close, and although she's as friendly as can be, she never says anything about the past. Whoever she sent the boy to will not give him back to her again."

"And you don't know to what person she sent the child?"

"He went first to Boland's Ait, but of course not to stop there. Why, there's no woman on the Ait to look after a child. The boy must be gone to some of his father's people. O, it's a sad, sad case! and I have a feeling-you can't help your feelings-that she's not long for this world, poor thing; and it breaks my heart to think of that, for I do love her as if she was my own child, though it was never given to me to know the feelings of a mother. I expect that private detective knew all about the case."

Meanwhile Kate Mellor had taken off her bonnet and cloak, and lain down on her bed, to rest and think. Up to that day she had lived hour by hour, since the loss of her boy and her recovery, with no definite purpose. At first she had been too ill and weak to consider her position or determine upon any course of action. She had drifted down to this hour without any plan or purpose. She knew the law would not enable her to recover her child, and she felt certain that her husband would see the child dead rather than restored to her arms. She had inserted the announcement of her death partly that her husband might not be fettered in anything he might design for the welfare of their child by considerations of her, and partly out of a pathetic craving for pain and self-sacrifice. She had bought the paper, and had cried a score of times over the bald, cold intimation that the world was over for her: for her the once beautiful and beloved bride of Frank Mellor, now the deserted, marred outcast of shame. She had wept that she, Kate Ray, Kate Mellor, was dead and buried before thirty-when she was not twenty-five. She had wept that she was poor. She had wept that her voice, her only means of earning a living, had been destroyed. She had wept longest of all that her beauty was gone from her for ever. Her beauty had been her greatest gift, her greatest curse, and she wept for it as though it had been an unmixed blessing.

Lying on her bed here to-day, she had no tears to shed. The scene on the pier had in some mysterious way calmed her spirits. She had read the announcement of her death in the paper, and now she was dead in verity.

Why should she live? What had she to live for? Everything woman could hold dear was gone-husband, child, reputation, beauty. In material affairs her destitution could scarcely be greater than it was at this moment. She had a little money still left, but when that was gone where should she find more? He, the betrayer, had been overjoyed to get his life back from the jaws of death that day; she, the victim, would enter those awful jaws freely, But she must see her child, her little Frank, the sweet baby she had held at her breast and cherished with the warmth of her embraces.

She was afraid of only one person in the world, and that was Frank Mellor, who had changed his name to Francis Bramwell for shame of her. If he found her he would kill her, and she owned that at his hands she deserved death; she had robbed him of everything he held dear.

She had resolved upon death, but she could not take it at his hands. It was too awful to think of a meeting between them. That would be ten times worse than the most painful form of quitting life. That would be an agony of the spirit ten thousand times transcending any possible agony of the body.

Frank, her husband, had always been a man of strong feeling. At times this strong feeling had exhibited itself to her in profound taciturnity, at times in overwhelming ecstasy. If she should encounter him now, he would be possessed by the demon of insatiable revenge; he would strike her to the ground and murder her cruelly, and mangle her dead body. While he was beating the life out of her he would revile and curse her. He would heap coals of fire on her head, and crush out of her the last trace of self-respect. And in all this he would, perhaps, be justified-in much of it certainly.

How good and indulgent he had been to her! She had not understood him then. She had eyes for nothing then but admiration and finery. To-day she had nothing to call forth admiration-no finery; and yet, if she had not hearkened to that other man, could she believe that Frank would not love and shield and cherish her now as he had then? Frank was the very soul of honour. He would not hurt a brute or wrong any living being. She had not known, had not understood, him then as she did now, judged by the light of subsequent experience.

She must see the boy once more-just once more before she died. She would not look upon another day. By some means or other she would see her child, and then bid good-bye to the world. When she saw her child, there would be the canal close at hand. But that would not do. It would not do to pollute with the last crime of her life the presence of her child. No; the river of which that other man had stood in such terror would be the fitting ending place for such a wicked life as hers.

"O, how different would all have been if only that man had not tempted her with lies, and she had not listened through vanity! Frank would have been good and kind to her, and by this time she should have grown to love him as she had never loved the other; and her boy, her darling, her little Frank, her baby, would be with her, his arms round her neck, his soft, round, warm cheek against her own!

"But, there, there, there!" she moaned, putting her hand before her blotched, disfigured, worn face. "It is all over! I have lost everything, and no one is to blame but myself and the other. Only I must suffer all. Yet it will not be for long. I will see my boy to-night, even if I die there and then. I don't care about dying. Death has refused me once, but it shall not this time. O, my little Frank! my little innocent Frank! my baby that I warmed against my breast!"

She lay in a kind of torpor for a few hours; then having got up and made some small arrangements, she wrote a note for Mrs. Pemberton, placed it in her trunk, and, putting a lock of hair and an old worn glove of her boy's in her bosom, went down-stairs and slipped out by the private door beside the shop.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

WILLIAM CRAWFORD'S LUCK

When William Crawford found himself safe aboard the moving steamboat, he uttered an exclamation of intense relief and satisfaction. He looked quickly behind him, and noticed with a laugh that pursuit was out of the question. He was safe! His life had been twice imperilled that day, and he had escaped with nothing worse than a wetting. He had been in imminent danger of death from drowning, had been saved by a woman whom he had ruined, and then escaped from her deadly demoniacal, maniac wrath. After all this, who could say that there was not luck in the world? and who could deny that luck had befriended him in a phenomenal manner?

Yes, he was lucky; he had been lucky all his life up to this, except at cards, and he should be lucky to the end. If Fate had meant ever to do him an ill turn, surely it would not have let slip two such remarkable opportunities. No, he was born to good fortune; and the saying was true that it was better to be born lucky than rich. And, thinking of riches, this day's mishaps had not even cost him the fifty pounds, for he still held the notes in his hand. What a fool that woman was not to take them! But then she had always been a fool.

And with this generous thought of the woman who had sacrificed everything for him, he dismissed her from his mind.

He was hatless, and his clothes were all rumpled and creased; and the water dripped from the ends of his trousers, making a wet patch on the deck wherever he stepped.

The people on the steamboat had noticed the hasty manner of his coming aboard, his rush out of the pier-master's room, and his leap from the hulk. They also observed that his clothes were wet, and that he was without any covering for his head. They were observing him with interest and curiosity. Becoming conscious of this, and feeling a slight shiver pass through him, he turned to one of the crew and said:

"In coming from the shore to the pier I fell into the water. Is there any brandy aboard?"

"Plenty, sir, in the fore-cabin."

To the fore-cabin he went forthwith, and drove off the chill with brandy, and escaped the curious eyes of the passengers.

He remained below until the boat arrived at Blackfriars Bridge. Here he went ashore, and, hailing the first hansom, drove to a tailor and outfitter's, where he got everything he wanted except boots, and these the obliging shopkeeper procured for him.

It was now four o'clock. He had had two great shocks that day, each of which was more severe than any other he had endured in his life. He felt that something in the way of compensation was due to him. Play went on all day long and all night long at the Counter Club. What better could he do with himself than have a few quiet games before going back to his dull Richmond home? He did not like appearing at the club in a suit of ready-made clothes, but, then, all kinds of men, in all kinds of costumes, went to the Counter; and he had never been a great dandy.

Accordingly to the Counter he drove, with four of the damp ten-pound notes in his pocket and some broken money. It was not as much as he should have liked, but then, he had no intention of making a night of it. He would get back to Richmond about dusk.

He left the club just in time to catch the last train for home. He found an empty compartment, and, as he threw himself into a corner, cried softly to himself:

"Luck! Why, of course, there never was such luck as mine! I used to be unlucky at cards. Unlucky at cards, lucky in love, they say. Well, I have been more lucky than most men in love, and here now are cards turning in my favour. I have now won twice running. I have a hundred and twenty pounds more in my pocket than when I came to town this morning. There seems to be absolutely no end to my luck. If that fool Kate had taken the fifty, of course I could not have played, and, of course, if I had not played I could not have won. My good fortune is almost miraculous. If any other person but Kate had rescued me, he or she would have taken the money, and there would have been no play; and if I had not fallen into the water it is very likely I should not have thought of treating myself to a game. Upon my word, it is miraculous-nothing short of miraculous."

His eyes winked rapidly, and he stroked his smoothly-shaven chin with intense satisfaction.

"But," he went on, "the whole thing is due to that delightful Hetty, for if I had not wanted to see that charming girl again I should not have gone to Welford to-day, and, of course, should not have played this afternoon. Like all other gamblers, I am a bit superstitious, and I do believe that she has brought me luck. Now twice out of three times that I have played since I saw her I have won, and that never happened in all my life before. Yes, she has undoubtedly brought me luck. Suppose this luck continued, I should be a rich man in a short time. I should be quite independent of Welford and Singleton Terrace, Richmond, and although I am good at private theatricals, I am getting a bit sick of Singleton Terrace, Richmond. A man gets tired of a goody-goody part sooner than of any other kind. I do believe, after all, that if I had that three thousand pounds for capital and Hetty for luck, I should be better off without Singleton Terrace, Richmond. That is an aspect of the future well worth thinking over."

When he got home he found to his surprise and disgust that his wife had not yet gone to bed. He put his arm round her and kissed her tenderly, and chid her gently for sitting up. She said she was anxious about him, as he had said he should be back early.

"The fact of the matter is, Nellie, I had a great deal more trouble about those gates than I anticipated. You have no notion of how stupid workmen can be. They always want to do something or other you have said distinctly you do not want to have done. I told the creature I went to as plainly as I am telling you that I did not wish to have ice-house doors, but simply gates sufficiently strong and well secured to prevent anyone falling into the water. I told him to go see the place, and that I should come back in an hour to hear what he had to say about price; and would you believe it? the animal had made out an estimate for double doors! I could hardly get him to adopt my views. He said an ice-house ought to have ice-house doors, and that to put up any others would not be workmanlike, and would expose him to contempt and ridicule in the neighbourhood! Did you ever hear anything so monstrously absurd in all your life?"

"It was very provoking, William, and I am sorry that my foolish fears caused you so much trouble," she said in a tone of self-reproach, softly stroking his hand held in both hers.

"Not at all, dear! Not at all! I am very glad I went. But of course the work about the gates did not keep me till now. I have had a little adventure."

She looked up at him in alarm, and glanced in fear at the unfamiliar clothes he wore. "A little adventure?" she cried faintly.

"Yes," he said, with one of his short quick laughs, "but you need not be uneasy; I am not the worse of it, and there was no fair lady in it to make you jealous."

"Jealous!" she cried, with a rapturous smile of utter faith. "Not all the fair ladies in the world could make me jealous, William. I know you too well."

"Thank you, Nellie," he said in a grateful, serious tone, raising one of her hands and kissing it. "No. The fact is, as I was waiting on the pier for the steamer, a little boy, about the age of the one I saw in my dream, about the age of young Layard, fell into the river, and as he was beyond the reach of the poles and too young to catch a line or lifebuoy, and was in great danger of drowning, I jumped in and got him out."

With a sigh of horror she lay back in her chair unable to speak.

"It was a strange fulfilment of my dream. As you know, I am not in the least superstitious, but it seems to me that the nightmare I had last night was sent to me that I might be on the spot to save that poor little chap from a watery grave. Don't look so terrified, Nellie. There was great danger for the little fellow, but not the slightest for me. I am as much at home in the water as a duck, and you see, being stout, I am buoyant and swim very high."

"O, but 'tis dreadful to think of you, William, in the water!" she whispered in a voice breathless with a combined feeling of dread of the peril he had been in and thankfulness for his present security.

"Well, it's all over now, and you needn't be afraid of my doing anything of the kind again. When I got out of the water I went and bought a dry suit of ready-made clothes, and I think you must admit I am quite a swell in them."

She forced a smile. He went on:

"Well, even all this wouldn't account for my being so late. You must know there is nothing I hate so much as notoriety, and I had absolutely got to Waterloo on my way home when it suddenly occurred to me that as two or three hundred people saw the rescue some one might go to the newspapers with an account of it. Nothing could make me more shamefaced than to see my name in print in connection with this affair. I had experience of something of the kind at the time of the fire-you remember, dearest?"

She pressed his hand and said, "My own, my own, my own!"

"So I took a cab and drove round to all the newspaper-offices to bar a report going in. That was what kept me till this hour."

They sat talking for a little while longer, and then she rang for the maid and he went to the dressing-room.