One Maid's Mischief

Hilton flushed angrily.

“Your reproaches are unjust,” he said. “You know that Miss Perowne never cared for me, and that I was too weak and vain not to see it earlier than I did. Harley, I will not quarrel, for I esteem you too well. We ought to be good friends.”

“And we are,” said the Resident. “Forgive me for what I have said!”

He held out his hand, which the other pressed warmly.

“I’m an outsider!” said Hilton, bitterly, in turn. “I’m going to set up for my friend’s friend. I shall be best man to Chumbley when he marries Miss Stuart; and so I shall to you, for I believe you will marry Helen Perowne after all.”

“Silence, man!” cried the Resident, harshly. “I have been sent for by Miss Stuart. Her friend is dying, I am sure. Perhaps it is best!”

“Dying!” cried Hilton.

“Yes! Are you surprised after what the doctor has said?”

“I am,” said Hilton; “for I had hopes after all. Let us make haste.”

The Resident glanced at him quickly, for Hilton’s words even then caused him a jealous pang; but there was nothing but honest commiseration there; and they walked on hastily to the doctor’s door.

Dr Bolter himself met them, looking very grave, and the faint hope that had been struggling in Neil Harley’s breast died out.

The doctor saw the question in each of his visitors’ eyes, and answered, hastily:

“No; I don’t think there is immediate danger, but – She expressed a wish to see you, Harley.”

That but, and the way in which he finished his sentence, spoke volumes. An invalid in a dangerous state expressing a wish to see some one in particular! It was like the cold chill of death itself seeming near.

“You may go in, Harley,” said the doctor. “My wife and Miss Stuart are there.”

The Resident hesitated for a moment. Then drawing a long breath, he walked through the drawing-room, and into Helen’s bedroom, seeing nothing but the thin swarthy face upon the white pillow, about which was tossed her abundant hair.

Mrs Bolter rose as he entered, and taking Grey Stuart’s hand, they softly moved towards the door, and left the room without a word.

For a few moments Neil Harley stood there, gazing down at the wasted face before him, his very soul looking out, as it were, from his eyes, in the intensity of his misery and despair; while Helen gazed up at him now with a saddened and resigned expression of countenance, the vanity all passed away and the dread that he should see her, disfigured as she was, a something of the past.

“I sent for you to ask you to forgive me,” she said, in a low, faint voice; but he did not speak.

“I know now how weak – how vain I was – how cruel to you; but – you know – my folly, you will forgive?”

He was down upon his knees by her bedside now, and the words seemed to be literally torn from his heart as he groaned:

“Helen! – Helen! my poor girl! has it come to this?”

“Yes!” she said, softly, “it seems like rest! I am happier now; but I thought – I should like to see you again – to say Good-bye!”

“No, no, no!” he cried, passionately. “You shall not leave me, Helen! My love – my darling – you shall not die!” She smiled faintly.

“I knew you loved me differently from the rest!” she said, softly, as he clasped her thin hand and held it to his lips; “that is why I sent. You said I should send for you – some day.”

“To ask me to take you for my wife,” he panted; “and, Helen, the time has come!”

“Yes,” she said, softly, “but it was the Helen of the past; not this wreck – this – this – Oh, Heaven!” she moaned, passionately, “did I sin so vilely that you should punish me like this?”

“Hush! hush!” he whispered, passing his arm beneath her light, too fragile form, and raising her till her head rested upon his breast. “That is all past now, and it is not the Helen of the past I love, but she who has sent for me at last. Helen, darling, speak to me again!”

“Speak?” she said, faintly; “what should I say, but ask you to forgive me, and say good-bye?”

“Good-bye?” he cried, frantically. “What, now that I have, as it were, begun to live?”

“One kind, forgiving word,” she said, faintly. “One? A thousand!” he panted; “my own – my love! Leave me? No, you shall not go! Is my love for you so weak and poor that I should let you go – that I should turn from you in this hour of trial? Helen!” he cried; “I tell you it is not the Helen of the past I love, but you – you, my own! Tell me that you have turned to me – truly turned to me at last, and live to bless me with your love!”

Her lips parted, and she tried to speak, but no words came. Her eyes closed, and as he clasped her more firmly to his breast a faint shuddering sigh seemed to fan his cheek.

“You shall not die,” he whispered, as he raised her thin arm and laid it tenderly round his neck, while his heart throbbed heavily against hers; “I am strong, and my strength shall give you strength, my breath should be yours, Helen, love, were it my last. Take it, darling, and breathe and live, my own – my wife – my all!”

As he whispered frantically these words he seemed endued with the idea that she would draw life from his strong manliness, and breathe it in his breath, as he bent down lower and laid his lips upon hers.

Then the shuddering sigh came again, and feeble as she was before, he felt her relax and sink away; her arm fell from where it rested on his shoulder, and in an agony of dread he stamped upon the floor.

There was a hurried rush of feet, the door was flung open, and the doctor entered the room.

“Quick!” he cried. “Lay her down, man! – That’s well.”

“Is – is she dead?” groaned the Resident; and in an agony of remorse and despair he sank back in the chair by the bedside, as he saw the doctor take one hand in his and lay his other upon his patient’s throat.

“No,” said Dr Bolter, shortly. “Fainting. Go away.”

“But, Bolter – ” protested the Resident.

“Be off, man, I tell you!” cried the little doctor, angrily, showing how thoroughly he was autocrat of the sick room. “Go, and send in my wife, and Miss Stuart. Or no: my wife will do.”

The Resident bent down once over the thin, dark face, and then stole softly out of the room, to find Mrs Bolter waiting; and nodding quickly, she went in and closed the door.

“What news?” asked Hilton, eagerly, as he rose from a chair near the window.

“I don’t know – I dare not say,” replied Harley, sinking hopelessly into a chair; and for a time no one spoke.

It was the doctor who broke the silence by coming back from the sick room, and this time sending a thrill of hope into the breast of all as he began to rub his hands in an apparently satisfied manner, and gazed from one to the other.

“Is – is she better, doctor?”

“Don’t know! won’t prognosticate!” he said, sharply. “I’ll say that she’s no worse. Prostrated by mental emotion, but other symptoms at a standstill. If she lives – well, if she lives – ”

“Yes, yes, doctor!” cried the Resident, imploringly.

“Well, if she lives, I think it will be from some sudden turn in her mental state, for I have done all I know, and of course a man – even a medical man – can do no more.”

Volume Three – Chapter Twenty Six.

More Mating

Slow work – terribly slow work; but at the end of three days – during which at any moment it had seemed as if the light of life would become extinct – Helen Perowne still lived, and in place of Grey Stuart or Mrs Bolter, Neil Harley was mostly by her side.

She suffered still from wild attacks of delirium, and in her wanderings, if the firm, strong hand of the Resident was not there to hold her, she grew plaintive and fretful, and a look of horror appeared upon her wasted face; but no sooner did she feel Neil Harley’s firm clasp and hear his whispered words, than she uttered a sigh of content, and dropped always into a placid sleep.

To his surprise and delight, these words seemed to pacify her; a long-drawn sigh came from her breast, and she fell into a restful slumber.

During the rest of the critical time of her illness a few whispered words always had the desired effect, and from that hour Helen began rapidly to mend.

“Yes, she is improving fast now,” said the doctor, as he sat beside her bed talking, as if he believed his patient to be asleep. “I shan’t take any of the credit, Harley. I should have lost her, I am sure, for it was not in physic to do more than I had done. There, I am going down now to my specimens, to have a look at them, and talk to my wife, for I have hardly seen her of late.”

He rose and left the room, and the Resident took his place, seeing that the great dark eyes were fixed upon him, full of a strange, pathetic light, that the warm evening glow seemed to give an almost supernatural effect.

“You are awake, then?” he said, softly.

“Yes; I heard all that he said, and it is true.”

“Thank heaven!” said the Resident, fervently, as he took one of the thin brown hands from the white coverlet and held it in both of his.

“I believe it was your tender words that gave me hope,” said Helen, softly. “Now it is time to take them back.”

“Take them back?” he exclaimed, wonderingly.

“Yes; take them back. Do you think I could be so weak and cruel as to let you be burdened for life with such a degraded thing as I?” she cried; and she burst into so violent a fit of sobbing that the Resident grew alarmed; but he must have possessed wonderful soothing power, for when Mrs Bolter came in a short time after, it was to find Helen Perowne’s weary head resting upon Neil Harley’s arm, and there was a restful, peaceful look in her eyes that the little lady had never seen there before.

Helen did not move, and the Resident seemed as if it was quite a matter of course for him to remain there, so little Mrs Bolter went softly forward and bent down to kiss her invalid as she called her, when she was prisoned by two trembling weak arms, and for a few minutes nothing was heard but Helen’s sobs.

When Mrs Bolter went down soon afterwards to sit with the doctor, she said, softly:

“I never thought I could like that girl, Henry, and now I believe I almost love her.”

“That’s because she has changed her colour,” said the doctor, with a hearty chuckle.

“Oh! that reminds me,” cried Mrs Bolter; “I wanted to ask you about that.”

“About what?” said the doctor, looking up.

“About the black stain. Will she always be like that?”

“Pooh, nonsense! my dear. It is only a stain, which has thoroughly permeated, if I may so term it, the outer skin. Soon wear off, my dear – soon wear off.”

“But her teeth, Henry?”

“Come right in time, my dear, with plenty of tooth-powder; all but the filing.”

“But that is a terrible disfigurement.”

“Oh, that will go off in time. The teeth are always growing and being worn down at the edges; but what does it matter? she is ten times as nice a girl as she was before.”

“Yes,” said Mrs Bolter, thoughtfully; “and now, Henry, if I could only have my mind set at rest about Arthur, I believe I should be a happy woman.”

“Then we’ll soon set your mind at rest about him,” said the doctor. “I never felt that I could leave you till Helen was safe from a relapse.”

“Leave me, Henry!” cried the little lady.

“Only for a time, till I have found Arthur.”

“Then you do think he will be found?”

“I am sure of it. Why, who would hurt him, the best and most inoffensive of men?”

“Surely no one,” said Mrs Bolter, with a sigh.

“Of course not. I’ve tried to get something out of Murad, but my messengers have failed; but all the same, I feel sure he knows all about it, and burked Arthur for a reason of his own.”

“But what reason could he have?” cried Mrs Bolter.

“Well, I’ll tell you my theory, my dear, and it is this: he meant to silence all Helen’s scruples by marrying her according to our rites.”

“Do you think so?”

“I do; and that is why he secured Arthur. If it was not so, it was because he was in the way. Anyhow, we can get nothing from the rascal, so I mean to go up the river again. I have my plans working.”

“But, Henry!”

“Only to try and find him; for Harley’s and Hilton’s men have made a miserable failure of it all.”

Mrs Bolter sighed, but she made no opposition; and then further conversation was ended by the arrival of Grey Stuart with Hilton, both looking so satisfied and happy that Mrs Bolter exclaimed: “Why, whatever now!” The doctor chuckled, and cried: “Oh! that’s it, is it! Oh! Grey! I thought you meant to be a female old bachelor all your life!”

“I have persuaded her that it is folly,” said Hilton. “But I always thought it was to be Chumbley!” cried the doctor. “Here, I say, this is a horrible take-in.”

“I thought the same, doctor,” said Hilton, smiling; “and have been making myself very miserable about what is a misconception, though Grey here owns to thinking Chum the best and truest of men.”

“And I’m sure he is!” cried Mrs Doctor, enthusiastically.

“Here, I say!” cried the doctor, banging his hand down on the table, “this won’t do! Am I to sit and hear a man praised to my very face?”

“Yes,” said Mrs Bolter, quickly; “if it is Chumbley; and if Grey had chosen with my eyes, she would have taken him instead.”

“But she did not choose with your eyes, my dear,” said the doctor, smiling; “and she was wise?”

“And why so?” cried Mrs Bolter, tartly.

“Because she saw what a bad one you were at making a choice, my dear. Look at me for a husband, Miss Stuart; this was the best she could do.”

“Oh, Henry! for shame!” cried Mrs Doctor. “There! I’ll say no more, only that I hardly forgive you, Hilton; and I tell you frankly that you have won a far better wife than you deserve!”

“Then I’m sure we shall be the best of friends over it, Mrs Bolter!” said Hilton, merrily, “for I have been repeating that sentiment almost word for word.”

“There, there, there – the young people know best,” said the doctor. “I congratulate you both; and I must be off now to see Perowne. But here is somebody coming. Mrs Barlow, I believe.”

“Henry, pray say I’m out!” cried Mrs Bolter, starting up. “I really cannot meet that woman to-day!” and she made for the door.

“It’s all right. Don’t go, my dear; it’s only Stuart,” said the doctor, chuckling.

“And you said it was that horrible Mrs Barlow on purpose to frighten me! It’s a very great shame – it is indeed!”

“Ye’re right, Mrs Bolter,” said the little dry Scotch merchant, appearing in the doorway; “it is a great shame! After all my care and devotion, and the money I have spent in her education, here’s this foolish girl takes a fancy to a red coat, and says she shan’t be happy without she marries it!”

“Pray, pray, papa! No, dear father, don’t talk like that!” said Grey, crossing to him, as he took a chair, and resting her hand upon his shoulder.

“Oh, but it’s enough to make any man speak!” he cried. “I suppose it’s natural though, Mrs Bolter?”

“Of course it is, Mr Stuart; and if Captain Hilton undertakes to make her a good husband, why you must be very thankful.”

“Humph! I suppose so; but mind this; you can’t be wed till the chaplain’s found! Ha! ha! ha! I say, doctor, that will stir up Hilton here!”

“We are making earnest efforts to find him without that,” said Hilton, warmly.

“Oh, are you?” said the old merchant. “Well, look here, just a few business words in the presence of witnesses before I go up to Perowne, for I promised to go and smoke a pipe with the poor fellow, who’s as sick in body as he is in pocket and mind.”

“I’m going there, and we’ll trot over together,” said the doctor.

“Verra good,” said old Stuart. “So now look here, Master Hilton, commonly called Captain Hilton, you came to me to-day saying that you had my child’s consent to ask me to give her to you for a wife.”

“Yes, sir, and I repeat it.”

“Well, I sort of consented, didn’t I?”

“You did, sir.”

“Good; but once more – you know I’m a verra poor man?”

“I know you are not a rich one, sir.”

“That’s right, Hilton. And you ken,” he continued, getting excited and a little more Scottish of accent – “ye ken that when puir Perowne failed, he owed me nearly sax hundred pounds?”

“I did hear so, sir.”

“Well, I meant to give little Grey here that for a wedding-portion, and now it’s all gone.”

“I’m glad of it, sir,” cried Hilton, warmly, “for I am only a poor fellow with my pay and a couple of hundred a year besides; but in a very few years’ time I shall be in the receipt of another two hundred and fifty a year, so that we shall not hurt.”

Grey crossed to him, and put her arm through his, as she nodded and smiled in his face.

“Ye’re a pair o’ feckless babies!” cried old Stuart. “So ye mean to say ye’ll be content to begin life on nothing but what ye’ve got, Hilton?”

“To be sure, sir! Why not?”

“To be sure! Why not?” said Mrs Bolter. “I don’t approve of people marrying for money, Mr Stuart; and I’m glad they act in so honest a spirit! Do you know, Mr Hilton, I began my life out here hating Helen Perowne, and thoroughly disliking you; and now, do you know, she has made me love her; and as for you, I never liked you half so well before, and I wish you both every joy, and as happy a life as I live myself when Henry stays at home, and does not glory in teasing me in every way he can!”

“Thank you, Mrs Bolter!” cried Hilton, warmly. “I don’t wonder, though, that you should dislike me, for I did not show you a very pleasant side of my character.”

“Well,” said old Stuart, rising, “you and I may as well be off, doctor. Poor Perowne will be glad to hear you chat a bit about Helen; and as for you two young and foolish people, why – ha! ha! ha! you had better make friends with the doctor. He has always been petting my little girl; now’s the time for him to do something a little more solid.”

“I’m sure,” said Mrs Doctor, warmly, “Grey shall not go to the altar without a little dowry of her own – eh, Henry?”

“To be sure, my dear!” said the doctor – “to be sure!”

“Nay, nay, nay!” cried old Stuart, showing his teeth; “hang your little dowries! I want something handsome down!”

“Oh, father!” cried Grey, turning scarlet with shame.

“You hold your tongue, child! I want the doctor to do something handsome for you out of his findings at Ophir – Solomon’s gold, Bolter. Ha, ha, ha!”

“Laugh away!” cried the doctor; “but I shall astonish you yet!”

“Gad, Bolter, ye will when ye mak’ anything out o’ that!” cried the little merchant. “Don’t let him run after shadows any more, Mrs Bolter. Well, Hilton, my boy, I won’t play with you,” he said, holding out his hand, as he spoke now, with Grey held tightly to his side, and the tears in his pale blue eyes. “I’m a pawkie, queer old Scot, but I believe my heart’s in the right place.”

“I’m sure – ” began Hilton.

“Let me speak, my lad!” cried the old man. “I always said to myself that I should like the lad who wooed my little lassie here to love her for herself alone, and I believe you do. Hold your tongue a bit my lad! I’ve always been a careful, plodding fellow, and such a screw, that people always looked upon me as poor; but I’m not, Hilton: and thank Heaven, I can laugh at such a loss as that I have had! Heaven bless you, my lad! You’ve won a sweet, true woman for your wife; and let me tell you that you’ve won a rich one. My lassie’s marriage portion is twenty thousand pounds on the day she becomes your wife, and she’ll have more than double that when the doctor kills me some day, as I am sure he will.”

“Mr Stuart!” cried Hilton.

“Hold your tongue, lad – not a word! Good-night, Mrs Bolter. Doctor, old friend, if you don’t take me up to Perowne’s, and prescribe pipes and a glass o’ whuskee, I shall sit down and cry like a child.”

He was already at the door, and the doctor followed him out, leaving Hilton, as he afterwards told his old companion, not knowing whether he was awake or in a dream.

But he was awake decidedly, as Mrs Bolter could have told, for dream-kisses never sound so loud as those which he printed on the lips of his future wife.

“Oh, it’s all right!” said Chumbley; “and I wish you joy! I knew the little lassie loved you months ago!”

Volume Three – Chapter Twenty Seven.

For Another Search

“By Jove, we’ve forgotten all about the parson!” exclaimed Chumbley. “What’s become of him?”

“I say, Chumbley, old fellow, we must be getting into a terrible state of mind to go on like this without troubling ourselves about our chaplain – Here comes the doctor.”

“And Harley not far behind.”

“Doctor ahoy!” shouted Chumbley.

“Well, lads – well, lads,” cried the little doctor, bustling up. “What news?”

“That’s what we were going to ask you, doctor. What next?”

“Why, now, my dear boys, that the troubles are about over, my principal patient quite safe, and people seem settling down, with no enemies to fear, it seems to me just the time for making a fresh start up the river.”

“To – ”

“Exactly, my dear Chumbley; to take up the clue where I left off when I found Helen Perowne, and go on and discover the gold-workings.”

“The gold-workings, doctor?” cried Hilton, wonderingly.

“To be sure, my dear fellow. Mind, I don’t say that Solomon’s ships ever came right up this river; but they certainly came here and traded with the Sakais or Jacoons, the aboriginals of the country, who worked the gold from surface-mines and brought it down to the coast.”

“Cut and dried, eh, doctor?” said Chumbley. “Dried, of course, my dear fellow. I don’t know about the cut. I feel more and more convinced that here we have the true Ophir of Solomon; and it only wants a little enterprise, such as I am bringing to bear – ”

“But you don’t mean to say,” cried Hilton, “that you are going off on another expedition of this sort, doctor?”

“Indeed but I do, sir!”

“And what does Mrs Doctor say?” asked Chumbley. “Does she approve?”

“Of course, my dear boy. Don’t you see that I am combining the journey with one in search of my brother-in-law?”

“Oh,” said Hilton, drily, “I see.

“Harley’s people are back without any news, and my little wife is distracted about it; vows she’ll go herself if I don’t find him. And then there’s that Mrs Barlow. I was up all night with her. Hysterical, and shrieking ‘Arthur!’ at intervals like minute-guns.”

“She has started a devoted attachment to the chaplain, hasn’t she?” asked Chumbley.

“Dreadful!” replied the doctor. “It makes me think that the poor fellow is best away, for she certainly means to marry him when he comes back. I say Chumbley, you’re a big fellow!”

“Granted, oh, wise man of the east.”

“You have no income?”

“The munificent pay awarded by Her Majesty’s Government to a lieutenant of foot, my dear doctor, as you perfectly well know.”

“Exactly,” continued the doctor. “And you would not be afraid of a widow?”

“No, I don’t think I should.”

“Then marry Mrs Barlow. She is to be had for the asking, I am sure; and she has a nice bit of money. It would be a catch for you, and relieve poor Arthur Rosebury from further trouble.”

“Hilton, old man,” said Chumbley, solemnly, “do you think there is a crocodile in the river big enough to receive this huge carcase of mine?”

“Doubtful,” said Hilton, laughing. “I agree with you, Hilton! it is doubtful. But sooner would I plunge in and be entombed there than in the affections of Barlow. No, doctor, if you have my health at heart, you must prescribe differently from that. I say, though, don’t you take it rather coolly about the chaplain?”

“Coolly? Not I, my dear fellow; but how can a man like me sit down and snivel? Here am I watching Helen Perowne one day, her father the next; then up all night with Billy – I mean Mrs – Barlow; without taking into consideration the calls to Private Thomas Atkins, who has eaten too much plaintain and mangosteen, and thinks he has the cholera; Mrs Ali Musto Rafoo, who is in a fidget about her offspring; and all the livers of the European residents to keep in gear. I say I have no time to think of anything.”

“But Solomon’s gold mines,” said Chumbley.

“Get out with your chaff!” cried the doctor. “But seriously, I have got hold of that fellow Yusuf, and he tells me he thinks he can find the chaplain, and I am just off. I couldn’t help the allusion to the gold.”

“But you think it lies somewhere up-country?” said Chumbley, seriously.