Cursed by a Fortune

Chapter Twenty Two

Jenny was almost breathless when she reached the park palings of the Manor House, some little distance from the gate at the end of the avenue; and here she paused for a few moments beneath an oak which grew within the park, but which, like many others, spread out three or four huge horizontal boughs right across the boundary lane, and made the way gloomy even on sunny days.

She looked sharply back in the direction by which she had come, but the evening was closing in more and more gloomy, and the mist exceedingly closely related to a rain, was gathering fast and forming drops on the edges of dead leaves and twigs, beside making the grass overhanging the footpath so wet that the girl’s feet and the lower parts of her skirts were drenched.

No one was in sight or likely to be in that secluded spot, and having gained her breath, she started off once more, heedless of the sticky mud of the lane, and followed it on, round by the park palings, where the autumn leaves lay thick and rustled as her dress swept over them. In a few minutes she reached a stile in the fence, where a footpath – an old right of way much objected to by Squire Wilton, as the village people called him – led across the little park, passing the house close by the end of the shrubbery, and entering another lane, which curved round to join the main road right at the far end of the village, a good mile away from the Doctor’s cottage.

There were lights in the drawing-room and dining-room, making a dull glow on the thickening mist, as Jenny halted at the end of the shrubbery, and all was still as death, till a dog barked suddenly, and was answered by half a dozen others, pointers and retrievers, in the kennel by the stables. This lasted in a dismal, irritating chorus, which made the girl utter little ejaculations suggestive of impatience, as she waited for the noise to end.

She glanced round once more, but the evergreens grew thickly just over an iron hurdle fence, and she satisfied herself that as she could only indistinctly see the shrubs three or four yards away, it was impossible for her to be seen from the house.

The barking went on in a full burst for a few minutes. Then dog after dog finished its part; the sextette became a quartette, a trio, a duet; and then a deep-voiced retriever performed a powerful solo, ending it with a prolonged bay, and Jenny raised her hand to her lips, when the hill chorus burst out again, and the girl angrily stamped her foot in the wet grass.

“Oh, what a cold I shall catch,” she muttered. “Why will people keep these nasty dogs?”

The barking went on for some minutes, just as before, breaking off by degrees into another solo; but at last all was still, the little sighs and ejaculations Jenny had kept on uttering ceased too. Then she raised her head quickly, and a shrill chirp sounded dead and dull in the misty air, followed at intervals by two more.

It was not a regular whistle, but a repetition of such a call as a night bird might utter in its flight as it floated over the house.

The mist seemed to stifle the call, and the girl was about to repeat it, but it was loud enough for the dogs to hear, and they set up a fierce baying, which lasted till there was a loud commotion of yelps and cries, mingled with the rattling of chains, the same deep-mouthed dog breaking out in a very different solo this time, one suggestive of suffering from the application of boot toes to its ribs.

Then quiet, and Jenny with trembling hand once more raised the little silver whistle to her lips, and the shrill chirps rang out in their former smothered way.

“Oh,” sighed Jenny. “It will be a sore throat – I’m sure it will. I must go back; I dare not stay any longer. Ugh! How I do hate the little wretch. I could kill him!”

The girl’s pretty little white teeth grated together, and once more she stamped her foot, following up this display of irritation by stamping the other.

“Cold as frogs,” she muttered, “and the water’s oozy in my boots. Wretch!”

“Ullo!” came in a harsh whisper, followed by the cachination which often accompanies a grin. “You’ve come, then!”

There was a rustle of the bushes before her, and the dimly seen figure of Claud climbed over the iron hurdle, made a snatch at the girl’s arm with his right and a trial to fling his left about her waist, but she eluded him.

“Keep off,” she said sharply; “how dare you!”

“Because I love you so, little dicky-bird,” he whispered.

“I thought you didn’t mean to come.”

“No, you didn’t, pet. I heard you first time, but I had to go out and kick the dogs. They heard it, too, and thought it was poachers. Only one, though – come after me!”

“You!” she said, contemptuously. “You, sir! Who would come after you?”

“Why, you would.”

“Such vanity!”

“Then what did you come for?”

“To bring you back this rubbishing little whistle.”

“Nonsense; you’d better keep that.”

“I tell you I don’t want it. Take it, sir.”

“No, I shan’t take it. Keep it.”

“There it is, then,” she cried; and she threw it at him.

“Gone in among the hollies,” he said. “Well, I’m not going to prick myself hunting for it in the dark. What a little spit-fire it is! What’s the matter with you to-night?”

“Matter enough. I’ve come to tell you never to make signals for me to come out again.”

“Why? I say, what a temper you are in to-night. Here, let me help you over, and we’ll go round to the arbor. You’ll get your feet wet standing there.”

“They are wet, and I shall catch a cold and die, I hope.”

“Oh, I say, Jenny!”

“Silence, sir! How dare you speak to me like that!”

“Come over, then, into the arbor.”

“I have told you again and again that I never would!”

“You are a little tartar,” he whispered. “You get prettier every day, and peck and say nastier things to me. But there, I don’t mind; it only makes me love you more and more.”

“It isn’t true,” she cried furiously. “You’re a wicked story-teller, and you know it.”

“Am I?”

“Yes; that’s the same miserable sickly tale you have told to half-a-dozen of the silly girls in the village. I know you thoroughly now. How dare you follow me and speak to me? If I were to tell my brother he’d nearly kill you.”

“Quite, p’raps, with a drop out of one of his bottles.”

“I can never forgive myself for having listened to the silly, contemptible flattery of the cast-off lover of a labourer’s daughter.”

“Oh, I like that, Jenny; what’s the good of bringing all that up? That’s been over ever so long. It was only sowing wild oats.”

“The only sort that you are ever likely to have to sow. I know all now – everything; so go to her, and never dare to speak to me again.”

“What? Go back to Sally? Well, you are a jealous little thing.”

“I, jealous – of you?” she said, with contempt in her tone and manner.

“Yes, that’s what’s the matter with you, little one. But go on; I like it. Shows me you love me.”

“I? Ha, ha, ha!” laughed Jenny derisively. “Do you think I don’t know everything?”

“I daresay you do. You’re such a clever little vixen.”

“Do you suppose it has not reached my ears about your elopement with your cousin?”

“I don’t care what you’ve heard; it ain’t true. But I say, don’t hold me off like this, Jenny; you know I love you like – like anything.”

“Yes, anything,” she retorted angrily; “any thing – your dogs, your horses, your fishing-rods and gun.”

“Oh, I say.”

“You miserable, deceitful trickster, I ought not to have lowered myself to even speak to you, or to come out again to-night, but I wanted to tell you what I thought about you, and it’s of no use to treat such thick-skinned creatures as you with contempt.”

“Well, you are wild to-night, little one. Don’t want me to show my teeth, too, and go, do you?”

“Yes, and the sooner the better, sir; go back to your wife.”

“Go back to my wife!” he cried, in tones which carried conviction to her ears. “Oh, I say; you’ve got hold of that cock-and-bull story, have you?”

“Yes, sir, I have got hold of the miserable cock-and-bull story, as you so elegantly turn it.”

“Oh, I don’t go in for elegance, Jenny; it ain’t my way; but as for that flam, it ain’t true.”

“You dare to tell me that, when the whole place is ringing with it, sir!” she cried, angrily.

“The whole place rings with the noise when that muddle-headed lot got pulling the bells in changes. But it’s only sound.”

“Don’t, pray don’t try to be witty, Claud Wilton; you only fail.”

“All right; go on.”

“Do you dare to tell me that you did not elope with your cousin the other night?”

“Say slope, little one; elope is so old-fashioned.”

“And I suppose you’ve married her for the sake of her money.”

“Do you?” he said, sulkily; “then you suppose jolly well wrong. It’s all a lie.”

“Then you haven’t married her?”

“No, I haven’t married her, and I didn’t slope with her; so now then.”

“Do you dare to tell me that you did not go up to London?”

“No, I don’t, because I did.”

“With her, in a most disgraceful, clandestine manner?”

“No; I went alone with a very jolly good-tempered chap, whom everybody bullies and calls a liar.”

“A nice companion; and pray, who was that?”

“This chap – your sweetheart; and I came back with him too.”

“Then where is your cousin?”

“How should I know?”

“She did go away, then, the same night?”

“Yes. Bolted after a row we had.”

“Is this true?”

“Every blessed word of it; and I haven’t seen her since. Now, tell me, you’re very sorry for all you’ve said.”

“Tell me this; has she gone away with some one else?”

“What do you want to know for?”

“I want to find out that you are not such a wicked story-teller as I thought.”

“Well, I have told you that.”

“Who can believe you?”

“You can. Come, I say; I thought you were going to be really a bit loving to me at last when I heard the whistle. It’s been like courting a female porcupine up to now.”

“You know whom your cousin has gone with?”

“Pretty sure,” he said, sulkily.

“Who is it?”

“Oh, well, if you must know, Harry Dasent.”

“That cousin I saw here?”

“Yes, bless him! Only wait till we meet.”

“Oh!” ejaculated Jenny, and then she turned to go; but Claud caught her arm.

“No, no; you might say something kind now you’ve found out you’re wrong.”

“Very well then, I will, Claud Wilton. First of all, I never cared a bit for you, and – ”

“Don’t believe you. Go on,” he said, laughing.

“Secondly, take my advice and go away at once, for if my brother should meet you there will be a terrible scene. He believes horrible things of you, and I know he’ll kill you.”

“Phew!” whistled Claud. “Then he has found out?”

“Take my advice and go. He is terrible when he is roused, and I don’t know what he’d do.”

“I say, this ain’t gammon, is it?”

“It is the solemn truth. Now loose my arm; you hurt me.”

“Well, it’s all right, then, and perhaps it’s for the best I am going off to-night to hunt out Harry Dasent. I should have gone before, but I had to be about with the guv’nor, making inquiries.”

“Then loose my arm at once, and go before it is too late.”

“It is too late,” thundered a voice out of the gloom. “Jenny – sister – is this you?”

Chapter Twenty Three

Jenny uttered a faint cry, and staggered against the iron hurdle, bringing down a shower of drops upon her head.

Leigh, after his words, uttered first in menace, then in a bitterly reproachful tone, paid no more heed to her, but turned fiercely upon Claud.

“Now, sir,” he cried; “have the goodness to – You scoundrel! You dog!”

He began after the fashion taught by education, but nature was too strong. He broke off and tried to seize Claud by the throat; but, active as the animal mentioned, the young fellow avoided the onslaught, placed one hand upon the hurdle, and sprang over among the shrubs.

Leigh followed him in time to receive blow after blow, as the branches through which Claud dashed sprang back, cutting him in the face and drenching him with water. Guided, though, by the sounds, he followed as quickly as he could, till all at once the rustling and crackling of branches ceased, and he drew up short on the soft turf of a lawn, listening for the next movement of his quarry, but listening in vain.

A minute later the dogs began barking violently, and Leigh’s thoughts turned to his sister. Then to Claud again, and he hesitated as to whether he should go to the house and insist upon seeing him. But his reason told him that he could not leave Jenny there in the wet and darkness, and with his teeth set hard in his anger and despair, he tried to find his way back to the place where he had come over into the garden, missing it, and coming to the conclusion that his sister had fled, for though he peered in all directions on crossing the hurdles, he could see no sign of her in the misty darkness.

As it happened he was not above a dozen yards from where she stood clinging to the dripping iron rail; and when with an angry exclamation he turned to make for the pathway, her plaintive voice arose:

“Please take me with you, Claud,” she said. “I am so faint and cold!”

He turned upon her with a suppressed roar, caught her by the arm, dragged it under his, and set off through the dripping grass with great strides, but without uttering a word.

She kept up with him as long as she could, weeping bitterly the while, and blinding herself with her tears so that she could not see which way they went. Twice over she stumbled and would have fallen, had not his hold been so tight upon her arm, and at last, totally unable to keep up with him, she was about to utter a piteous appeal, when he stopped short, for they had reached the wet and muddy stile.

Here he loosed her arm, and sprang over into the road.

“Give me your hands,” he cried, and she obeyed, and then as he reached over, she climbed the stile, stepping on to the top rail at last.

“Jump,” he said, sharply; and she obeyed, but slipped as she alighted, one foot gliding over the muddy surface, and in spite of his strong grasp upon her hands, she fell sideways, and uttered a sharp cry.

“No hysterical nonsense, now, girl,” he cried. “Get up!”

“I – I can’t, Pierce. Oh, pray, don’t be so cruel to me, please.”

“Get up!” he cried, more sternly.

“My ankle’s twisted under me,” she said, faintly. “I – I – !”

A piteous sigh ended her speech, and she sank nerveless nearly to the level, but a sudden snatch on his part saved her from falling prone.

Then bending down, he raised her, quite insensible, in his arms, drew her arm over his shoulders, and strode on again, the passionate rage and indignation in his breast nerving him so that she seemed to possess no weight at all.

For another agony had come upon him, just when life seemed to have suddenly become unbearable, and there were moments when it appeared to be impossible that the bright girl who had for years past been to him as his own child could have behaved in so treacherous, so weak and disgraceful a way as to have listened to the addresses of the young scoundrel who seemed to have blasted his life.

“And she always professed to hold him in such contempt,” he said to himself. “Great heavens! Are all women alike in their weakness and folly?”

He reached the cottage at last, where all was now dark; but the door yielded to his touch, and he bore her in, and laid her, still insensible, upon the sofa.

Upon striking a light, and holding a candle toward her face, he uttered a deep sigh, for she was ghastly pale, her hair was wet and clinging to her temples, and he could see that she was covered with the sticky, yellowish clay of the field and lane. But he steeled his breast against her. It was her punishment, he felt; and treating her as if she were some patient and a stranger, he took off her wet cloak and hood, threw them aside, and proceeded to examine for the injury.

But little examination was necessary, and his brow grew more deeply lined as he quickly took out a knife, slit her wet boot from ankle to toe, and set her foot at liberty.

Then lighting another candle, he walked sharply into his surgery, and returned with splints and bandages, to find her eyes open, and that she was gazing at him wildly.

“Where am I? What is the matter?” she cried, hysterically. “This dreadful pain and sickness!”

“At home. Lie still,” he said, coldly. “Your ankle is badly hart.”

“Oh!” she sighed, and the tears began to flow, accompanied by a piteous sobbing, for the meaning of it all came back.

He went out again, and returned with a glass containing some fluid, then passing his hand beneath her head, he raised her a little.

“Drink this,” he said.

“No, no, I can not bear it. You hurt me horribly.”

“I can not help it. Drink!”

He pressed the glass to her lips, and she drank the vile ammoniacal mixture.

“Now, lie still. I will not hurt you more than I can help, but I must see if the bone is broken, and set it.”

“No, no, not yet Pierce,” she sobbed; “I could not bear it while I am in this state. Let me tell you – let me explain to you first.”

“Be silent!” he cried, angrily. “I do not want to hear a word I must see to your ankle before it swells up and the work is impossible.”

“Never mind that, dear. I must tell you,” she cried, piteously.

“I know all I want to know,” he said, bitterly; “that the sister I have trusted and believed in has been cruelly deceiving me – that one I trusted to be sweet and true and innocent has been acting a part that would disgrace one of the village wenches, for to be seen even talking to that young scoundrel under such circumstances would rob her of her character. And this is my sister! Now, lie still. I must bandage this hurt.”

“Oh, Pierce, dear Pierce! You are hurting me more than I can bear,” she sobbed; for he had gone down on one knee as he spoke, and began manipulating the injured joint.

“I can not help it; you must bear it. I shall not be long.”

“I – I don’t mean that, dear; I can bear that,” she moaned. “It is your cruel words that hurt me so. How can you say such things to me?”

“Be silent, I tell you. I can only attend to this. If it is neglected, you may be lame for life.”

“Very well,” she said, with a passionate cry; “let me be lame for life – let me die of it if you like, but you must, you shall listen to me, dear.”

“I will not listen to you now – I will not at any time. You have killed my faith in you, and I can never believe or trust in you again.”

“But you shall listen to me,” she cried; and with an effort that gave her the most acute pain, she drew herself up and embraced her knees. “You shall not touch me again until you listen to me. There!”

“Don’t behave like a madwoman,” he said, sternly. “Lie back in your place; you are injuring yourself more by your folly.”

“It is not folly,” she cried; “I will not be misjudged like this by my own brother. Pierce, Pierce, I am not the wicked girl you think.”

“I am glad of it,” he said, coldly; “even if you are lost to shame.”

“Shame upon you, to say such words to me.”

“Perhaps I was deceived in thinking I found you there to-night with your lover.”

“My lover!” she cried, hysterically.

“Now, will you lie down quietly, and let me bandage your ankle, or must I stupefy you with chloroform?”

“You shall do nothing until you have listened to me,” she cried, wildly. “He is not my lover. I never had a lover, Pierce. I went there to-night to tell him to go away, for I was afraid for you to meet him. I shivered with dread, you were so wild and strange.”

“Were you afraid I should kill him,” he said, with an angry glare in his eyes.

“Yes, or that he might kill you. Pierce, dear, if I have deceived you, it was because I loved you, and I was fighting your fight.”

Indeed! he said, bitterly.

“He has been watching for me, and coming here constantly ever since we came to the house. I couldn’t go down the village, or for a walk without his meeting me. He has made my life hateful to me.”

“And you could not appeal to your brother for help and protection?”

“I was going to, dear, but matters happened so that I determined to be silent. No, no, don’t touch me till you have heard all. I found how you loved poor Kate.”

“Will you be silent!” he raged out.

“No, not if I die for it. I found out how you loved Kate, and I soon knew that they meant her for that – that dreadful boy, while all the time he was trying to pay his addresses to me. Then I made up my mind to give him just a little encouragement – to draw him on, so as to be able to let Kate see how utterly contemptible and unworthy he was, for I could lead him on until she surprised us together some day, when all would have been over at once, for she would never have listened to him. Do you hear me, Pierce? I tried to fool him, but he has fooled me instead, and robbed me of my own brother’s love.”

“What do you mean by fooling you?” he cried, with his attention arrested at last.

“We have been all wrong, dear; I found it out to-night. He did not take Kate away.”

“What! Why, they were seen together by that poaching vagabond, Barker, the fellow the keeper shot at and I attended. He watched them.”

“No, dear; it was not Kate with him then: it was I. Kate is gone, and he is in a rage about it.”

“Gone? With whom?”

“With – with – oh! Pierce, Pierce! say some kind word to me; tell me you love and believe me, dear. I am hot the wicked creature you think, and – and – am I dying? Is this death?”

He laid her back quickly, and hurriedly began to bathe her temples, but ceased directly.

“Better so,” he muttered; and then with trembling hands, which rapidly grew firmer, he examined the injury, acting with such skill that when a low sigh announced that the poor girl was recovering her senses, he was just laying the injured limb in an easy position, before rising to take her hand in his.

Chapter Twenty Four

Kate Wilton needed all her strength of mind to bear up against the depression consequent upon her self-inflicted position. As she sat back in a corner of the carriage, dimly lit by a lamp in which a quantity of thick oil was floating to and fro, she could see that Garstang in the corner diagonal to hers was either asleep or assuming to be so, and for the moment this relieved her, for she felt that it was from kindness and consideration on his part.

But the next minute she was in agony, reproaching herself bitterly for what now presented the aspect of a rashly foolish action on her part.

Then, with her mental suffering increasing, she tried to combat this idea, telling herself that she had acted wisely, for it would have been madness to have stayed at Northwood and exposed herself to the risk of further insult from her cousin, now that she knew for certain what were her uncle’s designs. For she knew that appeal to her aunt would be useless, that lady being a slave to the caprices of her son and the stern wishes of her husband, and quite ready to believe that everything they said or did was right.

And so on during the slow night journey toward London, her brain growing more and more confused by the strangeness of her position, and the absence of her natural rest, till the swaying to and fro of her thoughts seemed to be somewhat bound up with that of the thick oil in the great glass bubble of a lamp and with the stopping of the train and the roll and clang of the great milk tins taken up at various stations.

At last her fevered waking dream, as it seemed to her, was brought to an end by Garstang suddenly starting up as if from sleep to rub his condensed breath off the window-pane and look out.

“London lights,” he said. – “Asleep, my dear?”

“No, Mr Garstang. I have been awake thinking all the while.”

“Of course you would be. What an absurd, malapropos question. There, you see what it is to be a middle-aged, unfeeling man. I’m afraid we do get very selfish. Instead of trying to comfort you, and chatting pleasantly, I curl up like a great black cat and go to sleep.”

She made no reply. The words would not come.

“Cold, my dear?”

“No. I feel hot and feverish.”

“Nervous anxiety, of course. But try and master it. We shall soon be home, and you can have a good cup of tea and go to bed. A good long sleep will set you right, and you will not be thinking of what a terrible deed you have committed in coming away in this nocturnal clandestine manner. That sounds grand, doesn’t it, for a very calm, sensible move on life’s chess-board – one which effectually checks James Wilton and that pleasant young pawn his son. There, there, don’t fidget about it, pray. I have been thinking, too, and asking myself whether I have done my duty by Robert Wilton’s child in bringing you away, and I can find but one answer – yes; while conscience says that I should have been an utter brute to you if I had left you to be exposed to such a scandalous persecution.”