Elster's Folly

"No. I could not, somehow, whilst the child lay dead in the house. She shall know it shortly."

"And what about dismissing the countess-dowager? You will do it?"

"I shall be only too thankful to do it. All my courage has come back to me, thank Heaven!"

The Countess-Dowager of Kirton's reign was indeed over; never would he allow her to disturb the peace of his house again. He might have to pension her off, but that was a light matter. His intention was to speak to her in a few days' time, allowing an interval to elapse after the boy's death; but she forestalled the time herself, as Val was soon to find.

Dinner that evening was a sad meal—sad and silent. The only one who did justice to it was the countess-dowager—in a black gauze dress and white crêpe turban. Let what would betide, Lady Kirton never failed to enjoy her dinner. She had a scheme in her head; it had been working there since the day of her grandson's death; and when the servants withdrew, she judged it expedient to disclose it to Hartledon, hoping to gain her point, now that he was softened by sorrow.

"Hartledon, I want to talk to you," she began, critically tasting her wine; "and I must request that you'll attend to me."

Anne looked up, wondering what was coming. She wore an evening dress of black crêpe, a jet necklace on her fair neck, jet bracelets on her arms: mourning far deeper than the dowager's.

"Are you listening to me, Val?"

"I am quite ready," answered Val.

"I asked you, once before, to let me have Maude's children, and to allow me a fair income with them. Had you done so, this dreadful misfortune would not have overtaken your house: for it stands to reason that if Lord Elster had been living somewhere else with me, he could not have caught scarlet-fever in London."

"We never thought he did catch it," returned Hartledon. "It was not prevalent at the time; and, strange to say, none of the other children took it, nor any one else in the house."

"Then what gave it him?" sharply uttered the dowager.

What Val answered was spoken in a low tone, and she caught one word only, Providence. She gave a growl, and continued.

"At any rate, he's gone; and you have now no pretext for refusing me Maude. I shall take her, and bring her up, and you must make me a liberal allowance for her."

"I shall not part with Maude," said Val, in quiet tones of decision.

"You can't refuse her to me, I say," rejoined the dowager, nodding her head defiantly; "she's my own grandchild."

"And my child. The argument on this point years ago was unsatisfactory, Lady Kirton; I do not feel disposed to renew it. Maude will remain in her own home."

"You are a vile man!" cried the dowager, with an inflamed face. "Pass me the wine."

He filled her glass, and left the decanter with her. She resumed.

"One day, when I was with Maude, in that last illness of hers in London, when we couldn't find out what was the matter with her, poor dear, she wrote you a letter; and I know what was in it, for I read it. You had gone dancing off somewhere for a week."

"To the Isle of Wight, on your account," put in Lord Hartledon, quietly; "on that unhappy business connected with your son who lives there. Well, ma'am?"

"In that letter Maude said she wished me to have charge of her children, if she died; and begged you to take notice that she said it," continued the dowager. "Perhaps you'll say you never had that letter?"

"On the contrary, madam, I admit receiving it," he replied. "I daresay I have it still. Most of Maude's letters lie in my desk undisturbed."

"And, admitting that, you refuse to act up to it?"

"Maude wrote in a moment of pique, when she was angry with me. But—"

"And I have no doubt she had good cause for anger!"

"She had great cause," was his answer, spoken with a strange sadness that surprised both the dowager and Lady Hartledon. Thomas Carr was twirling his wine-glass gently round on the white cloth, neither speaking nor looking.

"Later, my wife fully retracted what she said in that letter," continued Val. "She confessed that she had written it partly at your dictation, Lady Kirton, and said—but I had better not tell you that, perhaps."

"Then you shall tell me, Lord Hartledon; and you are a two-faced man, if you shuffle out of it."

"Very well. Maude said that she would not for the whole world allow her children to be brought up by you; she warned me also not to allow you to obtain too much influence over them."

"It's false!" said the dowager, in no way disconcerted.

"It is perfectly true: and Maude told me you knew what her sentiments were upon the point. Her real wish, as expressed to me, was, that the children should remain with me in any case, in their proper home."

"You say you have that other letter still?" cried the dowager, who was not always very clear in her conversation.

"No doubt."

"Then perhaps you'll look for it: and read over her wishes in black and white."

"To what end? It would make no difference in my decision. I tell you, ma'am, I am consulting Maude's wishes in keeping her child at home."

"I know better," retorted the dowager, completely losing her temper. "I wish your poor dear wife could rise from her grave and confute you. It's all stinginess; because you won't part with a paltry bit of money."

"No," said Val, "it's because I won't part with my child. Understand me, Lady Kirton—had Maude's wishes even been with you in this, I should not carry them out. As to money—I may have something to say to you on that score; but suppose we postpone it to a more fitting opportunity."

"You wouldn't carry them out!" she cried. "But you might be forced to, you mean man! That letter may be as good as a will in the eyes of the law. You daren't produce it; that's what it is."

"I'll give it you with pleasure," said Val, with a smile. "That is, if I have kept it. I am not sure."

She caught up her fan, and sat fanning herself. The reservation had suggested a meaning never intended to her crafty mind; her rebellious son-in-law meant to destroy the letter; and she began wondering how she could outwit him.

A sharp cry outside the door interrupted them. The children were only coming in to dessert now; and Reginald, taking a flying leap down the stairs, took rather too long a one, and came to grief at the bottom. Truth to say, the young gentleman, no longer kept down by poor Edward, was getting high-spirited and venturesome.

"What's that?" asked Anne, as the nurse came in with them, scolding.

"Lord Elster fell down, my lady. He's getting as tiresome as can be. Only to-day, I caught him astride the kitchen banisters, going to slide down them."

"Oh, Regy," said his mother, holding up her reproving finger.

The boy laughed, and came forward rubbing his arm, and ashamed of his tears. Val caught him up and kissed them away, drawing Maude also to his side.

That letter! The dowager was determined to get it, if there was a possibility of doing so. A suspicion that she would not be tolerated much longer in Lady Hartledon's house was upon her, and she knew not where to go. Kirton had married again; and his new wife had fairly turned her out more unceremoniously than the late one did. By hook or by crook, she meant to obtain the guardianship of her granddaughter, because in giving her Maude, Lord Hartledon would have to allow her an income.

She was a woman to stop at nothing; and upon quitting the dining-room she betook herself to the library—a large, magnificent room—the pride of Hartledon. She had come in search of Val's desk; which she found, and proceeded to devise means of opening it. That accomplished, she sat herself down, like a leisurely housebreaker, to examine it, putting on a pair of spectacles, which she kept surreptitiously in a pocket, and would not have worn before any one for the world. She found the letter she was in search of; and she found something else for her pains, which she had not bargained for.

Not just at first. There were many tempting odds and ends of things to dip into. For one thing, she found Val's banking book, and some old cheque-books; they served her for some time. Next she came upon two packets sealed up in white paper, with Val's own seal. On one was written, "Letters of Lady Maude;" on the other, "Letters of my dear Anne." Peering further into the desk, she came upon an obscure inner slide, which had evidently not been opened for years, and she had difficulty in undoing it. A paper was in it, superscribed, "Concerning A.W.;" on opening which she found a letter addressed to Thomas Carr, of the Temple.

Thomas Carr's letters were no more sacred with her than Lord Hartledon's. No woman living was troubled with scruples so little as she. It proved to have been written by a Dr. Mair, in Scotland, and was dated several years back.

But now—did Lord Hartledon really know he had that dangerous letter by him? If so, what could have possessed him to preserve it? Or, did he not rather believe he had returned it to Mr. Carr at the time? The latter, indeed, proved to be the case; and never, to the end of his life, would he, in one sense, forgive his own carelessness.

Who was A.W.? thought the curious old woman, as she drew the light nearer to her, and began the tempting perusal, making the most of the little time left. They could not be at tea yet, and she had told Lady Hartledon she was going to take her nap in her own room. The gratification of rummaging false Val's desk was an ample compensation; and the countess-dowager hugged herself with delight.

But what was this she had come upon—this paper "concerning A. W."? The dowager's mouth fell as she read; and gradually her little eyes opened as if they would start from their sockets, and her face grew white. Have you ever watched the livid pallor of fear struggling to one of these painted faces? She dashed off her spectacles; she got up and wrung her hands; she executed a frantic war-dance; and finally she tore, with the letter, into the drawing-room, where Val and Anne and Thomas Carr were beginning tea and talking quietly.

They rose in consternation as she danced in amongst them, and held out the letter to Lord Hartledon.

He took it from her, gazing in utter bewilderment as he gathered in its contents. Was it a fresh letter, or—his face became whiter than the dowager's. In her reckless passion she avowed what she had done—the letter was secreted in his desk.

"Have you dared to visit my desk?" he gasped—"break my seals? Are you mad?"

"Hark at him!" she cried. "He calls me to account for just lifting the lid of a desk! But what is he? A villain—a thief—a spy—a murderer—and worse than any of them! Ah, ha, my lady!" nodding her false front at Lady Hartledon, who stood as one petrified, "you stare there at me with your open eyes; but you don't know what you are! Ask him! What was Maude—Heaven help her—my poor Maude? What was she? And you in the plot; you vile Carr! I'll have you all hanged together!"

Lord Hartledon caught his wife's hand.

"Carr, stay here with her and tell her all. No good concealing anything now she has read this letter. Tell her for me, for she would never listen to me."

He drew his wife into an adjoining room, the one where the portrait of George Elster looked down on its guests. The time for disclosing the story to his wife had been somewhat forestalled. He would have given half his life that it had never reached that other woman, miserable old sinner though she was.

"You are trembling, Anne; you need not do so. It is not against you that I have sinned."

Yes, she was trembling very much. And Val, in his honourable, his refined, shrinking nature, would have given his life's other half not to have had the tale to tell.

It is not a pleasant one. You may skip it if you please, and go on to the last page. Val once said he had been more sinned against than sinning: it may be deemed that in that opinion he was too lenient to himself. Anne, his wife, listened with averted face and incredulous ears.

"You have wanted a solution to my conduct, Anne—to the strange preference I seemed to accord the poor boy who is gone; why I could not punish him; why I was more thankful for the boon of his death than I had been for his life. He was my child, but he was not Lord Elster."

She did not understand.

"He had no right to my name; poor little Maude has no right to it. Do you understand me now?"

Not at all; it was as though he were talking Greek to her.

"Their mother, when they were born, was not my wife."

"Their mother was Lady Maude Kirton," she rejoined, in her bewilderment.

"That is exactly where it was," he answered bitterly. "Lady Maude Kirton, not Lady Hartledon."

She could not comprehend the words; her mind was full of consternation and tumult. Back went her thoughts to the past.

"Oh, Val! I remember papa's saying that a marriage in that unused chapel was only three parts legal!"

"It was legal enough, Anne: legal enough. But when that ceremony took place"—his voice dropped to a miserable whisper, "I had—as they tell me—a wife living."

Slowly she admitted the meaning of the words; and would have started from him with a faint cry, but that he held her to him.

"Listen to the whole, Anne, before you judge me. What has been your promise to me, over and over again?—that, if I would tell you my sorrow, you would never shrink from me, whatever it might be."

She remembered it, and stood still; terribly rebellious, clasping her fingers to pain, one within the other.

"In that respect, at any rate, I did not willingly sin. When I married Maude I had no suspicion that I was not free as air; free to marry her, or any other woman in the world."

"You speak in enigmas," she said faintly.

"Sit down, Anne, whilst I give you the substance of the tale. Not its details until I am more myself, and that voice"—pointing to the next room—"is not sounding in my ears. You shall hear all later; at least, as much as I know myself; I have never quite believed in it, and it has been to me throughout as a horrible dream."

Indeed Mr. Carr seemed to be having no inconsiderable amount of trouble, to judge by the explosions of wrath on the part of the dowager.

She sat down as he told her, her face turned from him, rebellious at having to listen, but curious yet. Lord Hartledon stood by the mantelpiece and shaded his eyes with his hand.

"Send your thoughts into the past, Anne; you may remember that an accident happened to me in Scotland. It was before you and I were engaged, or it would not have happened. Or, let me say, it might not; for young men are reckless, and I was no better than others. Heaven have mercy on their follies!"

"The accident might not have happened?"

"I do not speak of the accident. I mean what followed. When out shooting I nearly blew off my arm. I was carried to the nearest medical man's, a Dr. Mair's, and remained there; for it was not thought safe to move me; they feared inflammation, and they feared locked-jaw. My father was written to, and came; and when he left after the danger was over he made arrangements with Dr. Mair to keep me on, for he was a skilful man, and wished to perfect the cure. I thought the prolonged stay in the strange, quiet house worse than all the rest. That feeling wore off; we grow reconciled to most conditions; and things became more tolerable as I grew better and joined the household. There was a wild, clever, random young man staying there, the doctor's assistant—George Gordon; and there was also a young girl, Agnes Waterlow. I used to wonder what this Agnes did there, and one day asked the old housekeeper; she said the young lady was there partly that the doctor might watch her health, partly because she was a relative of his late wife's, and had no home."

He paused, as if in thought, but soon continued.

"We grew very intimate; I, Gordon, and Miss Waterlow. Neither of them was the person I should have chosen for an intimacy; but there was, in a sense, no help for it, living together. Agnes was a wild, free, rather coarse-natured girl, and Gordon drank. That she fell in love with me there's no doubt—and I grew to like her quite well enough to talk nonsense to her. Whether any plot was laid between her and Gordon to entrap me, or whether what happened arose in the recklessness of the moment, I cannot decide to this hour. It was on my twenty-first birthday; I was almost well again; we had what the doctor called a dinner, Gordon a jollification, and Agnes a supper. It was late when we sat down to it, eight o'clock; and there was a good deal of feasting and plenty of wine. The doctor was called out afterwards to a patient several miles distant, and George Gordon made some punch; which rendered none of our heads the steadier. At least I can answer for mine: I was weak with the long illness, and not much of a drinker at any time. There was a great deal of nonsense going on, and Gordon pretended to marry me to Agnes. He said or read (I can't tell which, and never knew then) some words mockingly out of the prayer-book, and said we were man and wife. Whilst we were all laughing at the joke, the doctor's old housekeeper came in, to see what the noise was about, and I, by way of keeping it up, took Agnes by the hand, and introduced her as Mrs. Elster. I did not understand the woman's look of astonishment then; unfortunately, I have understood it too well since."

Anne was growing painfully interested.

"Well, after that she threw herself upon me in a manner that—that was extraordinary to me, not having the key to it; and I—lost my head. Don't frown, Anne; ninety-nine men out of a hundred would have lost theirs; and you'll say so if ever I give you the details. Of course blame attached to me; to me, and not to her. Though at the time I mentally gave her, I assure you, her full share, somewhat after the manner of the Pharisee condemning the publican. That also has come home to me: she believed herself to be legally my wife; I never gave a thought to that evening's farce, and should have supposed its bearing any meaning a simple impossibility.

"A short time, and letters summoned me home; my mother was dangerously ill. I remember Agnes asked me to take her with me, and I laughed at her. I arranged to write to her, and promised to go back shortly—which, to tell you the truth, I never meant to do. Having been mistaking her, mistaking her still, I really thought her worthy of very little consideration. Before I had been at home a fortnight I received a letter from Dr. Mair, telling me that Agnes was showing symptoms of insanity, and asking what provision I purposed making for her. My sin was finding me out; I wondered how he had found it out; I did not ask, and did not know for years. I wrote back saying I would willingly take all expenses upon myself; and inquired what sum would be required by the asylum—to which he said she must be sent. He mentioned two hundred a-year, and from that time I paid it regularly."

"And was she really insane?" interrupted Lady Hartledon.

"Yes; she had been so once or twice before—and this was what the housekeeper had meant by saying she was with the doctor that her health might be watched. It appeared that when these symptoms came on, after I left, Gordon took upon himself to disclose to the doctor that Agnes was married to me, telling the circumstances as they had occurred. Dr. Mair got frightened: it was no light matter for the son of an English peer to have been deluded into marriage with an obscure and insane girl; and the quarrel that took place between him and Gordon on the occasion resulted in the latter's leaving. I have never understood Gordon's conduct in the matter: very disagreeable thoughts in regard to it come over me sometimes."

"What thoughts?"

"Oh, never mind; they can never be set at rest now. Let me make short work of this story. I heard no more and thought no more; and the years went on, and then came my marriage with Maude. We went to Paris—you cannot have forgotten any of the details of that period, Anne; and after our return to London I was surprised by a visit from Dr. Mair. That evening, that visit and its details stamped themselves on my memory for ever in characters of living fire."

He paused for a moment, and something like a shiver seized him. Anne said nothing.

"Maude had gone with some friends to a fête at Chiswick, and Thomas Carr was dining with me. Hedges came in and said a gentleman wanted to see me—would see me, and would not be denied. I went to him, and found it was Dr. Mair. In that interview I learnt that by the laws of Scotland Miss Waterlow was my wife."

"And the suspicion that she was so had never occurred to you before?"

"Anne! Should I have been capable of marrying Maude, or any one else, if it had? On my solemn word of honour, before Heaven"—he raised his right hand as if to give effect to his words—"such a thought had never crossed my brain. The evening that the nonsense took place I only regarded it as a jest, a pastime—what you will: had any one told me it was a marriage I should have laughed at them. I knew nothing then of the laws of Scotland, and should have thought it simply impossible that that minute's folly, and my calling her, to keep up the joke, Mrs. Elster, could have constituted a marriage. I think they all played a deep part, even Agnes. Not a soul had so much as hinted at the word 'marriage' to me after that evening; neither Gordon, nor she, nor Dr. Mair in his subsequent correspondence; and in that he always called her 'Agnes.' However—he then told me that she was certainly my legal wife, and that Lady Maude was not.

"At first," continued Val, "I did not believe it; but Dr. Mair persisted he was right, and the horror of the situation grew upon me. I told all to Carr, and took him up to Dr. Mair. They discussed Scottish law and consulted law-books; and the truth, so far, became apparent. Dr. Mair was sorry for me; he saw I had not erred knowingly in marrying Maude. As to myself, I was helpless, prostrated. I asked the doctor, if it were really true, why the fact had been kept from me: he replied that he supposed I knew it, and that delicacy alone had caused him to abstain from alluding to it in his letters. He had been very angry when Gordon told him, he said; grew half frightened as to consequences; feared he should get into trouble for allowing me to be so entrapped in his house; and he and Gordon parted at once. And then Dr. Mair asked a question which I could not very well answer, why, if I did not know she was my wife, I had paid so large a sum for Agnes. He had been burying the affair in silence, as he had assumed I was doing; and it was only the announcement of my marriage with Maude in the newspapers that aroused him. He had thought I was acting this bad part deliberately; and he went off at once to Hartledon in anger; found I had gone abroad; and now came to me on my return, still in anger, saying at first that he should proceed against me, and obtain justice for Agnes. When he found how utterly ignorant of wrong I had been, his tone changed; he was truly grieved and concerned for me. Nothing was decided: except that Dr. Mair, in his compassion towards Lady Maude, promised not to be the first to take legal steps. It seemed that there was only him to fear: George Gordon was reported to have gone to Australia; the old housekeeper was dead; Agnes was deranged. Dr. Mair left, and Carr and I sat on till midnight. Carr took what I thought a harsh view of the matter; he urged me to separate from Maude—"

"I think you should have done so for her sake," came the gentle interruption.

"For her sake! the words Carr used. But, Anne, surely there were two sides to the question. If I disclosed the facts, and put her away from me, what was she? Besides, the law might be against me—Scotland's iniquitous law; but in Heaven's sight Maude was my wife, not the other. So I temporized, hoping that time might bring about a relief, for Dr. Mair told me that Miss Waterlow's health was failing. However, she lived on, and—"

Lady Hartledon started up, her face blanching.

"Is she not dead now? Was she living when you married me? Am I your wife?"

He could hardly help smiling. His calm touch reassured her.

"Do you think you need ask, Anne? The next year Dr. Mair called upon me again—it was the evening before the boy was christened; he had come to London on business of his own. To my dismay, he told me that a change for the better was appearing in Miss Waterlow's mental condition; and he thought it likely she might be restored to health. Of course, it increased the perplexities and my horror, had that been needed; but the hope or fear, or what you like to call it, was not borne out. Three years later, the doctor came to me for the third and final time, to bring me the news that Agnes was dead."