Verner's Pride

"You would have found Frederick Massingbird a less indulgent husband to you than I have been," he firmly said. "But these remarks are profitless, and will add to the comfort of neither you nor me. Sibylla, I shall send, in your name, to pay this bill of Mrs. Duff's. Will you give it me?"

"I dare say Benoite can find it, if you choose to ask her."

"And, my dear, let me beg of you not to contract these paltry debts. There have been others, as you know. I do not like that Mrs. Verner's name should be thus bandied in the village. What you buy in the village, pay for at once."

"How can I pay while you stint me?"

"Stint you!" repeated Lionel, in amazement. "Stint you!"

"It's nothing but stinting—going on at me as you do!" she sullenly answered. "You would like to deprive me of the horses I have set my mind upon! You know you would!"

"The horses you cannot have, Sibylla," he answered, his tone a decisive one. "I have already said it."

It aroused her anger. "If you don't let me have the horses, and all other things I want, I'll go where I can have them."

What did she mean? Lionel's cheek turned white with the taunt the words might be supposed to imply. He held her two hands in his, pressing them nervously.

"You shall not force me to quarrel with you, Sibylla," he continued, with emotion. "I have almost registered a vow that no offensive word or conduct on your part shall make me forget myself for a moment; or render me other than an ever considerate, tender husband. It may be that our marriage was a mistake for both of us; but we shall do well to make the best of it. It is the only course remaining."

He spoke in a strangely earnest tone; one of deep agitation. Sibylla was aroused. She had believed that Lionel blindly loved her. Otherwise she might have been more careful to retain his love—there's no knowing.

"How do you mean that our marriage was a mistake for both of us?" she hastily cried.

"You do your best to remind me continually that it must be so," was his reply.

"Psha!" returned Sibylla. And Lionel, without another word, quitted her and walked away. In these moments, above all others, would the image of Lucy Tempest rise up before his sight. Beat it down as he would, it was ever present to him. A mistake in his marriage! Ay; none save Lionel knew how fatal a one.

He passed on direct to the terrace, avoiding the lawn, traversed it, and went out at the large gates. Thence he made his way to Poynton's, the veterinary surgeon, who also dealt in horses. At least, dealt in them so far as that he would buy and sell when employed to do so.

The man was in his yard, watching a horse go through his paces. He came forward to meet Lionel.

"Mrs. Verner has been talking to you about some ponies, she tells me," began Lionel. "What are they?"

"A very handsome pair, sir. Just the thing for a lady to drive. They are to be sold for a hundred and fifty pounds. It's under their value."

"Spirited?"

"Yes. They have their mettle about them. Good horses always have, you know, sir. Mrs. Verner has given me the commission."

"Which I am come to rescind," replied Lionel, calling up a light smile to his face. "I cannot have my wife's neck risked by her attempting to drive spirited ponies, Poynton. She knows nothing of driving, is constitutionally timid, and—in short, I do not wish the order executed."

"Very well, sir," was the man's reply. "There's no harm done. I was at Verner's Pride with that horse that's ill, and Mrs. Verner spoke to me about some ponies. It was only to-day I heard these were in the market, and I mentioned them to her. But, for all I know, they may be already sold."

Lionel turned to walk out of the yard. "After Mrs. Verner shall have learned to drive, then we shall see; perhaps we may buy a pair," he remarked. "My opinion is that she will not learn. After a trial or two she will give it up."

"All right, sir."

CHAPTER LVI.

A LIFE HOVERING IN THE BALANCE

Jan was coming up the road from Deerham with long strides, as Lionel turned out of Poynton's yard. Lionel advanced leisurely to meet him.

"One would think you were walking for a wager, Jan!"

"Ay," said Jan. "This is my first round to-day. Bitterworths have sent for me in desperate haste. Folks always get ill at the wrong time."

"Why don't you ride?" asked Lionel, turning with Jan, and stepping out at the same pace.

"There was no time to get the horse ready. I can walk it nearly as fast. I have had no breakfast yet."

"No breakfast!" echoed Lionel.

"I dived into the kitchen and caught up a piece of bread out of the basket. Half my patients must do without me to-day. I have only just got away from Hook's."

"How is the girl?"

"In great danger," replied Jan.

"She is ill, then?"

"So ill, that I don't think she'll last the day out. The child's dead. I must cut across the fields back there again, after I have seen what's amiss at Bitterworth's."

The words touching Alice Hook caused quite a shock to Lionel. "It will be a sad thing, Jan, if she should die!"

"I don't think I can save her. This comes of the ghost. I wonder how many more folks will get frightened to death."

Lionel paused. "Was it really that alone that frightened the girl, and caused her illness? How very absurd the thing sounds! And yet serious."

"I can't make it out," remarked Jan. "Here's Bourne now, says he saw it. There's only one solution of the riddle that I can come to."

"What's that?" asked Lionel.

"Well," said Jan, "it's not a pleasant one."

"You can tell it me, Jan, pleasant or unpleasant."

"Not pleasant for you, I mean, Lionel. I'll tell you if you like."

Lionel looked at him.

"Speak!"

"I think it must be Fred Massingbird himself."

The answer appeared to take Lionel by surprise. Possibly he had not admitted the doubt.

"Fred Massingbird himself; I don't understand you, Jan."

"Fred himself, in life," repeated Jan. "I fancy it will turn out that he did not die in Australia. He may have been very ill perhaps, and they fancied him dead; and now he is well, and has come over."

Every vestige of colour forsook Lionel's face.

"Jan!" he uttered, partly in terror, partly in anger. "Jan!" he repeated from between his bloodless lips. "Have you thought of the position in which your hint would place my wife?—the reflection it would cast upon her? How dare you?"

"You told me to speak," was Jan's composed answer. "I said you'd not like it. Speaking of it, or keeping silence, won't make it any the better, Lionel."

"What could possess you to think of such a thing?"

"There's nothing else that I can think of. Look here! Is there such a thing as a ghost? Is that probable?"

"Nonsense! No," said Lionel.

"Then what can it be, unless it's Fred himself? Lionel, were I you, I'd look the matter full in the face. It is Fred Massingbird, or it is not. If not, the sooner the mystery is cleared up the better, and the fellow brought to book and punished. It's not to be submitted to that he is to stride about for his own pastime, terrifying people to their injury. Is Alice Hook's life nothing? Were Dan Duff's senses nothing?—and, upon my word, I once thought there was good-bye to them."

Lionel did not answer. Jan continued.

"If it is Fred himself, the fact can't be long concealed. He'll be sure to make himself known. Why he should not do it at once, I can't imagine. Unless—"

"Unless what?" asked Lionel.

"Well, you are so touchy on all points relating to Sibylla, that one hesitates to speak," continued Jan. "I was going to say, unless he fears the shock to Sibylla; and would let her be prepared for it by degrees."

"Jan," gasped Lionel, "it would kill her."

"No, it wouldn't," dissented Jan. "She's not one to be killed by emotion of any sort. Or much stirred by it, as I believe, if you care for my opinion. It would not be pleasant for you or for her, but she'd not die of it."

Lionel wiped the moisture from his face. From the moment Jan had first spoken, a conviction seemed to arise within him that the suggestion would turn out to be only too true a one—that the ghost, in point of fact, was Frederick Massingbird in life.

"This is awful!" he murmured. "I would sacrifice my own life to save Sibylla from pain."

"Where'd be the good of that?" asked practical Jan. "If it is Fred Massingbird in the flesh, she's his wife and not your's; your sacrificing yourself—as you call it, Lionel—would not make her any the less or the more so. I am abroad a good deal at night, especially now, when there's so much sickness about, and I shall perhaps come across the fellow. Won't I pin him if I get the chance."

"Jan," said Lionel, catching hold of his brother's arm to detain him as he was speeding away, for they had reached the gate of Verner's Pride, "be cautious that not a breath of this suspicion escapes you. For my poor wife's sake."

"No fear," answered Jan. "If it gets about, it won't be from me, mind. I am going to believe in the ghost henceforth, you understand. Except to you and Bourne."

"If it gets about," mechanically answered Lionel, repeating the words which made most impression upon his mind. "You think it will get about?"

"Think! It's safe to," answered Jan. "Had old Frost and Dan Duff and Cheese not been great gulls, they'd have taken it for Fred himself; not his ghost. Bourne suspects. From a hint he dropped to me just now at Hook's, I find he takes the same view of the case that I do."

"Since when have you suspected this, Jan?"

"Not for many hours. Don't keep me, Lionel. Bitterworth may be dying, for aught I know, and so may Alice Hook."

Jan went on like a steam-engine. Lionel remained, standing at his entrance-gate, more like a prostrate being than a living man.

Thought after thought crowded upon him. If it was really Frederick Massingbird in life, how was it that he had not made his appearance before? Where had he been all this while? Considerably more than two years had elapsed since the supposed death. To the best of Lionel's recollection, Sibylla had said Captain Cannonby buried her husband; but it was a point into which Lionel had never minutely inquired. Allow that Jan's suggestion was correct—that he did not die—where had he been since? What had prevented him from joining or seeking his wife? What prevented him doing it now? From what motive could he be in concealment in the neighbourhood, stealthily prowling about at night? Why did he not appear openly? Oh, it could not—it could not be Frederick Massingbird!

Which way should he bend his steps? Indoors, or away? Not indoors! He could scarcely bear to see his wife, with this dreadful uncertainty upon him. Restless, anxious, perplexed, miserable, Lionel Verner turned towards Deerham.

There are some natures upon whom a secret, awful as this, tells with appalling force, rendering it next to impossible to keep silence. The imparting it to some friend, the speaking of it, appears to be a matter of dire necessity. It was so in this instance to Lionel Verner.

He was on his way to the vicarage. Jan had mentioned that Mr. Bourne shared the knowledge—if knowledge it could be called; and he was one in whom might be placed entire trust.

He walked onwards, like one in a fever dream, nodding mechanically in answer to salutations; answering he knew not what, if words were spoken to him. The vicarage joined the churchyard, and the vicar was standing in the latter as Lionel came up, watching two men who were digging a grave. He crossed over the mounds to shake hands with Lionel.

Lionel drew him into the vicarage garden, amidst the trees. It was shady there; the outer world shut out from eye and ear.

"I cannot beat about the bush; I cannot dissemble," began Lionel, in deep agitation. "Tell me your true opinion of this business, for the love of Heaven! I have come down to ask it of you."

The vicar paused. "My dear friend, I feel almost afraid to give it to you."

"I have been speaking with Jan. He thinks it may be Frederick Massingbird—not dead, but alive."

"I fear it is," answered the clergyman. "Within the last half-hour I have fully believed that it is."

Lionel leaned his back against a tree, his arms folded. Tolerably calm outwardly; but he could not get the healthy blood back to his face. "Why within the last half-hour more than before?" he asked. "Has anything fresh happened?"

"Yes," said Mr. Bourne. "I went down to Hook's; the girl's not expected to live the day through—but that you may have heard from Jan. In coming away, your gamekeeper met me. He stopped, and began asking my advice in a mysterious manner—whether, if a secret affecting his master had come to his knowledge, he ought, or ought not, to impart it to his master. I felt sure what the man was driving at—that it could be no other thing than this ghost affair—and gave him a hint to speak out to me in confidence; which he did."

"Well?" rejoined Lionel.

"He said," continued Mr. Bourne, lowering his voice, "that he passed a man last night who, he was perfectly certain, was Frederick Massingbird. 'Not Frederick Massingbird's ghost, as foolish people were fancying,' Broom added, 'but Massingbird himself.' He was in doubt whether or not it was his duty to acquaint Mr. Verner; and so he asked me. I bade him not acquaint you," continued the vicar, "but to bury the suspicion within his own breast, breathing a word to none."

Evidence upon evidence! Every moment brought less loop-hole of escape for Lionel. "How can it be?" he gasped. "If he is not dead, where can he have been all this while?"

"I conclude it will turn out to be one of those every-day occurrences that have little marvel at all in them. My thoughts were busy upon it, while standing over the grave yonder. I suppose he must have been to the diggings—possibly laid up there by illness; and letters may have miscarried."

"You feel little doubt upon the fact itself—that it is Frederick Massingbird?"

"I feel none. It is certainly he. Won't you come in and sit down?"

"No, no," said Lionel; and, drawing his hand from the vicar's, he went forth again, he, and his heavy weight. Frederick Massingbird alive!

CHAPTER LVII.

A WALK IN THE RAIN

The fine September morning had turned to a rainy afternoon. A heavy mist hung upon the trees, the hedges, the ground—something akin to the mist which had fallen upon Lionel Verner's spirit. The day had grown more like a November one; the clouds were leaden-coloured, the rain fell. Even the little birds sought the shelter of their nests.

One there was who walked in it, his head uncovered, his brow bared. He was in the height of his fever dream. It is not an inapt name for his state of mind. His veins coursed as with fever; his thoughts took all the vague uncertainty of a dream. Little heeded he that the weather had become chilly, or that the waters fell upon him!

What must be his course? What ought it to be? The more he dwelt on the revelation of that day, the deeper grew his conviction that Frederick Massingbird was alive, breathing the very air that he breathed. What ought to be his course? If this were so, his wife was—not his wife.

It was obvious that his present, immediate course ought to be to solve the doubt—to set it at rest. But how? It could only be done by unearthing Frederick Massingbird; or he who bore so strange a resemblance to him. And where was he to be looked for? To track the hiding-place of a "ghost" is not an easy matter; and Lionel had no clue where to find the track of this one. If staying in the village, he must be concealed in some house; lying perdu by day. It was very strange that it should be so; that he should not openly show himself.

There was another way by which perhaps the doubt might be solved—as it suddenly occurred to Lionel. And that was through Captain Cannonby. If this gentleman really was with Frederick Massingbird when he died, and saw him buried, it was evident that it could not be Frederick come back to life. In that case, who or what it might be, Lionel did not stay to speculate; his business lay in ascertaining by the most direct means in his power, whether it was, or was not, Frederick Massingbird. How was it possible to do this? how could it be possible to set the question at rest?

By a very simple process, it may be answered—the waiting for time and chance. Ay, but do you know what that waiting involves, in a case like this? Think of the state of mind that Lionel Verner must live under during the suspense!

He made no doubt that the man who had been under the tree on the lawn a few nights before, watching his window, whom they had set down as being Roy, was Frederick Massingbird. And yet, it was scarcely believable. Where now was Lionel to look for him? He could not, for Sibylla's sake, make inquiries in the village in secret or openly; he could not go to the inhabitants and ask—have you seen Frederick Massingbird? or say to each individual, I must send a police officer to search your house, for I suspect Frederick Massingbird is somewhere concealed, and I want to find him. For her sake he could not so much as breathe the name, in connection with his being alive.

Given that it was Frederick Massingbird, what could possibly prevent his making himself known? As he dwelt upon this problem, trying to solve it, the idea taken up by Lucy Tempest—that the man under the tree was watching for an opportunity to harm him—came into his mind. That, surely, could not be the solution! If he had taken Frederick Massingbird's wife to be his wife, he had done it in all innocence. Lionel spurned the notion as a preposterous one; nevertheless, a remembrance crossed him of the old days when the popular belief at Verner's Pride had been, that the younger of the Massingbirds was of a remarkably secretive and also of a revengeful nature. But all that he barely glanced at; the terrible fear touching Sibylla absorbed him.

He was leaning against a tree in the covered walk near Verner's Pride, the walk which led to the Willow Pond, his head bared, his brow bent with the most unmistakable signs of care, when something not unlike a small white balloon came flying down the path. A lady, with her silk dress turned over her shoulders, leaving only the white lining exposed to view. She was face to face with Lionel before she saw him.

"Lucy!" he exclaimed, in extreme surprise.

Lucy Tempest laughed, and let her dress drop into a more dignified position. "I and Decima went to call on Mrs. Bitterworth," she explained, "and Decima is staying there. It began to rain as I came out, so I turned into the back walk and put my dress up to save it. Am I not economical, Mr. Verner?"

She spoke quickly. Lionel thought it was done with a view to hide her agitation. "You cannot go home through this rain, Lucy. Let me take you indoors; we are close to Verner's Pride."

"No, thank you," said Lucy hastily, "I must go back to Lady Verner. She will not be pleased at Decima's staying out, therefore I must return. Poor Mrs. Bitterworth has had an attack of—what did they call it?—spasmodical croup, I think. She is better now, and begged Decima to stay with her the rest of the day; Mr. Bitterworth and the rest of them are out. Jan says it is highly dangerous for the time it lasts."

"She has had something of the same sort before, I remember," observed Lionel. "I wish you would come in, Lucy. If you must go home, I will send you in the carriage; but I think you might stay and dine with us."

A soft colour mantled in Lucy's cheeks. She had never made herself a familiar acquaintance at Lionel Verner's. He had observed it, if no one else had. Sibylla had once said to her that she hoped they should be great friends, that Verner's Pride would see a great deal of her. Lucy had never responded to the wish. A formal visit with Decima or Lady Verner when she could not help herself; but alone, in a social manner, she had never put her foot over the threshold of Verner's Pride.

"You are very kind. I must go home at once. The rain will not hurt me."

Lionel, self-conscious, did not urge it further. "Will you remain here, then, under the trees, while I go home and get an umbrella?"

"Oh, dear, no, I don't want an umbrella; thank you all the same. I have my parasol, you see."

She took her dress up again as she spoke; not high, as it was previously, but turning it a little. "Lady Verner scolds me so if I spoil my things," she said, in a tone of laughing apology. "She buys me very good ones, and orders me to take care of them. Good-bye, Mr. Verner."

Lionel took the hand in his which she held out. But he turned with her, and then loosed it again.

"You are not coming with me, Mr. Verner?"

"I shall see you home."

"But—I had rather you did not. I prefer—not to trouble you."

"Pardon me, Lucy. I cannot suffer you to go alone."

It was a calm reply, quietly spoken. There were no fine phrases of its being "no trouble," that the "trouble was a pleasure," as others might indulge in. Fine phrases from them! from the one to the other! Neither could have spoken them.

Lucy said no more, and they walked on side by side in silence, both unpleasantly self-conscious. Lionel's face had resumed its strange expression of care. Lucy had observed it when she came up to him; she observed it still.

"You look as though you had some great trouble upon you, Mr. Verner," she said, after a while.

"Then I look what is the truth. I have one, Lucy."

"A heavy one?" asked Lucy, struck with his tone.

"A grievously heavy one. One that does not often fall to the lot of man."

"May I know it?" she timidly said.

"No, Lucy. If I could speak it, it would only give you pain; but it is of a private nature. Possibly it may be averted; it is at present a suspected dread, not a confirmed one. Should it become confirmed, you will learn it in common with all the world."

She looked up at him, puzzled; sympathy in her mantling blush, in her soft, dark, earnest eyes. He could not avoid contrasting that truthful face with another's frivolous one; and I can't help it if you blame him. He did his best to shake off the feeling, and looked down at her with a careless smile.

"Don't let it give you concern, Lucy. My troubles must rest upon my own head.".

"Have you seen any more of that man who was watching? Roy."

"No. But I don't believe now that it was Roy. He strongly denies it, and I have had my suspicions diverted to another quarter."

"To one who may be equally wishing to do you harm?"

"I cannot say. If it be the party I—I suspect, he may deem that I have done him harm."

"You!" echoed Lucy. "And have you?"

"Yes. Unwittingly. It seems to be my fate, I think, to work harm upon—upon those whom I would especially shield from it."

Did he allude to her? Lucy thought so, and the flush on her cheeks deepened. At that moment the rain began to pour down heavily. They were then passing the thicket of trees where those adventurous ghost-hunters had taken up their watch a few nights previously, in view of the Willow Pond. Lucy stepped underneath their branches.

"Now," said Lionel, "should you have done well to accept my offer of Verner's Pride as a shelter, or not?"

"It may only be a passing storm," observed Lucy. "The rain then was nothing."

Lionel took her parasol and shook the wet off it. He began to wonder how Lucy would get home. No carriage could be got to that spot, and the rain, coming down now, was not, in his opinion, a passing storm.

"Will you promise to remain here, Lucy, while I get an umbrella?" he presently asked.

"Why! where could you get an umbrella from?"

"From Hook's, if they possess such a thing. If not, I can get one from Broom's."

"But you would get so wet, going for it!"

Lionel laughed as he went off.

"I don't wear a silk dress; to be scolded for it, if it gets spoiled."

Not ten steps had he taken, however, when who should come striding through an opening in the trees, but Jan. Jan was on his way from Hook's cottage, a huge brown cotton umbrella over his head, more useful than elegant.

"What, is that you, Miss Lucy! Well, I should as soon have thought of seeing Mrs. Peckaby's white donkey!"

"I am weather-bound, Jan," said Lucy. "Mr. Verner was about to get me an umbrella."