Put Yourself in His Place

C >> Charles Reade >> Put Yourself in His Place


"Ah, Grace! Grace!" he sobbed, "how could you? how could you?"

"Don't speak unkindly to her," cried Jael, "or she won't be alive a day.
She is worse off than you are; and so is he too."

"You mock me; he is her husband. He can make her live with him. He
can--" Here he broke out cursing and blaspheming, and called Grace
a viper, and half thrust her away from him with horror, and his face
filled with jealous anguish: he looked like a man dying of poison.

Then he rose to his feet, and said, with a sort of deadly calm, "Where
can I find the man?"

"Not in this house, you may be sure," said Jael; "nor in any house where
she is."

Henry sank into his seat again, and looked amazed.

"Tell him all," said Grace. "Don't let him think I do not love him at
all."

"I will," said Jael. "Well, the wedding was at eleven; your letter came
at half-past twelve, and I took it her. Soon after that the villain came
to her, and she stabbed him directly with this stiletto. Look at it;
there's his blood up on it; I kept it to show you. I caught her arm, or
she would have killed him, I believe. He lost so much blood, the doctor
would not let him be moved. Then she thought of you still, and would not
pass a night under the same roof with him; at two o'clock she was on the
way to Raby; but Mr. Coventry was too much of a man to stay in the house
and drive her out; so he went off next morning, and, as soon as she
heard that, she came home. She is wife and no wife, as the saying is,
and how it is all to end Heaven only knows."

"It will end the moment I meet the man; and that won't be long."

"There! there!" cried Grace, "that is what I feared. Ah, Jael! Jael! why
did you hold my hand? They would not have hung ME. I told you so at the
time: I knew what I was about."

"Jael," said the young man, "of all the kind things you have done for
me, that was the kindest. You saved my poor girl from worse trouble than
she is now in. No, Grace; you shall not dirty your hand with such scum
as that: it is my business, and mine only."

In vain did Jael expostulate, and Grace implore. In vain did Jael assure
him that Coventry was in a worse position than himself, and try to make
him see that any rash act of his would make Grace even more miserable
than she was at present. He replied that he had no intention of running
his neck into a halter; he should act warily, like the Hillsborough
Trades, and strike his blow so cunningly that the criminal should never
know whence it came. "I've been in a good school for homicide," said
he; "and I am an inventor. No man has ever played the executioner so
ingeniously as I will play it. Think of all this scoundrel has done to
me: he owes me a dozen lives, and I'll take one. Man shall never detect
me: God knows all, and will forgive me, I hope. If He doesn't, I can't
help it."

He kissed Grace again and again, and comforted her; said she was not to
blame; honest people were no match for villains: if she had been twice
as simple, he would have forgiven her at sight of the stiletto; that
cleared her, in his mind, better than words.

He was now soft and gentle as a lamb. He begged Jael's pardon humbly for
leaving Hillsborough without telling her. He said he had gone up to her
room; but all was still; and he was a working man, and the sleep of a
working-woman was sacred to him--(he would have awakened a fine lady
without ceremony). Be assured her he had left a note for her in his box,
thanking and blessing her for all her goodness. He said that he hoped
he might yet live to prove by acts, and not by idle words, how deeply he
felt all she had done and suffered for him.

Jael received these excuses in hard silence. "That is enough about
me," said she, coldly. "If you are grateful to me, show it by taking my
advice. Leave vengeance to Him who has said that vengeance is His."

The man's whole manner changed directly, and he said doggedly:

"Well, I will be His instrument."

"He will choose His own."

"I'll lend my humble co-operation."

"Oh, do not argue with him," said Grace, piteously. "When did a man ever
yield to our arguments? Dearest, I can't argue: but I am full of misery,
and full of fears. You see my love; you forgive my folly. Have pity on
me; think of my condition: do not doom me to live in terror by night and
day: have I not enough to endure, my own darling? There, promise me you
will do nothing rash to-night, and that you will come to me the first
thing to-morrow. Why, you have not seen your mother yet; she is at Raby
Hall."

"My dear mother!" said he: "it would be a poor return for all your love
if I couldn't put off looking for that scum till I have taken you in my
arms."

And so Grace got a reprieve.

They parted in deep sorrow, but almost as lovingly as ever, and Little
went at once to Raby Hall, and Grace, exhausted by so many emotions, lay
helpless on a couch in her own room all the rest of the day.

For some time she lay in utter prostration, and only the tears that
trickled at intervals down her pale cheeks showed that she was conscious
of her miserable situation.

Jael begged and coaxed her to take some nourishment: but she shook her
head with disgust at the very idea.

For all that at nine o'clock, her faithful friend almost forced a few
spoonfuls of tea down her throat, feeding her like a child: and, when
she had taken it, she tried to thank her, but choked in the middle, and,
flinging her arm round Jael's neck, burst into a passion of weeping,
and incoherent cries of love, and pity, and despair. "Oh, my darling! so
great! so noble! so brave! so gentle! And I have destroyed us both! he
forgave me as soon as he SAW me! So terrible, so gentle! What will be
the next calamity? Ah, Jael! save him from that rash act, and I shall
never complain; for he was dead, and is alive again."

"We will find some way to do that between us--you, and I, and his
mother."

"Ah, yes: she will be on my side in that. But she will be hard upon me.
She will point out all my faults, my execrable folly. Ah, if I could but
live my time over again, I'd pray night and day for selfishness. They
teach us girls to pray for this and that virtue, which we have too much
of already; and what we ought to pray for is selfishness. But no! I
must think of my father, and think of that hypocrite: but the one person
whose feelings I was too mean, and base, and silly to consult, was
myself. I always abhorred this marriage. I feared it, and loathed it;
yet I yielded step by step, for want of a little selfishness; we are
slaves without it--mean, pitiful, contemptible slaves. O God, in mercy
give me selfishness! Ah me, it is too late now. I am a lost creature;
nothing is left me but to die."


Jael got her to bed, and sleep came at last to her exhausted body; but,
even when her eyes were closed, tears found their way through the lids,
and wetted her pillow.

So can great hearts and loving natures suffer.

Can they enjoy in proportion?

Let us hope so. But I have my doubts.


Henry Little kept his word, and came early next morning. He looked
hopeful and excited: he said he had thought the matter over, and was
quite content to let that scoundrel live, and even to dismiss all
thought of him, if Grace really loved him.

"If I love you!" said Grace. "Oh, Henry, why did I ask you to do nothing
rash, but that I love you? Why did I attempt his life myself? because
you said in your letter--It was not to revenge myself, but to save you
from more calamity. Cruel, cruel! Do I love him?"

"I know you love me, Grace: but do you love me enough? Will you give up
the world for me, and let us be happy together, the only way we can? My
darling Grace, I have made our fortune; all the world lies before us; I
left England alone, for you; now leave it with me, and let us roam the
world together."

"Henry!--what!--when I can not be your wife!"

"You can be my wife; my wife in reality, as you are his in name
and nothing else. It is idle to talk as if we were in some ordinary
situation. There are plenty of countries that would disown such a
marriage as yours, a mere ceremony obtained by fraud, and canceled by
a stroke with a dagger and instant separation. Oh, my darling, don't
sacrifice both our lives to a scruple that is out of place here. Don't
hesitate; don't delay. I have a carriage waiting outside; end all our
misery by one act of courage, and trust yourself to me; did I ever fail
you?"

"For shame, Henry! for shame!"

"It is the only way to happiness. You were quite right; if I kill that
wretch we shall be parted in another way, always parted; now we can be
together for life. Remember, dearest, how I begged you in this very room
to go to the United States with me: you refused: well, have you never
been sorry you refused? Now I once more implore you to be wise and
brave, and love me as I love you. What is the world to us? You are all
the world to me."

"Answer him, Jael; oh, answer him!"

"Nay, these are things every woman must answer for herself."

"And I'll take no answer but yours." Then he threw himself at her feet,
and clasping her in his arms implored her, with all the sighs and tears
and eloquence of passion, to have pity on them both, and fly at once
with him.

She writhed and struggled faintly, and turned away from him, and fell
tenderly toward him, by turns, and still he held her tight, and grew
stronger, more passionate, more persuasive, as she got weaker and
almost faint. Her body seemed on the point of sinking, and her mind of
yielding.

But all of a sudden she made a desperate effort. "Let me go!" she cried.
"So this is your love! With all my faults and follies, I am truer than
you. Shame on your love, that would dishonor the creature you love! Let
me go, sir, I say, or I shall hate you worse than I do the wretch whose
name I bear."

He let her go directly, and then her fiery glance turned to one long
lingering look of deep but tender reproach, and she fled sobbing.

He sank into a chair, and buried his face in his hands.

After a while he raised his head, and saw Jael Dence looking gravely at
him.

"Oh, speak your mind," said he, bitterly.

"You are like the world. You think only of yourself; that's all I have
to say."

"You are very unkind to say so. I think for us both: and she will think
with me, in time. I shall come again to-morrow."

He said this with an iron resolution that promised a long and steady
struggle, to which Grace, even in this first encounter, had shown
herself hardly equal.

Jael went to her room, expecting to find her as much broken down as she
was by Henry's first visit; but, instead of that, the young lady was
walking rapidly to and fro.

At sight of Jael, she caught her by the hand, and said, "Well!"

"He is coming again to-morrow."

"Is he sorry?"

"Not he."

"Who would have thought he was so wicked?"

This seemed rather exaggerated to Jael; for with all Mrs. Little's
teaching she was not quite a lady yet in all respects, though in many
things she was always one by nature. "Let it pass," said she.

"'It is a man's part to try,
And a woman's to deny.'"

"And how often shall I have to deny him I love so dearly?"

"As often as he asks you to be his mistress; for, call it what you like,
that is all he has to offer you."

Grace hid her face in her hands.

Jael colored. "Excuse my blunt speaking; but sometimes the worst word is
the best; fine words are just words with a veil on."

"Will he dare to tempt me again, after what I said?"

"Of course he will: don't you know him? he never gives in. But, suppose
he does, you have your answer ready."

"Jael," said Grace, "you are so strong, it blinds you to my weakness.
I resist him, day after day! I, who pity him so, and blame myself! Why,
his very look, his touch, his voice, overpower me so that my whole frame
seems dissolving: feel how I tremble at him, even now. No, no; let those
resist who are sure of their strength. Virtue, weakened by love and
pity, has but one resource--to fly. Jael Dence, if you are a woman, help
me to save the one thing I have got left to save."

"I will," said Jael Dence.

In one hour from that time they had packed a box and a carpetbag, and
were on their way to a railway station. They left Hillsborough.

In three days Jael returned, but Grace Coventry did not come back with
her.


The day after that trying scene, Henry Little called, not to urge Grace
again, as she presumed he would, but to ask pardon: at the same time we
may be sure of this--that, after a day or two spent in obtaining pardon,
the temptation would have been renewed, and so on forever. Of this,
however, Little was not conscious: he came to ask pardon, and offer a
pure and patient love, till such time as Heaven should have pity on them
both. He was informed that Mrs. Coventry had quitted Hillsborough, and
left a letter for him. It was offered him; he snatched it and read it.


"MY OWN DEAR HENRY,--You have given me something to forgive, and I
forgive you without asking, as I hope you will one day forgive me. I
have left Hillsborough to avoid a situation that was intolerable and
solicitations which I blushed to hear, and for which you would one day
have blushed too. This parting is not forever, I hope; but that
rests with yourself. Forego your idea of vengeance on that man, whose
chastisement you would best alleviate by ending his miserable existence;
and learn to love me honorably and patiently, as I love you. Should
you obtain this great victory over yourself, you will see me again.
Meantime, think of her who loves you to distraction, and whose soul
hovers about you unseen. Pray for me, dear one, at midnight, and at
eight o'clock every morning; for those are two of the hours I shall pray
for you. Do you remember the old church, and how you cried over me? I
can write no more: my tears blind me so. Farewell. Your unhappy

"GRACE."


Little read this piteous letter, and it was a heavy blow to him; a blow
that all the tenderness shown in it could not at first soften. She had
fled from him; she shunned him. It was not from Coventry she fled; it
was from him.

He went home cold and sick at heart, and gave himself up to grief and
deep regrets for several days.

But soon his powerful and elastic mind, impatient of impotent sorrow,
and burning for some kind of action, seized upon vengeance as the only
thing left to do.

At this period he looked on Coventry as a beast in human shape, whom he
had a moral right to extinguish; only, as he had not a legal right, it
must be done with consummate art. He trusted nobody; spoke to nobody;
but set himself quietly to find out where Coventry lived, and what were
his habits. He did this with little difficulty. Coventry lodged in a
principal street, but always dined at a club, and returned home late,
walking through a retired street or two; one of these passed by the
mouth of a narrow court that was little used.

Little, disguised as a workman, made a complete reconnaissance of this
locality, and soon saw that his enemy was at his mercy.

But, while he debated within himself what measure of vengeance he should
take, and what noiseless weapon he should use, an unseen antagonist
baffled him. That antagonist was Grace Carden. Still foreboding
mischief, she wrote to Mr. Coventry, from a town two hundred miles
distant:


"Whatever you are now, you were born a gentleman, and will, I think,
respect a request from a lady you have wronged. Mr. Little has returned,
and I have left Hillsborough; if he encounters you in his despair, he
will do you some mortal injury. This will only make matters worse, and I
dread the scandal that will follow, and to hear my sad story in a court
of law as a justification for his violence. Oblige me, then, by leaving
Hillsborough for a time, as I have done."


On receipt of this, Coventry packed up his portmanteau directly, and,
leaving Lally behind to watch the town, and see whether this was a ruse,
he went directly to the town whence Grace's letter was dated, and to the
very hotel.

This she had foreseen and intended.

He found she had been there, and had left for a neighboring
watering-place: he followed her thither, and there she withdrew the
clew; she left word she was gone to Stirling; but doubled on him,
and soon put hundreds of miles between them. He remained in Scotland,
hunting her.

Thus she played the gray plover with him she hated, and kept the beloved
hands from crime.

When Little found that Coventry had left Hillsborough, he pretended to
himself that he was glad of it. "My darling is right," said he. "I will
obey her, and do nothing contrary to law. I will throw him into prison,
that is all." With these moderated views, he called upon his friend
Ransome, whom of course he had, as yet, carefully avoided, to ask his
aid in collecting the materials for an indictment. He felt sure that
Coventry had earned penal servitude, if the facts could only be put in
evidence. He found Ransome in low spirits, and that excellent public
servant being informed what he was wanted for, said dryly, "Well, but
this will require some ability: don't you think your friend Silly Billy
would be more likely to do it effectually than John Ransome?"

"Why, Ransome, are you mad?"

"No, I merely do myself justice. Silly Billy smelt that faulty
grindstone; and I can't smell a rat a yard from my nose, it seems. You
shall judge for yourself. There have been several burglaries in this
town of late, and planned by a master. This put me on my mettle, and
I have done all I could, with my small force, and even pryed about in
person, night after night, and that is not exactly my business, but I
felt it my duty. Well, sir, two nights ago, no more, I had the luck to
come round a corner right upon a job: Alderman Dick's house, full of
valuables, and the windows well guarded; but one of his cellars is only
covered with a heavy wooden shutter, bolted within. I found this open,
and a board wedged in, to keep it ajar: down I went on my knees, saw a
light inside, and heard two words of thieves' latin; that was enough,
you know; I whipped out the board, jumped on the heavy shutter, and
called for the police."

"Did you expect them to come?"

"Not much. These jobs are timed so as not to secure the attendance
of the police. But assistance of another kind came; a gentleman full
dressed, in a white tie and gloves, ran up, and asked me what it
was. 'Thieves in the cellar,' said I, and shouted police, and gave my
whistle. The gentleman jumped on the shutter. 'I can keep that down,'
said he. 'I'm sure I saw two policemen in acorn Street: run quick!' and
he showed me his sword-cane, and seemed so hearty in it, and confident,
I ran round the corner, and gave my whistle. Two policemen came up; but,
in that moment, the swell accomplice had pulled all his pals out of
the cellar, and all I saw of the lot, when I came back, was the swell's
swallow-tail coat flying like the wind toward a back slum, where I and
my bobbies should have been knocked on the head, if we had tried to
follow him; but indeed he was too fleet to give us the chance."

"Well," said Henry, "that was provoking: but who can foresee every thing
all in a moment? I have been worse duped than that a good many times."

Ransome shook his head. "An old officer of police, like me, not to smell
a swell accomplice. I had only to handcuff that man, and set him down
with me on the shutter, till, in the dispensation of Providence, a bobby
came by."

He added by way of corollary, "You should send to London for a
detective."

"Not I," said Henry. "I know you for a sagacious man, and a worthy man,
and my friend. I'll have no one to help me in it but you."

"Won't you?" said Ransome. "Then I'll go in. You have done me good, Mr.
Little, by sticking to a defeated friend like this. Now for your case;
tell me all you know, and how you know it."

Henry complied, and Ransome took his notes. Then he said, he had got
some old memoranda by him, that might prove valuable: he would call in
two days.

He did call, and showed Henry Coventry's card, and told him he
had picked it up close by his letter-box, on the very night of the
explosion. "Mark my words, this will expand into something," said the
experienced officer.

Before he left, he told Henry that he had now every reason to
believe the swell accomplice was Shifty Dick, the most successful and
distinguished criminal in England. "I have just got word from London
that he has been working here, and has collared a heavy swag; he says
he will go into trade: one of his old pals let that out in jail. Trade!
then heaven help his customers, that is all."

"You may catch him yet."

"When I catch Jack-a-lantern. He is not so green as to stay a day in
Hillsborough, now his face has been close to mine; they all know I
never forget a face. No, no; I shall never see him again, till I am
telegraphed for, to inspect his mug and his wild-cat eyes in some jail
or other. I must try and not think of him; it disturbs my mind, and
takes off my attention from my duties."

Ransome adhered to this resolution for more than a month, during which
time he followed out every indication with the patience of a beagle;
and, at last, he called one day and told Little Hill had forfeited his
bail, and gone to Canada at the expense of the trade; but had let
out strange things before he left. There was a swell concerned in his
attempt with the bow and arrow: there was a swell concerned in the
explosion, with some workman, whose name he concealed; he had seen them
on the bridge, and had seen the workman receive a bag of gold, and had
collared him, and demanded his share; this had been given him, but not
until he threatened to call the bobbies. "Now, if we could find Hill,
and get him to turn Queen's evidence, this, coupled with what you and
I could furnish, would secure your man ten years of penal servitude. I
know an able officer at Quebec. Is it worth while going to the expense?"

Little, who had received the whole communication in a sort of
despondent, apathetic way, replied that he didn't think it was worth
while. "My good friend," said he, "I am miserable. Vengeance, I find,
will not fill a yearning heart. And the truth is, that all this time I
have been secretly hoping she would return, and that has enabled me to
bear up, and chatter about revenge. Who could believe a young creature
like that would leave her father and all her friends for good? I made
sure she would come back in a week or two. And to think that it is I who
have driven her away, and darkened my own life. I thought I had sounded
the depths of misery. I was a fool to think so. No, no; life would be
endurable if I could only see her face once a day, and hear her voice,
though it was not even speaking to me. Oh! oh!"

Now this was the first time Little had broken down before Ransome.
Hitherto he had spoken of Coventry, but not of Grace; he had avoided
speaking of her, partly from manly delicacy, partly because he foresaw
his fortitude would give way if he mentioned her.

But now the strong man's breast seemed as if it would burst, and his
gasping breath, and restless body, betrayed what a price he must have
paid for the dogged fortitude he had displayed for several weeks,
love-sick all the time.

Ransome was affected: he rose and walked about the room, ashamed to look
at a Spartan broken down.

When he had given Little time to recover some little composure, he said,
"Mr. Little, you were always too much of a gentleman to gossip about the
lady you love; and it was not my business to intrude upon that subject;
it was too delicate. But, of course, with what I have picked up here
and there, and what you have let drop, without the least intending it, I
know pretty well how the land lies. And, sir, a man does not come to my
time of life without a sore and heavy heart; if I was to tell you how I
came to be a bachelor--but, no; even after ten years I could not answer
for myself. All I can say is that, if you should do me the honor to
consult me on something that is nearer your heart than revenge, you
would have all my sympathy and all my zeal."

"Give me your hand, old fellow," said Little, and broke down again.

But, this time, he shook it off quickly, and, to encourage him, Mr.
Ransome said, "To begin, you may take my word Mr. Carden knows, by this
time, where his daughter is. Why not sound him on the matter?"

Henry acted on this advice, and called on Mr. Carden.

He was received very coldly by that gentleman.

After some hesitation, he asked Mr. Carden if he had any news of his
daughter.

"I have."

The young man's face was irradiated with joy directly.

"Is she well, sir?"

"Yes."

"Is she happier than she was?"

"She is content."

"Has she friends about her? Kind, good people; any persons of her own
sex, whom she can love?"

"She is among people she takes for angels, at present. She will find
them to be petty, mean, malicious devils. She is in a Protestant
convent."

"In a convent? Where?"

"Where? Where neither the fool nor the villain, who have wrecked her
happiness between them, and robbed me of her, will ever find her. I
expected this visit, sir; the only thing I doubted was which would come
first, the villain or the fool. The fool has come first, and being a
fool, expects ME to tell him where to find his victim, and torture
her again. Begone, fool, from the house you have made desolate by your
execrable folly in slipping away by night like a thief, or rather like
that far more dangerous animal, a fool."