East Lynne

M >> Mrs. Henry Wood >> East Lynne


"Oh, no, I shall not. How very soon you are leaving. You have scarcely
stayed ten minutes."

"But you forget I have not been at home."

"You were on your road to Beauchamp's, and would not have been at home
for an hour or two in that case," spoke Barbara, in a tone that savored
of resentment.

"That was different; that was upon business. But, Barbara, I think your
mother looks unusually ill."

"You know she suffers a little thing to upset her; and last night she
had what she calls one of her dreams," answered Barbara. "She says that
it is a warning that something bad is going to happen, and she has been
in the most unhappy, feverish state possible all day. Papa has been
quite angry over her being so weak and nervous, declaring that she ought
to rouse herself out of her 'nerves.' Of course we dare not tell him
about the dream."

"It related to--the----"

Mr. Carlyle stopped, and Barbara glanced round with a shudder, and drew
closer to him as she whispered. He had not given her his arm this time.

"Yes, to the murder. You know mamma has always declared that Bethel had
something to do with it; she says her dreams would have convinced her
of it, if nothing else did; and she dreamt she saw him with--with--you
know."

"Hallijohn?" whispered Mr. Carlyle.

"With Hallijohn," assented Barbara, with a shiver. "He was standing
over him as he lay on the floor; just as he _did_ lay on it. And that
wretched Afy was standing at the end of the kitchen, looking on."

"But Mrs. Hare ought not to suffer dreams to disturb her peace by day,"
remonstrated Mr. Carlyle. "It is not to be surprised at that she dreams
of the murder, because she is always dwelling upon it; but she should
strive and throw the feeling from her with the night."

"You know what mamma is. Of course she ought to do so, but she does not.
Papa wonders what makes her get up so ill and trembling of a morning;
and mamma has to make all sorts of evasive excuses; for not a hint, as
you are aware, must be breathed to him about the murder."

Mr. Carlyle gravely nodded.

"Mamma does so harp about Bethel. And I know that dream arose from
nothing in the world but because she saw him pass the gate yesterday.
Not that she thinks that it was he who did it; unfortunately, there is
no room for that; but she will persist that he had a hand in it in some
way, and he haunts her dreams."

Mr. Carlyle walked on in silence; indeed there was no reply that he
could make. A cloud had fallen upon the house of Mr. Hare, and it was an
unhappy subject. Barbara continued,--

"But for mamma to have taken it into her head that 'some evil is going
to happen,' because she had this dream, and to make herself miserable
over it, is so absurd, that I have felt quite cross with her all day.
Such nonsense, you know, Archibald, to believe that dreams give signs of
what is going to happen, so far behind these enlightened days!"

"Your mamma's trouble is great, Barbara; and she is not strong."

"I think all our troubles have been great since--since that dark
evening," responded Barbara.

"Have you heard from Anne?" inquired Mr. Carlyle, willing to change the
subject.

"Yes, she is very well. What do you think they are going to name the
baby? Anne; after her mamma. So very ugly a name! Anne!"

"I do not think so," said Mr. Carlyle. "It is simple and unpretending,
I like it much. Look at the long, pretentious names of our
family--Archibald! Cornelia! And yours, too--Barbara! What a mouthful
they all are!"

Barbara contracted her eyebrows. It was equivalent to saying that he did
not like her name.

They reached the gate, and Mr. Carlyle was about to pass out of it when
Barbara laid her hand on his arm to detain him, and spoke in a timid
voice,--

"Archibald!"

"What is it?"

"I have not said a word of thanks to you for this," she said,
touching the chain and locket; "my tongue seemed tied. Do not deem me
ungrateful."

"You foolish girl! It is not worth them. There! Now I am paid.
Good-night, Barbara."

He had bent down and kissed her cheek, swung through the gate, laughing,
and strode away. "Don't say I never gave you anything," he turned his
head round to say, "Good-night."

All her veins were tingling, all her pulses beating; her heart was
throbbing with its sense of bliss. He had never kissed her, that she
could remember, since she was a child. And when she returned indoors,
her spirits were so extravagantly high that Mrs. Hare wondered.

"Ring for the lamp, Barbara, and you can get to your work. But don't
have the shutters closed; I like to look out on these light nights."

Barbara, however, did not get to her work; she also, perhaps, liked
"looking out on a light night," for she sat down at the window. She
was living the last half hour over again. "'Don't say I never gave you
anything,'" she murmured; "did he allude to the chain or to the--kiss?
Oh, Archibald, why don't you say that you love me?"

Mr. Carlyle had been all his life upon intimate terms with the Hare
family. His father's first wife--for the late lawyer Carlyle had been
twice married--had been a cousin of Justice Hare's, and this had caused
them to be much together. Archibald, the child of the second Mrs.
Carlyle, had alternately teased and petted Anne and Barbara Hare, boy
fashion. Sometimes he quarreled with the pretty little girls, sometimes
he caressed them, as he would have done had they been his sisters; and
he made no scruple of declaring publicly to the pair that Anne was his
favorite. A gentle, yielding girl she was, like her mother; whereas
Barbara displayed her own will, and it sometimes clashed with young
Carlyle's.

The clock struck ten. Mrs. Hare took her customary sup of brandy and
water, a small tumbler three parts full. Without it she believed
she could never get to sleep; it deadened unhappy thought, she said.
Barbara, after making it, had turned again to the window, but she did
not resume her seat. She stood right in front of it, her forehead bent
forward against its middle pane. The lamp, casting a bright light, was
behind her, so that her figure might be distinctly observable from the
lawn, had any one been there to look upon it.

She stood there in the midst of dreamland, giving way to all its
enchanting and most delusive fascinations. She saw herself, in
anticipation, the wife of Mr. Carlyle, the envied, thrice envied, of all
West Lynne; for, like as he was the dearest on earth to her heart, so
was he the greatest match in the neighborhood around. Not a mother but
what coveted him for her child, and not a daughter but would have said,
"Yes, and thank you," to an offer from the attractive Archibald Carlyle.
"I never was sure, quite sure of it till to-night," murmured Barbara,
caressing the locket, and holding it to her cheek. "I always thought he
meant something, or he might mean nothing: but to give me this--to kiss
me--oh Archibald!"

A pause. Barbara's eyes were fixed upon the moonlight.

"If he would but say he loved me! If he would but save the suspense
of my aching heart! But it must come; I know it will; and if that
cantankerous toad of a Corny--"

Barbara Hare stopped. What was that, at the far end of the lawn, just in
advance of the shade of the thick trees? Their leaves were not causing
the movement, for it was a still night. It had been there some minutes;
it was evidently a human form. What _was_ it? Surely it was making signs
to her!

Or else it looked as though it was. That was certainly its arm moving,
and now it advanced a pace nearer, and raised something which it wore
on its head--a battered hat with a broad brim, a "wide-awake," encircled
with a wisp of straw.

Barbara Hare's heart leaped, as the saying runs, into her mouth, and
her face became deadly white in the moonlight. Her first thought was to
alarm the servants; her second, to be still; for she remembered the fear
and mystery that attached to the house. She went into the hall, shutting
her mamma in the parlor, and stood in the shade of the portico, gazing
still. But the figure evidently followed her movement with its sight,
and the hat was again taken off, and waved violently.

Barbara Hare turned sick with utter terror. _She_ must fathom it; she
must see who, and what it was; for the servants she dared not call, and
those movements were imperative, and might not be disregarded. But
she possessed more innate courage than falls to the lot of some young
ladies.

"Mamma," she said, returning to the parlor and catching up her shawl,
while striving to speak without emotion. "I shall just walk down the
path and see if papa is coming."

Mrs. Hare did not reply. She was musing upon other things, in that
quiescent happy mood, which a small portion of spirits will impart to
one weak in body; and Barbara softly closed the door, and stole out
again to the portico. She stood a moment to rally her courage, and again
the hat was waved impatiently.

Barbara Hare commenced her walk towards it in dread unutterable, an
undefined sense of evil filling her sinking heart; mingling with which,
came, with a rush of terror, a fear of that other undefinable evil--the
evil Mrs. Hare had declared was foreboded by her dream.



CHAPTER IV.

THE MOONLIGHT INTERVIEW.

Cold and still looked the old house in the moonbeams. Never was the moon
brighter; it lighted the far-stretching garden, it illuminated even the
weathercock aloft, it shone upon the portico, and upon one who appeared
in it. Stealing to the portico from the house had come Barbara Hare, her
eyes strained in dread affright on the grove of trees at the foot of the
garden. What was it that had stepped out of that groove of trees, and
mysteriously beckoned to her as she stood at the window, turning her
heart to sickness as she gazed? Was it a human being, one to bring
more evil to the house, where so much evil had already fallen? Was it a
supernatural visitant, or was it but a delusion of her own eyesight? Not
the latter, certainly, for the figure was now emerging again, motioning
to her as before; and with a white face and shaking limbs, Barbara
clutched her shawl around her and went down that path in the moonlight.
The beckoning form retreated within the dark recess as she neared it,
and Barbara halted.

"Who and what are you?" she asked, under her breath. "What do you want?"

"Barbara," was the whispered, eager answer, "don't you recognize me?"

Too surely she did--the voice at any rate--and a cry escaped her,
telling more of sorrow than of joy, though betraying both. She
penetrated the trees, and burst into tears as one in the dress of a
farm laborer caught her in his arms. In spite of his smock-frock and his
straw-wisped hat, and his false whiskers, black as Erebus, she knew him
for her brother.

"Oh, Richard! Where have you come from? What brings you here?"

"Did you know me, Barbara?" was his rejoinder.

"How was it likely--in this disguise? A thought crossed my mind that it
might be some one from you, and even that made me sick with terror.
How could you run such a risk as to come here?" she added, wringing her
hands. "If you are discovered, it is certain death; death--upon--you
know!"

"Upon the gibbet," returned Richard Hare. "I do know it, Barbara."

"Then why risk it? Should mamma see you it will kill her outright."

"I can't live on as I am living," he answered, gloomily. "I have been
working in London ever since--"

"In London!" interrupted Barbara.

"In London, and have never stirred out of it. But it is hard work for
me, and now I have an opportunity of doing better, if I can get a little
money. Perhaps my mother can let me have it; it is what I have come to
ask for."

"How are you working? What at?"

"In a stable-yard."

"A stable-yard!" she uttered, in a deeply shocked tone. "Richard!"

"Did you expect it would be as a merchant, or a banker, or perhaps as
secretary to one of her majesty's ministers--or that I was a gentleman
at large, living on my fortune?" retorted Richard Hare, in a tone of
chafed anguish, painful to hear. "I get twelve shillings a week, and
that has to find me in everything!"

"Poor Richard, poor Richard!" she wailed, caressing his hand and weeping
over it. "Oh, what a miserable night's work that was! Our only comfort
is, Richard, that you must have committed the deed in madness."

"I did not commit it at all," he replied.

"What!" she exclaimed.

"Barbara, I swear that I am innocent; I swear I was not present when
the man was murdered; I swear that from my own positive knowledge, my
eyesight, I know no more who did it than you. The guessing at it is
enough for me; and my guess is as sure and true a one as that the moon
is in the heavens."

Barbara shivered as she drew close to him. It was a shivering subject.
"You surely do not mean to throw the guilt on Bethel?"

"Bethel!" lightly returned Richard Hare. "He had nothing to do with it.
He was after his gins and his snares, that night, though, poacher as he
is!"

"Bethel is no poacher, Richard."

"Is he not?" rejoined Richard Hare, significantly. "The truth as to what
he is may come out, some time. Not that I wish it to come out; the man
has done no harm to me, and he may go on poaching with impunity till
doomsday for all I care. He and Locksley--"

"Richard," interrupted his sister, in a hushed voice, "mamma entertains
one fixed idea, which she cannot put from her. She is certain that
Bethel had something to do with the murder."

"Then she is wrong. Why should she think so?"

"How the conviction arose at first, I cannot tell you; I do not think
she knows herself. But you remember how weak and fanciful she is,
and since that dreadful night she is always having what she calls
'dreams'--meaning that she dreams of the murder. In all these dreams
Bethel is prominent; and she says she feels an absolute certainty that
he was, in some way or other, mixed up in it."

"Barbara, he was no more mixed up in it than you."

"And--you say that you were not?"

"I was not even at the cottage at the time; I swear it to you. The man
who did the deed was Thorn."

"Thorn!" echoed Barbara, lifting her head. "Who is Thorn?"

"I don't know who. I wish I did; I wish I could unearth him. He was a
friend of Afy's."

Barbara threw back her neck with a haughty gesture. "Richard!"

"What?"

"You forget yourself when you mention that name to me."

"Well," returned Richard. "It was not to discuss these things that I put
myself in jeopardy; and to assert my innocence can do no good; it cannot
set aside the coroner's verdict of 'Wilful murder against Richard Hare,
the younger.' Is my father as bitter against me as ever?"

"Quite. He never mentions your name, or suffers it to be mentioned; he
gave his orders to the servants that it never was to be spoken in the
house again. Eliza could not, or would not remember, and she persisted
in calling your room 'Mr. Richard's.' I think the woman did it
heedlessly, not maliciously, to provoke papa; she was a good servant,
and had been with us three years you know. The first time she
transgressed, papa warned her; the second, he thundered at her as I
believe nobody else in the world can thunder; and the third he turned
her from the doors, never allowing her to get her bonnet; one of the
others carrying her bonnet and shawl to the gate, and her boxes were
sent away the same day. Papa took an oath--did you hear of it?"

"What oath? He takes many."

"This was a solemn one, Richard. After the delivery of the verdict,
he took an oath in the justice-room, in the presence of his brother
magistrates, that if he could find you he would deliver you up to
justice, and that he _would_ do it, though you might not turn up for ten
years to come. You know his disposition, Richard, and therefore may be
sure he will keep it. Indeed, it is most dangerous for you to be here."

"I know that he never treated me as he ought," cried Richard, bitterly.
"If my health was delicate, causing my poor mother to indulge me, ought
that to have been a reason for his ridiculing me on every possible
occasion, public and private? Had my home been made happier I should not
have sought the society I did elsewhere. Barbara, I must be allowed an
interview with my mother."

Barbara Hare reflected before she spoke. "I do not see how it can be
managed."

"Why can't she come out to me as you have done? Is she up, or in bed?"

"It is impossible to think of it to-night," returned Barbara in an
alarmed tone. "Papa may be in at any moment; he is spending the evening
at Beauchamp's."

"It is hard to have been separated from her for eighteen months, and to
go back without seeing her," returned Richard. "And about the money? It
is a hundred pounds that I want."

"You must be here again to-morrow night, Richard; the money, no doubt,
can be yours, but I am not so sure about your seeing mamma. I am
terrified for your safety. But, if it is as you say, that you are
innocent," she added, after a pause, "could it not be proved?"

"Who is to prove it? The evidence is strong against me; and Thorn, did I
mention him, would be as a myth to other people; nobody knew anything of
him."

"Is he a myth?" said Barbara, in a low voice.

"Are you and I myths?" retorted Richard. "So, even you doubt me?"

"Richard," she suddenly exclaimed, "why not tell the whole circumstances
to Archibald Carlyle? If any one can help you, or take measures to
establish your innocence, he can. And you know that he is true as
steel."

"There's no other man living should be trusted with the secret that I am
here, except Carlyle. Where is it they suppose that I am, Barbara?"

"Some think that you are dead; some that you are in Australia; the very
uncertainty has nearly killed mamma. A report arose that you had been
seen at Liverpool, in an Australian-bound ship, but we could not trace
it to any foundation."

"It had none. I dodged my way to London, and there I have been."

"Working in a stable-yard?"

"I could not do better. I was not brought up to anything, and I did
understand horses. Besides, a man that the police-runners were after
could be more safe in obscurity, considering that he was a gentleman,
than--"

Barbara turned suddenly, and placed her hand upon her brother's mouth.
"Be silent for your life," she whispered, "here's papa."

Voices were heard approaching the gate--those of Justice Hare and Squire
Pinner. The latter walked on; the former came in. The brother and sister
cowered together, scarcely daring to breathe; you might have heard
Barbara's heart beating. Mr. Hare closed the gate and walked on up the
path.

"I must go, Richard," said Barbara, hastily; "I dare not stay another
minute. Be here again to-morrow night, and meanwhile I will see what can
be done."

She was speeding away, but Richard held her back. "You did not seem to
believe my assertion of innocence. Barbara, we are here alone in the
still night, with God above us; as truly as that you and I must sometime
meet Him face to face, I told you the truth. It was Thorn murdered
Hallijohn, and I had nothing whatever to do with it."

Barbara broke out of the trees and flew along, but Mr. Hare was already
in, locking and barring the door. "Let me in, papa," she called out.

The justice opened the door again, and thrusting forth his flaxen wig,
his aquiline nose, and his amazed eyes, gazed at Barbara.

"Halloo! What brings you out at this time of night, young lady?"

"I went down to the gate to look for you," she panted, "and
had--had--strolled over to the side path. Did you not see me?"

Barbara was truthful by nature and habit; but in such a cause, how could
she avoid dissimulation?

"Thank you, papa," she said, as she went in.

"You ought to have been in bed an hour ago," angrily responded Mr.
Justice Hare.



CHAPTER V.

MR. CARLYLE'S OFFICE.

In the centre of West Lynne stood two houses adjoining each other, one
large, the other much smaller. The large one was the Carlyle residence,
and the small one was devoted to the Carlyle offices. The name of
Carlyle bore a lofty standing in the county; Carlyle and Davidson were
known as first-class practitioners; no pettifogging lawyers were they.
It was Carlyle & Davidson in the days gone by; now it was Archibald
Carlyle. The old firm were brothers-in-law--the first Mrs. Carlyle
having been Mr. Davidson's sister. She had died and left one child.
The second Mrs. Carlyle died when her son was born--Archibald; and his
half-sister reared him, loved him and ruled him. She bore for him all
the authority of a mother; the boy had known no other, and, when a
little child he had called her Mamma Corny. Mamma Corny had done her
duty by him, that was undoubted; but Mamma Corny had never relaxed her
rule; with an iron hand she liked to rule him now, in great things as in
small, just as she had done in the days of his babyhood. And Archibald
generally submitted, for the force of habit is strong. She was a woman
of strong sense, but, in some things, weak of judgment; and the ruling
passions of her life were love of Archibald and love of saving money.
Mr. Davidson had died earlier than Mr. Carlyle, and his fortune--he had
never married--was left equally divided between Cornelia and Archibald.
Archibald was no blood relation to him, but he loved the open-hearted
boy better than his niece Cornelia. Of Mr. Carlyle's property, a small
portion only was bequeathed to his daughter, the rest to his son; and in
this, perhaps there was justice, since the 20,000 pounds brought to
Mr. Carlyle by his second wife had been chiefly instrumental in the
accumulation of his large fortune.

Miss Carlyle, or, as she was called in town, Miss Corny, had never
married; it was pretty certain she never would; people thought that her
intense love of her young brother kept her single, for it was not likely
that the daughter of the rich Mr. Carlyle had wanted for offers. Other
maidens confess to soft and tender impressions. Not so Miss Carlyle. All
who had approached her with the lovelorn tale, she sent quickly to the
right-about.

Mr. Carlyle was seated in his own private room in his office the morning
after his return from town. His confidential clerk and manager stood
near him. It was Mr. Dill, a little, meek-looking man with a bald head.
He was on the rolls, had been admitted years and years ago, but he had
never set up for himself; perhaps he deemed the post of head manager
in the office of Carlyle & Davidson, with its substantial salary,
sufficient for his ambition; and manager he had been to them when the
present Mr. Carlyle was in long petticoats. He was a single man, and
occupied handsome apartments near.

Between the room of Mr. Carlyle and that of the clerks, was a small
square space or hall, having ingress also from the house passage;
another room opened from it, a narrow one, which was Mr. Dill's own
peculiar sanctum. Here he saw clients when Mr. Carlyle was out or
engaged, and here he issued private orders. A little window, not larger
than a pane of glass, looked out from the clerk's office; they called
it old Dill's peep-hole and wished it anywhere else, for his spectacles
might be discerned at it more frequently than was agreeable. The old
gentleman had a desk, also, in their office, and there he frequently
sat. He was sitting there, in state, this same morning, keeping a sharp
lookout around him, when the door timidly opened, and the pretty face of
Barbara Hare appeared at it, rosy with blushes.

"Can I see Mr. Carlyle?"

Mr. Dill rose from his seat and shook hands with her. She drew him into
the passage and he closed the door. Perhaps he felt surprised, for it
was _not_ the custom for ladies, young and single, to come there after
Mr. Carlyle.

"Presently, Miss Barbara. He is engaged just now. The justices are with
him."

"The justices!" uttered Barbara, in alarm; "and papa one? Whatever
shall I do? He must not see me. I would not have him see me here for the
world."

An ominous sound of talking; the justices were evidently coming forth.
Mr. Dill laid hold of Barbara, whisked her through the clerks' room,
not daring to take her the other way, lest he should encounter them, and
shut her in his own. "What the plague brought papa here at this moment?"
thought Barbara, whose face was crimson.

A few minutes and Mr. Dill opened the door again. "They are gone now,
and the coast's clear, Miss Barbara."

"I don't know what opinion you must form of me, Mr. Dill," she
whispered, "but I will tell you, in confidence, that I am here on some
private business for mamma, who was not well enough to come herself. It
is a little private matter that she does not wish papa to know of."

"Child," answered the manager, "a lawyer receives visits from many
people; and it is not the place of those about him to 'think.'"

He opened the door as he spoke, ushered her into the presence of Mr.
Carlyle, and left her. The latter rose in astonishment.

"You must regard me as a client, and pardon my intrusion," said Barbara,
with a forced laugh, to hide her agitation. "I am here on the part of
mamma--and I nearly met papa in your passage, which terrified me out of
my senses. Mr. Dill shut me into his room."