Desperate Remedies

T >> Thomas Hardy >> Desperate Remedies


The labouring men had just left work, and passed the park gate,
which opened into the street as Owen came down towards it. They
went along in a drift, earnestly talking, and were finally about to
turn in at their respective doorways. But upon seeing him they
looked significantly at one another, and paused. He came into the
road, on that side of the village-green which was opposite the row
of cottages, and turned round to the right. When Owen turned, all
eyes turned; one or two men went hurriedly indoors, and afterwards
appeared at the doorstep with their wives, who also contemplated
him, talking as they looked. They seemed uncertain how to act in
some matter.

'If they want me, surely they will call me,' he thought, wondering
more and more. He could no longer doubt that he was connected with
the subject of their discourse.

The first who approached him was a boy.

'What has occurred?' said Owen.

'O, a man ha' got crazy-religious, and sent for the pa'son.'

'Is that all?'

'Yes, sir. He wished he was dead, he said, and he's almost out of
his mind wi' wishen it so much. That was before Mr. Raunham came.'

'Who is he?' said Owen.

'Joseph Chinney, one of the railway-porters; he used to be
night-porter.'

'Ah--the man who was ill this afternoon; by the way, he was told to
come to the Old House for something, but he hasn't been. But has
anything else happened--anything that concerns the wedding to-day?'

'No, sir.'

Concluding that the connection which had seemed to be traced between
himself and the event must in some way have arisen from Cytherea's
friendliness towards the man, Owen turned about and went homewards
in a much quieter frame of mind--yet scarcely satisfied with the
solution. The route he had chosen led through the dairy-yard, and
he opened the gate.

Five minutes before this point of time, Edward Springrove was
looking over one of his father's fields at an outlying hamlet of
three or four cottages some mile and a half distant. A
turnpike-gate was close by the gate of the field.

The carrier to Casterbridge came up as Edward stepped into the road,
and jumped down from the van to pay toll. He recognized Springrove.
'This is a pretty set-to in your place, sir,' he said. 'You don't
know about it, I suppose?'

'What?' said Springrove.

The carrier paid his dues, came up to Edward, and spoke ten words in
a confidential whisper: then sprang upon the shafts of his vehicle,
gave a clinching nod of significance to Springrove, and rattled
away.

Edward turned pale with the intelligence. His first thought was,
'Bring her home!'

The next--did Owen Graye know what had been discovered? He probably
did by that time, but no risks of probability must be run by a woman
he loved dearer than all the world besides. He would at any rate
make perfectly sure that her brother was in possession of the
knowledge, by telling it him with his own lips.

Off he ran in the direction of the old manor-house.

The path was across arable land, and was ploughed up with the rest
of the field every autumn, after which it was trodden out afresh.
The thaw had so loosened the soft earth, that lumps of stiff mud
were lifted by his feet at every leap he took, and flung against him
by his rapid motion, as it were doggedly impeding him, and
increasing tenfold the customary effort of running,

But he ran on--uphill, and downhill, the same pace alike--like the
shadow of a cloud. His nearest direction, too, like Owen's, was
through the dairy-barton, and as Owen entered it he saw the figure
of Edward rapidly descending the opposite hill, at a distance of two
or three hundred yards. Owen advanced amid the cows.

The dairyman, who had hitherto been talking loudly on some absorbing
subject to the maids and men milking around him, turned his face
towards the head of the cow when Owen passed, and ceased speaking.

Owen approached him and said--

'A singular thing has happened, I hear. The man is not insane, I
suppose?'

'Not he--he's sensible enough,' said the dairyman, and paused. He
was a man noisy with his associates--stolid and taciturn with
strangers.

'Is it true that he is Chinney, the railway-porter?'

'That's the man, sir.' The maids and men sitting under the cows
were all attentively listening to this discourse, milking
irregularly, and softly directing the jets against the sides of the
pail.

Owen could contain himself no longer, much as his mind dreaded
anything of the nature of ridicule. 'The people all seem to look at
me, as if something seriously concerned me; is it this stupid
matter, or what is it?'

'Surely, sir, you know better than anybody else if such a strange
thing concerns you.'

'What strange thing?'

'Don't you know! His confessing to Parson Raunham.'

'What did he confess? Tell me.'

'If you really ha'n't heard, 'tis this. He was as usual on duty at
the station on the night of the fire last year, otherwise he
wouldn't ha' known it.'

'Known what? For God's sake tell, man!'

But at this instant the two opposite gates of the dairy-yard, one on
the east, the other on the west side, slammed almost simultaneously.

The rector from one, Springrove from the other, came striding across
the barton.

Edward was nearest, and spoke first. He said in a low voice: 'Your
sister is not legally married! His first wife is still living! How
it comes out I don't know!'

'O, here you are at last, Mr. Graye, thank Heaven!' said the rector
breathlessly. 'I have been to the Old House, and then to Miss
Aldclyffe's looking for you--something very extraordinary.' He
beckoned to Owen, afterwards included Springrove in his glance, and
the three stepped aside together.

'A porter at the station. He was a curious nervous man. He had
been in a strange state all day, but he wouldn't go home. Your
sister was kind to him, it seems, this afternoon. When she and her
husband had gone, he went on with his work, shifting luggage-vans.
Well, he got in the way, as if he were quite lost to what was going
on, and they sent him home at last. Then he wished to see me. I
went directly. There was something on his mind, he said, and told
it. About the time when the fire of last November twelvemonth was
got under, whilst he was by himself in the porter's room, almost
asleep, somebody came to the station and tried to open the door. He
went out and found the person to be the lady he had accompanied to
Carriford earlier in the evening, Mrs. Manston. She asked, when
would be another train to London? The first the next morning, he
told her, was at a quarter-past six o'clock from Budmouth, but that
it was express, and didn't stop at Carriford Road--it didn't stop
till it got to Anglebury. "How far is it to Anglebury?" she said.
He told her, and she thanked him, and went away up the line. In a
short time she ran back and took out her purse. "Don't on any
account say a word in the village or anywhere that I have been here,
or a single breath about me--I'm ashamed ever to have come." He
promised; she took out two sovereigns. "Swear it on the Testament
in the waiting-room," she said, "and I'll pay you these." He got
the book, took an oath upon it, received the money, and she left
him. He was off duty at half-past five. He has kept silence all
through the intervening time till now, but lately the knowledge he
possessed weighed heavily upon his conscience and weak mind. Yet
the nearer came the wedding-day, the more he feared to tell. The
actual marriage filled him with remorse. He says your sister's
kindness afterwards was like a knife going through his heart. He
thought he had ruined her.'

'But whatever can be done? Why didn't he speak sooner?' cried Owen.

'He actually called at my house twice yesterday,' the rector
continued, 'resolved, it seems, to unburden his mind. I was out
both times--he left no message, and, they say, he looked relieved
that his object was defeated. Then he says he resolved to come to
you at the Old House last night--started, reached the door, and
dreaded to knock--and then went home again.'

'Here will be a tale for the newsmongers of the county,' said Owen
bitterly. 'The idea of his not opening his mouth sooner--the
criminality of the thing!'

'Ah, that's the inconsistency of a weak nature. But now that it is
put to us in this way, how much more probable it seems that she
should have escaped than have been burnt--'

'You will, of course, go straight to Mr. Manston, and ask him what
it all means?' Edward interrupted.

'Of course I shall! Manston has no right to carry off my sister
unless he's her husband,' said Owen. 'I shall go and separate
them.'

'Certainly you will,' said the rector.

'Where's the man?'

'In his cottage.'

''Tis no use going to him, either. I must go off at once and
overtake them--lay the case before Manston, and ask him for
additional and certain proofs of his first wife's death. An
up-train passes soon, I think.'

'Where have they gone?' said Edward.

'To Paris--as far as Southampton this afternoon, to proceed
to-morrow morning.'

'Where in Southampton?'

'I really don't know--some hotel. I only have their Paris address.
But I shall find them by making a few inquiries.'

The rector had in the meantime been taking out his pocket-book, and
now opened it at the first page, whereon it was his custom every
month to gum a small railway time-table--cut from the local
newspaper.

'The afternoon express is just gone,' he said, holding open the
page, 'and the next train to Southampton passes at ten minutes to
six o'clock. Now it wants--let me see--five-and-forty minutes to
that time. Mr. Graye, my advice is that you come with me to the
porter's cottage, where I will shortly write out the substance of
what he has said, and get him to sign it. You will then have far
better grounds for interfering between Mr. and Mrs. Manston than if
you went to them with a mere hearsay story.'

The suggestion seemed a good one. 'Yes, there will be time before
the train starts,' said Owen.

Edward had been musing restlessly.

'Let me go to Southampton in your place, on account of your
lameness?' he said suddenly to Graye.

'I am much obliged to you, but I think I can scarcely accept the
offer,' returned Owen coldly. 'Mr. Manston is an honourable man,
and I had much better see him myself.'

'There is no doubt,' said Mr. Raunham, 'that the death of his wife
was fully believed in by himself.'

'None whatever,' said Owen; 'and the news must be broken to him, and
the question of other proofs asked, in a friendly way. It would not
do for Mr. Springrove to appear in the case at all.' He still spoke
rather coldly; the recollection of the attachment between his sister
and Edward was not a pleasant one to him.

'You will never find them,' said Edward. 'You have never been to
Southampton, and I know every house there.'

'That makes little difference,' said the rector; 'he will have a
cab. Certainly Mr. Graye is the proper man to go on the errand.'

'Stay; I'll telegraph to ask them to meet me when I arrive at the
terminus,' said Owen; 'that is, if their train has not already
arrived.'

Mr. Raunham pulled out his pocket-book again. 'The two-thirty train
reached Southampton a quarter of an hour ago,' he said.

It was too late to catch them at the station. Nevertheless, the
rector suggested that it would be worth while to direct a message to
'all the respectable hotels in Southampton,' on the chance of its
finding them, and thus saving a deal of personal labour to Owen in
searching about the place.

'I'll go and telegraph, whilst you return to the man,' said Edward
--an offer which was accepted. Graye and the rector then turned off
in the direction of the porter's cottage.

Edward, to despatch the message at once, hurriedly followed the road
towards the station, still restlessly thinking. All Owen's
proceedings were based on the assumption, natural under the
circumstances, of Manston's good faith, and that he would readily
acquiesce in any arrangement which should clear up the mystery.
'But,' thought Edward, 'suppose--and Heaven forgive me, I cannot
help supposing it--that Manston is not that honourable man, what
will a young and inexperienced fellow like Owen do? Will he not be
hoodwinked by some specious story or another, framed to last till
Manston gets tired of poor Cytherea? And then the disclosure of the
truth will ruin and blacken both their futures irremediably.'

However, he proceeded to execute his commission. This he put in the
form of a simple request from Owen to Manston, that Manston would
come to the Southampton platform, and wait for Owen's arrival, as he
valued his reputation. The message was directed as the rector had
suggested, Edward guaranteeing to the clerk who sent it off that
every expense connected with the search would be paid.

No sooner had the telegram been despatched than his heart sank
within him at the want of foresight shown in sending it. Had
Manston, all the time, a knowledge that his first wife lived, the
telegram would be a forewarning which might enable him to defeat
Owen still more signally.

Whilst the machine was still giving off its multitudinous series of
raps, Edward heard a powerful rush under the shed outside, followed
by a long sonorous creak. It was a train of some sort, stealing
softly into the station, and it was an up-train. There was the ring
of a bell. It was certainly a passenger train.

Yet the booking-office window was closed.

'Ho, ho, John, seventeen minutes after time and only three stations
up the line. The incline again?' The voice was the stationmaster's,
and the reply seemed to come from the guard.

'Yes, the other side of the cutting. The thaw has made it all in a
perfect cloud of fog, and the rails are as slippery as glass. We
had to bring them through the cutting at twice.'

'Anybody else for the four-forty-five express?' the voice continued.
The few passengers, having crossed over to the other side long
before this time, had taken their places at once.

A conviction suddenly broke in upon Edward's mind; then a wish
overwhelmed him. The conviction--as startling as it was sudden--was
that Manston was a villain, who at some earlier time had discovered
that his wife lived, and had bribed her to keep out of sight, that
he might possess Cytherea. The wish was--to proceed at once by this
very train that was starting, find Manston before he would expect
from the words of the telegram (if he got it) that anybody from
Carriford could be with him--charge him boldly with the crime, and
trust to his consequent confusion (if he were guilty) for a solution
of the extraordinary riddle, and the release of Cytherea!

The ticket-office had been locked up at the expiration of the time
at which the train was due. Rushing out as the guard blew his
whistle, Edward opened the door of a carriage and leapt in. The
train moved along, and he was soon out of sight.

Springrove had long since passed that peculiar line which lies
across the course of falling in love--if, indeed, it may not be
called the initial itself of the complete passion--a longing to
cherish; when the woman is shifted in a man's mind from the region
of mere admiration to the region of warm fellowship. At this
assumption of her nature, she changes to him in tone, hue, and
expression. All about the loved one that said 'She' before, says
'We' now. Eyes that were to be subdued become eyes to be feared
for: a brain that was to be probed by cynicism becomes a brain that
is to be tenderly assisted; feet that were to be tested in the dance
become feet that are not to be distressed; the once-criticized
accent, manner, and dress, become the clients of a special pleader.

6. FIVE TO EIGHT O'CLOCK P.M.

Now that he was fairly on the track, and had begun to cool down,
Edward remembered that he had nothing to show--no legal authority
whatever to question Manston or interfere between him and Cytherea
as husband and wife. He now saw the wisdom of the rector in
obtaining a signed confession from the porter. The document would
not be a death-bed confession--perhaps not worth anything legally
--but it would be held by Owen; and he alone, as Cytherea's natural
guardian, could separate them on the mere ground of an unproved
probability, or what might perhaps be called the hallucination of an
idiot. Edward himself, however, was as firmly convinced as the
rector had been of the truth of the man's story, and paced backward
and forward the solitary compartment as the train wound through the
dark heathery plains, the mazy woods, and moaning coppices, as
resolved as ever to pounce on Manston, and charge him with the crime
during the critical interval between the reception of the telegram
and the hour at which Owen's train would arrive--trusting to
circumstances for what he should say and do afterwards, but making
up his mind to be a ready second to Owen in any emergency that might
arise.

At thirty-three minutes past seven he stood on the platform of the
station at Southampton--a clear hour before the train containing
Owen could possibly arrive.

Making a few inquiries here, but too impatient to pursue his
investigation carefully and inductively, he went into the town.

At the expiration of another half-hour he had visited seven
hotels and inns, large and small, asking the same questions at
each, and always receiving the same reply--nobody of that name,
or answering to that description, had been there. A boy from the
telegraph-office had called, asking for the same persons, if they
recollected rightly.

He reflected awhile, struck again by a painful thought that they
might possibly have decided to cross the Channel by the night-boat.
Then he hastened off to another quarter of the town to pursue his
inquiries among hotels of the more old-fashioned and quiet class.
His stained and weary appearance obtained for him but a modicum of
civility, wherever he went, which made his task yet more difficult.
He called at three several houses in this neighbourhood, with the
same result as before. He entered the door of the fourth house
whilst the clock of the nearest church was striking eight.

'Have a tall gentleman named Manston, and a young wife arrived here
this evening?' he asked again, in words which had grown odd to his
ears from very familiarity.

'A new-married couple, did you say?'

'They are, though I didn't say so.'

'They have taken a sitting-room and bedroom, number thirteen.'

'Are they indoors?'

'I don't know. Eliza!'

'Yes, m'm.'

'See if number thirteen is in--that gentleman and his wife.'

'Yes, m'm.'

'Has any telegram come for them?' said Edward, when the maid had
gone on her errand.

'No--nothing that I know of.'

'Somebody did come and ask if a Mr. and Mrs. Masters, or some such
name, were here this evening,' said another voice from the back of
the bar-parlour.

'And did they get the message?'

'Of course they did not--they were not here--they didn't come till
half-an-hour after that. The man who made inquiries left no
message. I told them when they came that they, or a name something
like theirs, had been asked for, but they didn't seem to understand
why it should be, and so the matter dropped.'

The chambermaid came back. 'The gentleman is not in, but the lady
is. Who shall I say?'

'Nobody,' said Edward. For it now became necessary to reflect upon
his method of proceeding. His object in finding their whereabouts
--apart from the wish to assist Owen--had been to see Manston, ask
him flatly for an explanation, and confirm the request of the message
in the presence of Cytherea--so as to prevent the possibility of the
steward's palming off a story upon Cytherea, or eluding her brother
when he came. But here were two important modifications of the
expected condition of affairs. The telegram had not been received,
and Cytherea was in the house alone.

He hesitated as to the propriety of intruding upon her in Manston's
absence. Besides, the women at the bottom of the stairs would see
him--his intrusion would seem odd--and Manston might return at any
moment. He certainly might call, and wait for Manston with the
accusation upon his tongue, as he had intended. But it was a
doubtful course. That idea had been based upon the assumption that
Cytherea was not married. If the first wife were really dead after
all--and he felt sick at the thought--Cytherea as the steward's wife
might in after-years--perhaps, at once--be subjected to indignity
and cruelty on account of an old lover's interference now.

Yes, perhaps the announcement would come most properly and safely
for her from her brother Owen, the time of whose arrival had almost
expired.

But, on turning round, he saw that the staircase and passage were
quite deserted. He and his errand had as completely died from the
minds of the attendants as if they had never been. There was
absolutely nothing between him and Cytherea's presence. Reason was
powerless now; he must see her--right or wrong, fair or unfair to
Manston--offensive to her brother or no. His lips must be the first
to tell the alarming story to her. Who loved her as he! He went
back lightly through the hall, up the stairs, two at a time, and
followed the corridor till he came to the door numbered thirteen.

He knocked softly: nobody answered.

There was no time to lose if he would speak to Cytherea before
Manston came. He turned the handle of the door and looked in. The
lamp on the table burned low, and showed writing materials open
beside it; the chief light came from the fire, the direct rays of
which were obscured by a sweet familiar outline of head and
shoulders--still as precious to him as ever.

7. A QUARTER-PAST EIGHT O'CLOCK P.M.

There is an attitude--approximatively called pensive--in which the
soul of a human being, and especially of a woman, dominates
outwardly and expresses its presence so strongly, that the
intangible essence seems more apparent than the body itself. This
was Cytherea's expression now. What old days and sunny eves at
Budmouth Bay was she picturing? Her reverie had caused her not to
notice his knock.

'Cytherea!' he said softly.

She let drop her hand, and turned her head, evidently thinking that
her visitor could be no other than Manston, yet puzzled at the
voice.

There was no preface on Springrove's tongue; he forgot his position
--hers--that he had come to ask quietly if Manston had other proofs
of being a widower--everything--and jumped to a conclusion.

'You are not his wife, Cytherea--come away, he has a wife living!'
he cried in an agitated whisper. 'Owen will be here directly.'

She started up, recognized the tidings first, the bearer of them
afterwards. 'Not his wife? O, what is it--what--who is living?'
She awoke by degrees. 'What must I do? Edward, it is you! Why did
you come? Where is Owen?'

'What has Manston shown you in proof of the death of his other wife?
Tell me quick.'

'Nothing--we have never spoken of the subject. Where is my brother
Owen? I want him, I want him!'

'He is coming by-and-by. Come to the station to meet him--do,'
implored Springrove. 'If Mr. Manston comes, he will keep you from
me: I am nobody,' he added bitterly, feeling the reproach her words
had faintly shadowed forth.

'Mr. Manston is only gone out to post a letter he has just written,'
she said, and without being distinctly cognizant of the action, she
wildly looked for her bonnet and cloak, and began putting them on,
but in the act of fastening them uttered a spasmodic cry.

'No, I'll not go out with you,' she said, flinging the articles down
again. Running to the door she flitted along the passage, and
downstairs.

'Give me a private room--quite private,' she said breathlessly to
some one below.

'Number twelve is a single room, madam, and unoccupied,' said some
tongue in astonishment.

Without waiting for any person to show her into it, Cytherea hurried
upstairs again, brushed through the corridor, entered the room
specified, and closed the door. Edward heard her sob out--

'Nobody but Owen shall speak to me--nobody!'

'He will be here directly,' said Springrove, close against the
panel, and then went towards the stairs. He had seen her; it was
enough.

He descended, stepped into the street, and hastened to meet Owen at
the railway-station.

As for the poor maiden who had received the news, she knew not what
to think. She listened till the echo of Edward's footsteps had died
away, then bowed her face upon the bed. Her sudden impulse had been
to escape from sight. Her weariness after the unwonted strain,
mental and bodily, which had been put upon her by the scenes she had
passed through during the long day, rendered her much more timid and
shaken by her position than she would naturally have been. She
thought and thought of that single fact which had been told her
--that the first Mrs. Manston was still living--till her brain seemed
ready to burst its confinement with excess of throbbing. It was
only natural that she should, by degrees, be unable to separate the
discovery, which was matter of fact, from the suspicion of treachery
on her husband's part, which was only matter of inference. And thus
there arose in her a personal fear of him.