Man and Wife Read online

reason."

  "I'll try the next page," said Arnold. "I can't have read that

  before--for I haven't turned over yet."

  Blanche threw herself back in her chair, and flung her

  handkerchief resignedly over her face. "The flies," she

  explained. "I'm not going to sleep. Try the next page. Oh, dear

  me, try the next page!"

  Arnold proceeded:

  "Say first for heaven hides nothing from thy view.

  Nor the deep tract of hell say first what cause.

  Moved our grand parents in that happy state--"

  Blanche suddenly threw the handkerchief off again, and sat bolt

  upright in her chair. "Shut it up," she cried. "I can't bear any

  more. Leave off, Arnold--leave off!"

  "What's, the matter now?"

  " 'That happy state,' " said Blanche. "What does 'that happy

  state' mean? Marriage, of course! And marriage reminds me of

  Anne. I won't have any more. Paradise Lost is painful. Shut it

  up. Well, my next question to Sir Patrick was, of course, to know

  what he thought Anne's husband had done. The wretch had behaved

  infamously to her in some way. In what way? Was it any thing to

  do with her marriage? My uncle considered again. He thought it

  quite possible. Private marriages were dangerous things (he

  said)--especially in Scotland. He asked me if they had been

  married in Scotland. I couldn't tell him--I only said, 'Suppose

  they were? What then?' 'It's barely possible, in that case,' says

  Sir Patrick, 'that Miss Silvester may be feeling uneasy about her

  marriage. She may even have reason--or may think she has

  reason--to doubt whether it is a marriage at all.' "

  Arnold started, and looked round at Geoffrey still sitting at the

  writing-table with his back turned on them. Utterly as Blanche

  and Sir Patrick were mistaken in their estimate of Anne's

  position at Craig Fernie, they had drifted, nevertheless, into

  discussing the very question in which Geoffrey and Miss Silvester

  were interested--the question of marriage in Scotland. It was

  impossible in Blanche's presence to tell Geoffrey that he might

  do well to listen to Sir Patrick's opinion, even at second-hand.

  Perhaps the words had found their way to him? perhaps he was

  listening already, of his own accord?

  (He _was_ listening. Blanche's last words had found their way to

  him, while he was pondering over his half-finished letter to his

  brother. He waited to hear more--without moving, and with the pen

  suspended in his hand.)

  Blanche proceeded, absently winding her fingers in and out of

  Arnold's hair as he sat at her feet:

  "It flashed on me instantly that Sir Patrick had discovered the

  truth. Of course I told him so. He laughed, and said I mustn't

  jump at conclusions We were guessing quite in the dark; and all

  the distressing things I had noticed at the inn might admit of

  some totally different explanation. He would have gone on

  splitting straws in that provoking way the whole morning if I

  hadn't stopped him. I was strictly logical. I said _I_ had seen

  Anne, and _he_ hadn't--and that made all the difference. I said,

  'Every thing that puzzled and frightened me in the poor darling

  is accounted for now. The law must, and shall, reach that man,

  uncle--and I'll pay for it!' I was so much in earnest that I

  believe I cried a little. What do you think the dear old man did?

  He took me on his knee and gave me a kiss; and he said, in the

  nicest way, that he would adopt my view, for the present, if I

  would promise not to cry any more; and--wait! the cream of it is

  to come!--that he would put the view in quite a new light to me

  as soon as I was composed again. You may imagine how soon I dried

  my eyes, and what a picture of composure I presented in the

  course of half a minute. 'Let us take it for granted,' says Sir

  Patrick, 'that this man unknown has really tried to deceive Miss

  Silvester, as you and I suppose. I can tell you one thing: it's

  as likely as not that, in trying to overreach _her,_ he may

  (without in the least suspecting it) have ended in overreaching

  himself.' "

  (Geoffrey held his breath. The pen dropped unheeded from his

  fingers. It was coming. The light that his brother couldn't throw

  on the subject was dawning on it at last!)

  Blanche resumed:

  "I was so interested, and it made such a tremendous impression on

  me, that I haven't forgotten a word. 'I mustn't make that poor

  little head of yours ache with Scotch law,' my uncle said; 'I

  must put it plainly. There are marriages allowed in Scotland,

  Blanche, which are called Irregular Marriages--and very

  abominable things they are. But they have this accidental merit

  in the present case. It is extremely difficult for a man to

  pretend to marry in Scotland, and not really to do it. And it is,

  on the other hand, extremely easy for a man to drift into

  marrying in Scotland without feeling the slightest suspicion of

  having done it himself.' That was exactly what he said, Arnold.

  When _we_ are married, it sha'n't be in Scotland!"

  (Geoffrey's ruddy color paled. If this was true he might be

  caught himself in the trap which he had schemed to set for Anne!

  Blanche went on with her narrative. He waited and listened.)

  "My uncle asked me if I understood him so far. It was as plain as

  the sun at noonday, of course I understood him! 'Very well,

  then--now for the application!' says Sir Patrick. 'Once more

  supposing our guess to be the right one, Miss Silvester may be

  making herself very unhappy without any real cause. If this

  invisible man at Craig Fernie has actually meddled, I won't say

  with marrying her, but only with pretending to make her his wife,

  and if he has attempted it in Scotland, the chances are nine to

  one (though _he_ may not believe it, and though _she_ may not

  believe it) that he has really married her, after all.' My

  uncle's own words again! Quite needless to say that, half an hour

  after they were out of his lips, I had sent them to Craig Fernie

  in a letter to Anne!"

  (Geoffrey's stolidly-staring eyes suddenly brightened. A light of

  the devil's own striking illuminated him. An idea of the devil's

  own bringing entered his mind. He looked stealthily round at the

  man whose life he had saved--at the man who had devotedly served

  him in return. A hideous cunning leered at his mouth and peeped

  out of his eyes. "Arnold Brinkworth pretended to be married to

  her at the inn. By the lord Harry! that's a way out of it that

  never struck me before!" With that thought in his heart he turned

  back again to his half-finished letter to Julius. For once in his

  life he was strongly, fiercely agitated. For once in his life he

  was daunted--and that by his Own Thought! He had written to

  Julius under a strong sense of the necessity of gaining time to

  delude Anne into leaving Scotland before he ventured on paying

  his addresses to Mrs. Glenarm. His letter contained a string of

  clumsy excuses, intended to delay his return to his brother's

  hou
se. "No," he said to himself, as he read it again. "Whatever

  else may do--_this_ won't! " He looked round once more at Arnold,

  and slowly tore the letter into fragments as he looked.)

  In the mean time Blanche had not done yet. "No," she said, when

  Arnold proposed an adjournment to the garden; "I have something

  more to say, and you are interested in it, this time." Arnold

  resigned himself to listen, and worse still to answer, if there

  was no help for it, in the character of an innocent stranger who

  had never been near the Craig Fernie inn.

  "Well," Blanche resumed, "and what do you think has come of my

  letter to Anne?"

  "I'm sure I don't know."

  "Nothing has come of it!"

  "Indeed?"

  "Absolutely nothing! I know she received the letter yesterday

  morning. I ought to have had the answer to-day at breakfast."

  "Perhaps she thought it didn't require an answer."

  "She couldn't have thought that, for reasons that I know of.

  Besides, in my letter yesterday I implored her to tell me (if it

  was one line only) whether, in guessing at what her trouble was,

  Sir Patrick and I had not guessed right. And here is the day

  getting on, and no answer! What am I to conclude?"

  "I really can't say!"

  "Is it possible, Arnold, that we have _not_ guessed right, after

  all? Is the wickedness of that man who blew the candles out

  wickedness beyond our discovering? The doubt is so dreadful that

  I have made up my mind not to bear it after to-day. I count on

  your sympathy and assistance when to-morrow comes!"

  Arnold's heart sank. Some new complication was evidently

  gathering round him. He waited in silence to hear the worst.

  Blanche bent forward, and whispered to him.

  "This is a secret," she said. "If that creature at the

  writing-table has ears for any thing but rowing and racing, he

  mustn't hear this! Anne may come to me privately to-day while you

  are all at luncheon. If she doesn't come and if I don't hear from

  her, then the mystery of her silence must be cleared up; and You

  must do it!"

  "I!"

  "Don't make difficulties! If you can't find your way to Craig

  Fernie, I can help you. As for Anne, you know what a charming

  person she is, and you know she will receive you perfectly, for

  my sake. I must and will have some news of her. I can't break the

  laws of the household a second time. Sir Patrick sympathizes, but

  he won't stir. Lady Lundie is a bitter enemy. The servants are

  threatened with the loss of their places if any one of them goes

  near Anne. There is nobody but you. And to Anne you go to-morrow,

  if I don't see her or hear from her to-day!"

  This to the man who had passed as Anne's husband at the inn, and

  who had been forced into the most intimate knowledge of Anne's

  miserable secret! Arnold rose to put Milton away, with the

  composure of sheer despair. Any other secret he might, in the

  last resort, have confided to the discretion of a third person.

  But a woman's secret--with a woman's reputation depending on his

  keeping it--was not to be confided to any body, under any stress

  of circumstances whatever. "If Geoffrey doesn't get me out of

  _this,_," he thought, "I shall have no choice but to leave

  Windygates to-morrow."

  As he replaced the book on the shelf, Lady Lundie entered the

  library from the garden.

  "What are you doing here?" she said to her step-daughter.

  "Improving my mind," replied Blanche. "Mr. Brinkworth and I have

  been reading Milton."

  "Can you condescend so far, after reading Milton all the morning,

  as to help me with the invitations for the dinner next week?"

  "If _you_ can condescend, Lady Lundie, after feeding the poultry

  all the morning, I must be humility itself after only reading

  Milton!"

  With that little interchange of the acid amenities of feminine

  intercourse, step-mother and step-daughter withdrew to a

  writing-table, to put the virtue of hospitality in practice

  together.

  Arnold joined his friend at the other end of the library.

  Geoffrey was sitting with his elbows on the desk, and his

  clenched fists dug into his cheeks. Great drops of perspiration

  stood on his forehead, and the fragments of a torn letter lay

  scattered all round him. He exhibited symptoms of nervous

  sensibility for the first time in his life--he started when

  Arnold spoke to him.

  "What's the matter, Geoffrey?"

  "A letter to answer. And I don't know how."

  "From Miss Silvester?" asked Arnold, dropping his voice so as to

  prevent the ladies at the other end of the room from hearing him.

  "No," answered Geoffrey, in a lower voice still.

  "Have you heard what Blanche has been saying to me about Miss

  Silvester?"

  "Some of it."

  "Did you hear Blanche say that she meant to send me to Craig

  Fernie to-morrow, if she failed to get news from Miss Silvester

  to-day?"

  "No."

  "Then you know it now. That is what Blanche has just said to me."

  "Well?"

  "Well--there's a limit to what a man can expect even from his

  best friend. I hope you won't ask me to be Blanche's messenger

  to-morrow. I can't, and won't, go back to the inn as things are

  now."

  "You have had enough of it--eh?"

  "I have had enough of distressing Miss Silvester, and more than

  enough of deceiving Blanche."

  "What do you mean by 'distressing Miss Silvester?' "

  "She doesn't take the same easy view that you and I do, Geoffrey,

  of my passing her off on the people of the inn as my wife."

  Geoffrey absently took up a paper-knife. Still with his head

  down, he began shaving off the topmost layer of paper from the

  blotting-pad under his hand. Still with his head down, he

  abruptly broke the silence in a whisper.

  "I say!"

  "Yes?"

  "How did you manage to pass her off as your wife?"

  "I told you how, as we were driving from the station here."

  "I was thinking of something else. Tell me again."

  Arnold told him once more what had happened at the inn. Geoffrey

  listened, without making any remark. He balanced the paper-knife

  vacantly on one of his fingers. He was strangely sluggish and

  strangely silent.

  "All _that_ is done and ended," said Arnold shaking him by the

  shoulder. "It rests with you now to get me out of the difficulty

  I'm placed in with Blanche. Things must be settled with Miss

  Silvester to-day."

  "Things _shall_ be settled."

  "Shall be? What are you waiting for?"

  "I'm waiting to do what you told me."

  "What I told you?"

  "Didn't you tell me to consult Sir Patrick before I married her?"

  "To be sure! so I did."

  "Well--I am waiting for a chance with Sir Patrick."

  "And then?"

  "And then--" He looked at Arnold for the first time. "Then," he

  said, "you may consider it settled."

  "The marriage?"

  He suddenly looked down again at the blotting-pad. "Yes--th
e

  marriage."

  Arnold offered his hand in congratulation. Geoffrey never noticed

  it. His eyes were off the blotting-pad again. He was looking out

  of the window near him.

  "Don't I hear voices outside?" he asked.

  "I believe our friends are in the garden," said Arnold. "Sir

  Patrick may be among them. I'll go and see."

  The instant his back was turned Geoffrey snatched up a sheet of

  note-paper. "Before I forget it!" he said to himself. He wrote

  the word "Memorandum" at the top of the page, and added these

  lines beneath it:

  "He asked for her by the name of his wife at the door. He said,

  at dinner, before the landlady and the waiter, 'I take these

  rooms for my wife.' He made _her_ say he was her husband at the

  same time. After that he stopped all night. What do the lawyers

  call this in Scotland?--(Query: a marriage?)"

  After folding up the paper he hesitated for a moment. "No!" he

  thought, "It won't do to trust to what Miss Lundie said about it.

  I can't be certain till I have consulted Sir Patrick himself."

  He put the paper away in his pocket, and wiped the heavy

  perspiration from his forehead. He was pale--for _him,_

  strikingly pale--when Arnold came back.

  "Any thing wrong, Geoffrey?--you're as white as ashes."

  "It's the heat. Where's Sir Patrick?"

  "You may see for yourself."

  Arnold pointed to the window. Sir Patrick was crossing the lawn,

  on his way to the library with a newspaper in his hand; and the

  guests at Windygates were accompanying him. Sir Patrick was

  smiling, and saying nothing. The guests were talking excitedly at

  the tops of their voices. There had apparently been a collision

  of some kind between the old school and the new. Arnold directed

  Geoffrey's attention to the state of affairs on the lawn.

  "How are you to consult Sir Patrick with all those people about

  him?"

  "I'll consult Sir Patrick, if I take him by the scruff of the

  neck and carry him into the next county!" He rose to his feet as

  he spoke those words, and emphasized them under his breath with

  an oath.

  Sir Patrick entered the library, with the guests at his heels.

  CHAPTER THE NINETEENTH.

  CLOSE ON IT.

  THE object of the invasion of the library by the party in the

  garden appeared to be twofold.

  Sir Patrick had entered the room to restore the newspaper to the

  place from which he had taken it. The guests, to the number of

  five, had followed him, to appeal in a body to Geoffrey Delamayn.

  Between these two apparently dissimilar motives there was a

  connection, not visible on the surface, which was now to assert

  itself.

  Of the five guests, two were middle-aged gentlemen belonging to

  that large, but indistinct, division of the human family whom the

  hand of Nature has painted in unobtrusive neutral tint. They had

  absorbed the ideas of their time with such receptive capacity as

  they possessed; and they occupied much the same place in society

  which the chorus in an opera occupies on the stage. They echoed

  the prevalent sentiment of the moment; and they gave the

  solo-talker time to fetch his breath.

  The three remaining guests were on the right side of thirty. All

  profoundly versed in horse-racing, in athletic sports, in pipes,

  beer, billiards, and betting. All profoundly ignorant of every

  thing else under the sun. All gentlemen by birth, and all marked

  as such by the stamp of "a University education." They may be

  personally described as faint reflections of Geoffrey; and they

  may be numerically distinguished (in the absence of all other

  distinction) as One, Two, and Three.

  Sir Patrick laid the newspaper on the table and placed himself in

  one of the comfortable arm-chairs. He was instantly assailed, in

  his domestic capacity, by his irrepressible sister-in-law. Lady