Man and Wife Page 58
desire, kept out of view
among the crowd; and he decided on walking back by himself. The
separation from Blanche had changed him in all his habits. He
asked but two favors during the interval which was to elapse
before he saw his wife again--to be allowed to bear it in his own
way, and to be left alone.
Relieved of the oppression which had kept him silent while the
race was in progress, Sir Patrick put a question to the surgeon
as they drove home, which had been in his mind from the moment
when Geoffrey had lost the day.
"I hardly understand the anxiety you showed about Delamayn," he
said, "when you found that he had only fainted under the fatigue.
Was it something more than a common fainting fit?"
"It is useless to conceal it now," replied Mr. Speedwell. "He has
had a narrow escape from a paralytic stroke."
"Was that what you dreaded when you spoke to him at Windygates?"
"That was what I saw in his face when I gave him the warning. I
was right, so far. I was wrong in my estimate of the reserve of
vital power left in him. When he dropped on the race-course, I
firmly believed we should find him a dead man."
"Is it hereditary paralysis? His father's last illness was of
that sort."
Mr. Speedwell smiled. "Hereditary paralysis?" he repeated. "Why
the man is (naturally) a phenomenon of health and strength--in
the prime of his life. Hereditary paralysis might have found him
out thirty years hence. His rowing and his running, for the last
four years, are alone answerable for what has happened to-day."
Sir Patrick ventured on a suggestion.
"Surely," he said, "with your name to compel attention to it, you
ought to make this public--as a warning to others?"
"It would be quite useless. Delamayn is far from being the first
man who has dropped at foot-racing, under the cruel stress laid
on the vital organs. The public have a happy knack of forgetting
these accidents. They would be quite satisfied when they found
the other man (who happens to have got through it) produced as a
sufficient answer to me."
Anne Silvester's future was still dwelling on Sir Patrick's mind.
His next inquiry related to the serious subject of Geoffrey's
prospect of recovery in the time to come.
"He will never recover," said Mr. Speedwell. "Paralysis is
hanging over him. How long he may live it is impossible for me to
say. Much depends on himself. In his condition, any new
imprudence, any violent emotion, may kill him at a moment's
notice."
"If no accident happens," said Sir Patrick, "will he be
sufficiently himself again to leave his bed and go out?"
"Certainly."
"He has an appointment that I know of for Saturday next. Is it
likely that he will be able to keep it?"
"Quite likely."
Sir Patrick said no more. Anne's face was before him again at the
memorable moment when he had told her that she was Geoffrey's
wife.
FOURTEENTH SCENE.--PORTLAND PLACE.
CHAPTER THE FORTY-SIXTH.
A SCOTCH MARRIAGE.
IT was Saturday, the third of October--the day on which the
assertion of Arnold's marriage to Anne Silvester was to be put to
the proof.
Toward two o'clock in the afternoon Blanche and her step-mother
entered the drawing-room of Lady Lundie's town house in Portland
Place.
Since the previous evening the weather had altered for the worse.
The rain, which had set in from an early hour that morning, still
fell. Viewed from the drawing-room windows, the desolation of
Portland Place in the dead season wore its aspect of deepest
gloom. The dreary opposite houses were all shut up; the black mud
was inches deep in the roadway; the soot, floating in tiny black
particles, mixed with the falling rain, and heightened the dirty
obscurity of the rising mist. Foot-passengers and vehicles,
succeeding each other at rare intervals, left great gaps of
silence absolutely uninterrupted by sound. Even the grinders of
organs were mute; and the wandering dogs of the street were too
wet to bark. Looking back from the view out of Lady Lundie's
state windows to the view in Lady Lundie's state room, the
melancholy that reigned without was more than matched by the
melancholy that reigned within. The house had been shut up for
the season: it had not been considered necessary, during its
mistress's brief visit, to disturb the existing state of things.
Coverings of dim brown hue shrouded the furniture. The
chandeliers hung invisible in enormous bags. The silent clocks
hibernated under extinguishers dropped over them two months
since. The tables, drawn up in corners--loaded with ornaments at
other times--had nothing but pen, ink, and paper (suggestive of
the coming proceedings) placed on them now. The smell of the
house was musty; the voice of the house was still. One melancholy
maid haunted the bedrooms up stairs, like a ghost. One melancholy
man, appointed to admit the visitors, sat solitary in the lower
regions--the last of the flunkies, mouldering in an extinct
servants' hall. Not a word passed, in the drawing-room, between
Lady Lundie and Blanche. Each waited the appearance of the
persons concerned in the coming inquiry, absorbed in her own
thoughts. Their situation at the moment was a solemn burlesque of
the situation of two ladies who are giving an evening party, and
who are waiting to receive their guests. Did neither of them see
this? Or, seeing it, did they shrink from acknowledging it? In
similar positions, who does not shrink? The occasions are many on
which we have excellent reason to laugh when the tears are in our
eyes; but only children are bold enough to follow the impulse. So
strangely, in human existence, does the mockery of what is
serious mingle with the serious reality itself, that nothing but
our own self-respect preserves our gravity at some of the most
important emergencies in our lives. The two ladies waited the
coming ordeal together gravely, as became the occasion. The
silent maid flitted noiseless up stairs. The silent man waited
motionless in the lower regions. Outside, the street was a
desert. Inside, the house was a tomb.
The church clock struck the hour. Two.
At the same moment the first of the persons concerned in the
investigation arrived.
Lady Lundie waited composedly for the opening of the drawing-room
door. Blanche started, and trembled. Was it Arnold? Was it Anne?
The door opened--and Blanche drew a breath of relief. The first
arrival was only Lady Lundie's solicitor--invited to attend the
proceedings on her ladyship's behalf. He was one of that large
class of purely mechanical and perfectly mediocre persons
connected with the practice of the law who will probably, in a
more advanced state of science, be superseded by machinery. He
made himself useful in altering the arrangement of the tables and
chairs, so as to keep the contending parties effectually
in mind that he knew nothing of Scotch law, and that he was there
in the capacity of a friend only. This done, he sat down, and
looked out with silent interest at the rain--as if it was an
operation of Nature which he had never had an opportunity of
inspecting before.
The next knock at the door heralded the arrival of a visitor of a
totally different order. The melancholy man-servant announced
Captain Newenden.
Possibly, in deference to the occasion, possibly, in defiance of
the weather, the captain had taken another backward step toward
the days of his youth. He was painted and padded, wigged and
dressed, to represent the abstract idea of a male human being of
five-and twenty in robust health. There might have been a little
stiffness in the region of the waist, and a slight want of
firmness in the eyelid and the chin. Otherwise there was the
fiction of five-and twenty, founded in appearance on the fact of
five-and-thirty--with the truth invisible behind it, counting
seventy years! Wearing a flower in his buttonhole, and carrying a
jaunty little cane in his hand--brisk, rosy, smiling,
perfumed--the captain's appearance brightened the dreary room. It
was pleasantly suggestive of a morning visit from an idle young
man. He appeared to be a little surprised to find Blanche present
on the scene of approaching conflict. Lady Lundie thought it due
to herself to explain. "My s tep-daughter is here in direct
defiance of my entreaties and my advice. Persons may present
themselves whom it is, in my opinion, improper she should see.
Revelations will take place which no young woman, in her
position, should hear. She insists on it, Captain Newenden--and I
am obliged to submit."
The captain shrugged his shoulders, and showed his beautiful
teeth.
Blanche was far too deeply interested in the coming ordeal to
care to defend herself: she looked as if she had not even heard
what her step-mother had said of her. The solicitor remained
absorbed in the interesting view of the falling rain. Lady Lundie
asked after Mrs. Glenarm. The captain, in reply, described his
niece's anxiety as something--something--something, in short,
only to be indicated by shaking his ambrosial curls and waving
his jaunty cane. Mrs. Delamayn was staying with her until her
uncle returned with the news. And where was Julius? Detained in
Scotland by election business. And Lord and Lady Holchester? Lord
and Lady Holchester knew nothing about it.
There was another knock at the door. Blanche's pale face turned
paler still. Was it Arnold? Was it Anne? After a longer delay
than usual, the servant announced Mr. Geoffrey Delamayn and Mr.
Moy.
Geoffrey, slowly entering first, saluted the two ladies in
silence, and noticed no one else. The London solicitor,
withdrawing himself for a moment from the absorbing prospect of
the rain, pointed to the places reserved for the new-comer and
for the legal adviser whom he had brought with him. Geoffrey
seated himself, without so much as a glance round the room.
Leaning his elbows on his knees, he vacantly traced patterns on
the carpet with his clumsy oaken walking-stick. Stolid
indifference expressed itself in his lowering brow and his
loosely-hanging mouth. The loss of the race, and the
circumstances accompanying it, appeared to have made him duller
than usual and heavier than usual--and that was all.
Captain Newenden, approaching to speak to him, stopped half-way,
hesitated, thought better of it--and addressed himself to Mr.
Moy.
Geoffrey's legal adviser--a Scotchman of the ruddy, ready, and
convivial type--cordially met the advance. He announced, in reply
to the captain's inquiry, that the witnesses (Mrs. Inchbare and
Bishopriggs) were waiting below until they were wanted, in the
housekeeper's room. Had there been any difficulty in finding
them? Not the least. Mrs. Inchbare was, as a matter of course, at
her hotel. Inquiries being set on foot for Bishopriggs, it
appeared that he and the landlady had come to an understanding,
and that he had returned to his old post of headwaiter at the
inn. The captain and Mr. Moy kept up the conversation between
them, thus begun, with unflagging ease and spirit. Theirs were
the only voices heard in the trying interval that elapsed before
the next knock was heard at the door.
At last it came. There could be no doubt now as to the persons
who might next be expected to enter the room. Lady Lundie took
her step-daughter firmly by the hand. She was not sure of what
Blanche's first impulse might lead her to do. For the first time
in her life, Blanche left her hand willingly in her step-mother's
grasp.
The door opened, and they came in.
Sir Patrick Lundie entered first, with Anne Silvester on his arm.
Arnold Brinkworth followed them.
Both Sir Patrick and Anne bowed in silence to the persons
assembled. Lady Lundie ceremoniously returned her
brother-in-law's salute--and pointedly abstained from noticing
Anne's presence in the room. Blanche never looked up. Arnold
advanced to her, with his hand held out. Lady Lundie rose, and
motioned him back. "Not _yet,_ Mr. Brinkworth!" she said, in her
most quietly merciless manner. Arnold stood, heedless of her,
looking at his wife. His wife lifted her eyes to his; the tears
rose in them on the instant. Arnold's dark complexion turned ashy
pale under the effort that it cost him to command himself. "I
won't distress you," he said, gently--and turned back again to
the table at which Sir Patrick and Anne were seated together
apart from the rest. Sir Patrick took his hand, and pressed it in
silent approval.
The one person who took no part, even as spectator, in the events
that followed the appearance of Sir Patrick and his companions in
the room--was Geoffrey. The only change visible in him was a
change in the handling of his walking-stick. Instead of tracing
patterns on the carpet, it beat a tattoo. For the rest, there he
sat with his heavy head on his breast and his brawny arms on his
knees--weary of it by anticipation before it had begun.
Sir Patrick broke the silence. He addressed himself to his
sister-in-law.
"Lady Lundie, are all the persons present whom you expected to
see here to-day?"
The gathered venom in Lady Lundie seized the opportunity of
planting its first sting.
"All whom I expected are here," she answered. "And more than I
expected," she added, with a look at Anne.
The look was not returned--was not even seen. From the moment
when she had taken her place by Sir Patrick, Anne's eyes had
rested on Blanche. They never moved--they never for an instant
lost their tender sadness--when the woman who hated her spoke.
All that was beautiful and true in that noble nature seemed to
find its one sufficient enc
ouragement in Blanche. As she looked
once more at the sister of the unforgotten days of old, its
native beauty of expression shone out again in her worn and weary
face. Every man in the room (but Geoffrey) looked at her; and
every man (but Geoffrey) felt for her.
Sir Patrick addressed a second question to his sister-in-law.
"Is there any one here to represent the interests of Mr. Geoffrey
Delamayn?" he asked.
Lady Lundie referred Sir Patrick to Geoffrey himself. Without
looking up, Geoffrey motioned with his big brown hand to Mr. Moy,
sitting by his side.
Mr. Moy (holding the legal rank in Scotland which corresponds to
the rank held by solicitors in England) rose and bowed to Sir
Patrick, with the courtesy due to a man eminent in his time at
the Scottish Bar.
"I represent Mr. Delamayn," he said. "I congratulate myself, Sir
Patrick, on having your ability and experience to appeal to in
the conduct of the pending inquiry."
Sir Patrick returned the compliment as well as the bow.
"It is I who should learn from you," he answered. "_I_ have had
time, Mr. Moy, to forget what I once knew."
Lady Lundie looked from one to the other with unconcealed
impatience as these formal courtesies were exchanged between the
lawyers. "Allow me to remind you, gentlemen, of the suspense that
we are suffering at this end of the room," she said. "And permit
me to ask when you propose to begin?"
Sir Patrick looked invitingly at Mr. Moy. Mr. Moy looked
invitingly at Sir Patrick. More formal courtesies! a polite
contest this time as to which of the two learned gentlemen should
permit the other to speak first! Mr. Moy's modesty proving to be
quite immovable, Sir Patrick ended it by opening the proceedings.
"I am here," he said, "to act on behalf of my friend, Mr. Arnold
Brinkworth. I beg to present him to you, Mr. Moy as the husband
of my niece--to whom he was lawfully married on the seventh of
September last, at the Church of Saint Margaret, in the parish of
Hawley, Kent. I have a copy of the marriage certificate here--if
you wish to look at it."
Mr. Moy's modesty declined to look at it.
"Quite needless, Sir Patrick! I admit that a marriage ceremony
took place on the date named, between the persons named; but I
contend that it was not a valid marriage. I say, on behalf of my
client here present (Mr. Geoffrey Delamayn), that Arnold
Brinkworth was married at a date prior to the seventh of
September last--namely, on the fourteenth of August in this year,
and at a place called Craig Fernie, in Scotland--to a lady named
Anne Silvester, now living, and present among us (as I
understand) at this moment."
Sir Patrick presented Anne. "This is the lady, Mr. Moy."
Mr. Moy bowed, and made a suggestion. "To save needless
formalities, Sir Patrick, shall we take the question of identity
as established on both sides?"
Sir Patrick agreed with his learned friend. Lad y Lundie opened
and shut her fan in undisguised impatience. The London solicitor
was deeply interested. Captain Newenden, taking out his
handkerchief, and using it as a screen, yawned behind it to his
heart's content. Sir Patrick resumed.
"You assert the prior marriage," he said to his colleague. "It
rests with you to begin."
Mr. Moy cast a preliminary look round him at the persons
assembled.
"The object of our meeting here," he said, "is, if I am not
mistaken, of a twofold nature. In the first place, it is thought
desirable, by a person who has a special interest in the issue of
this inquiry" (he glanced at the captain--the captain suddenly
became attentive), "to put my client's assertion, relating to Mr.
Brinkworth's marriage, to the proof. In the second place, we are
all equally desirous--whatever difference of opinion may
otherwise exist--to make this informal inquiry a means, if
possible, of avoiding the painful publicity which would result