The Legacy of Cain by Wilkie Collins (page 7)

“I think I have.”

“Well, the Governor has taken an old man’s fancy to your sister. They appeared to understand each other perfectly when I was at the farmhouse.”

“Excuse me, Mrs. Tenbruggen, that is what I know already. Why did Philip go to the Governor?”

She smiled. “If anybody is acquainted with the true state of your sister’s feelings, the Governor is the man. I sent Mr. Dunboyne to consult him–and there is the reason for it.”

This open avowal of her motives perplexed and offended me. After declaring herself to be interested in my marriage-engagement had she changed her mind, and resolved on favoring Philip’s return to Eunice? What right had he to consult anybody about the state of that girl’s feelings? _My_ feelings form the only subject of inquiry that was properly open to him. I should have said something which I might have afterward regretted, if Mrs. Tenbruggen had allowed me the opportunity. Fortunately for both of us, she went on with her narrative of her own proceedings.

“Philip Dunboyne is an excellent fellow,” she continued; “I really like him–but he has his faults. He sadly wants strength of purpose; and, like weak men in general, he only knows his own mind when a resolute friend takes him in hand and guides him. I am his resolute friend. I saw him veering about between you and Eunice; and I decided for his sake–may I say for your sake also?–on putting an end to that mischievous state of indecision. You have the claim on him; you are the right wife for him, and the Governor was (as I thought likely from what I had myself observed) the man to make him see it. I am not in anybody’s secrets; it was pure guesswork on my part, and it has succeeded. There is no more doubt now about Miss Eunice’s sentiments. The question is settled.”

“In my favor?”

“Certainly in your favor–or I should not have said a word about it.”

“Was Philip’s visit kindly received? Or did the old wretch laugh at him?”

“My dear Miss Gracedieu, the old wretch is a man of the world, and never makes mistakes of that sort. Before he could open his lips, he had to satisfy himself that your lover deserved to be taken into his confidence, on the delicate subject of Eunice’s sentiments. He arrived at a favorable conclusion. I can repeat Philip’s questions and the Governor’s answers after putting the young man through a stiff examination just as they passed: ‘May I inquire, sir, if she has spoken to you about me?’ ‘She has often spoken about you.’ ‘Did she seem to be angry with me?’ ‘She is too good and too sweet to be angry with you.’ ‘Do you think she will forgive me?’ ‘She has forgiven you.’ ‘Did she say so herself?’ ‘Yes, of her own free will.’ ‘Why did she refuse to see me when I called at the farm?’ ‘She had her own reasons–good reasons.’ ‘Has she regretted it since?’ ‘Certainly not.’ ‘Is it likely that she would consent, if I proposed a reconciliation?’ ‘I put that question to her myself.’ ‘How did she take it, sir?’ ‘She declined to take it.’ ‘You mean that she declined a reconciliation?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘Are you sure she was in earnest?’ ‘I am positively sure.’ That last answer seems, by young Dunboyne’s own confession, to have been enough, and more than enough for him. He got up to go–and then an odd thing happened. After giving him the most unfavorable answers, the Governor patted him paternally on the shoulder, and encouraged him to hope. ‘Before we say good-by, Mr. Philip, one word more. If I was as young as you are, I should not despair.’ There is a sudden change of front! Who can explain it?”

The Governor’s mischievous resolution to reconcile Philip and Eunice explained it, of course. With the best intentions (perhaps) Mrs. Tenbruggen had helped that design by bringing the two men together. “Go on,” I said; “I am prepared to hear next that Philip has paid another visit to my sister, and has been received this time.”

I must say this for Mrs. Tenbruggen: she kept her temper perfectly.

“He has not been to the farm,” she said, “but he has done something nearly as foolish. He has written to your sister.”

“And he has received a favorable reply, of course?”

She put her hand into the pocket of her dress.

“There is your sister’s reply,” she said.

Any persons who have had a crushing burden lifted, unexpectedly and instantly, from off their minds, will know what I felt when I read the reply. In the most positive language, Eunice refused to correspond with Philip, or to speak with him. The concluding words proved that she was in earnest. “You are engaged to Helena. Consider me as a stranger until you are married. After that time you will be my brother-in-law, and then I may pardon you for writing to me.”

Nobody who knows Eunice would have supposed that she possessed those two valuable qualities–common-sense and proper pride. It is pleasant to feel that I can now send cards to my sister, when I am Mrs. Philip Dunboyne.

I returned the letter to Mrs. Tenbruggen, with the sincerest expressions of regret for having doubted her. “I have been unworthy of your generous interest in me,” I said; “I am almost ashamed to offer you my hand.”

She took my hand, and gave it a good, heady shake.

“Are we friends?” she asked, in the simplest and prettiest manner. “Then let us be easy and pleasant again,” she went on. “Will you call me Elizabeth; and shall I call you Helena? Very well. Now I have got something else to say; another secret which must be kept from Philip (I call _him_ by his name now, you see) for a few days more. Your happiness, my dear, must not depend on his miserly old father. He must have a little income of his own to marry on. Among the hundreds of unfortunate wretches whom I have relieved from torture of mind and body, there is a grateful minority. Small! small! but there they are. I have influence among powerful people; and I am trying to make Philip private secretary to a member of Parliament. When I have succeeded, you shall tell him the good news.”

What a vile humor I must have been in, at the time, not to have appreciated the delightful gayety of this good creature; I went to the other extreme now, and behaved like a gushing young miss fresh from school. I kissed her.

She burst out laughing. “What a sacrifice!” she cried. “A kiss for me, which ought to have been kept for Philip! By-the-by, do you know what I should do, Helena, in your place? I should take our handsome young man away from that hotel!”

“I will do anything that you advise,” I said.

“And you will do well, my child. In the first place, the hotel is too expensive for Philip’s small means. In the second place, two of the chambermaids have audaciously presumed to be charming girls; and the men, my dear–well! well! I will leave you to find that out for yourself. In the third place, you want to have Philip under your own wing; domestic familiarity will make him fonder of you than ever. Keep him out of the sort of company that he meets with in the billiard-room and the smoking-room. You have got a spare bed here, I know, and your poor father is in no condition to use his authority. Make Philip one of the family.”

This last piece of advice staggered me. I mentioned the Proprieties. Mrs. Tenbruggen laughed at the Proprieties.

“Make Selina of some use,” she suggested. “While you have got _her_ in the house, Propriety is rampant. Why condemn poor helpless Philip to cheap lodgings? Time enough to cast him out to the feather-bed and the fleas on the night before your marriage. Besides, I shall be in and out constantly–for I mean to cure your father. The tongue of scandal is silent in my awful presence; an atmosphere of virtue surrounds Mamma Tenbruggen. Think of it.”

CHAPTER LV.

HELENA’S DIARY RESUMED.

I did think of it. Philip came to us, and lived in our house.

Let me hasten to add that the protest of Propriety was duly entered, on the day before my promised husband arrived. Standing in the doorway–nothing would induce her to take a chair, or even to enter the room–Miss Jillgall delivered her opinion on Philip’s approaching visit. Mrs. Tenbruggen reported it in her pocket-book, as if she was representing a newspaper at a public meeting. Here it is, copied from her notes:

“Miss Helena Gracedieu, my first impulse under the present disgusting circumstances was to leave the house, and earn a bare crust in the cheapest garret I could find in the town. But my grateful heart remembers Mr. Gracedieu. My poor afflicted cousin was good to me when I was helpless. I cannot forsake him when _he_ is helpless. At whatever sacrifice of my own self-respect, I remain under this roof, so dear to me for the Minister’s sake. I notice, miss, that you smile. I see my once dear Elizabeth, the friend who has so bitterly disappointed me–” she stopped, and put her handkerchief to her eyes, and went on again–“the friend who has so bitterly disappointed me, taking satirical notes of what I say. I am not ashamed of what I say. The virtue which will not stretch a little, where the motive is good, is feeble virtue indeed. I shall stay in the house, and witness horrors, and rise superior to them. Good-morning, Miss Gracedieu. Good-morning, Elizabeth.” She performed a magnificent curtsey, and (as Mrs. Tenbruggen’s experience of the stage informed me) made a very creditable exit.

A week has passed, and I have not opened my Diary.

My days have glided away in one delicious flow of happiness. Philip has been delightfully devoted to me. His fervent courtship, far exceeding any similar attentions which he may once have paid to Eunice, has shown such variety and such steadfastness of worship, that I despair of describing it. My enjoyment of my new life is to be felt–not to be coldly considered, and reduced to an imperfect statement in words.

For the first time I feel capable, if the circumstances encouraged me, of acts of exalted virtue. For instance, I could save my country if my country was worth it. I could die a martyr to religion if I had a religion. In one word, I am exceedingly well satisfied with myself. The little disappointments of life pass over me harmless. I do not even regret the failure of good Mrs. Tenbruggen’s efforts to find an employment for Philip, worthy of his abilities and accomplishments. The member of Parliament to whom she had applied has chosen a secretary possessed of political influence. That is the excuse put forward in his letter to Mrs. Tenbruggen. Wretched corrupt creature! If he was worth a thought I should pity him. He has lost Philip’s services.

Three days more have slipped by. The aspect of my heaven on earth is beginning to alter.

Perhaps the author of that wonderful French novel, “L’Ame Damne’e,” is right when he tells us that human happiness is misery in masquerade. It would be wrong to say that I am miserable. But I may be on the way to it; I am anxious.

To-day, when he did not know that I was observing him, I discovered a preoccupied look in Philip’s eyes. He laughed when I asked if anything had happened to vex him. Was it a natural laugh? He put his arm round me and kissed me. Was it done mechanically? I daresay I am out of humor myself. I think I had a little headache. Morbid, probably. I won’t think of it any more.

It has occurred to me this morning that he may dislike being left by himself, while I am engaged in my household affairs. If this is the case, intensely as I hate her, utterly as I loathe the idea of putting her in command over my domestic dominions, I shall ask Miss Jillgall to take my place as housekeeper.

I was away to-day in the kitchen regions rather longer than usual. When I had done with my worries, Philip was not to be found. Maria, looking out of one of the bedroom windows instead of doing her work, had seen Mr. Dunboyne leave the house. It was possible that he had charged Miss Jillgall with a message for me. I asked if she was in her room. No; she, too, had gone out. It was a fine day, and Philip had no doubt taken a stroll–but he might have waited till I could join him. There were some orders to be given to the butcher and the green-grocer. I, too, left the house, hoping to get rid of some little discontent, caused by thinking of what had happened. Returning by the way of High Street–I declare I can hardly believe it even now–I did positively see Miss Jillgall coming out of a pawnbroker’s shop!

The direction in which she turned prevented her from seeing me. She was quite unaware that I had discovered her; and I have said nothing about it since. But I noticed something unusual in the manner in which her watch-chain was hanging, and I asked her what o’clock it was. She said, “You have got your own watch.” I told her my watch had stopped. “So has mine,” she said. There is no doubt about it now; she has pawned her watch. What for? She lives here for nothing, and she has not had a new dress since I have known her. Why does she want money?

Philip had not returned when I got home. Another mysterious journey to London? No. After an absence of more than two hours, he came back.

Naturally enough, I asked what he had been about. He had been taking a long walk. For his health’s sake? No: to think. To think of what? Well, I might be surprised to hear it, but his idle life was beginning to weigh on his spirits; he wanted employment. Had he thought of an employment? Not yet. Which way had he walked? Anyway: he had not noticed where he went. These replies were all made in a tone that offended me. Besides, I observed there was no dust on his boots (after a week of dry weather), and his walk of two hours did not appear to have heated or tired him. I took an opportunity of consulting Mrs. Tenbruggen.

She had anticipated that I should appeal to her opinion, as a woman of the world.

I shall not set down in detail what she said. Some of it humiliated me; and from some of it I recoiled. The expression of her opinion came to this. In the absence of experience, a certain fervor of temperament was essential to success in the art of fascinating men. Either my temperament was deficient, or my intellect overpowered it. It was natural that I should suppose myself to be as susceptible to the tender passion as the most excitable woman living. Delusion, my Helena, amiable delusion! Had I ever observed or had any friend told me that my pretty hands were cold hands? I had beautiful eyes, expressive of vivacity, of intelligence, of every feminine charm, except the one inviting charm that finds favor in the eyes of a man. She then entered into particulars, which I don’t deny showed a true interest in helping me. I was ungrateful, sulky, self-opinionated. Dating from that day’s talk with Mrs. Tenbruggen, my new friendship began to show signs of having caught a chill.

But I did my best to follow her instructions–and failed.

It is perhaps true that my temperament is overpowered by my intellect. Or it is possibly truer still that the fire in my heart, when it warms to love, is a fire that burns low. My belief is that I surprised Philip instead of charming him. He responded to my advances, but I felt that it was not done in earnest, not spontaneously. Had I any right to complain? Was I in earnest? Was I spontaneous? We were making love to each other under false pretenses. Oh, what a fool I was to ask for Mrs. Tenbruggen’s advice!

A humiliating doubt has come to me suddenly. Has his heart been inclining to Eunice again? After such a letter as she has written to him? Impossible!

Three events since yesterday, which I consider, trifling as they may be, intimations of something wrong.

First, Miss Jillgall, who at one time was eager to take my place, has refused to relieve me of my housekeeping duties. Secondly, Philip has been absent again, on another long walk. Thirdly, when Philip returned, depressed and sulky, I caught Miss Jillgall looking at him with interest and pity visible in her skinny face. What do these things mean?

I am beginning to doubt everybody. Not one of them, Philip included, cares for me–but I can frighten them, at any rate. Yesterday evening, I dropped on the floor as suddenly as if I had been shot: a fit of some sort. The doctor honestly declared that he was at a loss to account for it. He would have laid me under an eternal obligation if he had failed to bring me back to life again.

As it is, I am more clever than the doctor. What brought the fit on is well known to me. Rage–furious, overpowering, deadly rage–was the cause. I am now in the cold-blooded state, which can look back at the event as composedly as if it had happened to some other girl. Suppose that girl had let her sweetheart know how she loved him as she had never let him know it before. Suppose she opened the door again the instant after she had left the room, eager, poor wretch, to say once more, for the fiftieth time, “My angel, I love you!” Suppose she found her angel standing with his back toward her, so that his face was reflected in the glass. And suppose she discovered in that face, so smiling and so sweet when his head had rested on her bosom only the moment before, the most hideous expression of disgust that features can betray. There could be no doubt of it; I had made my poor offering of love to a man who secretly loathed me. I wonder that I survived my sense of my own degradation. Well! I am alive; and I know him in his true character at last. Am I a woman who submits when an outrage is offered to her? What will happen next? Who knows? I am in a fine humor. What I have just written has set me laughing at myself. Helena Gracedieu has one merit at least–she is a very amusing person.

I slept last night.

This morning, I am strong again, calm, wickedly capable of deceiving Mr. Philip Dunboyne, as he has deceived me. He has not the faintest suspicion that I have discovered him. I wish he had courage enough to kill somebody. How I should enjoy hiring the nearest window to the scaffold, and seeing him hanged!

Miss Jillgall is in better spirits than ever. She is going to take a little holiday; and the cunning creature makes a mystery of it. “Good-by, Miss Helena. I am going to stay for a day or two with a friend.” What friend? Who cares?

Last night, I was wakeful. In the darkness a daring idea came to me. To-day, I have carried out the idea. Something has followed which is well worth entering in my Diary.

I left the room at the usual hour for attending to my domestic affairs. The obstinate cook did me a service; she was insolent; she wanted to have her own way. I gave her her own way. In less than five minutes I was on the watch in the pantry, which has a view of the house door. My hat and my parasol were waiting for me on the table, in case of my going out, too.

In a few minutes more, I heard the door opened. Mr. Philip Dunboyne stepped out. He was going to take another of his long walks.

I followed him to the street in which the cabs stand. He hired the first one on the rank, an open chaise; while I kept myself hidden in a shop door.

The moment he started on his drive, I hired a closed cab. “Double your fare,” I said to the driver, “whatever it may be, if you follow that chaise cleverly, and do what I tell you.”

He nodded and winked at me. A wicked-looking old fellow; just the man I wanted.

We followed the chaise.

CHAPTER LVI.

HELENA’S DIARY RESUMED.

When we had left the town behind us, the coachman began to drive more slowly. In my ignorance, I asked what this change in the pace meant. He pointed with his whip to the open road and to the chaise in the distance.

“If we keep too near the gentleman, miss, he has only got to look back, and he’ll see we are following him. The safe thing to do is to let the chaise get on a bit. We can’t lose sight of it, out here.”

I had felt inclined to trust in the driver’s experience, and he had already justified my confidence in him. This encouraged me to consult his opinion on a matter of some importance to my present interests. I could see the necessity of avoiding discovery when we had followed the chaise to its destination; but I was totally at a loss to know how it could be done. My wily old man was ready with his advice the moment I asked for it.

“Wherever the chaise stops, miss, we must drive past it as if we were going somewhere else. I shall notice the place while we go by; and you will please sit back in the corner of the cab so that the gentleman can’t see you.”

“Well,” I said, “and what next?”

“Next, miss, I shall pull up, wherever it may be, out of sight of the driver of the chaise. He bears an excellent character, I don’t deny it; but I’ve known him for years–and we had better not trust him. I shall tell you where the gentleman stopped; and you will go back to the place (on foot, of course), and see for yourself what’s to be done, specially if there happens to be a lady in the case. No offense, miss; it’s in my experience that there’s generally a lady in the case. Anyhow, you can judge for yourself, and you’ll know where to find me waiting when you want me again.”

“Suppose something happens,” I suggested, “that we don’t expect?”

“I shan’t lose my head, miss, whatever happens.”

“All very well, coachman; but I have only your word for it.” In the irritable state of my mind, the man’s confident way of thinking annoyed me.

“Begging your pardon, my young lady, you’ve got (if I may say so) what they call a guarantee. When I was a young man, I drove a cab in London for ten years. Will that do?”

“I suppose you mean,” I answered, “that you have learned deceit in the wicked ways of the great city.”

He took this as a compliment. “Thank you, miss. That’s it exactly.”

After a long drive, or so it seemed to my impatience, we passed the chaise drawn up at a lonely house, separated by a front garden from the road. In two or three minutes more, we stopped where the road took a turn, and descended to lower ground. The farmhouse which we had left behind us was known to the driver. He led the way to a gate at the side of the road, and opened it for me.

“In your place, miss,” he said slyly, “the private way back is the way I should wish to take. Try it by the fields. Turn to the right when you have passed the barn, and you’ll find yourself at the back of the house.” He stopped, and looked at his big silver watch. “Half-past twelve,” he said, “the Chawbacons–I mean the farmhouse servants, miss–will be at their dinner. All in your favor, so far. If the dog happens to be loose, don’t forget that his name’s Grinder; call him by his name, and pat him before he has time enough to think, and he’ll let you be. When you want me, here you’ll find me waiting for orders.”

I looked back as I crossed the field. The driver was sitting on the gate, smoking his pipe, and the horse was nibbling the grass at the roadside. Two happy animals, without a burden on their minds!

After passing the barn, I saw nothing of the dog. Far or near, no living creature appeared; the servants must have been at dinner, as the coachman had foreseen. Arriving at a wooden fence, I opened a gate in it, and found myself on a bit of waste ground. On my left, there was a large duck-pond. On my right, I saw the fowl-house and the pigstyes. Before me was a high impenetrable hedge; and at some distance behind it–an orchard or a garden, as I supposed, filling the intermediate space–rose the back of the house. I made for the shelter of the hedge, in the fear that some one might approach a window and see me. Once sheltered from observation, I might consider what I should do next. It was impossible to doubt that this was the house in which Eunice was living. Neither could I fail to conclude that Philip had tried to persuade her to see him, on those former occasions when he told me he had taken a long walk.

As I crouched behind the hedge, I heard voices approaching on the other side of it. At last fortune had befriended me. The person speaking at the moment was Miss Jillgall; and the person who answered her was Philip.

“I am afraid, dear Mr. Philip, you don’t quite understand my sweet Euneece. Honorable, high minded, delicate in her feelings, and, oh, so unselfish! I don’t want to alarm you, but when she hears you have been deceiving Helena–“

“Upon my word, Miss Jillgall, you are so provoking! I have not been deceiving Helena. Haven’t I told you what discouraging answers I got, when I went to see the Governor? Haven’t I shown you Eunice’s reply to my letter? You can’t have forgotten it already?”

“Oh, yes, I have. Why should I remember it? Don’t I know poor Euneece was in your mind, all the time?”

“You’re wrong again! Eunice was not in my mind all the time. I was hurt–I was offended by the cruel manner in which she had treated me. And what was the consequence? So far was I from deceiving Helena–she rose in my estimation by comparison with her sister.”

“Oh, come, come, Mr. Philip! that won’t do. Helena rising in anybody’s estimation? Ha! ha! ha!”

“Laugh as much as you like, Miss Jillgall, you won’t laugh away the facts. Helena loved me; Helena was true to me. Don’t be hard on a poor fellow who is half distracted. What a man finds he can do on one day, he finds he can’t do on another. Try to understand that a change does sometimes come over one’s feelings.”

“Bless my soul, Mr. Philip, that’s just what I have been understanding all the time! I know your mind as well as you know it yourself. You can’t forget my sweet Euneece.”

“I tell you I tried to forget her! On my word of honor as a gentleman, I tried to forget her, in justice to Helena. Is it my fault that I failed? Eunice was in my mind, as you said just now. Oh, my friend–for you are my friend, I am sure–persuade her to see me, if it’s only for a minute!”

(Was there ever a man’s mind in such a state of confusion as this! First, I rise in his precious estimation, and Eunice drops. Then Eunice rises, and I drop. Idiot! Mischievous idiot! Even Selina seemed to be disgusted with him, when she spoke next.)

“Mr. Philip, you are hard and unreasonable. I have tried to persuade her, and I have made my darling cry. Nothing you can say will induce me to distress her again. Go back, you very undetermined man–go back to your Helena.”

“Too late.”

“Nonsense!”

“I say too late. If I could have married Helena when I first went to stay in the house, I might have faced the sacrifice. As it is, I can’t endure her; and (I tell you this in confidence) she has herself to thank for what has happened.”

“Is that really true?”

“Quite true.”

“Tell me what she did.

“Oh, don’t talk of her! Persuade Eunice to see me. I shall come back again, and again, and again till you bring her to me.”

“Please don’t talk nonsense. If she changes her mind, I will bring her with pleasure. If she still shrinks from it, I regard Euneece’s feelings as sacred. Take my advice; don’t press her. Leave her time to think of you, and to pity you–and that true heart may be yours again, if you are worthy of it.”

“Worthy of it? What do you mean?”

“Are you quite sure, my young friend, that you won’t go back to Helena?”

“Go back to _her_? I would cut my throat if I thought myself capable of doing it!”

“How did she set you against her? Did the wretch quarrel with you?”

“It might have been better for both of us if she had done that. Oh, her fulsome endearments! What a contrast to the charming modesty of Eunice! If I was rich, I would make it worth the while of the first poor fellow I could find to rid me of Helena by marrying her. I don’t like saying such a thing of a woman, but if you will have the truth–“

“Well, Mr. Philip–and what is the truth?”

“Helena disgusts me.”

CHAPTER LVII.

HELENA’S DIARY RESUMED.

So it was all settled between them. Philip is to throw me away, like one of his bad cigars, for this unanswerable reason: “Helena disgusts me.” And he is to persuade Eunice to take my place, and be his wife. Yes! if I let him do it.

I heard no more of their talk. With that last, worst outrage burning in my memory, I left the place.

On my way back to the carriage, the dog met me. Truly, a grand creature. I called him by his name, and patted him. He licked my hand. Something made me speak to him. I said: “If I was to tell you to tear Mr. Philip Dunboyne to pieces, would you do it?” The great good-natured brute held out his paw to shake hands. Well! well! I was not an object of disgust to the dog.

But the coachman was startled, when he saw me again. He said something, I did not know what it was; and he produced a pocket-flask, containing some spirits, I suppose. Perhaps he thought I was going to faint. He little knew me. I told him to drive back to the place at which I had hired the cab, and earn his money. He earned it.

On getting home, I found Mrs. Tenbruggen walking up and down the dining-room, deep in thought. She was startled when we first confronted each other. “You look dreadfully ill,” she said.

I answered that I had been out for a little exercise, and had over-fatigued myself; and then changed the subject. “Does my father seem to improve under your treatment?” I asked.

“Very far from it, my dear. I promised that I would try what Massage would do for him, and I find myself compelled to give it up.”

“Why?”

“It excites him dreadfully.”

“In what way?”

“He has been talking wildly of events in his past life. His brain is in some condition which is beyond my powers of investigation. He pointed to a cabinet in his room, and said his past life was locked up there. I asked if I should unlock it. He shook with fear; he said I should let out the ghost of his dead brother-in-law. Have you any idea of what he meant?”

The cabinet was full of old letters. I could tell her that–and could tell her no more. I had never heard of his brother-in-law. Another of his delusions, no doubt. “Did you ever hear him speak,” Mrs. Tenbruggen went on, “of a place called Low Lanes?”

She waited for my reply to this last inquiry with an appearance of anxiety that surprised me. I had never heard him speak of Low Lanes.

“Have you any particular interest in the place?” I asked.

“None whatever.”

She went away to attend on a patient. I retired to my bedroom, and opened my Diary. Again and again, I read that remarkable story of the intended poisoning, and of the manner in which it had ended. I sat thinking over this romance in real life till I was interrupted by the announcement of dinner.

Mr. Philip Dunboyne had returned. In Miss Jillgall’s absence we were alone at the table. My appetite was gone. I made a pretense of eating, and another pretense of being glad to see my devoted lover. I talked to him in the prettiest manner. As a hypocrite, he thoroughly matched me; he was gallant, he was amusing. If baseness like ours had been punishable by the law, a prison was the right place for both of us.

Mrs. Tenbruggen came in again after dinner, still not quite easy about my health. “How flushed you are!” she said. “Let me feel your pulse.” I laughed, and left her with Mr. Philip Dunboyne.

Passing my father’s door, I looked in, anxious to see if he was in the excitable state which Mrs. Tenbruggen had described. Yes; the effect which she had produced on him–how, she knows best–had not passed away yet: he was still talking. The attendant told me it had gone on for hours together. On my approaching his chair, he called out: “Which are you? Eunice or Helena?” When I had answered him, he beckoned me to come nearer. “I am getting stronger every minute,” he said. “We will go traveling to-morrow, and see the place where you were born.”

Where had I been born? He had never told me where. Had he mentioned the place in Mrs. Tenbruggen’s hearing? I asked the attendant if he had been present while she was in the room. Yes; he had remained at his post; he had also heard the allusion to the place with the odd name. Had Mr. Gracedieu said anything more about that place? Nothing more; the poor Minister’s mind had wandered off to other things. He was wandering now. Sometimes, he was addressing his congregation; sometimes, he wondered what they would give him for supper; sometimes, he talked of the flowers in the garden. And then he looked at me, and frowned, and said I prevented him from thinking.

I went back to my bedroom, and opened my Diary, and read the story again.

Was the poison of which that resolute young wife proposed to make use something that acted slowly, and told the doctors nothing if they looked for it after death?

Would it be running too great a risk to show the story to the doctor, and try to get a little valuable information in that way? It would be useless. He would make some feeble joke; he would say, girls and poisons are not fit company for each other.

But I might discover what I want to know in another way. I might call on the doctor, after he has gone out on his afternoon round of visits, and might tell the servant I would wait for his master’s return. Nobody would be in my way; I might get at the medical literature in the consulting-room, and find the information for myself.

A knock at my door interrupted me in the midst of my plans. Mrs. Tenbruggen again!–still in a fidgety state of feeling on the subject of my health. “Which is it?” she said. “Pain of body, my dear, or pain of mind? I am anxious about you.”

“My dear Elizabeth, your sympathy is thrown away on me. As I have told you already, I am over-tired–nothing more.”

She was relieved to hear that I had no mental troubles to complain of. “Fatigue,” she remarked, “sets itself right with rest. Did you take a very long walk?”

“Yes.”

“Beyond the limits of the town, of course? Philip has been taking a walk in the country, too. He doesn’t say that he met you.”

These clever people sometimes overreach themselves. How she suggested it to me, I cannot pretend to have discovered. But I did certainly suspect that she had led Philip, while they were together downstairs, into saying to her what he had already said to Miss Jillgall. I was so angry that I tried to pump my excellent friend, as she had been trying to pump me–a vulgar expression, but vulgar writing is such a convenient way of writing sometimes. My first attempt to entrap the Masseuse failed completely. She coolly changed the subject.

“Have I interrupted you in writing?” she asked, pointing to my Diary.

“No; I was idling over what I have written already–an extraordinary story which I copied from a book.”

“May I look at it?”

I pushed the open Diary across the table. If I was the object of any suspicions which she wanted to confirm, it would be curious to see if the poisoning story helped her. “It’s a piece of family history,” I said; “I think you will agree with me that it is really interesting.”

She began to read. As she went on, not all her power of controlling herself could prevent her from turning pale. This change of color (in such a woman) a little alarmed me. When a girl is devoured by deadly hatred of a man, does the feeling show itself to other persons in her face? I must practice before the glass and train my face into a trustworthy state of discipline.

“Coarse melodrama!” Mrs. Tenbruggen declared. “Mere sensation. No analysis of character. A made-up story!”

“Well made up, surely?” I answered.

“I don’t agree with you.” Her voice was not quite so steady as usual. She asked suddenly if my clock was right–and declared that she should be late for an appointment. On taking leave she pressed my hand strongly–eyed me with distrustful attention and said, very emphatically: “Take care of yourself, Helena; pray take care of yourself.”

I am afraid I did a very foolish thing when I showed her the poisoning story. Has it helped the wily old creature to look into my inmost thoughts?

Impossible!

To-day, Miss Jillgall returned, looking hideously healthy and spitefully cheerful. Although she tried to conceal it, while I was present, I could see that Philip had recovered his place in her favor. After what he had said to her behind the hedge at the farm, she would be relieved from all fear of my becoming his wife, and would joyfully anticipate his marriage to Eunice. There are thoughts in me which I don’t set down in my book. I only say: We shall see.

This afternoon, I decided on visiting the doctor. The servant was quite sorry for me when he answered the door. His master had just left the house for a round of visits. I said I would wait. The servant was afraid I should find waiting very tedious. I reminded him that I could go away if I found it tedious. At last, the polite old man left me.

I went into the consulting-room, and read the backs of the medical books ranged round the walls, and found a volume that interested me. There was such curious information in it that I amused myself by making extracts, using the first sheets of paper that I could find. They had printed directions at the top, which showed that the doctor was accustomed to write his prescriptions on them. We had many, too many, of his prescriptions in our house.

The servant’s doubts of my patience proved to have been well founded. I got tired of waiting, and went home before the doctor returned.

From morning to night, nothing has been seen of Mrs. Tenbruggen to-day. Nor has any apology for her neglect of us been received, fond as she is of writing little notes. Has that story in my Diary driven her away? Let me see what to-morrow may bring forth.

To-day has brought forth–nothing. Mrs. Tenbruggen still keeps away from us. It looks as if my Diary had something to do with the mystery of her absence.

I am not in good spirits to-day. My nerves–if I have such things, which is more than I know by my own experience–have been a little shaken by a horrid dream. The medical information, which my thirst for knowledge absorbed in the doctor’s consulting-room, turned traitor–armed itself with the grotesque horrors of nightmare–and so thoroughly frightened me that I was on the point of being foolish enough to destroy my notes. I thought better of it, and my notes are safe under lock and key.

Mr. Philip Dunboyne is trying to pave the way for his flight from this house. He speaks of friends in London, whose interest will help him to find the employment which is the object of his ambition. “In a few days more,” he said, “I shall ask for leave of absence.”

Instead of looking at me, his eyes wandered to the window; his fingers played restlessly with his watch-chain while he spoke. I thought I would give him a chance, a last chance, of making the atonement that he owes to me. This shows shameful weakness, on my part. Does my own resolution startle me? Or does the wretch appeal–to what? To my pity? It cannot be my love; I am positively sure that I hate him. Well, I am not the first girl who had been an unanswerable riddle to herself.

“Is there any other motive for your departure?” I asked.

“What other motive can there be?” he replied. I put what I had to say to him in plainer words still. “Tell me, Philip, are you beginning to wish that you were a free man again?”

He still prevaricated. Was this because he is afraid of me, or because he is not quite brute enough to insult me to my face? I tried again for the third and last time. I almost put the words into his mouth.

“I fancy you have been out of temper lately,” I said. “You have not been your own kinder and better self. Is this the right interpretation of the change that I think I see in you?”

He answered: “I have not been very well lately.”

“And that is all?”

“Yes–that is all.”

There was no more to be said; I turned away to leave the room. He followed me to the door. After a momentary hesitation, he made the attempt to kiss me. I only looked at him–he drew back from me in silence. I left the new Judas, standing alone, while the shades of evening began to gather over the room.

Third Period _(continued)_.

_EVENTS IN THE FAMILY, RELATED BY MISS JILLGALL._

CHAPTER LVIII.

DANGER.

“If anything of importance happens, I trust to you to write an account of it, and to send the writing to me. I will come to you at once, if I see reason to believe that my presence is required.” Those lines, in your last kind reply to me, rouse my courage, dear Mr. Governor, and sharpen the vigilance which has always been one of the strong points in my character. Every suspicious circumstance which occurs in this house will be (so to speak) seized on by my pen, and will find itself (so to speak again) placed on its trial, before your unerring judgment! Let the wicked tremble! I mention no names.

Taking up my narrative where it came to an end when I last wrote, I have to say a word first on the subject of my discoveries, in regard to Philip’s movements.

The advertisement of a private inquiry office, which I read in a newspaper, put the thing into my head. I provided myself with money to pay the expenses by–I blush while I write it–pawning my watch. This humiliation of my poor self has been rewarded by success. Skilled investigation has proved that our young man has come to his senses again, exactly as I supposed. On each occasion when he was suspiciously absent from the house, he has been followed to the farm. I have been staying there myself for a day or two, in the hope of persuading Eunice to relent. The hope has not yet been realized. But Philip’s devotion, assisted by my influence, will yet prevail. Let me not despair.

Whether Helena knows positively that she has lost her wicked hold on Philip I cannot say. It seems hardly possible that she could have made the discovery just yet. The one thing of which I am certain is, that she looks like a fiend.

Philip has wisely taken my advice, and employed pious fraud. He will get away from the wretch, who has tempted him once and may tempt him again, under pretense of using the interest of his friends in London to find a place under Government. He has not been very well for the last day or two, and the execution of our project is in consequence delayed.

I have news of Mrs. Tenbruggen which will, I think, surprise you.

She has kept away from us in a most unaccountable manner. I called on her at the hotel, and heard she was engaged with her lawyer. On the next day, she suddenly returned to her old habits, and paid the customary visit. I observed a similar alteration in her state of feeling. She is now coldly civil to Helena; and she asks after Eunice with a maternal interest touching to see–I said to her: “Elizabeth, you appear to have changed your opinion of the two girls, since I saw you.” She answered, with a delightful candor which reminded me of old times: “Completely!” I said: “A woman of your intellectual caliber, dear, doesn’t change her mind without a good reason for it.” Elizabeth cordially agreed with me. I ventured to be a little more explicit: “You have no doubt made some interesting discovery.” Elizabeth agreed again; and I ventured again: “I suppose I may not ask what the discovery is?” “No, Selina, you may not ask.”

This is curious; but it is nothing to what I have got to tell you next. Just as I was longing to take her to my bosom again as my friend and confidante, Elizabeth has disappeared. And, alas! alas! there is a reason for it which no sympathetic person can dispute.

I have just received some overwhelming news, in the form of a neat parcel, addressed to myself.

There has been a scandal at the hotel. That monster in human form, Elizabeth’s husband, is aware of his wife’s professional fame, has heard of the large sums of money which she earns as the greatest living professor of massage, has been long on the lookout for her, and has discovered her at last. He has not only forced his way into her sitting-room at the hotel; he insists on her living with him again; her money being the attraction, it is needless to say. If she refuses, he threatens her with the law, the barbarous law, which, to use his own coarse expression, will “restore his conjugal rights.”

All this I gather from the narrative of my unhappy friend, which forms one of the two inclosures in her parcel. She has already made her escape. Ha! the man doesn’t live who can circumvent Elizabeth. The English Court of Law isn’t built which can catch her when she roams the free and glorious Continent.

The vastness of this amazing woman’s mind is what I must pause to admire. In the frightful catastrophe that has befallen her, she can still think of Philip and Euneece. She is eager to hear of their marriage, and renounces Helena with her whole heart. “I too was deceived by that cunning young Woman,” she writes. “Beware of her, Selina. Unless I am much mistaken, she is going to end badly. Take care of Philip, take care of Euneece. If you want help, apply at once to my favorite hero in real life, The Governor.” I don’t presume to correct Elizabeth’s language. I should have called you The idol of the Women.

The second inclosure contains, as I suppose, a wedding present. It is carefully sealed–it feels no bigger than an ordinary letter–and it contains an inscription which your highly- cultivated intelligence may be able to explain. I copy it as follows:

“To be inclosed in another envelope, addressed to Mr. Dunboyne the elder, at Percy’s Private Hotel, London, and delivered by a trustworthy messenger, on the day when Mr. Philip Dunboyne is married to Miss Eunice Gracedieu. Placed meanwhile under the care of Miss Selina Jillgall.”

Why is this mysterious letter to be sent to Philip’s father? I wonder whether that circumstance will puzzle you as it has puzzled me.

I have kept my report back, so as to send you the last news relating to Philip’s state of health. To my great regret, his illness seems to have made a serious advance since yesterday. When I ask if he is in pain, he says: “It isn’t exactly pain; I feel as if I was sinking. Sometimes I am giddy; and sometimes I find myself feeling thirsty and sick.” I have no opportunity of looking after him as I could wish; for Helena insists on nursing him, assisted by the housemaid. Maria is a very good girl in her way, but too stupid to be of much use. If he is not better to-morrow, I shall insist on sending for the doctor.

He is no better; and he wishes to have medical help. Helena doesn’t seem to understand his illness. It was not until Philip had insisted on seeing him that she consented to send for the doctor.

You had some talk with this experienced physician when you were here, and you know what a clever man he is. When I tell you that he hesitates to say what is the matter with Philip, you will feel as much alarmed as I do. I will wait to send this to the post until I can write in a more definite way.

Two days more have passed. The doctor has put two very strange questions to me.

He asked, first, if there was anybody staying with us besides the regular members of the household. I said we had no visitor. He wanted to know, next, if Mr. Philip Dunboyne had made any enemies since he has been living in our town. I said none that I knew of–and I took the liberty of asking what he meant. He answered to this, that he has a few more inquiries to make, and that he will tell me what he means to-morrow.

For God’s sake come here as soon as you possibly can. The whole burden is thrown on me–and I am quite unequal to it.

I received the doctor to-day in the drawing-room. To my amazement, he begged leave to speak with me in the garden. When I asked why, he answered: “I don’t want to have a listener at the door. Come out on the lawn, where we can be sure that we are alone.”

When we were in the garden, he noticed that I was trembling.

“Rouse your courage, Miss Jillgall,” he said. “In the Minister’s helpless state there is nobody whom I can speak to but yourself.”

I ventured to remind him that he might speak to Helena as well as to myself.

He looked as black as thunder when I mentioned her name. All he said was, “No!” But, oh, if you had heard his voice–and he so gentle and sweet-tempered at other times–you would have felt, as I did, that he had Helena in his mind!

“Now, listen to this,” he went on. “Everything that my art can do for Mr. Philip Dunboyne, while I am at his bedside, is undone while I am away by some other person. He is worse to-day than I have seen him yet.”

“Oh, sir, do you think he will die?”

“He will certainly die unless the right means are taken to save him, and taken at once. It is my duty not to flinch from telling you the truth. I have made a discovery since yesterday which satisfies me that I am right. Somebody is trying to poison Mr. Dunboyne; and somebody will succeed unless he is removed from this house.”

I am a poor feeble creature. The doctor caught me, or I should have dropped on the grass. It was not a fainting-fit. I only shook and shivered so that I was too weak to stand up. Encouraged by the doctor, I recovered sufficiently to be able to ask him where Philip was to be taken to. He said: “To the hospital. No poisoner can follow my patient there. Persuade him to let me take him away, when I call again in an hour’s time.”

As soon as I could hold a pen, I sent a telegram to you. Pray, pray come by the earliest train. I also telegraphed to old Mr. Dunboyne, at the hotel in London.

It was impossible for me to face Helena; I own I was afraid. The cook kindly went upstairs to see who was in Philip’s room. It was the housemaid’s turn to look after him for a while. I went instantly to his bedside.

There was no persuading him to allow himself to be taken to the hospital. “I am dying,” he said. “If you have any pity for me, send for Euneece. Let me see her once more, let me hear her say that she forgives me, before I die.”

I hesitated. It was too terrible to think of Euneece in the same house with her sister. Her life might be in danger! Philip gave me a look, a dreadful ghastly look. “If you refuse,” he said wildly, “the grave won’t hold me. I’ll haunt you for the rest of your life.”

“She shall hear that you are ill,” I answered–and ran out of the room before he could speak again.

What I had promised to write, I did write. But, placed between Euneece’s danger and Philip’s danger, my heart was all for Euneece. Would Helena spare her, if she came to Philip’s bedside? In such terror as I never felt before in my life, I added a word more, entreating her not to leave the farm. I promised to keep her regularly informed on the subject of Philip’s illness; and I mentioned that I expected the Governor to return to us immediately. “Do nothing,” I wrote, “without his advice.” My letter having been completed, I sent the cook away with it, in a chaise. She belonged to the neighborhood, and she knew the farmhouse well.

Nearly two hours afterward, I heard the chaise stop at the door, and ran out, impatient to hear how my sweet girl had received my letter. God help us all! When I opened the door, the first person whom I saw was Euneece herself.

CHAPTER LIX.

DEFENSE.

One surprise followed another, after I had encountered Euneece at the door.

When my fondness had excused her for setting the well-meant advice in my letter at defiance, I was conscious of expecting to see her in tears; eager, distressingly eager, to hear what hope there might be of Philip’s recovery. I saw no tears, I heard no inquiries. She was pale, and quiet, and silent. Not a word fell from her when we met, not a word when she kissed me, not a word when she led the way into the nearest room–the dining-room. It was only when we were shut in together that she spoke.

“Which is Philip’s room?” she asked.

Instead of wanting to know how he was, she desired to know where he was! I pointed toward the back dining-room, which had been made into a bedroom for Philip. He had chosen it himself, when he first came to stay with us, because the window opened into the garden. and he could slip out and smoke at any hour of the day or night, when he pleased.

“Who is with him now?” was the next strange thing this sadly-changed girl said to me.

“Maria is taking her turn,” I answered; “she assists in nursing Philip.”

“Where is–?” Euneece got no further than that. Her breath quickened, her color faded away. I had seen people look as she was looking now, when they suffered under some sudden pain. Before I could offer to help her, she rallied, and went on: “Where,” she began again, “is the other nurse?”

“You mean Helena?” I said.

“I mean the Poisoner.”

When I remind you, dear Mr. Governor, that my letter had carefully concealed from her the horrible discovery made by the doctor, your imagination will picture my state of mind. She saw that I was overpowered. Her sweet nature, so strangely frozen up thus far, melted at last. “You don’t know what I have heard,” she said, “you don’t know what thoughts have been roused in me.” She left her chair, and sat on my knee with the familiarity of the dear old times, and took the letter that I had written to her from her pocket.

“Look at it yourself,” she said, “and tell me if anybody could read it, and not see that you were concealing something. My dear, I have driven round by the doctor’s house–I have seen him–I have persuaded him, or perhaps I ought to say surprised him, into telling me the truth. But the kind old man is obstinate. He wouldn’t believe me when I told him I was on my way here to save Philip’s life. He said: ‘My child, you will only put your own life in jeopardy. If I had not seen that danger, I should never have told you of the dreadful state of things at home. Go back to the good people at the farm, and leave the saving of Philip to me.'”

“He was right, Euneece, entirely right.”

“No, dear, he was wrong. I begged him to come here, and judge for himself; and I ask you to do the same.”

I was obstinate. “Go back!” I persisted. “Go back to the farm!”

“Can I see Philip?” she asked.

I have heard some insolent men say that women are like cats. If they mean that we do, figuratively speaking, scratch at times, I am afraid they are not altogether wrong. An irresistible impulse made me say to poor Euneece: “This is a change indeed, since you refused to receive Philip.”

“Is there no change in the circumstances?” she asked sadly. “Isn’t he ill and in danger?”

I begged her to forgive me; I said I meant no harm.

“I gave him up to my sister,” she continued, “when I believed that his happiness depended, not on me, but on her. I take him back to myself, when he is at the mercy of a demon who threatens his life. Come, Selina, let us go to Philip.”

She put her arm round me, and made me get up from my chair. I was so easily persuaded by her, that the fear of what Helena’s jealousy and Helena’s anger might do was scarcely present in my thoughts. The door of communication was locked on the side of the bedchamber. I went into the hall, to enter Philip’s room by the other door. She followed, waiting behind me. I heard what passed between them when Maria went out to her.

“Where is Miss Gracedieu?”

“Resting upstairs, miss, in her room.”

“Look at the clock, and tell me when you expect her to come down here.”

“I am to call her, miss, in ten minutes more.”

“Wait in the dining-room, Maria, till I come back to you.”

She joined me. I held the door open for her to go into Philip’s room. It was not out of curiosity; the feeling that urged me was sympathy, when I waited a moment to see their first meeting. She bent over the poor, pallid, trembling, suffering man, and raised him in her arms, and laid his head on her bosom. “My Philip!” She murmured those words in a kiss. I closed the door, I had a good cry; and, oh, how it comforted me!

There was only a minute to spare when she came out of the room. Maria was waiting for her. Euneece said, as quietly as ever: “Go and call Miss Gracedieu.”

The girl looked at her, and saw–I don’t know what. Maria became alarmed. But she went up the stairs, and returned in haste to tell us that her young mistress was coming down.

The faint rustling of Helena’s dress as she left her room reached us in the silence. I remained at the open door of the dining-room, and Maria approached and stood near me. We were both frightened. Euneece stepped forward, and stood on the mat at the foot of the stairs, waiting. Her back was toward me; I could only see that she was as still as a statue. The rustling of the dress came nearer. Oh, heavens! what was going to happen? My teeth chattered in my head; I held by Maria’s shoulder. Drops of perspiration showed themselves on the girl’s forehead; she stared in vacant terror at the slim little figure, posted firm and still on the mat.

Helena turned the corner of the stairs, and waited a moment on the last landing, and saw her sister.

“You here?” she said. “What do you want?”

There was no reply. Helena descended, until she reached the last stair but one. There, she stopped. Her staring eyes grew large and wild; her hand shook as she stretched it out, feeling for the banister; she staggered as she caught at it, and held herself up. The silence was still unbroken. Something in me, stronger than myself, drew my steps along the hall nearer and nearer to the stair, till I could see the face which had struck that murderous wretch with terror.

I looked.

No! it was not my sweet girl; it was a horrid transformation of her. I saw a fearful creature, with glittering eyes that threatened some unimaginable vengeance. Her lips were drawn back; they showed her clinched teeth. A burning red flush dyed her face. The hair of her head rose, little by little, slowly. And, most dreadful sight of all, she seemed, in the stillness of the house, to be _listening to something_. If I could have moved, I should have fled to the first place of refuge I could find. If I could have raised my voice, I should have cried for help. I could do neither the one nor the other. I could only look, look, look; held by the horror of it with a hand of iron.

Helena must have roused her courage, and resisted her terror. I heard her speak:

“Let me by!”

“No.”

Slowly, steadily, in a whisper, Euneece made that reply.

Helena tried once more–still fighting against her own terror: I knew it by the trembling of her voice.

“Let me by,” she repeated; “I am on my way to Philip’s room.”

“You will never enter Philip’s room again.”

“Who will stop me?”

“I will.”

She had spoken in the same steady whisper throughout–but now she moved. I saw her set her foot on the first stair. I saw the horrid glitter in her eyes flash close into Helena’s face. I heard her say:

“Poisoner, go back to your room.”

Silent and shuddering, Helena shrank away from her–daunted by her glittering eyes; mastered by her lifted hand pointing up the stairs.

Helena slowly ascended till she reached the landing. She turned and looked down; she tried to speak. The pointing hand struck her dumb, and drove her up the next flight of stairs. She was lost to view. Only the small rustling sound of the dress was to be heard, growing fainter and fainter; then an interval of stillness; then the noise of a door opened and closed again; then no sound more –but a change to be seen: the transformed creature was crouching on her knees, still and silent, her face covered by her hands. I was afraid to approach her; I was afraid to speak to her. After a time, she rose. Suddenly, swiftly, with her head turned away from me, she opened the door of Philip’s room–and was gone.

I looked round. There was only Maria in the lonely hall. Shall I try to tell you what my sensations were? It may sound strangely, but it is true–I felt like a sleeper, who has half-awakened from a dream.

CHAPTER LX.

DISCOVERY.

A little later, on that eventful day, when I was most in need of all that your wisdom and kindness could do to guide me, came the telegram which announced that you were helpless under an attack of gout. As soon as I had in some degree got over my disappointment, I remembered having told Euneece in my letter that I expected her kind old friend to come to us. With the telegram in my hand I knocked softly at Philip’s door.

The voice that bade me come in was the gentle voice that I knew so well. Philip was sleeping. There, by his bedside, with his hand resting in her hand, was Euneece, so completely restored to her own sweet self that I could hardly believe what I had seen, not an hour since. She talked of you, when I showed her your message, with affectionate interest and regret. Look back, my admirable friend, at what I have written on the two or three pages which precede this, and explain the astounding contrast if you can.

I was left alone to watch by Philip, while Euneece went away to see her father. Soon afterward, Maria took my place; I had been sent for to the next room to receive the doctor.

He looked care-worn and grieved. I said I was afraid he had brought bad news with him.

“The worst possible news,” he answered. “A terrible exposure threatens this family, and I am powerless to prevent it,”

He then asked me to remember the day when I had been surprised by the singular questions which he had put to me, and when he had engaged to explain himself after he had made some inquiries. Why, and how, he had set those inquiries on foot was what he had now to tell. I will repeat what he said, in his own words, as nearly as I can remember them. While he was in attendance on Philip, he had observed symptoms which made him suspect that Digitalis had been given to the young man, in doses often repeated. Cases of attempted poisoning by this medicine were so rare, that he felt bound to put his suspicions to the test by going round among the chemists’s shops–excepting of course the shop at which his own prescriptions were made up–and asking if they had lately dispensed any preparation of Digitalis, ordered perhaps in a larger quantity than usual. At the second shop he visited, the chemist laughed. “Why, doctor,” he said, “have you forgotten your own prescription?” After this, the prescription was asked for, and produced. It was on the paper used by the doctor–paper which had his address printed at the top, and a notice added, telling patients who came to consult him for the second time to bring their prescriptions with them. Then, there followed in writing: “Tincture of Digitalis, one ounce”–with his signature at the end, not badly imitated, but a forgery nevertheless. The chemist noticed the effect which this discovery had produced on the doctor, and asked if that was his signature. He could hardly, as an honest man, have asserted that a forgery was a signature of his own writing. So he made the true reply, and asked who had presented the prescription. The chemist called to his assistant to come forward. “Did you tell me that you knew, by sight, the young lady who brought this prescription?” The assistant admitted it. “Did you tell me she was Miss Helena Gracedieu?” “I did.” “Are you sure of not having made any mistake?” “Quite sure.” The chemist then said: “I myself supplied the Tincture of Digitalis, and the young lady paid for it, and took it away with her. You have had all the information that I can give you, sir; and I may now ask, if you can throw any light on the matter.” Our good friend thought of the poor Minister, so sorely afflicted, and of the famous name so sincerely respected in the town and in the country round, and said he could not undertake to give an immediate answer. The chemist was excessively angry. “You know as well as I do,” he said, “that Digitalis, given in certain doses, is a poison, and you cannot deny that I honestly believed myself to be dispensing your prescription. While you are hesitating to give me an answer, my character may suffer; I may be suspected myself.” He ended in declaring he should consult his lawyer. The doctor went home, and questioned his servant. The man remembered the day of Miss Helena’s visit in the afternoon, and the intention that she expressed of waiting for his master’s return. He had shown her into the parlor which opened into the consulting-room. No other visitor was in the house at that time, or had arrived during the rest of the day. The doctor’s own experience, when he got home, led him to conclude that Helena had gone into the consulting-room. He had entered that room, for the purpose of writing some prescriptions, and had found the leaves of paper that he used diminished in number. After what he had heard, and what he had discovered (to say nothing of what he suspected), it occurred to him to look along the shelves of his medical library. He found a volume (treating of Poisons) with a slip of paper left between the leaves; the poison described at the place so marked being Digitalis, and the paper used being one of his own prescription-papers. “If, as I fear, a legal investigation into Helena’s conduct is a possible event,” the doctor concluded, “there is the evidence that I shall be obliged to give, when I am called as a witness.”

It is my belief that I could have felt no greater dismay, if the long arm of the Law had laid its hold on me while he was speaking. I asked what was to be done.

“If she leaves the house at once,” the doctor replied, “she may escape the infamy of being charged with an attempt at murder by poison; and, in her absence, I can answer for Philip’s life. I don’t urge you to warn her, because that might be a dangerous thing to do. It is for you to decide, as a member of the family, whether you will run the risk.”

I tried to speak to him of Euneece, and to tell him what I had already related to yourself. He was in no humor to listen to me. “Keep it for a fitter time,” he answered; “and think of what I have just said to you.” With that, he left me, on his way to Philip’s room.

Mental exertion was completely beyond me. Can you understand a poor middle-aged spinster being frightened into doing a dangerous thing? That may seem to be nonsense. But if you ask why I took a morsel of paper, and wrote the warning which I was afraid to communicate by word of mouth–why I went upstairs with my knees knocking together, and opened the door of Helena’s room just wide enough to let my hand pass through–why I threw the paper in, and banged the door to again, and ran downstairs as I have never run since I was a little girl–I can only say, in the way of explanation, what I have said already: I was frightened into doing it.

What I have written, thus far, I shall send to you by to-night’s post.

The doctor came back to me, after he had seen Philip, and spoken with Euneece. He was very angry; and, I must own, not without reason. Philip had flatly refused to let himself be removed to the hospital; and Euneece–“a mere girl”–had declared that she would be answerable for consequences! The doctor warned me that he meant to withdraw from the case, and to make his declaration before the magistrates. At my entreaties he consented to return in the evening, and to judge by results before taking the terrible step that he had threatened.

While I remained at home on the watch, keeping the doors of both rooms locked, Eunice went out to get Philip’s medicine. She came back, followed by a boy carrying a portable apparatus for cooking. “All that Philip wants, and all that we want,” she explained, “we can provide for ourselves. Give me a morsel of paper to write on.”

Unhooking the little pencil attached to her watch-chain, she paused and looked toward the door. “Somebody listening,” she whispered. “Let them listen.” She wrote a list of necessaries, in the way of things to eat and things to drink, and asked me to go out and get them myself. “I don’t doubt the servants,” she said, speaking distinctly enough to be heard outside; “but I am afraid of what a Poisoner’s cunning and a Poisoner’s desperation may do, in a kitchen which is open to her.” I went away on my errand–discovering no listener outside, I need hardly say. On my return, I found the door of communication with Philip’s room closed, but no longer locked. “We can now attend on him in turn,” she said, “without opening either of the doors which lead into the hall. At night we can relieve each other, and each of us can get sleep as we want it in the large armchair in the dining-room. Philip must be safe under our charge, or the doctor will insist on taking him to the hospital. When we want Maria’s help, from time to time, we can employ her under our own superintendence. Have you anything else, Selina, to suggest?”

There was nothing left to suggest. Young and inexperienced as she was, how (I asked) had she contrived to think of all this? She answered, simply “I’m sure I don’t know; my thoughts came to me while I was looking at Philip.”

Soon afterward I found an opportunity of inquiring if Helena had left the house. She had just rung her bell; and Maria had found her, quietly reading, in her room. Hours afterward, when I was on the watch at night, I heard Philip’s door softly tried from the outside. Her dreadful purpose had not been given up, even yet.

The doctor came in the evening, as he had promised, and found an improvement in Philip’s health. I mentioned what precautions we had taken, and that they had been devised by Euneece. “Are you going to withdraw from the case?” I asked. “I am coming back to the case,” he answered, “to-morrow morning.”

It had been a disappointment to me to receive no answer to the telegram which I had sent to Mr. Dunboyne the elder. The next day’s post brought the explanation in a letter to Philip from his father, directed to him at the hotel here. This showed that my telegram, giving my address at this house, had not been received. Mr. Dunboyne announced that he had returned to Ireland, finding the air of London unendurable, after the sea- breezes at home. If Philip had already married, his father would leave him to a life of genteel poverty with Helena Gracedieu. If he had thought better of it, his welcome was waiting for him.

Little did Mr. Dunboyne know what changes had taken place since he and his son had last met, and what hope might yet present itself of brighter days for poor Euneece! I thought of writing to him. But how would that crabbed old man receive a confidential letter from a lady who was a stranger?

My doubts were set at rest by Philip himself. He asked me to write a few lines of reply to his father; declaring that his marriage with Helena was broken off–that he had not given up all hope of being permitted to offer the sincere expression of his penitence to Euneece–and that he would gladly claim his welcome, as soon as he was well enough to undertake the journey to Ireland. When he had signed the letter, I was so pleased that I made a smart remark. I said: “This is a treaty of peace between father and son.”

When the doctor arrived in the morning, and found the change for the better in his patient confirmed, he did justice to us at last. He spoke kindly, and even gratefully, to Euneece. No more allusions to the hospital as a place of safety escaped him. He asked me cautiously for news of Helena. I could only tell him that she had gone out at her customary time, and had returned at her customary time. He did not attempt to conceal that my reply had made him uneasy.

“Are you still afraid that she may succeed in poisoning Philip?” I asked.

“I am afraid of her cunning,” he said. “If she is charged with attempting to poison young Dunboyne, she has some system of defense, you may rely on it, for which we are not prepared. There, in my opinion, is the true reason for her extraordinary insensibility to her own danger.”

Two more days passed, and we were still safe under the protection of lock and key.

On the evening of the second day (which was a Monday) Maria came to me in great tribulation. On inquiring what was the matter, I received a disquieting reply: “Miss Helena is tempting me. She is so miserable at being prevented from seeing Mr. Philip, and helping to nurse him, that it is quite distressing to see her. At the same time, miss, it’s hard on a poor servant. She asks me to take the key secretly out of the door, and lend it to her at night for a few minutes only. I’m really afraid I shall be led into doing it, if she goes on persuading me much longer.”

I commended Maria for feeling scruples which proved her to be the best of good girls, and promised to relieve her from all fear of future temptation. This was easily done. Euneece kept the key of Philip’s door in her pocket; and I kept the key of the dining-room door in mine.

CHAPTER LXI.

ATROCITY.

On the next day, a Tuesday in the week, an event took place which Euneece and I viewed with distrust. Early in the afternoon, a young man called with a note for Helena. It was to be given to her immediately, and no answer was required.

Maria had just closed the house door, and was on her way upstairs with the letter, when she was called back by another ring at the bell. Our visitor was the doctor. He spoke to Maria in the hall:

“I think I see a note in your hand. Was it given to you by the young man who has just left the house?”

“Yes, sir.

“If he’s your sweetheart, my dear, I have nothing more to say.”

“Good gracious, doctor, how you do talk! I never saw the young man before in my life.”

“In that case, Maria, I will ask you to let me look at the address. Aha! Mischief!”

The moment I heard that I threw open the dining-room door. Curiosity is not easily satisfied. When it hears, it wants to see; when it sees, it wants to know. Every lady will agree with me in this observation.

“Pray come in,” I said.

“One minute, Miss Jillgall. My girl, when you give Miss Helena that note, try to get a sly look at her when she opens it, and come and tell me what you have seen.” He joined me in the dining-room, and closed the door. “The other day,” he went on, “when I told you what I had discovered in the chemist’s shop, I think I mentioned a young man who was called to speak to a question of identity–an assistant who knew Miss Helena Gracedieu by sight.”

“Yes, yes!”

“That young man left the note which Maria has just taken upstairs.”

“Who wrote it, doctor, and what does it say?”

“Questions naturally asked, Miss Jillgall–and not easily answered. Where is Eunice? Her quick wit might help us.”

She had gone out to buy some fruit and flowers for Philip.

The doctor accepted his disappointment resignedly. “Let us try what we can do without her,” he said. “That young man’s master has been in consultation (you may remember why) with his lawyer, and Helena may be threatened by an investigation before the magistrates. If this wild guess of mine turns out to have hit the mark, the poisoner upstairs has got a warning.”

I asked if the chemist had written the note. Foolish enough of me when I came to think of it. The chemist would scarcely act a friendly part toward Helena, when she was answerable for the awkward position in which he had placed himself. Perhaps the young man who had left the warning was also the writer of the warning. The doctor reminded me that he was all but a stranger to Helena. “We are not usually interested,” he remarked, “in a person whom we only know by sight.”

“Remember that he is a young man,” I ventured to say. This was a strong hint, but the doctor failed to see it. He had evidently forgotten his own youth. I made another attempt.

“And vile as Helena is,” I continued, “we cannot deny that this disgrace to her sex is a handsome young lady.”

He saw it at last. “Woman’s wit!” he cried. “You have hit it, Miss Jillgall. The young fool is smitten with her, and has given her a chance of making her escape.”

“Do you think she will take the chance?”

“For all our sakes, I pray God she may! But I don’t feel sure about it.”

“Why?”

“Recollect what you and Eunice have done. You have shown your suspicion of her without an attempt to conceal it. If you had put her in prison you could not have more completely defeated her infernal design. Do you think she is a likely person to submit to that, without an effort to be even with you?”

Just as he said those terrifying words, Maria came back to us. He asked at once what had kept her so long upstairs.

The girl had evidently something to say, which had inflated her (if I may use such an expression) with a sense of her own importance.

“Please to let me tell it, sir,” she answered, “in my own way. Miss Helena turned as pale as ashes when she opened the letter, and then she took a turn in the room, and then she looked at me with a smile–well, miss, I can only say that I felt that smile in the small of my back. I tried to get to the door. She stopped me. She says: ‘Where’s Miss Eunice?’ I says: ‘Gone out.’ She says: ‘Is there anybody in the drawing-room?’ I says: ‘No, miss.’ She says: ‘Tell Miss Jillgall I want to speak to her, and say I am waiting in the drawing-room.’ It’s every word of it true! And, if a poor servant may give an opinion, I don’t like the look of it.”

The doctor dismissed Maria. “Whatever it is,” he said to me, “you must go and hear it.”

I am not a courageous woman; I expressed myself as being willing to go to her, if the doctor went with me. He said that was impossible; she would probably refuse to speak before any witness; and certainly before him. But he promised to look after Philip in my absence, and to wait below if it really so happened that I wanted him. I need only ring the bell, and he would come to me the moment he heard it. Such kindness as this roused my courage, I suppose. At any rate, I went upstairs.

She was standing by the fire-place, with her elbow on the chimney-piece, and her head, resting on her hand. I stopped just inside the door, waiting to hear what she had to say. In this position her side-face only was presented to me. It was a ghastly face. The eye that I could see turned wickedly on me when I came in–then turned away again. Otherwise, she never moved. I confess I trembled, but I did my best to disguise it.

She broke out suddenly with what she had to say: “I won’t allow this state of things to go on any longer. My horror of an exposure which will disgrace the family has kept me silent, wrongly silent, so far. Philip’s life is in danger. I am forgetting my duty to my affianced husband, if I allow myself to be kept away from him any longer. Open those locked doors, and relieve me from the sight of you. Open the doors, I say, or you will both of you–you the accomplice, she the wretch who directs you–repent it to the end of your lives.”

In my own mind, I asked myself if she had gone mad. But I only answered: “I don’t understand you.”

She said again: “You are Eunice’s accomplice.”

“Accomplice in what?” I asked.

She turned her head slowly and faced me. I shrank from looking at her.

“All the circumstances prove it,” she went on. “I have supplanted Eunice in Philip’s affection. She was once engaged to marry him; I am engaged to marry him now. She is resolved that he shall never make me his wife. He will die if I delay any longer. He will die if I don’t crush her, like the reptile she is. She comes here–and what does she do? Keeps him prisoner under her own superintendence. Who gets his medicine? She gets it. Who cooks his food? She cooks it. The doors are locked. I might be a witness of what goes on; and I am kept out. The servants who ought to wait on him are kept out. She can do what she likes with his medicine; she can do what she likes with his food: she is infuriated with him for deserting her, and promising to marry me. Give him back to my care; or, dreadful as it is to denounce my own sister, I shall claim protection from the magistrates.”

I lost all fear of her: I stepped close up to the place at which she was standing; I cried out: “Of what, in God’s name, do you accuse your sister?”

She answered: “I accuse her of poisoning Philip Dunboyne.”

I ran out of the room; I rushed headlong down the stairs. The doctor heard me, and came running into the hall. I caught hold of him like a madwoman. “Euneece!” My breath was gone; I could only say: “Euneece!”

He dragged me into the dining-room. There was wine on the side-board, which he had ordered medically for Philip. He forced me to drink some of it. It ran through me like fire; it helped me to speak. “Now tell me,” he said, “what has she done to Eunice?”

“She brings a horrible accusation against her,” I answered.

“What is the accusation?” I told him.

He looked me through and through. “Take care!” he said. “No hysterics, no exaggeration. You may lead to dreadful consequences if you are not sure of yourself. If it’s really true, say it again.” I said it again–quietly this time.

His face startled me; it was white with rage. He snatched his hat off the hall table.

“What are you going to do?” I asked.

“My duty.” He was out of the house before I could speak to him again.

Third Period _(concluded)._

_TROUBLES AND TRIUMPHS OF THE FAMILY, RELATED BY THE GOVERNOR._

CHAPTER LXII.

THE SENTENCE PRONOUNCED.

MARTYRS to gout know, by sad experience, that they suffer under one of the most capricious of maladies. An attack of this disease will shift, in the most unaccountable manner, from one part of the body to another; or, it will release the victim when there is every reason to fear that it is about to strengthen its hold on him; or, having shown the fairest promise of submitting to medical treatment, it will cruelly lay the patient prostrate again in a state of relapse. Adverse fortune, in my case, subjected me to this last and worst trial of endurance. Two months passed–months of pain aggravated by anxiety–before I was able to help Eunice and Miss Jillgall personally with my sympathy and advice.

During this interval, I heard regularly from the friendly and faithful Selina.

Terror and suspense, courageously endured day after day, seem to have broken down her resistance, poor soul, when Eunice’s good name and Eunice’s tranquillity were threatened by the most infamous of false accusations. From that time, Miss Jillgall’s method of expressing herself betrayed a gradual deterioration. I shall avoid presenting at a disadvantage a correspondent who has claims on my gratitude, if I give the substance only of what she wrote–assisted by the newspaper which she sent to me, while the legal proceedings were in progress.

Honest indignation does sometimes counsel us wisely. When the doctor left Miss Jillgall, in anger and in haste, he had determined on taking the course from which, as a humane man and a faithful friend, he had hitherto recoiled. It was no time, now, to shrink from the prospect of an exposure. The one hope of successfully encountering the vindictive wickedness of Helena lay in the resolution to be beforehand with her, in the appeal to the magistrates with which she had threatened Eunice and Miss Jillgall. The doctor’s sworn information stated the whole terrible case of the poisoning, ranging from his first suspicions and their confirmation, to Helena’s atrocious attempt to accuse her innocent sister of her own guilt. So firmly were the magistrates convinced of the serious nature of the case thus stated, that they did not hesitate to issue their warrant. Among the witnesses whose attendance was immediately secured, by the legal adviser to whom the doctor applied, were the farmer and his wife.

Helena was arrested while she was dressing to go out. Her composure was not for a moment disturbed. “I was on my way,” she said coolly, “to make a statement before the justices. The sooner they hear what I have to say the better.”

The attempt of this shameless wretch to “turn the tables” on poor Eunice–suggested, as I afterward discovered, by the record of family history which she had quoted in her journal–was defeated with ease. The farmer and his wife proved the date at which Eunice had left her place of residence under their roof. The doctor’s evidence followed. He proved, by the production of his professional diary, that the discovery of the attempt to poison his patient had taken place before the day of Eunice’s departure from the farm, and that the first improvement in Mr. Philip Dunboyne’s state of health had shown itself after that young lady’s arrival to perform the duties of a nurse. To the wise precautions which she had taken–perverted by Helena to the purpose of a false accusation–the doctor attributed the preservation of the young man’s life.

Having produced the worst possible impression on the minds of the magistrates, Helena was remanded. Her legal adviser had predicted this result; but the vindictive obstinacy of his client had set both experience and remonstrance at defiance.

At the renewed examination, the line of defense adopted by the prisoner’s lawyer proved to be–mistaken identity.

It was asserted that she had never entered the chemist’s shop; also, that the assistant had wrongly identified some other lady as Miss Helena Gracedieu; also, that there was not an atom of evidence to connect her with the stealing of the doctor’s prescription-paper and the forgery of his writing. Other assertions to the same purpose followed, on which it is needless to dwell.

The case for the prosecution was, happily, in competent hands. With the exception of one witness, cross-examination afforded no material help to the evidence for the defense.

The chemist swore positively to the personal appearance of Helena, as being the personal appearance of the lady who had presented the prescription. His assistant, pressed on the question of identity, broke down under cross-examination –purposely, as it was whispered, serving the interests of the prisoner. But the victory, so far gained by the defense, was successfully contested by the statement of the next witness, a respectable tradesman in the town. He had seen the newspaper report of the first examination, and had volunteered to present himself as a witness. A member of Mr. Gracedieu’s congregation, his pew in the chapel was so situated as to give him a view of the minister’s daughters occupying their pew. He had seen the prisoner on every Sunday, for years past; and he swore that he was passing the door of the chemist’s shop, at the moment when she stepped out into the street, having a bottle covered with the customary white paper in her hand. The doctor and his servant were the next witnesses called. They were severely cross- examined. Some of their statements–questioned technically with success–received unexpected and powerful support, due to the discovery and production of the prisoner’s diary. The entries, guardedly as some of them were written, revealed her motive for attempting to poison Philip Dunboyne; proved that she had purposely called on the doctor when she knew that he would be out, that she had entered the consulting-room, and examined the medical books, had found (to use her own written words) “a volume that interested her,” and had used the prescription-papers for the purpose of making notes. The notes themselves were not to be found; they had doubtless been destroyed. Enough, and more than enough, remained to make the case for the prosecution complete. The magistrates committed Helena Gracedieu for trial at the next assizes.

I arrived in the town, as well as I can remember, about a week after the trial had taken place.

Found guilty, the prisoner had been recommended to mercy by the jury–partly in consideration of her youth; partly as an expression of sympathy and respect for her unhappy father. The judge (a father himself) passed a lenient sentence. She was condemned to imprisonment for two years. The careful matron of the jail had provided herself with a bottle of smelling-salts, in the fear that there might be need for it when Helena heard her sentence pronounced. Not the slightest sign of agitation appeared in her face or her manner. She lied to the last; asserting her innocence in a firm voice, and returning from the dock to the prison without requiring assistance from anybody.

Relating these particulars to me, in a state of ungovernable excitement, good Miss Jillgall ended with a little confession of her own, which operated as a relief to my overburdened mind after what I had just heard.

“I wouldn’t own it,” she said, “to anybody but a dear friend. One thing, in the dreadful disgrace that has fallen on us, I am quite at a loss to account for. Think of Mr. Gracedieu’s daughter being one of those criminal creatures on whom it was once your terrible duty to turn the key! Why didn’t she commit suicide?”

“My dear lady, no thoroughly wicked creature ever yet committed suicide. Self-destruction, when it is not an act of madness, implies some acuteness of feeling–sensibility to remorse or to shame, or perhaps a distorted idea of making atonement. There is no such thing as remorse or shame, or hope of making atonement, in Helena’s nature.”

“But when she comes out of prison, what will she do?”

“Don’t alarm yourself, my good friend. She will do very well.”

“Oh, hush! hush! Poetical justice, Mr. Governor!”

“Poetical fiddlesticks, Miss Jillgall.”

CHAPTER LXIII.

THE OBSTACLE REMOVED.

When the subject of the trial was happily dismissed, my first inquiry related to Eunice. The reply was made with an ominous accompaniment of sighs and sad looks. Eunice had gone back to her duties as governess at the farm. Hearing this, I asked naturally what had become of Philip.

Melancholy news, again, was the news that I now heard.

Mr. Dunboyne the elder had died suddenly, at his house in Ireland, while Philip was on his way home. When the funeral ceremony had come to an end, the will was read. It had been made only a few days before the testator’s death; and the clause which left all his property to his son was preceded by expressions of paternal affection, at a time when Philip was in sore need of consolation. After alluding to a letter, received from his son, the old man added: “I always loved him, without caring to confess it; I detest scenes of sentiment, kissings, embracings, tears, and that sort of thing. But Philip has yielded to my wishes, and has broken off a marriage which would have made him, as well as me, wretched for life. After this, I may speak my mind from my grave, and may tell my boy that I loved him. If the wish is likely to be of any use, I will add (on the chance)–God bless him.”

“Does Philip submit to separation from Eunice?” I asked. “Does he stay in Ireland?”

“Not he, poor fellow! He will be here to-morrow or next day. When I last wrote,” Miss Jillgall continued, “I told him I hoped to see you again soon. If you can’t help us (I mean with Eunice) that unlucky young man will do some desperate thing. He will join those madmen at large who disturb poor savages in Africa, or go nowhere to find nothing in the Arctic regions.

“Whatever I can do, Miss Jillgall, shall be gladly done. Is it really possible that Eunice refuses to marry him, after having