Elster's Folly Part 91

Anne was growing painfully interested.

"Well, after that she threw herself upon me in a manner that--that was extraordinary to me, not having the key to it; and I--lost my head. Don't frown, Anne; ninety-nine men out of a hundred would have lost theirs; and you'll say so if ever I give you the details. Of course blame attached to me; to me, and not to her. Though at the time I mentally gave her, I a.s.sure you, her full share, somewhat after the manner of the Pharisee condemning the publican. That also has come home to me: she believed herself to be legally my wife; I never gave a thought to that evening's farce, and should have supposed its bearing any meaning a simple impossibility.

"A short time, and letters summoned me home; my mother was dangerously ill. I remember Agnes asked me to take her with me, and I laughed at her.

I arranged to write to her, and promised to go back shortly--which, to tell you the truth, I never meant to do. Having been mistaking her, mistaking her still, I really thought her worthy of very little consideration. Before I had been at home a fortnight I received a letter from Dr. Mair, telling me that Agnes was showing symptoms of insanity, and asking what provision I purposed making for her. My sin was finding me out; I wondered how _he_ had found it out; I did not ask, and did not know for years. I wrote back saying I would willingly take all expenses upon myself; and inquired what sum would be required by the asylum--to which he said she must be sent. He mentioned two hundred a-year, and from that time I paid it regularly."

"And was she really insane?" interrupted Lady Hartledon.

"Yes; she had been so once or twice before--and this was what the housekeeper had meant by saying she was with the doctor that her health might be watched. It appeared that when these symptoms came on, after I left, Gordon took upon himself to disclose to the doctor that Agnes was married to me, telling the circ.u.mstances as they had occurred. Dr. Mair got frightened: it was no light matter for the son of an English peer to have been deluded into marriage with an obscure and insane girl; and the quarrel that took place between him and Gordon on the occasion resulted in the latter's leaving. I have never understood Gordon's conduct in the matter: very disagreeable thoughts in regard to it come over me sometimes."

"What thoughts?"

"Oh, never mind; they can never be set at rest now. Let me make short work of this story. I heard no more and thought no more; and the years went on, and then came my marriage with Maude. We went to Paris--_you_ cannot have forgotten any of the details of that period, Anne; and after our return to London I was surprised by a visit from Dr. Mair. That evening, that visit and its details stamped themselves on my memory for ever in characters of living fire."

He paused for a moment, and something like a s.h.i.+ver seized him. Anne said nothing.

"Maude had gone with some friends to a fete at Chiswick, and Thomas Carr was dining with me. Hedges came in and said a gentleman wanted to see me--_would_ see me, and would not be denied. I went to him, and found it was Dr. Mair. In that interview I learnt that by the laws of Scotland Miss Waterlow was my wife."

"And the suspicion that she was so had never occurred to you before?"

"Anne! Should I have been capable of marrying Maude, or any one else, if it had? On my solemn word of honour, before Heaven"--he raised his right hand as if to give effect to his words--"such a thought had never crossed my brain. The evening that the nonsense took place I only regarded it as a jest, a pastime--what you will: had any one told me it was a marriage I should have laughed at them. I knew nothing then of the laws of Scotland, and should have thought it simply impossible that that minute's folly, and my calling her, to keep up the joke, Mrs. Elster, could have const.i.tuted a marriage. I think they all played a deep part, even Agnes.

Not a soul had so much as hinted at the word 'marriage' to me after that evening; neither Gordon, nor she, nor Dr. Mair in his subsequent correspondence; and in that he always called her 'Agnes.' However--he then told me that she was certainly my legal wife, and that Lady Maude was not.

"At first," continued Val, "I did not believe it; but Dr. Mair persisted he was right, and the horror of the situation grew upon me. I told all to Carr, and took him up to Dr. Mair. They discussed Scottish law and consulted law-books; and the truth, so far, became apparent. Dr. Mair was sorry for me; he saw I had not erred knowingly in marrying Maude. As to myself, I was helpless, prostrated. I asked the doctor, if it were really true, why the fact had been kept from me: he replied that he supposed I knew it, and that delicacy alone had caused him to abstain from alluding to it in his letters. He had been very angry when Gordon told him, he said; grew half frightened as to consequences; feared he should get into trouble for allowing me to be so entrapped in his house; and he and Gordon parted at once. And then Dr. Mair asked a question which I could not very well answer, why, if I did not know she was my wife, I had paid so large a sum for Agnes. He had been burying the affair in silence, as he had a.s.sumed I was doing; and it was only the announcement of my marriage with Maude in the newspapers that aroused him. He had thought I was acting this bad part deliberately; and he went off at once to Hartledon in anger; found I had gone abroad; and now came to me on my return, still in anger, saying at first that he should proceed against me, and obtain justice for Agnes. When he found how utterly ignorant of wrong I had been, his tone changed; he was truly grieved and concerned for me. Nothing was decided: except that Dr. Mair, in his compa.s.sion towards Lady Maude, promised not to be the first to take legal steps.

It seemed that there was only him to fear: George Gordon was reported to have gone to Australia; the old housekeeper was dead; Agnes was deranged. Dr. Mair left, and Carr and I sat on till midnight. Carr took what I thought a harsh view of the matter; he urged me to separate from Maude--"

"I think you should have done so for her sake," came the gentle interruption.

"For her sake! the words Carr used. But, Anne, surely there were two sides to the question. If I disclosed the facts, and put her away from me, what was she? Besides, the law might be against me--Scotland's iniquitous law; but in Heaven's sight _Maude_ was my wife, not the other.

So I temporized, hoping that time might bring about a relief, for Dr.

Mair told me that Miss Waterlow's health was failing. However, she lived on, and--"

Lady Hartledon started up, her face blanching.

"Is she not dead now? Was she living when you married me? Am _I_ your wife?"

He could hardly help smiling. His calm touch rea.s.sured her.

"Do you think you need ask, Anne? The next year Dr. Mair called upon me again--it was the evening before the boy was christened; he had come to London on business of his own. To my dismay, he told me that a change for the better was appearing in Miss Waterlow's mental condition; and he thought it likely she might be restored to health. Of course, it increased the perplexities and my horror, had that been needed; but the hope or fear, or what you like to call it, was not borne out. Three years later, the doctor came to me for the third and final time, to bring me the news that Agnes was dead."

As the relief had been to him then, so did it almost seem now to Anne. A sigh of infinite pain broke from her. She had not seen where all this was tending.

"Imagine, if you can, what it was for me all those years with the knowledge daily and nightly upon me that the disgraceful truth might at any moment come out to Maude--to her children, to the world! Living in the dread of arrest myself, should the man Gordon show himself on the scene! And now you see what it is that has marred my peace, and broken the happiness of our married life. How could I bear to cross those two deeply-injured children, who were ever rising up in judgment against me?

How take our children's part against them, little unconscious things? It seemed that I had always, daily, hourly, some wrong to make up to them.

The poor boy was heir to Hartledon in the eyes of the world; but, Anne, your boy was the true heir."

"Why did you not tell me?--all this time!"

"I could not. I dared not. You might not have liked to put Reginald out of his rights."

"Oh, Percival; how can you so misjudge me?" she asked, in tones of pain.

"I would have guarded the secret as jealously as you. I must still do it for Maude."

"Poor Maude!" he sighed. "Her mother forgave me before she died--"

"She knew it, then?"

"Yes. She learned--"

Sounds of drumming on the door, and the countess-dowager's voice, stopped Lord Hartledon.

"I had better face her," he said, as he unlocked it. "She will arouse the household."

Wild, intemperate, she met him with a volley of abuse that startled Lady Hartledon. He got her to a sofa, and gently held her down there.

"It's what I've been obliged to do all along," said Thomas Carr; "I don't believe she has heard ten words of my explanation."

"Pray be calm, Lady Kirton," said Hartledon, soothingly; "be calm, as you value your daughter's memory. We shall have the servants at the doors."

"I won't be calm; I will know the worst."

"I wish you to know it; but not others."

"Was Maude your wife?"

"No," he answered, in low tones. "Not--"

"And you are not ashamed to confess it?" she interrupted, not allowing him to continue. But she was a little calmer in manner; and Val stood upright before her with folded arms.

"I am ashamed and grieved to confess it; but I did not knowingly inflict the injury. In Scotland--"

"Don't repeat the shameful tale," she cried; "I have heard from your confederate, Carr, as much as I want to hear. What do you deserve for your treachery to Maude?"

"All I have reaped--and more. But it was not intentional treachery; and Maude forgave me before she died."

"She knew it! You told her? Oh, you cruel monster!"

"I did not tell her. She did as you have just done--interfered in what did not concern her, in direct disobedience to my desire; and she found it out for herself, as you, ma'am, have found it out."

"When?"

"The winter before her death."

"Then the knowledge killed her!"

"No. Something else killed her, as you know. It preyed upon her spirits."

"Lord Hartledon, I can have you up for fraud and forgery, and I'll do it.