Mrs. Dorriman Volume Iii Part 2

"I mean," she said, hopelessly, "that if Margaret had not wanted to give Grace a home she would not have married Mr. Drayton."

"Do you suppose I do not know that?" he said. "Can you not see that the horror of it all is almost overwhelming me? I have already told you this myself!"

"Oh, brother," said Mrs. Dorriman, remorsefully, "I did not mean ..."

Mrs. Dorriman looked ready to cry.

"It is because you do not mean it that it makes it worse. Anne," he said, suddenly raising himself and looking at her, "if any one knew what the word remorse meant, I think there would be less wrong-doing in the world. _It_ is the worm that never dies, and the fire that never is quenched." He spoke in a tone of despair and despondency, and Mrs.

Dorriman endeavoured to console him.

"You know nothing of this, brother," she said, "you should not speak so.

You never did any grievous wrong." She stopped short as a cruel pang of recollection came to her, the haunting fear that once had possessed her.

Her face flushed and she trembled visibly.

He looked at her in silence, unable to reconcile to himself the words she spoke, implying trust in him and the doubt expressed in her face. At length he said in a feeble tone, which betrayed the great prostration he was suffering from--

"We will talk another day, Anne. Perhaps when we do have that conversation then you will feel you are free to leave me, to go to Margaret, or any one else."

"Brother," said Mrs. Dorriman, rising and standing beside him with her hands clasped, "I have learned to care for you now--and if in the past anything exists that may part us--let it alone--unless," she added, hastily, "it may be doing my husband's memory a wrong."

She spoke solemnly, and he gazed at her, earnestly.

"I believe you are a good woman, Anne, but you cannot right the one without----"

He waved her away from him, and she, disturbed and agitated, fearing and hoping at one and the same moment, stooped suddenly and kissed him, an unwonted demonstration on her side, but meant as a seal to the promise she had intended to make, and so he understood it.

Mrs. Dorriman, reserved and reticent, had one great hope in all this.

She trusted that the story which was so painful in every detail was not known to outsiders. Nothing would seem so painful to her if only they could keep it to themselves. She was one of those people who like to draw her mantle round her and not show her wounds. It is the misfortune of characters like hers that no event ever happens in connection with their home history of an unhappy nature that they do not begin to reproach themselves either for doing or not doing things, or for saying or not saying something in connection with it. A want of self-confidence often leads to a good deal of self-torment, and when she had left her brother's room she was very unhappy, clinging to this one belief of privacy as the one bright spot.

No one need know, and she said these words to herself, and found that they gave her comfort. How long she had sat thinking she did not know, but the twilight was coming on when the servant came to her and asked her if she would receive Mrs. Wymans.

"I am not out, of course, if any one calls; you can show them in," she said, surprised by his tone.

Mrs. Wymans came in with that prepared expression of sympathy that some people feel right to show on all occasions when sorrow may properly be supposed to be in question.

"This is indeed kind," she said, nestling up to Mrs. Dorriman. "I call it real friends.h.i.+p to allow me to see you at such a moment."

"My brother is so much better," said Mrs. Dorriman, with her little air of gentle dignity, "that there is no reason why I should deny myself to any one."

"Ah, so good of you; but then, dear Mrs. Dorriman, I am so deeply interested in you ever since that day we met in the railway-carriage. I have felt so much sympathy and real interest."

"You are very good."

"Oh no! I am not good at all. But your brother, how does he bear it?"

"He is better and in fair enough spirits, considering all things."

"Ah!" and Mrs. Wymans heaved a sigh that might have almost sent a s.h.i.+p across the sea.

The scene was curious--the one woman burning with curiosity and an intense anxiety to know what would put her in the position (in the society of Renton) of being really intimate with Mrs. Dorriman; and the other alarmed, anxious, yet standing bravely up and concealing by a wonderful exertion that she was at all nervous about anything.

"Will he be tried? Of course he will," and Mrs. Wymans heaved another sigh, which was cut short in the middle by want of breath.

Poor Mrs. Dorriman's heart seemed to stand still. Who was meant? Her brother? Still she showed a composed front to Mrs. Wymans, who was perplexed, annoyed, and began to be half afraid her information might not have been correct in every particular.

"You are talking riddles, Mrs. Wymans," and Mrs. Dorriman was unmistakeably annoyed.

"Such strange, such very strange stories spread, one never knows what to believe," Mrs. Wymans answered, "but I heard it on what seemed to be very good authority."

"Would you be so kind as to tell me what you have heard, and in what way it refers to me?" and Mrs. Dorriman felt the suspense was very terrible to her.

"Be prepared, for you evidently have heard nothing," and Mrs. Wymans felt to the full the importance of being the first to tell important news; "Mrs. Drayton's baby is dead, and, Mrs. Dorriman, _the child did not die a natural death_!"

Mrs. Dorriman started--for a moment she lost her self-control.

"Take care, Mrs. Wymans! Oh, do you know what you are saying!"

"You know nothing?"

"I know nothing about the child, and," taking sudden courage at the thought, "Jean, my old servant, wrote to me, and Grace--Miss Rivers--telegraphed, 'Mr. Drayton is ill,' that is all. There is nothing more."

"There is a great deal more. But, my dear Mrs. Dorriman, pray compose yourself; pray do not excite yourself. Mr. Drayton is ill, that is true, but has no one told you anything else?"

"What more can any one have to say?" Mrs. Dorriman asked, struggling for self-command, and feeling as though it was beyond her.

Mrs. Wymans paused; she had believed her authority to be good, and she had so completely credited every word she heard--we are all of us so apt to believe the very worst part of a friend's misfortune--that now, finding that Mrs. Dorriman knew nothing, she began to ask herself, when it was too late, if the story could be altogether true; perhaps it had been exaggerated.

"Perhaps," she said slowly, "as you have heard nothing----"

Mrs. Dorriman turned upon her with a fire and vivacity that fairly astonished her.

"Mrs. Wymans, you have said enough to fill me with apprehension; you say the child is dead. It is strange we do not know this, my brother and I; and you add, in a tone of great meaning, it did not die a natural death.

What do you mean?"

Thus brought to bay, Mrs. Wymans blurted out suddenly what she had heard.

"It is said Mr. Drayton is mad, and that he killed the child. For goodness sake, Mrs. Dorriman, do not faint!" she exclaimed, noticing the deadly pallor of the poor little woman before her.

"I----am not going to faint," said poor Mrs. Dorriman, in that far-away voice that speaks of the cruellest mental agitation; "but you have told me a horrible story. I do not believe it!" she continued, with a sob; "but it is horrible, and I must go--I must telegraph at once."

"Yes, do telegraph," said Mrs. Wymans, eagerly; "can I not take the telegram with me? It will hardly be a moment out of my way."

"Thank you, no," said Mrs. Dorriman, coldly.

How little we love the bearer of bad tidings!

"What will you do about Mr. Sandford?" continued the obtuse woman, anxious to be in the way of whatever there was, and not seeing that Mrs.

Dorriman was dying to get rid of her; "do make me of use. Shall I go to him? A stranger sometimes breaks bad news better than a very near relation."