“The arrow once discharged from this weak hand,
Can I arrest its flight in the free air?
Where will this course now lead me?”
Camoens. By H. S. G. Tucker.
The countess advanced one step towards Bardon, and held out her hand. He took it cordially, and looked at her bloodless face with mingled interest and concern.
“Do not suppose,” said Annabella, resuming her seat, and motioning to him to take a chair beside her,—“do not suppose that I see you in order to ask for your medical advice. You must know well that it is beyond your power to ‘minister to a mind diseased,’ that my case is not one which the whole pharmacopeia can cure. I see you as a friend,”—her lip quivered as she spoke,—“as one who will understand my feelings, and not torment me with well-meant advice which I would rather die than follow!”
“You are a noble creature—a brave creature!” exclaimed Bardon; “I am proud of the spirit which you have shown.”
[129]
“Have you been far to-day?” asked the countess, colouring slightly at the ill-merited praise.
“I was at Pelton this morning on business, or I should have called upon you earlier,” was the doctor’s reply.
“You have been, doubtless, at many houses,”—Annabella seemed to frame each sentence with difficulty,—“you have seen many people—have heard—heard much that is—that must be said—and—.” She stopped, and looked at the doctor, but he did not seem disposed to guess the meaning of her unfinished sentence.
“I wish to learn from you,” continued the countess, forcing herself to a more explicit explanation; “it is important for me to know what the world says of this—this unhappy affair.”
“You care as little as I do for what the world says,” replied the doctor.
But it was not so with Annabella. Popular distinction, the applause of others, had been to her as the breath of life. Her pride was not the pride of self-sufficiency; she was intensely desirous to know whether public opinion were inclining to her side or that of her lord, and she pressed the doctor for a more definite reply.
“Of course,” he answered at last, “there are almost as many versions of the story as there are narrators of it. No tale loses by the telling. Some say this thing, some say that, some pity, and some blame.[130] What is, however, pretty universally received as the most authentic account is—”
“Tell me!” cried the countess nervously, as the speaker paused.
“Why, it is said that you had somehow got into the snares of the Papists. That an old priest and a nun in disguise had made their way into Dashleigh Hall; and, some affirm, had a private mass there. That the earl discovered amongst your papers a prayer to the Virgin, or something of that sort, and that he was so much disgusted by what he called your apostasy, that tearing the paper into a thousand fragments, he turned you out of the room.”
“Did any one believe such a senseless tale?” cried Annabella.
“It was said to come from the best authority, and is very generally credited.”
“Did you not give it indignant refutation?”
“My dear lady, you forget that I am in utter darkness upon the subject myself. I could stake my life that you had good cause for what you did, but of that cause I know no more than this chair.”
“Then you shall know all,” exclaimed Annabella, “that you may be able to give an answer to such idle calumnies as these;” and with rapid utterance she gave the doctor an account of what had occurred, her narrative following truth in the main, though coloured by prejudice and passion.
Bardon’s face showed gloomy satisfaction as he[131] listened to the excited speaker. “So then,” he exclaimed as she concluded, “your crime is having drawn so faithful a portrait, that he who sat for it would not own it! What a fool he was to quarrel with one who has him so completely at her mercy!”
“What do you mean?” said Annabella quickly.
“You carried your desk with you, did you not?” said Bardon, with an expressive glance at that on the table; “and you carried with you the wit that can sting. Write out that paper again; give it to the public;—the world will laugh, and the earl will wince. No one who reads but will understand (I will do my best to enlighten dull comprehensions) why the peer was so angry with his wife—why he who stood trembling on the mountain was afraid of the wit of a woman.”
“It would be retribution!” exclaimed Annabella.
“It would be revenge!” cried the haughty old man.
Little did the Aumerles divine that the physician whom they had admitted in order that he might quiet a fevered pulse, was pouring venom into a wound which he should rather have sought to heal; that he was doing the work, obeying the hest of the demon Pride, and drawing further from happiness and peace the young creature who had turned to him in her distress.
There was a strange, almost fierce satisfaction in the looks of Dr. Bardon when he descended to the[132] sitting-room, that was incomprehensible to the Aumerles.
“You will send her a sleeping draught?” said the vicar.
“I have given her something to compose,” replied Bardon, a grim smile relaxing his features.
“You think her very feverish?” inquired Ida.
“Oh, there’s nothing to alarm,” said the doctor; “she will be much relieved by-and-bye.”
As soon as he had quitted the vicarage, Ida went up to Annabella’s room, and gently knocked at the door.
“I wish to be alone!” said a voice from within, and Ida immediately retired.
When the carriage which had been ordered by Augustine Aumerle rolled up to the front of the vicarage, Ida was sent again to try her powers of persuasion, to induce the countess to avail herself of it to return to her husband’s home.
Ida felt the errand painful, and almost hopeless. She hesitated for a moment ere she knocked, and heard within the sound of a pen moving rapidly over the paper.
“Annabella, my love,” began Ida, as she softly unclosed the door.
The countess was bending over her desk, apparently absorbed in writing. Her back was towards the door, but she started on the entrance of Ida, and turning hastily round showed a countenance crimsoned to the temples with a burning flush.
[133]
“I can’t be disturbed!” she exclaimed in a voice strangely harsh and impatient.
“O dear cousin!” cried Ida, “if you would but listen for a moment—”
“I will hear you to-morrow,” said Annabella, “let me feel that in this room at least I am safe from unwelcome intrusion!”
Intrusion! what a word—and from those lips! Ida Aumerle was deeply hurt, not to say offended, and returned again to her family mortified and dejected. The vicar breathed a weary sigh, and Mrs. Aumerle said something about “a termagant,” which made Mabel extremely angry.
“So then I must be off!” said Augustine. “I had so little hope of the fair lady’s yielding, that, as you see, my travelling bag is all ready. Farewell, Mrs. Aumerle; thanks for your hospitality. Lawrence, remember that I expect you all at Aspendale on the 12th. I shall be glad if by that time you think my friend Mabel sufficiently fledged to try a flight in the blue empyrean!”
After her uncle’s departure Ida retired with a heavy heart to the little room which, since Annabella’s arrival, she had shared with her sister Mabel. The gratitude which a woman feels towards one who has offered to her his home and his heart, and the affection which Ida had from childhood entertained for............