Hello,Welcome!Log In to My AccountorCreate Account

BEFORE she had uttered a word, I saw in my mother-in-law's facethat she brought bad news.

"Eustace?" I said.

She answered me by a look.

"Let me he ar it at once!" I cried. "I can bear anything butsuspense."

Mrs. Macallan lifted her hand, and showed me a telegraphicdispatch which she had hitherto kept concealed in the folds ofher dress.

"I can trust your courage," she said. "There is no need, mychild, to prevaricate with you. Read that."

I read the telegram. It was sent by the chief surgeon of afield-hospital; and it was dated from a village in the north ofSpain.

"Mr. Eustace severely wounded in a skirmish by a stray shot. Notin danger, so far. Every care taken of him. Wait for anothertelegram."

I turned away my face, and bore as best I might the pang thatwrung me when I read those words. I thought I knew how dearly Iloved him: I had never known it till that moment.

My mother-in-law put her arm round me, and held me to hertenderly. She knew me well enough not to speak to me at thatmoment.

I rallied my courage, and pointed to the last sentence in thetelegram.

"Do you mean to wait?" I asked.

"Not a day!" she answered. "I am going to the Foreign Officeabout my passport--I have some interest there: they can give meletters; they can advise and assist me. I leave to-night by themail train to Calais."

"_You_ leave?" I said. "Do you suppose I will let you go withoutme? Get my passport when you get yours. At seven this evening Iwill be at your house."

She attempted to remonstrate; she spoke of the perils of thejourney. At the first words I stopped her. "Don't you know yet,mother, how obstinate I am? They may keep you waiting at theForeign Office. Why do you waste the precious hours here?"

She yielded with a gentleness that was not in her everydaycharacter. "Will my poor Eustace ever know what a wife he hasgot?" That was all she said. She kissed me, and went away in hercarriage.

My remembrances of our journey are strangely vague andimperfect.

As I try to recall them, the memory of those more recent and moreinteresting events which occurred after my return to England getsbetween me and my adventures in Spain, and seems to force theselast into a shadowy background, until they look like adventuresthat happened many years since. I confusedly recollect delays andalarms that tried our patience and our courage. I remember ourfinding friends (thanks to our letters of recommendation) in aSecretary to the Embassy and in a Queen's Messenger, who assistedand protected us at a critical point in the journey. I recall tomind a long succession of men in our employment as travelers, allequally remarkable for their dirty cloaks and their clean linen,for their highly civilized courtesy to women and their utterlybarbarous cruelty to horses. Last, and most important of all, Isee again, more clearly than I can see anything else, the onewretched bedroom of a squalid village inn in which we found ourpoor darling, prostrate between life and death, insensible toeverything that passed in the narrow little world that lay aroundhis bedside.

There was nothing romantic or interesting in the accident whichhad put my husband's life in peril.

He had ventured too near the scene of the conflict (a miserableaffair) to rescue a poor lad who lay wounded on thefield--mortally wounded, as the event proved. A rifle-bullet hadstruck him in the body. His brethren of the field-hospital hadcarried him back to their quarters at the risk of their lives. Hewas a great favorite with all of them; patient and gentle andbrave; only wanting a little more judgment to be the mostvaluable recruit who had joined the brotherhood.

In telling me this, the surgeon kindly and delicately added aword of warning as well.

The fever caused by the wound had brought with it delirium, asusual. My poor husband's mind, in so far as his wandering wordsmight interpret it, was filled by the one image of his wife. Themedical attendant had heard enough in the course of hisministrations at the bedside, to satisfy him that any suddenrecognition of me by Eustace (if he recovered) might be attendedby the most lamentable results. As things were at that sad time,I might take my turn at nursing him, without the slightest chanceof his discovering me, perhaps for weeks and weeks to come. Buton the day when he was declared out of danger--if that happy dayever arrived--I must resign my place at his bedside, and mustwait to show myself until the surgeon gave me leave.

My mother-in-law and I relieved each other regularly, day andnight, in the sick-room.

In the hours of his delirium--hours that recurred with a pitilessregularity--my name was always on my poor darling's fevered lips.The ruling idea in him was the fine dreadful idea which I hadvainly combated at our last interview. In the face of the verdictpronounced at the Trial, it was impossible even for his wife tobe really and truly persuaded that he was an innocent man. Allthe wild pictures which his distempered imagination drew wereequally inspired by that one obstinate conviction. He fanciedhimself to be still living with me under those dreadedconditions. Do what he might, I was always recalling to him theterrible ordeal through which he had passed. He acted his part,and he acted mine. He gave me a cup of tea; and I said to him,"We quarreled yesterday, Eustace. Is it poisoned?" He kissed me,in token of our reconciliation; and I laughed, and said, "It'smorning now, my dear. Shall I die by nine o'clock to-night?" Iwas ill in bed, and he gave me my medicine. I looked at him witha doubting eye. I said to him, "You are in love with anotherwoman. Is there anything in the medicine that the doctor doesn'tknow of?" Such was the horrible drama which now perpetually acteditself in his mind. Hundreds and hundreds of times I heard himrepeat it, almost always in the same words. On other occasionshis thoughts wandered away to my desperate project of proving himto be an innocent man. Sometimes he laughed at it. Sometimes hemourned over it. Sometimes he devised cunning schemes for placingunsuspected obstacles in my way. He was especially hard on mewhen he was inventing his preventive stratagems--he cheerfullyinstructed the visionary people who assisted him not to hesitateat offending or distressing me. "Never mind if you make herangry; never mind if you make her cry. It's all for her good;it's all to save the poor fool from dangers she doesn't dream of.You mustn't pity her when she says she does it for my sake. See!she is going to be insulted; she is going to be deceived; she isgoing to disgrace herself without knowing it. Stop her! stopher!" It was weak of me, I know; I ought to have kept the plainfact that he was out of his senses always present to my mind:still it is true that my hours passed at my husband's pillow weremany of them hours of mortification and misery of which he, poordear, was the innocent and only cause.

The weeks passed; and he still hovered between life and death.

I kept no record of the time, and I cannot now recall the exactdate on which the first favorable change took place. I onlyremember that it was toward sunrise on a fine winter morning whenwe were relieved at last of our heavy burden of suspense. Thesurgeon happened to be by the bedside when his patient awoke. Thefirst thing he did, after looking at Eustace, was to caution meby a sign to be silent and to keep out of sight. My mother-in-lawand I both knew what this meant. With full hearts we thanked Godtogether for giving us back the husband and the son.

The same evening, being alone, we ventured to speak of thefuture--for the first time since we had left home.

"The surgeon tells me," said Mrs. Macallan, "that Eustace is tooweak to be capable of bearing anything in the nature of asurprise for some days to come. We have time to consider whetherhe is or is not to be told that he owes his life as much to yourcare as to mine. Can you find it in your heart to leave him,Valeria, now that God's mercy has restored him to you and to me?"

"If I only consulted my own heart," I answered, "I should neverleave him again."

Mrs. Macallan looked at me in grave surprise.

"What else have you to consult?" she asked.

"If we both live," I repli ed, "I have to think of the happinessof his life and the happiness of mine in the years that are tocome. I can bear a great deal, mother, but I cannot endure themisery of his leaving me for the second time."

"You wrong him, Valeria--I firmly believe you wrong him--inthinking it possible that he can leave you again."

"Dear Mrs. Macallan, have you forgotten already what we have bothheard him say of me while we have been sitting by his bedside?"

"We have heard the ravings of a man in delirium. It is surelyhard to hold Eustace responsible for what he said when he was outof his senses."

"It is harder still," I said, "to resist his mother when she ispleading for him. Dearest and best of friends! I don't holdEustace responsible for what he said in the fever--but I _do_take warning by it. The wildest words that fell from him were,one and all, the faithful echo of what he said to me in the bestdays of his health and his strength. What hope have I that hewill recover with an altered mind toward me? Absence has notchanged it; suffering has not changed it. In the delirium offever, and in the full possession of his reason, he has the samedreadful doubt of me. I see but one way of winning him back: Imust destroy at its root his motive for leaving me. It ishopeless to persuade him that I believe in his innocence: I mustshow him that belief is no longer necessary; I must prove to himthat his position toward me has become the position of aninnocent man!"

"Valeria! Valeria! you are wasting time and words. You have triedthe experiment; and you know as well as I do that the thing isnot to be done."

I had no answer to that. I could say no more than I had saidalready.

"Suppose you go back to Dexter, out of sheer compassion for a madand miserable wretch who has already insulted you," proceeded mymother-in-law. "You can only go back accompanied by me, or bysome other trustworthy person. You can only stay long enough tohumor the creature's wayward fancy, and to keep his crazy brainquiet for a time. That done, all is done--you leave him. Evensupposing Dexter to be still capable of helping you, how can youmake use of him but by admitting him to terms of confidence andfamiliarity--by treating him, in short, on the footing of anintimate friend? Answer me honestly: can you bring yourself to dothat, after what happened at Mr. Benjamin's house?"

I had told her of my last interview with Miserrimus Dexter, inthe natural confidence that she inspired in me as relative andfellow-traveler; and this was the use to which she turned herinformation! I suppose I had no right to blame her; I suppose themotive sanctioned everything. At any rate, I had no choice but togive offense or to give an answer. I gave it. I acknowledged thatI could never again permit Miserrimus Dexter to treat me on termsof familiarity as a trusted and intimate friend.

Mrs. Macallan pitilessly pressed the advantage that she had won.

"Very well," she said, "that resource being no longer open toyou, what hope is left? Which way are you to turn next?"

There was no meeting those questions, in my present situation, byany adequate reply. I felt strangely unlike myself--I submittedin silence. Mrs. Macallan struck the last blow that completed hervictory.

"My poor Eustace is weak and wayward," she said; "but he is notan ungrateful man. My child, you have returned him good forevil--you have proved how faithfully and how devotedly you lovehim, by suffering all hardships and risking all dangers for hissake. Trust me, and trust him! He cannot resist you. Let him seethe dear face that he has been dreaming of looking at him againwith all the old love in it, and he is yours once more, mydaughter--yours for life." She rose and touched my forehead withher lips; her voice sank to tones of tenderness which I had neverheard from her yet. "Say yes, Valeria," she whispered; "and bedearer to me and dearer to him than ever!"

My heart sided with her. My energies were worn out. No letter hadarrived from Mr. Playmore to guide and to encourage me. I hadresisted so long and so vainly; I had tried and suffered so much;I had met with such cruel disasters and such reiterateddisappointments--and he was in the room beneath me, feeblyfinding his way back to consciousness and to life--how could Iresist? It was all over. In saying Yes (if Eustace confirmed hismother's confidence in him), I was saying adieu to the onecherished ambition, the one dear and noble hope of my life. Iknew it--and I said Yes.

And so good-by to the grand struggle! And so welcome to the newresignation which owned that I had failed.

My mother-in-law and I slept together under the only shelterthat the inn could offer to us--a sort of loft at the top of thehouse. The night that followed our conversation was bitterlycold. We felt the chilly temperature, in spite of the protectionof our dressing-gowns and our traveling-wrappers. Mymother-in-law slept, but no rest came to me. I was too anxiousand too wretched, thinking over my changed position, and doubtinghow my husband would receive me, to be able to sleep.

Some hours, as I suppose, must have passed, and I was stillabsorbed in my own melancholy thoughts, when I suddenly becameconscious of a new and strange sensation which astonished andalarmed me. I started up in the bed, breathless and bewildered.The movement awakened Mrs. Macallan. "Are you ill?" she asked."What is the matter with you?" I tried to tell her, as well as Icould. She seemed to understand me before I had done; she took metenderly in her arms, and pressed me to her bosom. "My poorinnocent child," she said, "is it possible you don't know? Must Ireally tell you?" She whispered her next words. Shall I everforget the tumult of feelings which the whisper aroused inme--the strange medley of joy and fear, and wonder and relief,and pride and humility, which filled my whole being, and made anew woman of me from that moment? Now, for the first time, I knewit! If God spared me for a few months more, the most enduring andthe most sacred of all human joys might be mine--the joy of beinga mother.

I don't know how the rest of the night passed. I only find mymemory again when the morning came, and when I went out by myselfto breathe the crisp wintry air on the open moor behind the inn.

I have said that I felt like a new woman. The morning found mewith a new resolution and a new courage. When I thought of thefuture, I had not only my husband to consider now. His good namewas no longer his own and mine--it might soon become the mostprecious inheritance that he could leave to his child. What had Idone while I was in ignorance of this? I had resigned the hope ofcleansing his name from the stain that rested on it--a stainstill, no matter how little it might look in the eye of the Law.Our child might live to hear malicious tongues say, "Your fatherwas tried for the vilest of all murders, and was never absolutelyacquitted of the charge." Could I face the glorious perils ofchildbirth with that possibility present to my mind? No! notuntil I had made one more effort to lay the conscience ofMiserrimus Dexter bare to my view! not until I had once againrenewed the struggle, and brought the truth that vindicated thehusband and the father to the light of day!

I went back to the house, with my new courage to sustain me. Iopened my heart to my friend and mother, and told her frankly ofthe change that had come over me since we had last spoken ofEustace.

She was more than disappointed--she was almost offended with me.The one thing needful had happened, she said. The happiness thatmight soon come to us would form a new tie between my husband andme. Every other consideration but this she treated as purelyfanciful. If I left Eustace now, I did a heartless thing and afoolish thing. I should regret, to the end of my days, havingthrown away the one golden opportunity of my married life.

It cost me a hard struggle, it oppressed me with many a painfuldoubt; but I held firm this time. The honor of the father, theinheritance of the child--I kept these thoughts as constant ly aspossible before my mind. Sometimes they failed me, and left menothing better than a poor fool who had some fitful bursts ofcrying, and was always ashamed of herself afterward. But mynative obstinacy (as Mrs. Macallan said) carried me through. Nowand then I had a peep at Eustace, while he was asleep; and thathelped me too. Though they made my heart ache and shook me sadlyat the times those furtive visits to my husband fortified meafterward. I cannot explain how this happened (it seems socontradictory); I can only repeat it as one of my experiences atthat troubled time.

I made one concession to Mrs. Macallan--I consented to wait fortwo days before I took any steps for returning to England, on thechance that my mind might change in the interval.

It was well for me that I yielded so far. On the second day thedirector of the field-hospital sent to the post-office at ournearest town for letters addressed to him or to his care. Themessenger brought back a letter for me. I thought I recognizedthe handwriting, and I was right. Mr. Playmore's answer hadreached me at last!

If I had been in any danger of changing my mind, the good lawyerwould have saved me in the nick of time. The extract that followscontains the pith of his letter; and shows how he encouraged mewhen I stood in sore need of a few cheering and friendly words.

"Let me now tell you," he wrote, "what I have done towardverifying the conclusion to which your letter points.

"I have traced one of the servants who was appointed to keepwatch in the corridor on the night when the first Mrs. Eustacedied at Gleninch. The man perfectly remembers that MiserrimusDexter suddenly appeared before him and his fellow-servant longafter the house was quiet for the night. Dexter said to them, 'Isuppose there is no harm in my going into the study to read? Ican't sleep after what has happened; I must relieve my mindsomehow.' The men had no orders to keep any one out of the study.They knew that the door of communication with the bedchamber waslocked, and that the keys of the two other doors of communicationwere in the possession of Mr. Gale. They accordingly permittedDexter to go into the study. He closed the door (the door thatopened on the corridor), and remained absent for some time--inthe study as the men supposed; in the bedchamber as we know fromwhat he let out at his interview with you. Now he could enterthat room, as you rightly imagine, in but one way--by being inpossession of the missing key. How long he remained there Icannot discover. The point is of little consequence. The servantremembers that he came out of the study again 'as pale as death,'and that he passed on without a word on his way back to his ownroom.

"These are facts. The conclusion to which they lead is serious inthe last degree. It justifies everything that I confided to youin my office at Edinburgh. You remember what passed between us. Isay no more.

"As to yourself next. You have innocently aroused in MiserrimusDexter a feeling toward you which I need not attempt tocharacterize. There is a certain something--I saw it myself--inyour figure, and in some of your movements, which does recall thelate Mrs. Eustace to those who knew her well, and which hasevidently had its effect on Dexter's morbid mind. Withoutdwelling further on this subject, let me only remind you that hehas shown himself (as a consequence of your influence over him)to be incapable, in his moments of agitation, of thinking beforehe speaks while he is in your presence. It is not merelypossible, it is highly probable, that he may betray himself farmore seriously than he has betrayed himself yet if you give himthe opportunity. I owe it to you (knowing what your interestsare) to express myself plainly on this point. I have no sort ofdoubt that you have advanced one step nearer to the end which youhave in view in the brief interval since you left Edinburgh. Isee in your letter (and in my discoveries) irresistible evidencethat Dexter must have been in secret communication with thedeceased lady (innocent communication, I am certain, so far as_she_ was concerned), not only at the time of her death, butperhaps for weeks before it. I cannot disguise from myself orfrom you, my own strong persuasion that if you succeed indiscovering the nature of this communication, in all humanlikelihood you prove your husband's innocence by the discovery ofthe truth. As an honest man, I am bound not to conceal this. And,as an honest man also, I am equally bound to add that, not evenwith your reward in view, can I find it in my conscience toadvise you to risk what you must risk if you see MiserrimusDexter again. In this difficult and delicate matter I cannot andwill not take the responsibility: the final decision must restwith yourself. One favor only I entreat you to grant--let me hearwhat you resolve to do as soon as you know it yourself."

The difficulties which my worthy correspondent felt were nodifficulties to me. I did not possess Mr. Playmore's judicialmind. My resolution was settled before I had read his letterthrough.

The mail to France crossed the frontier the next day. There was aplace for me, under the protection of the conductor, if I choseto take it. Without consulting a living creature--rash as usual,headlong as usual--I took it.