Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (1341 page)

“Well, sir, you might have some other engagement.”

Was this a hint? or only an excuse? In either case it was high time, if he still refused to speak out, that I should set him the example.

“You have given me some curious information,” I said, “on the subject of fighting with the fists; and you have made me understand the difference between ‘fair hitting’ and ‘foul hitting’. Are you hitting fair now? Very likely I am mistaken — but you seem to me to be trying to prevent my accepting your master’s invitation.”

He pulled off his hat in a hurry.

“I beg your pardon, sir; I won’t detain you any longer. If you will allow me, I’ll take my leave.”

“Don’t go, Mr. Gloody, without telling me whether I am right or wrong. Is there really some objection to my coming to tea tomorrow?”

“Quite a mistake, sir,” he said, still in a hurry. “I’ve led you wrong without meaning it — being an ignorant man, and not knowing how to express myself. Don’t think me ungrateful, Mr. Roylake! After your kindness to me, I’d go through fire and water for you — I would!”

His sunken eyes moistened, his big voice faltered. I let him leave me, in mercy to the strong feeling which I had innocently roused. But I shook hands with him first. Yielding to one of my headlong impulses? Yes. And doing a very indiscreet thing? Wait a little — and we shall see.

CHAPTER XII

WARNED FOR THE LAST TIME!

My loyalty towards the afflicted man, whose friendly advances I had seen good reason to return, was in no sense shaken. His undeserved misfortunes, his manly appeal to me at the spring, his hopeless attachment to the beautiful girl whose aversion towards him I had unhappily encouraged, all pleaded with me in his favour. I had accepted his invitation; and I had no other engagement to claim me: it would have been an act of meanness amounting to a confession of fear, if I had sent an excuse. Still, while Cristel’s entreaties and Cristel’s influence had failed to shake me, Gloody’s strange language and Gloody’s incomprehensible conduct had troubled my mind. I felt vaguely uneasy; irritated by my own depression of spirits. If I had been a philosopher, I should have recognised the symptoms of a very common attack of a very widely-spread moral malady. The meanest of all human infirmities is also the most universal; and the name of it is Self-esteem.

It is perhaps only right to add that my patience had been tried by the progress of domestic events, which affected Lady Lena and myself — viewed as victims.

Calling, with my stepmother, at Lord Uppercliff’s house later in the day, I perceived that Lady Rachel and Mrs. Roylake found (or made) an opportunity of talking together confidentially in a corner; and, once or twice, I caught them looking at Lady Lena and at me. Even Lord Uppercliff (perhaps not yet taken into their confidence) noticed the proceedings of the two ladies, and seemed to be at a loss to understand them.

When Mrs. Roylake and I were together again, on our way home, I was prepared to hear the praise of Lady Lena, followed by a delicate examination into the state of my heart. Neither of these anticipations was realized. Once more, my clever stepmother had puzzled me.

Mrs. Roylake talked as fluently as ever; exhausting one common-place subject after another, without the slightest allusion to my lord’s daughter, to my matrimonial prospects, or to my visits at the mill. I was secretly annoyed, feeling that my stepmother’s singular indifference to domestic interests of paramount importance, at other times, must have some object in view, entirely beyond the reach of my penetration. If I had dared to commit such an act of rudeness, I should have jumped out of the carriage, and have told Mrs. Roylake that I meant to walk home.

The day was Sunday. I loitered about the garden, listening to the distant church-bell ringing for the afternoon service. Without any cause that I knew of to account for it, I was so restless that nothing I could do attracted me or quieted me.

Returning to the house, I tried to occupy myself with my collection of insects, sadly neglected of late. Useless! My own moths failed to interest me.

I went back to the garden. Passing the open window of one of the lower rooms which looked out on the terrace, I saw Mrs. Roylake reading a book in sad-coloured binding. She was yawning over it fearfully, when she discovered that I was looking at her. Equal to any emergency, this remarkable woman instantly handed to me a second and similar volume. “The most precious sermons, Gerard, that have been written in our time.” I looked at the book; I opened the book; I recovered my presence of mind, and handed it back. If a female humbug was on one side of the window, a male humbug was on the other. “Please keep it for me till the evening,” I said; “I am going for a walk.”

Which way did I turn my steps?

Men will wonder what possessed me — women will think it a proceeding that did me credit — I took the familiar road which led to the gloomy wood and the guilty river. The longing in me to see Cristel again, was more than I could resist. Not because I was in love with her; only because I had left her in distress.

Beyond the spring, and within a short distance of the river, I saw a lady advancing towards me on the path which led from the mill.

Brisk, smiling, tripping along like a young girl, behold the mock-republican, known in our neighbourhood as Lady Rachel! She held out both hands to me. But for her petticoats, I should have thought I had met with a jolly young man.

“I have been wandering in your glorious wood, Mr. Roylake. Anything to escape the respectable classes on Sunday, patronising piety on the way to afternoon church. I must positively make a sketch of the cottage by the mill — I mean, of course, the picturesque side of it. That fine girl of Toller’s was standing at the door. She is really handsomer than ever. Are you going to see her, you wicked man? Which do you admire — that gypsy complexion, or Lena’s lovely skin? Both, I have no doubt, at your age. Good-bye.”

When we had left each other, I thought of the absent Captain in the Navy who was Lady Rachel’s husband. He was a perfect stranger — but I put myself in his place, and felt that I too should have gone to sea.

Old Toller was alone in his kitchen, evidently annoyed and angry.

“We are all at sixes and sevens, Mr. Gerard. I’ve had another row with that deaf-devil — my new name for him, and I think it’s rather clever. He swears, sir, that he won’t go at the end of his week’s notice. Says, if I think I’m likely to get rid of him before he has married Cristy, I’m mistaken. Threatens, if any man attempts to take her away, he’ll shoot her, and shoot the man, and shoot himself. Aha! old as I am, if he believes he’s going to have it all his own way, he’s mistaken. I’ll be even with him. You mark my words: I’ll be even with him.”

That old Toller — the most exasperating of men, judged by a quick temper — had irritated my friend into speaking rashly was plain enough. Nevertheless, I felt some anxiety (jealous anxiety, I am afraid) about Cristel. After looking round the kitchen again, I asked where she was.

“Sitting forlorn in her bedroom, crying,” her father told me. “I went out for a walk by the river, and I sat down, and (being Sunday) I fell asleep. When I woke, and got home again just now, that was how I found her. I don’t like to hear my girl crying; she’s as good as gold and better. No, sir; our deaf-devil is not to blame for this. He has given Cristy no reason to complain of him. She says so herself — and she never told a lie yet.”

“But, Mr. Toller,” I objected, “something must have happened to distress her. Has she not told you what it is?”

“Not she! Obstinate about it. Leaves me to guess. It’s clear to my mind, Mr. Gerard, that somebody has got at her in my absence, and said something to upset her. You will ask me who the person is. I can’t say I have found that out yet.”

“But you mean to try?”

“Yes; I mean to try.”

He answered me with little of the energy which generally distinguished him. Perhaps he was fatigued, or perhaps he had something else to think of. I offered a suggestion.

“When we are in want of help,” I said, “we sometimes find it, nearer than we had ventured to expect — at our own doors.”

The ancient miller rose at that hint like a fish at a fly.

“Gloody!” he cried.

“Find him at once, Mr. Toller.”

He hobbled to the door — and looked round at me. “I’ve got burdens on my mind,” he explained, “or I should have thought of it too.” Having done justice to his own abilities, he bustled out. In less than a minute, he was back again in a state of breathless triumph. “Gloody has seen the person,” he announced; “and (what do you think, sir?) it’s a woman!”

I beckoned to Gloody, waiting modestly at the door, to come in, and tell me what he had discovered.

“I saw her outside, sir — rapping at the door here, with her parasol.” That was the servant’s report.

Her parasol? Not being acquainted with the development of dress among female servants in England, I asked if she was a lady. There seemed to be no doubt of it in the man’s mind. She was also, as Gloody supposed, a person whom he had never seen before.

“How is it you are not sure of that?” I said.

“Well, sir, she was waiting to be let in; and I was behind her, coming out of the wood.”

“Who let her in?”

“Miss Cristel.” His face brightened with an expression of interest when he mentioned the miller’s daughter. He went on with his story without wanting questions to help him. “Miss Cristel looked like a person surprised at seeing a stranger — what
I
should call a free and easy stranger. She walked in, sir, as if the place belonged to her.”

I am not suspicious by nature, as I hope and believe. But I began to be reminded of Lady Rachel already.

“Did you notice the lady’s dress?” I asked.

A woman who had seen her would have been able to describe every morsel of her dress from head to foot. The man had only observed her hat; and all he could say was that he thought it “a smartish one.”

“Any particular colour?” I went on.

“Not that I know of. Dark green, I think.”

“Any ornament in it?”

“Yes! A purple feather.”

The hat I had seen on the head of that hateful woman was now sufficiently described — for a man. Sly old Toller, leaving Gloody unnoticed, and keeping his eye on me, saw the signs of conviction in my face, and said with his customary audacity: “Who is she?”

I followed, at my humble distance, the example of Sir Walter Scott, when inquisitive people asked him if he was the author of the Waverley Novels. In plain English, I denied all knowledge of the stranger wearing the green hat. But, I was naturally desirous of discovering next what Lady Rachel had said; and I asked to speak with Cristel. Her far-seeing father might or might not have perceived a chance of listening to our conversation. He led me to the door of his daughter’s room; and stood close by, when I knocked softly, and begged that she would come out.

The tone of the poor girl’s voice — answering, “Forgive me, sir; I can’t do it” — convicted the she-socialist (as I thought) of merciless conduct of some sort. Assuming this conclusion to be the right one, I determined, then and there, that Lady Rachel should not pass the doors of Trimley Deen again. If her bosom-friend resented that wise act of severity by leaving the house, I should submit with resignation, and should remember the circumstance with pleasure.

“I am afraid you are ill, Cristel?” was all I could find to say, under the double disadvantage of speaking through a door, and having a father listening at my side.

“Oh no, Mr. Gerard, not ill. A little low in my mind, that’s all. I don’t mean to be rude, sir — pray be kinder to me than ever! pray let me be!”

I said I would return on the next day; and left the room with a sore heart.

Old Toller highly approved of my conduct. He rubbed his fleshless hands, and whispered: “You’ll get it out of Cristy to-morrow, and I’ll help you.”

I found Gloody waiting for me outside the cottage. He was anxious about Miss Cristel; his only excuse, he told me, being the fear that she might be ill. Having set him at ease, in that particular, I said: “You seem to be interested in Miss Cristel.”