35 It Was The Hour When Woods Are Cold

THERE come times in most lives when, after long depression and wearing worries, a sort of revulsion, a sort of exaltation of feeling sets in. Such a time comes now to Dolores. There is a revulsion in favor of her absent husband. Perhaps the fact that he is absent has something to do with it. Looking in his gloomy face, it would seem a difficult thing for any woman wife or otherwise, to get up much sentiment for Vane Valentine. Her ideas, after all, of the sacrifice demanded are vague. If Manor Valentine and the fortune are resigned to their lawful owner, she knows very little what will remain to them. She doubts greatly if the sacrifice will be made; it will never be, at least, until proof “clear as Holy Writ” is placed before him—that is to be expected. He will be enraged and unbelieving, beyond doubt. Still, once convinced—and she is sure such conviction must be possible since M. Paul is the claimant—he cannot be so glaringly dishonest and dishonorable as to retain what will no longer be his. Dolores, reasoning on these points, is primitive and of another world than this; the distinction between mine and thine stands out with almost startling vividness in her unworldly mind. To retain, knowingly, the goods of another is to resign hope of salvation here and hereafter—that is her creed, sharp and clear. It is quite in her to regard with horror and aversion such a one. For a husband capable of such a crime she feels that even the outward semblance of regard and duty must come to an end—that for him, for all time, nothing but contempt could live in her heart. And to drag out life by the side of a man one despises—well, life holds for any woman few harder things.

But if he does the right—oh! then how gladly will she go with him, to poverty if need be; how she will honor him, how hardly she will try to win him back. She does not fear poverty—was she not poor on Isle Perdrix, and were not those the best, the very best, days of her short life? She would like a cottage, she thinks, where she might reign alone, far from stern Miss Dorothy, sneering Miss Routh, and with her husband alone, who knows?—she might learn to love him; he even might learn a little to care for her. She would so strive, so try, so pray! Anything—anything would be better than this death in life here, this most miserable estrangement, this loveless house, these cold, hard faces. Any change, be it what it may, must be for the better. She will try, at least—the opportunity being given—she will do her utmost to soften and win the man who is her husband.

With hopes like these in her girl’s mind, Dolores waits through the long day that follows. She does not go out; she has a feeling that she would rather not meet Rene again until she has seen her husband. She must be loyal of heart, even to the shadow of a shadow, and to sit by Rene’s side, look up in Rene’s eyes, listen to Rene’s voice, and remain thoroughly true to Vane Valentine, is no such easy task. If she goes abroad she may meet him, so she remains at home.

The evening post brings her a letter from London, from Jemima Ann. She has half forgotten this faithful friend, in thinking of other things; she feels self-reproachful for it, as she reads. Jemima is stopping, for the present, in an humble London lodging, and proposes remaining there until her “dear sweet Miss Snowball” writes good-by. Then she will go back to New York and resume life in her native land. It is not quite so easy to think wifely thoughts of Sir Vane and make generous resolutions, after reading this, and remembering how treacherously and stealthily this humble friend was forced away.

Another night; another day. This day certainly will bring the absent seigneur. A strange nervousness, be gotten of waiting and expectation, hope and dread, fills her. She can rest nowhere; she wanders aimlessly about the house, starting at every heavy footstep, at every opening door .

Miss Routh watches her with malicious, smiling eyes, She has seen Rene, at least; has walked down to the village on purpose, and chatted for five minutes condescendingly with the hostess. No, they have not many strangers at the Arms this spring, the landlady says, dropping a courtesy. Only one just now; a Mr. Macdonald, a foreigner, by his looks, and ways, and talk, in spite of his Scotch name. No, she does not know when he is going away; he does not say; he is a real gentleman in all his ways, and gives very little trouble. Mr. Macdonald appears at the moment, walking briskly up the road, with his sketch book and cigar, and keen dark eyes, and Miss Routh hastily pulls down her vail and departs.

The day wears on. Sir Vane comes not. It brings no answer to her letter either, and Dolores’ fitful exaltation of feeling vanishes as it came. A dull depression, a fear of the future, fills her. How blank and drear that long life—path stretches before her, here in this silent, dark, moldering old home, with the faces of these two women who dislike her, before her every day, and all day long! Insulted, distrusted, unloved, how shall she bear it to the bitter end. And she is but nineteen, and life looks so long, so long!

Perhaps it is the unusual confinement to the house that is telling upon her; it is now two days since she has been out. A half—stifled feeling oppresses her; she must get out of these deathly-silent, gruesome rooms, or suffocate. It is after dinner; the last ray of twilight is fading out; there is a broad May moon rising, and a star-studded sky.

She leaves the house and wanders aimlessly for awhile between the prim beds and borders of one of the stiff Dutch gardens. Now and then she stoops to gather the old-fashioned, sweet-smelling flowers, but almost without knowing what she does. A nightingale is singing, in a thorn-bush near, a song so piercingly sweet, so mournful in its sweetness, that she stops, and the tears rise to her eyes as she listens. And in that stop and pause to listen something more than the nightingale’s song reaches her ear—the soft, cooing tones of Camilla Routh pronouncing her name.

“Dolores’ lover? Was he really a lover of your wife’s, Vane, before you married her?” she is asking. “Anything more lover—like than they looked when I surprised them it would be difficult to find. And he is very handsome—there can be no mistake about that—with the most beautiful Spanish eyes I think I ever saw.”

There is a grumbling reply; it sounds like, “Devil take his eyes!” and it is in the voice of the lord of Valentine.

Dolores stands quite still, thrilled and shocked, feeling all cold and rigid, and powerless to move. A tall, thick hedge separates them; she wears a dark, dun-colored dress, and in this shadowy light, among the other shadows of trees and moonlight, she can hardly be seen. They are walking slowly up and down a secluded avenue known as the Willow Walk. In the deep evening hush even Miss Routh’s subdued tones are distinctly and painfully audible.

“He is still in the village,” again it is Miss Routh who speaks; “how often they meet, where they meet, I do not know. That they do meet is certain, of course. Yes, Colonel Deering has called twice, but she has declined to see him; one lover, I suppose, at a time, is as much as she can attend to.

” ‘Old loves, new loves, what are they worth?
Old love dies at the new love’s birth.’ ”

hums the fair Camilla, and laughs softly.

“Signor Rene is far and away the handsomer man of the two.”

“Are you too deserting Deering and going over to this sallow, black-eyed boy, Camilla?” retorts, with a sneer, Sir Vane.

“No,” lightly. “Like your pretty wife, I am true to my first lover. She is pretty, Vane—really pretty. I always doubted it—being a blonde myself, I seldom admire blondes—but the other evening, when I came upon her by his side down there in the park, you should have seen her—transfigured by gladness, love—who knows what? Yes, she is pretty—when she likes. I confess the woe-begone expression she puts on for us hardly becomes her. People are beginning to talk—many were whispering the other night at the Broughton’s how wretchedly ill and, worn Lady Valentine was looking. It would be well to speak to her on the subject, I think, Vane. It may be pleasant for her to pose in the part of the heart-broken wife, but it can hardly be agreeable for you.”

Something—a sulky and stifled imprecation it sounds like—ground out between closed teeth, is the answer. Miss Routh is an expert mouser, and knows how to torture her victim well.

“But about this extravagant story—what of that, Vane?”

Miss Routh appears to have the ball of conversation in her own hands, and to unwind at her pleasure.

“Something must be done, and at once. We may disbelieve it, but we cannot afford to ignore it. And others will not, if we do. Once let it get abroad that you are not really the rightful baronet—the rightful—— ”

She is interrupted, sullenly, angrily, by her companion. “I do not propose that it shall get abroad,” he says.

“No? But that is this Macdonald’s purpose in coming here. How are you to prevent it? Your wife will see him—— “.

“My wife will not see him. She shall never see him again!”

“What do you mean?” breathlessly.

“Nothing that you need take that startled tone about,” sulkily, “nothing but what I have a perfect right to do. I mean to remove my wife out of his way.”

“Yes?” eagerly. “How—where ?”

“To Flintbarrow. My mines will keep me there, off and on, for months—years, if I like. What more natural,” grimly, “than that an adoring young wife should wish to remain with her husband? It is a dismal place, I admit: all the more reason why she should enliven my enforced, exile there. The old stone house is out of repair, but we can furbish up two or three rooms, and for two loving and lately united hearts, what more is required? And I doubt if M. Rene Macdonald’s beautiful Spanish, French, Italian——what was it?—eyes will illuminate the gloom of Flintbarrow for her, though they were twice as sharp they are.”

There is silence for a moment; they pass out of range in their slow walk, and the sweet song of the nightingale fills up the pause. For Dolores—the world is going round, the stars are reeling; she catches hold of the hedge, but fails to hold herself, and half falls, half sinks in a dark heap in the dew—wet grass.

“She will not go; I tell you, she will not go,” are the words of Camilla she hears next. “She has a great deal of latent force and resolution, once aroused, and she fears and dislikes and distrusts us all. Here she has friends—Colonel Deering, the rector’s family, the Broughtons, Lady Ratherripe—to whom she may appeal if she chooses. There she will have no one. She will not go!”

“Will she not?” says the hard, metallic tones of the baronet. “Ah, we shall see! You taunted me before with my impotence in my own house—I could not compel the woman Jemima to leave. I have banished the maid; I shall banish the mistress exactly how, and when, and where I please. Meantime, tell Dorothy nothing of this; I don’t want to be maddened by her questions and comments. For this Macdonald——”

There is another break; they pass down under the willows. She who crouches under the hedge, prone there on the wet grass, makes no effort to overhear. She has heard enough.

“I shall take high-handed measures with him“—it is the voice of Vane Valentine, on the return walk. “There is a law to punish scoundrels who conspire for purposes of extortion and fraud. This Farrar—a clever, clear-headed rascal as I know him of old, a vagabond by profession—has addled his brains reading up Roger Tichborne. George Valentine was drowned, beyond all doubt, a score of years ago. Men don’t rise from the dead after this fashion, except in the last act of a Porte St. Martin melodrama. I don’t fear them with my credulous fool of a wife out of the way. If it got wind that she believed the story and was on their side—well, I can hardly trust myself to say what I might not do in such a case. At Flintbarrow she will be safe; at Flintbarrow there are no long—eared neighbors to listen, no prying eyes to see. There she will be, perforce, as silent as in her coffin. And there, by Heaven, she shall remain until she swears to me to resign all complicity or belief in this plot—ay, though it should be until her hair is gray!”

“She will not go,” retorts the quietly resolute voice of Camilla Routh; “she will suspect your intentions, she will see your anger against her in your face——”

“That she shall not,” grimly; “she shall suspect nothing. It shall be made a family affair. You will all come down.” They pass by again. A long moment, then returning steps and voices. ——”in this way. I shall use finesse until I get her there,” with a laugh that makes even Camilla shiver. “I shall doubt the story, of course, decline to see Farrar’s ambassador, refuse to listen to a word, scout the whole impossible romance. Meantime I must at once return to Cornwall, and it is my desire that you, and my sister and my wife come down after me to see the place. What can be more natural ? and once there——”

The pause that follows is more significant than any words. Camilla’s low laugh comes through it softly. “An excellent idea, Vane—I did not give you credit for so much strategy. Of course Dorothy is to be kept in the dark?”

“Of course. She has a sort of liking for my wife and might blurt out something. She will like to see the old place again; she spent her youth there, you know.”

“How long are we to remain, she and I, I mean ?”

“A week or two—as you like. Of course I would be very glad to keep you there, Camilla, but you would not like it. It is deadly dull; the nearest hamlet is five miles off; nothing but moors behind, stretching up to the sky, and the sea in front melting into the horizon. A week, I dare say, will be as much of it as you will be able to exist through. No one will wonder at Lady Valentine’s remaining; it is surely the most natural thing in the world that she should remain with her husband under the circumstances. Now, perhaps, we had better go in. I have not dined. After dinner I shall speak to Dolores, and—the rest will be easy.”

They pass out of sight and hearing—this time there is no return. The nightingale, on the thorn-bush near, has the night to itself and its sweet love-song. Dolores lies where she has sunk—her face hidden in her hands, the chill, fresh-scented grass, cool and grateful to her heated head. She is numb and aching, full of a cold, deathly torpor—”past hope, past care, past help.” Life has come to an end—just that. “And now I live, and now my life is done”—done—done forever and forever!

After a time—not long—though it seems long to her, a physical sense of discomfort and cold makes her get up. Once on her feet she stands for a moment dizzily—then turns mechanically and walks back to the house. It is late and she will be missed; she does not want to be missed, she is hardly conscious of more than that. If she suffers she hardly realizes it—in soul and body she is be-numbed. Much pain, many blows, have dulled for the time all sense of agony.

They are all three in the drawing-room when she enters, Miss Valentine bending over her never-ending account books, Miss Routh at the piano. Her fingers are flying over the keys in a brilliant galop; she laughs up in Sir Vane’s face, and chatters gayly as she plays. She looks over her shoulder, keenly, at the new-comer, her mocking smile is most derisive.

“How pale you are, Lady Valentine,” she says: “whither have you been wandering until this unearthly hour? See! our truant has returned in your absence. She has pined herself to a shadow, as you may see for yourself, in your absence, Vane. You must take her with you to Cornwall, I think!”

Sir Vane rises and comes forward, quite like the old Sir Vane of Italian days, courteous, if cold, and takes her hand.

“You do look pale, Dolores. You should not stay about in the night air. And see—your dress is quite wet with dew. I have returned to answer your letter in person. Naturally it annoyed me. How can you credit such a cock-and-bull story? Come here and sit down, and let us talk the thing over. ”

He leads her to a chair—wonderful cordiality, this!—and takes another near her. It is quite a lover-like tableau—Miss Routh’s gray-green eyes gleam derisively as she glances. Dolores takes up a screen and holds it before her face.

“The light dazzles my eyes,” she says, without meeting his glance.

He looks at her suspiciously. She is singularly, startlingly pale; her eyes look wild, and dark, and dazed—what is the matter with her? Has this story and Macdonald’s coming turned her brain? But his voice is smooth, suspiciously smooth and gentle, when he speaks. She sits, the screen held well before her face, her eyes fixed upon its frisky Japanese figures, but seeing none of them. His voice is in her ear, as he talks steadily on and on—she hears its tone, but is scarcely conscious of his words. Miss Routh’s gay playing fills the room; she plays the “Beautiful Blue Danube”—his monotonous words set themselves to the gay, bright music, and blend and lose themselves in the melody—all mingle themselves together in her mind; nothing seems clear or distinct.

Is she assenting or answering at all to what he says? Afterward she does not know. He seems to be satisfied, at least, when he rises at last, and leaves her, crossing over to Camilla Routh.

“Well?” she asks.

“It is well. I knew it would be. She says yes to everything. She will go.”

“I don’t believe she knows what she is saying,” thinks Miss Routh, glancing across at her. “She sits there with the fixed vacant look of a sleep-walker. She had it when she came in. What if she heard us talking out there? It is very possible. Suppose she has—what then?

“She looks once more, trying to read her answer in that pale, rigid face. As she looks Dolores rises, and without glancing at any one, or speaking, quits the room.

“H’m!” muses Miss Routh, thoughtfully, resuming her performance, “something odd here. The end is not yet. Your wife is not in Cornwall yet awhile, Sir Vane Valentine.”

“How long do you stay with us?” she asks him, aloud.

“Until to-morrow only. Apart from this affair, my presence is necessary there. By being on the spot I save no end of money, and hurry on the work. You, and Dorothy, and Dolores will follow—say in two days. I suppose it would look a trifle abrupt to hurry you off with me to-morrow. Meantime, watch her; no more secret meetings with Macdonald, if you can by any means prevent them. Come to Flintbarrow without fail on the third day.”

“I will come,” responds Miss Routh. “But whether your wife will accompany me or not, cousin mine,” she adds inwardly, “that third day only will tell!”