JOAN HASTE, H. RIDER HAGGARD [free ereaders TXT] 📗

Lodge was her name ever mentioned, and yet she was seldom out of the minds of the members of either of those households. Ellen, when the preparations for her approaching marriage allowed her time for thought, never ceased to congratulate herself upon her presence of mind in preventing the recognition of Joan by Henry. It was clear to her that her obstinate brother had begun to settle down and to see matters in a truer light, especially as regarded Emma; but it was also clear that had he once found the missing Joan there would have been new troubles. Well, he had not found her, so that danger was gone by. And Ellen rejoiced accordingly.

Mrs. Bird kept her promise, writing and telegraphing regularly to Mr. Levinger to inform him of Joan's progress. Indeed, for some time the messenger from the Bradmouth post-office arrived almost daily with a yellow envelope at Monk's Lodge. One of these telegrams Emma opened by chance, as her father happened to be out and the boy said that it required an answer. It ran: "Patient had serious relapse last night. Doctor proposes to call in----" [here followed the name of a very eminent authority on such ceases]--"do you sanction expense? Reply, Bird." Emma was naturally quite unable to reply, and so soon as he came in she handed the telegram to Mr. Levinger, explaining why she had opened it. He read it, then said, with as much severity as he ever showed towards his daughter:--

"I wish, my dear Emma, that in future you would be so kind as to leave my letters and telegrams alone. As you have opened it, however, and your curiosity is doubtless excited, I may as well tell you that this is a business cypher, and has to do with nothing more romantic than the Stock Exchange."

"I am very sorry, father," she answered coldly--for, trusting as she was by nature, she did not believe him--"I will be more careful in the future."

Then she left the room, feeling that another enigma had been added to the growing stock of family mysteries.

 

Slowly the days went by, till at length it became clear to those who tended her that Joan would recover from her illness.

The last and greatest crisis had come and gone, the fever had left her, and she no longer wandered in her mind, but lay upon the bed a shadow of her former self, so weak that she could scarcely speak above a whisper. All day long she lay thus, staring at the dingy ceiling above her with her brown eyes, which, always large, now looked positively unnatural in her wasted face--a very pathetic sight to see. At times the eyes would fill with tears, and at times she would sigh a little, but she never smiled, except in acknowledgment of some service of the sick room. Once she asked Mrs. Bird if any one had discovered that she was ill, or come to see her, and on receiving a reply in the affirmative, asked eagerly--

"Who? What was his name?"

"Mr. Levinger," the little woman answered.

"It is very kind of him," Joan murmured, and turned her head upon the pillow, where presently Mrs. Bird saw such a mark as might have been left by the falling of a heavy raindrop.

Then it was that Mrs. Bird's doubts and difficulties began afresh. From what she had heard while attending on Joan in her delirium, she was now convinced that the poor girl's story was true, and that the letter which she had written was addressed not to any imaginary person, but to a living man who had worked her bitter wrong. This view indeed was confirmed by the doctor, who added, curiously enough, that had it not been for her condition he did not believe that she would have lived. In these circumstances the question that tormented Mrs. Bird was whether or no she would do right to post that letter. At one time she thought of laying the matter before Mr. Levinger, but upon consideration she refrained from so doing. He was the girl's guardian, and doubtless he knew nothing of her disgrace. Why, then, should she expose it, unless such a step became absolutely necessary? Ultimately he would have to be told, but there seemed no need to tell him until an appeal to the man's honour and pity had failed. After much thought Mrs. Bird adopted a third course, and took the doctor into her confidence. He was a man of rough manners, plain speech, and good heart, and her story did not in the least surprise him.

"There's nothing wonderful about this, Mrs. Bird," he said. "I have seen the same thing with variations dozens of times in my twenty years of experience. It's no use your starting off to call this man a scoundrel and a brute. It's fashionable, I know, but it does not follow that it is accurate: you see it is just possible that the girl may have been to blame herself, poor dear. However, she is in a mess, and the thing is to get her out of it, at the expense of the man if necessary, for we are interested in her and not in him. That letter of hers is a beautiful production in a queer kind of way, and ought to have an effect on the individual, if he is not already married, or a bad lot--both of which things are probable. I tell you what, I will make a few inquiries to-morrow. What did you say his name was? Henry Graves? Thanks; good-bye. No, no opiate to-night, I think."

On the following day the doctor returned, and having visited Joan and reported favourably of her progress, he descended to the front parlour, where Mrs. Bird was waiting for him.

"She's getting on well," he said--"a good deal better than I expected, indeed. Well, I have looked up Sir Henry Graves, for he's a baronet. As it chanced, I came across a man at the hospital last night who used to stay with his father down at Rosham. The old man, Sir Reginald, died a few months ago; and Henry, the second son--for his elder brother broke his neck in a steeplechase--succeeded him. He is, or was, a captain in the Navy, rather a distinguished man in a small way; and not long ago he met with an accident, broke his leg or something of that sort, and was laid up at an inn in a place called Bradmouth. It seems that he is a good sort of fellow, though rather taciturn. That's all I could find out about him."

"Joan comes from Bradmouth, and she lived in an inn there," answered Mrs. Bird.

"Oh! did she? Well, then there you have the whole thing; nothing could be more natural and proper, or rather improper."

"Perhaps so, sir," said Mrs. Bird reprovingly; "though, begging your pardon, I cannot see that this is a matter to joke about. What I want to know now is--shall I send the gentleman that letter?"

The doctor rubbed his nose reflectively and answered, "If you do he will probably put it at the back of the fire; but so far as I can judge, being of course totally unacquainted with the details, it can't hurt anybody much, and it may have a good effect. /She/ has forgotten that she ever wrote it, and you may be sure that unless he acts on it he won't show it about the neighbourhood. Yes, on the whole I think that you may as well send it, though I dare say that it will put him in a tight place."

"That is where I should like to see him," she answered, pursing up her lips.

"I dare say. You're down on the man, are you not, Mrs. Bird? And so am I, speaking in a blessed ignorance of the facts. By all means let him be put into a tight place, or ruined, for anything I care. He may be comparatively innocent, but my sympathies are with the lady, whom I chance to know, and who is very good looking. Mind you let me know what happens--that is, if anything does happen."

That afternoon Mrs. Bird wrote her letter, or rather she wrote several letters, for never before did the composition of an epistle give her so much thought and trouble. In the end it ran as follows:--

"Sir,--

"I am venturing to take what I dare say you will thing a great liberty, and a liberty it is, indeed, that only duty drives me to. For several months a girl called Joan Haste has been staying in my house as a lodger. Some weeks ago she was taken seriously ill with a brain fever, from which she has nearly died; but it pleased God to spare her life, and now, though she is weak as water, the doctor thinks that she will recover. On the night that she became ill she returned home not at all herself, and made a confession to me, about which I need say nothing. Afterwards she wrote what I enclose to you. You will see from the wording of it that she was off her head when she did it, and now I am sure that she remembers nothing of it. I found the letter and kept it; and partly from what fell from her lips while she was delirious, partly because of other circumstances, I became sure that you are the man to whom that letter is addressed. If I have made any mistake you must forgive me, and I beg that you will then return the enclosed and destroy my letter. If, sir, I have not made a mistake, then I hope that you will see fit to act like an honest man towards poor Joan, who, whatever her faults may be--and such as they are you are the cause of them--is as good-hearted as she is sweet and beautiful. It is not for me to judge you or reproach you: but if you can, I do pray you to act right by this poor girl, who otherwise must be ruined, and may perhaps drift into a life of sin and misery, the responsibility of which will be upon your hands.

"Sir, I have nothing more to say: the paper I enclose explains everything.

"I am, sir, "Your humble servant, "Jane Bird.

"P.S.--Sir, I may say that there is no need for you to hurry to answer this, since, even if you wished to do so, I do not think that it would be safe for you to see Joan, or even to write anything that would excite her, for ten days at least."

CHAPTER XXX(REAPING THE WHIRLWIND)

 

The day that Mrs. Bird wrote her letter to Henry was the day of Ellen's marriage with Mr. Edward Milward. It was settled that the ceremony should be a quiet one, because of the recent death of the bride's father--an arrangement which suited Lady Graves and her daughter very well, seeing that it was necessary to cut down the expenses to the last farthing. Indeed, the possibility of a financial /esclandre/ at Rosham before she was safely married and independent of such misfortunes, haunted Ellen like a nightmare. Edward, it is true, was now perfectly in hand, and