The Tragedy of the Chain Pier, Charlotte Mary Brame [free e books to read txt] 📗

I replied. "The child you flung into the sea was living, not dead."

"It was not living," she cried--"it was dead an hour before I reached there."

"The doctors said--for there was an inquest on the tiny body--they said the child had been drugged before it was drowned, but that it had died from drowning."

"Oh, no, a thousand times!" she cried. "Oh, believe me, I did not wilfully murder my own child--I did not, indeed! Let me tell you. You are a just and merciful man, John Ford; let me tell you--you must hear my story; you shall give me my sentence--I will leave it in your hands. I will tell you all."

"You had better tell Lance, not me," I cried. "What can I do?"

"No; you listen; you judge. It may be that when you have heard all, you will take pity on me; you may spare me--you may say to yourself that I have been more sinned against than sinning--you may think that I have suffered enough, and that I may live out the rest of my life with Lance. Let me tell you, and you shall judge me."

She fell over on her knees again, rocking backwards and forwards.

"Ah, why," she cried--"why is the world so unfair?--why, when there is sin and sorrow, why does the punishment fall all on the woman, and the man go free? I am here in disgrace and humiliation, in shame and sorrow--in fear of losing my home, my husband, it may even be my life--while he, who was a thousand times more guilty than I was, is welcomed, flattered, courted! It is cruel and unjust.

"I have told you," she said, "how hard my childhood was, how lonely and desolate and miserable I was with my girl's heart full of love and no one to love.

"When I was eighteen I went to live with a very wealthy family in London, the name--I will not hide one detail from you--the name was Cleveland; they had one little girl, and I was her governess. I went with them to their place in the country, and there a visitor came to them, a handsome young nobleman, Lord Dacius by name.

"It was a beautiful sunlit county. I had little to do, plenty of leisure, and he could do as he would with his time. We had met and had fallen in love with each other. I did not love him, I idolized him; remember in your judgment that no one had ever loved me. No one had ever kissed my face and said kind words to me; and I, oh! wretched, miserable me, I was in Heaven. To be loved for the first time, and by one so handsome, so charming, so fascinating! A few weeks passed like a dream. I met him in the early morning, I met him in the gloaming. He swore a hundred times each day that he would marry me when he came of age. We must wait until then. I never dreamed of harm or wrong, I believed in him implicitly, as I loved him. I believe every word that came from his lips. May Heaven spare me! I need tell you no more. A girl of eighteen madly, passionately in love; a girl as ignorant as any girl could be, and a handsome, experienced man of the world.

"There was no hope, no chance. I fell; yet almost without knowing how I had fallen. You will spare me the rest, I know.

"When in my sore anguish and distress, I went to him, I thought he would marry me at once; I thought he would be longing only to make me happy again; to comfort me; to solace me; to make amends for all I had suffered. I went to him in London with my heart full of longing and love. I had left my situation, and my stern, cruel grandmother believed that I had found another. If I lived to be a thousand years old I should never forget my horror and surprise. He had worshipped me; he had sworn a thousand times over that he would marry me; he had loved me with the tenderest love.

"Now, when after waiting some hours, I saw him last, he frowned at me; there was no kiss, no caress, no welcome.

"'This is a nice piece of news,' he said. 'This comes of country visiting.'

"'But you love me?--you love me?' I cried.

"'I did, my dear,' he said, 'but, of course, that died with Summer. One does not speak of what is dead.'

"'Do you not mean to marry me?' I asked.

"'No, certainly not; and you know that I never did. It was a Summer's amusement.'

"'And what is it to me?' I asked.

"'Oh, you must make the best of it. Of course, I will not see you want, but you must not annoy me. And that old grandmother of yours, she must not be let loose upon me. You must do the best you can. I will give you a hundred pounds if you will promise not to come near me again.'

"I spoke no word to him; I did not reproach him; I did not utter his name; I did not say good-bye to him; I walked away. I leave his punishment to Heaven. Then I crushed the anguish within me and tried to look my life in the face. I would have killed myself rather than have gone home. My grandmother had forced me to be saving, and in the postoffice bank I had nearly thirty pounds. I had a watch and chain worth ten. I sold them, and I sold with them a small diamond ring that had been my mother's, and some other jewelry; altogether I realized fifty pounds. I went to the outskirts of London and took two small rooms.

"I remember that I made no effort to hide my disgrace; I did not pretend to be married or to be a widow, and the mistress of the house was not unkind to me. She liked me all the better for telling the truth. I say no word to you of my mental anguish--no words can describe it, but I loved the little one. She was only three weeks old when a letter was forwarded to me at the address I had given in London, saying that my grandmother was ill and wished me to go home at once. What was I to do with the baby? I can remember how the great drops of anguish stood on my face, how my hands trembled, how my very heart went cold with dread.

"The newspapers which I took daily, to read the advertisements for governesses, lay upon the table, and my eyes were caught by an advertisement from some woman living at Brighton, who undertook the bringing up of children. I resolved to go down that very day. I said nothing to my landlady of my intention. I merely told her that I was going to place the little one in very good hands, and that I would return for my luggage.

"I meant--so truly as Heaven hears me speak--I meant to do right by the little child. I meant to work hard to keep her in a nice home. Oh, I meant well!

"I was ashamed to go out in the streets with a little baby in my arms.

"'What shall I do if it cries?' I asked the kindly landlady. 'You can prevent it from crying,' she said; 'give it some cordial.' 'What cordial?' I asked, and she told me. 'Will it hurt the little one?' I asked again, and she laughed.

"'No,' she replied, 'certainly not. Half the mothers in London give it to their children. It sends them into a sound sleep, and they wake up none the worse for it. If you give the baby just a little it will sleep all the way to Brighton, and you will have no trouble.' I must say this much for myself, that I knew nothing whatever of children, that is, of such little children. I had never been where there was a baby so little as my own.

"I bought the cordial, and just before I started gave the baby some. I thought that I was very careful. I meant to be so. I would not for the whole world have given my baby one half-drop too much.

"It soon slept a calm, placid sleep, and I noticed that the little face grew paler. 'Your baby is dying,' said a woman, who was traveling in the third-class carriage with me. 'It is dying, I am sure.' I laughed and cried; it was so utterly impossible, I thought; it was well and smiling only one hour ago. I never remembered the cordial. Afterwards, when I came to make inquiries, I found that I had given her too much. I need not linger on details.

"You see, that if my little one died by my fault, it was most unconscious on my part; it was most innocently, most ignorantly done. I make no excuse. I tell you the plain truth as it stands. I caused my baby's death, but it was most innocently done; I would have given my own life to have brought hers back. You, my judge, can you imagine any fate more terrible than standing quite alone on the Brighton platform with a dead child in my arms?

"I had very little money. I knew no soul in the place. I had no more idea what to do with a dead child than a baby would have had. I call it dead," she continued, "for I believe it to have been dead, no matter what any doctor says. It was cold--oh, my Heaven, how cold!--lifeless; no breath passed the little lips! the eyes were closed--the pretty hand stiff. I believed it dead. I wandered down to the beach and sat down on the stones.

"What was I to do with this sweet, cold body? I cried until I was almost blind; in the whole wide world there was no one so utterly desolate and wretched. I cried aloud to Heaven to help me--where should I bury my little child? I cannot tell how the idea first occurred to me. The waves came in with a soft, murmuring melody, a sweet, silvery hush, and I thought the deep, green sea would make a grave for my little one. It was mad and wicked I know now; I can see how horrible it was; it did not seem to be so then. I only thought of the sea then as my best friend, the place where I was to hide the beloved little body, the clear, green grave where she was to sleep until the Judgment Day. I waited until--it is a horrible thing to tell you! but I fell asleep--fast asleep, and of all the horrors in my story, the worst part is that, sitting by the sea, fast asleep myself, with my little, dead babe on my knee.

"When I awoke the tide was coming in full and soft, and swift-running waves, the sun had set, and a thick, soft gloom had fallen over everything, and then I knew the time had come for what I wanted to do."


CHAPTER XII.


"I went on to the Chain Pier. I had kissed the little face for the last time; I had wrapped the pretty white body in the black-and-gray shawl. I said all the prayers I could remember as I walked along the pier; it was the most solemn of burial services to me.

"I went to the side of the pier--I cannot understand how