Eleanor, Mrs. Humphry Ward [best books to read now .txt] 📗

afternoon while Manisty and the priest were talking! But mine held. So I had to deal with Dalgetty.' She stooped, and whispered:--'I got it in Venice one day--the chemist near the Rialto. She might have found it--but she never did--she is very stupid. I did her no harm--I think. But if it kills her, death is nothing!--nothing!--only the gate of life. Come!--come! prove it!'

A hand darted and fell, like a snake striking. Lucy just threw herself aside in time--she sprang up--she rushed--she tore at the door--pulling at it with a frantic strength. It yielded with a crash, for the lock was already broken. Should she turn left or right?--to the room of Mrs. Burgoyne's maid, or to Mr. Manisty's library? She chose the right and fled on. She had perhaps ten seconds start, since the bed had been between her enemy and the door. But if any other door interposed between her and succour, all was over!--for she heard a horrible cry behind her, and knew that she was pursued. On she dashed, across the landing at the head of the stairs. Ah! the dining-room door was open! She passed it, and then turned, holding it desperately against her pursuer.

'Mr. Manisty! help!'

The agonised voice rang through the silent rooms. Suddenly--a sound from the library--a chair overturned--a cry--a door flung open. Manisty stood in the light.

He bounded to her side. His strength released hers. The upper part of the door was glass, and that dark gasping form on the other side of it was visible to them both, in a pale dawn light from the glass passage.

'Go!'--he said--'Go through my room--find Eleanor!'

She fled. But as she entered the room, she tottered--she fell upon the chair that Manisty had just quitted,--and with a long shudder that relaxed all her young limbs, her senses left her.

Meanwhile the whole apartment was alarmed. The first to arrive upon the scene was the strong housemaid, who found Alice Manisty stretched upon the floor of the glass passage, and her brother kneeling beside her, his clothes and hands torn in the struggle with her delirious violence. Alfredo appeared immediately afterwards; and then Manisty was conscious of the flash of a hand-lamp, and the soft, hurrying step of Eleanor Burgoyne.

She stood in horror at the entrance of the glass passage. Manisty gave his sister into Alfredo's keeping as he rose and went towards her.

'For God's sake'--he said under his breath--'go and see what has happened to Dalgetty.'

He took for granted that Lucy had taken refuge with her, and Eleanor stayed to ask no questions, but fled on to Dalgetty's room. As she opened the door the fumes of chloroform assailed her, and there on the bed lay the unfortunate maid, just beginning to moan herself back to consciousness from beneath the chloroformed handkerchief that had reduced her to impotence.

Her state demanded every care. While Manisty and the housemaid Andreina conveyed Alice Manisty, now in a state of helpless exhaustion, to her room, and secured her there, Alfredo ran for the Marinata doctor. Eleanor and Aunt Pattie forced brandy through the maid's teeth, and did what they could to bring back warmth and circulation.

They were still busy with their task when the elderly Italian arrived who was the communal doctor and chemist of the village. The smell of the room, the sight of the woman, was enough. The man was efficient and discreet, and he threw himself into his work without more questions than were absolutely necessary. In the midst of their efforts Manisty reappeared, panting.

'Ought he not to see Miss Foster too?' he said anxiously to Eleanor Burgoyne.

Eleanor looked at him in astonishment.

A smothered exclamation broke from him. He rushed away, back to the library which he had seen Lucy enter.

The cool clear light was mounting. It penetrated the wooden shutters of the library and mingled with the dying light of the lamp which had served him to read with through the night, beside which, in spite of his utmost efforts, he had fallen asleep at the approach of dawn. There, in the dream-like illumination, he saw Lucy lying within his deep arm-chair. Her face was turned away from him and hidden against the cushion; her black hair streamed over the white folds of her wrapper: one arm was beneath her, the other hung helplessly over her knee.

He went up to her and called her name in an agony.

She moved slightly, made an effort to rouse herself and raised her hand. But the hand fell again, and the word half-formed upon her lips died away. Nothing could be more piteous, more disarmed. Yet even her disarray and helplessness were lovely; she was noble in her defeat; her very abandonment breathed youth and purity; the man's wildly surging thoughts sank abashed.

But words escaped him--words giving irrevocable shape to feeling. For he saw that she could not hear.

'Lucy!--Lucy--dear, beautiful Lucy!'

He hung over her in an ardent silence, his eyes breathing a respect that was the very soul of passion, his hand not daring to touch even a fold of her dress. Meanwhile the door leading to the little passage-room opened noiselessly. Eleanor Burgoyne entered. Manisty was not aware of it. He bent above Lucy in a tender absorption speaking to her as he might have spoken to a child, calling to her, comforting and rousing her. His deep voice had an enchanter's sweetness; and gradually it wooed her back to life. She did not know what he was saying to her, but she responded. Her lids fluttered; she moved in her chair, a deep sigh lifted her breast.

At that moment the door in Eleanor's hand escaped her and swung to. Manisty started back and looked round him.

'Eleanor!--is that you?'

In the barred and ghostly light Eleanor came slowly forward. She looked first at Lucy--then at Manisty. Their eyes met.

Manisty was the first to move uneasily.

'Look at her, Eleanor!--poor child!--Alice must have attacked her in her room. She escaped by a marvel. When I wrestled with Alice, I found this in her hand. One second more, and she would have used it on Miss Foster.'

He took from his pocket a small surgical knife, and looked, shuddering, at its sharpness and its curved point.

Eleanor too shuddered. She laid her hand on Lucy's shoulder, while Manisty withdrew into the shadows of the room.

Lucy raised herself by a great effort. Her first half-conscious impulse was to throw herself into the arms of the woman standing by her. Then as she perceived Eleanor clearly, as her reason came back, and her gaze steadied, the impulse died.

'Will you help me?' she said, simply--holding out her hand and tottering to her feet.

A sudden gleam of natural feeling lit up the frozen whiteness of Eleanor's face. She threw her arm round Lucy's waist, guiding her. And so, closely entwined, the two passed from Manisty's sight.


CHAPTER XII

The sun had already deserted the eastern side of the villa when, on the morning following these events, Lucy woke from a fitful sleep to find Benson standing beside her. Benson had slept in her room since the dawn; and, thanks to exhaustion and the natural powers of youth, Lucy came back to consciousness, weak but refreshed, almost free from fever and in full possession of herself. Nevertheless, as she raised herself in bed to drink the tea that Benson offered her--as she caught a glimpse through the open window of the convent-crowned summit and wooded breast of Monte Cavo, flooded with a broad white sunlight--she had that strange sense of change, of a yesterday irrevocably parted from to-day, that marks the entry into another room of life. The young soul at such times trembles before a power unknown, yet tyrannously felt. All in a moment without our knowledge or co-operation something has happened. Life will never be again as it was last week. 'How?--or why?' the soul cries. 'I knew nothing--willed nothing.' And then dimly, through the dark of its own tumult, the veiled Destiny appears.

Benson was not at all anxious that Lucy should throw off the invalid.

'And indeed, Miss, if I may say so, you'll be least in the way where you are. They're expecting the doctor from Rome directly.'

The maid looked at her curiously. All that the household knew was that Miss Alice Manisty had escaped from her room in the night, after pinioning Dalgetty's arms and throwing a chloroformed handkerchief over her face. Miss Foster, it seemed, had been aroused and alarmed, and Mr. Manisty coming to the rescue had overpowered his sister by the help of the stout _cameriera_, Andreina. This was all that was certainly known.

Nor did Lucy shew herself communicative. As the maid threw back all the shutters and looped the curtains, the girl watched the summer light conquer the room with a shiver of reminiscence.

'And Mrs. Burgoyne?' she asked eagerly.

The maid hesitated.

'She's up long ago, Miss. But she looks that ill, it's a pity to see her. She and Mr. Manisty had their coffee together an hour ago--and she's been helping him with the arrangements. I am sure it'll be a blessing when the poor lady's put away. It would soon kill all the rest of you.'

'Will she go to-day, Benson?' said Lucy, in a low voice.

The maid replied that she believed that was Mr. Manisty's decision, that he had been ordering a carriage, and that it was supposed two nurses were coming with the doctor. Then she enquired whether she might carry good news of Lucy to Miss Manisty and the master.

Lucy hurriedly begged they might be told that she was quite well, and nobody was to take the smallest trouble about her any more. Benson threw a sceptical look at the girl's blanched cheek, shook her head a little, and departed.

A few minutes afterwards there was a light tap at the door and Eleanor Burgoyne entered.

'You have slept?--you are better,' she said, standing at Lucy's bedside.

'I am only ashamed you should give me a thought,' the girl protested. 'I should be up now but for Benson. She said I should be out of the way.'

'Yes,' said Eleanor quietly. 'That is so.' She hesitated a moment, and then resumed--'If you should hear anything disagreeable don't be alarmed. There will be a doctor and nurses. But she is quite quiet this morning--quite broken--poor soul! My cousins are going into Rome with her. The home where she will be placed is on Monte Mario. Edward wishes to assure himself that it is all suitable and well managed. And Aunt Pattie will go with him.'

Through the girl's mind flashed the thought--'Then _we_ shall be alone together all day,'--and her heart sank. She dared not look into Mrs. Burgoyne's tired eyes. The memory of words spoken to her in the darkness--of that expression she had surprised on Mrs. Burgoyne's face as she woke from her swoon in the library, suddenly renewed the nightmare in which she had been living. Once more she felt herself walking among snares and shadows, with a trembling pulse.

Yet the feeling which rose to sight was nothing more than a stronger form of that remorseful tenderness which had been slowly invading her during many days. She took Eleanor's hand in hers and kissed it shyly.

'Then _I_ shall look after _you_,' she said trying to smile. 'I'll have my way this time!'

'Wasn't that a carriage?' said Eleanor hurriedly. She listened a moment. Yes--a carriage had drawn up. She hastened away.