The Dead Secret, Wilkie Collins [best historical biographies .TXT] 📗

find yourself tonight, Mrs. Frankland?” asked Mr. Orridge, reaching out his hand to undraw the curtains. “Do you think you will be any the worse for a little freer circulation of air?”

“On the contrary, doctor, I shall be all the better,” was the answer. “But I am afraid⁠—in case you have ever been disposed to consider me a sensible woman⁠—that my character will suffer a little in your estimation when you see how I have been occupying myself for the last hour.”

Mr. Orridge smiled as he undrew the curtains, and laughed outright when he looked at the mother and child.

Mrs. Frankland had been amusing herself, and gratifying her taste for bright colors, by dressing out her baby with blue ribbons as he lay asleep. He had a necklace, shoulder-knots, and bracelets, all of blue ribbon; and, to complete the quaint finery of his costume, his mother’s smart little lace cap had been hitched comically on one side of his head. Rosamond herself, as if determined to vie with the baby in gayety of dress, wore a light pink jacket, ornamented down the bosom and over the sleeves with bows of white satin ribbon. Laburnum blossoms, gathered that morning, lay scattered about over the white counterpane, intermixed with some flowers of the lily of the valley, tied up into two nosegays with strips of cherry-colored ribbon. Over this varied assemblage of colors, over the baby’s smoothly rounded cheeks and arms, over his mother’s happy, youthful face, the tender light of the May evening poured tranquil and warm. Thoroughly appreciating the charm of the picture which he had disclosed on undrawing the curtains, the doctor stood looking at it for a few moments, quite forgetful of the errand that had brought him into the room. He was only recalled to a remembrance of the new nurse by a chance question which Mrs. Frankland addressed to him.

“I can’t help it, doctor,” said Rosamond, with a look of apology. “I really can’t help treating my baby, now I am a grown woman, just as I used to treat my doll when I was a little girl. Did anybody come into the room with you? Lenny, are you there? Have you done dinner, darling, and did you drink my health when you were left at dessert all by yourself?”

“Mr. Frankland is still at dinner,” said the doctor. “But I certainly brought someone into the room with me. Where, in the name of wonder, has she gone to?⁠—Mrs. Jazeph!”

The housekeeper had slipped round to the part of the room between the foot of the bed and the fireplace, where she was hidden by the curtains that still remained drawn. When Mr. Orridge called to her, instead of joining him where he stood, opposite the window, she appeared at the other side of the bed, where the window was behind her. Her shadow stole darkly over the bright picture which the doctor had been admiring. It stretched obliquely across the counterpane, and its dusky edges touched the figures of the mother and child.

“Gracious goodness! who are you?” exclaimed Rosamond. “A woman or a ghost?”

Mrs. Jazeph’s veil was up at last. Although her face was necessarily in shadow in the position which she had chosen to occupy, the doctor saw a change pass over it when Mrs. Frankland spoke. The lips dropped and quivered a little; the marks of care and age about the mouth deepened; and the eyebrows contracted suddenly. The eyes Mr. Orridge could not see; they were cast down on the counterpane at the first word that Rosamond uttered. Judging by the light of his medical experience, the doctor concluded that she was suffering pain, and trying to suppress any outward manifestation of it. “An affection of the heart, most likely,” he thought to himself. “She has concealed it from her mistress, but she can’t hide it from me.”

“Who are you?” repeated Rosamond. “And what in the world do you stand there for⁠—between us and the sunlight?”

Mrs. Jazeph neither answered nor raised her eyes. She only moved back timidly to the farthest corner of the window.

“Did you not get a message from me this afternoon?” asked the doctor, appealing to Mrs. Frankland.

“To be sure I did,” replied Rosamond. “A very kind, flattering message about a new nurse.”

“There she is,” said Mr. Orridge, pointing across the bed to Mrs. Jazeph.

“You don’t say so!” exclaimed Rosamond. “But of course it must be. Who else could have come in with you? I ought to have known that. Pray come here⁠—(what is her name, doctor? Joseph, did you say?⁠—No?⁠—Jazeph?)⁠—pray come nearer, Mrs. Jazeph, and let me apologize for speaking so abruptly to you. I am more obliged than I can say for your kindness in coming here, and for your mistress’s good-nature in resigning you to me. I hope I shall not give you much trouble, and I am sure you will find the baby easy to manage. He is a perfect angel, and sleeps like a dormouse. Dear me! now I look at you a little closer, I am afraid you are in very delicate health yourself. Doctor, if Mrs. Jazeph would not be offended with me, I should almost feel inclined to say that she looks in want of nursing herself.”

Mrs. Jazeph bent down over the laburnum blossoms on the bed, and began hurriedly and confusedly to gather them together.

“I thought as you do, Mrs. Frankland,” said Mr. Orridge. “But I have been assured that Mrs. Jazeph’s looks belie her, and that her capabilities as a nurse quite equal her zeal.”

“Are you going to make all that laburnum into a nosegay?” asked Mrs. Frankland, noticing how the new nurse was occupying herself. “How thoughtful of you! and how magnificent it will be! I am afraid you will find the room very untidy. I will ring for my maid to set it to rights.”

“If you will allow me to put it in order, ma’am, I shall be very glad to begin being of use to you in that way,” said Mrs. Jazeph. When she made the offer she looked up; and her eyes and Mrs. Frankland’s met. Rosamond instantly drew back on