Joan Haste

Then he rode away, and in due course reached the ruins of Ramborough Abbey.

Chapter 9

Mutual Admiration

That Henry and Joan were left lying for so many hours among the graves of Ramborough Abbey is not greatly to be wondered at, since, before he had ridden half a mile, Master Willie Hood’s peculiar method of horsemanship resulted in frightening the cob so much that, for the first time in its peaceful career, it took the bit between its teeth and bolted. For a mile or more it galloped on at right angles to the path, while Willie clung to its mane, screaming “Wo!” at the top of his voice, and the sea-birds’ eggs with which his pockets were filled, now smashed into a filthy mass, trickled in yellow streams down the steed’s panting sides.

At length the end came. Arriving at a fence, the cob stopped suddenly, and Willie pitched over its head into a bramble bush. By the time that he had extricated himself – unharmed, but very much frightened, and bleeding from a dozen scratches – the horse was standing five hundred yards away, snorting and staring round in an excited manner. Willie, who was a determined youth, set to work to catch it.

Into the details of the pursuit we need not enter: suffice it to say that the sun had set before he succeeded in his enterprise. Mount it again he could not, for the saddle had twisted and one stirrup was lost; nor would he have done so if he could. Therefore he determined to walk into Bradmouth, whither, after many halts and adventures, he arrived about ten o’clock, leading the unwilling animal by the reins.

Now Willie, although exceedingly weary, and somewhat shaken, was a boy of his word; so, still leading the horse, he proceeded straight to the residence of Dr. Childs, and rang the bell.

“I want the doctor, please, miss,” he said to the servant girl who answered it.

“My gracious! you look as if you did,” remarked that young lady, surveying his bleeding countenance.

“Tain’t for myself, Silly!” he replied. “You ask the doctor to step out, for I don’t trust this here horse to you or anybody: he’s run away once, and I don’t want no more of that there game.”

The girl complied, laughing; and presently Dr. Childs, a middle-aged man with a quiet manner, appeared, and asked what was the matter.

“Please, sir, there’s a gentleman fallen off Ramborough Tower and broken his leg; and Joan Haste she’s with him, and she’s all bloody too – though I don’t know what she’s broken. I was to ask you to go and fetch him with a shutter, and to take things along to tie him up with.”

“When did he fall, and what is his name, my boy?” asked the doctor.

“I don’t know when he fell, sir; but I saw Joan Haste about six o’clock time. Since then I’ve been getting here with this here horse; and I wish that I’d stuck to my legs, for all the help he’s been to me – the great idle brute! I’d rather wheel a barrow of bricks nor pull him along behind me. Oh! the name? She said it was Captain Graves of Rosham: that was what I was to tell her aunt.”

“Captain Graves of Rosham!” said Dr. Childs to himself. “Why, I heard Mr. Levinger say that he was coming to stay with him to-day!”

Then he went into the house, and ten minutes later he was on his way to Ramborough in a dogcart, followed by some men with a stretcher. On reaching the ruined abbey, the doctor stood up and looked round; but, although the moon was bright, he could see no one. He called aloud, and presently heard a faint voice answering him. Leaving the cart in charge of his groom, he followed the direction of the sound till he came to the foot of the tower. Here, beneath the shadow of the spiked tomb, clasping the senseless body of a man in her arms, he found a woman – Joan Haste – whose white dress was smirched with blood, and who, to all appearance, had but just awakened from a faint. Very feebly – for she was quite exhausted – she explained what had happened; and, without more words, the doctor set to work.

“It’s a baddish fracture,” he said presently. “Lucky that the poor fellow is insensible.”

In a quarter of an hour he had done all that could be done there and in that light, and by this time the men who were following with the stretcher, were seen arriving in another cart. Very gently they lifted Henry, who was still unconscious, on to the stretcher, and set out upon the long trudge back to Bradmouth, Dr. Childs walking by their side. Meanwhile Joan was placed in the dogcart and driven forward by the coachman, to see that every possible preparation was made at the Crown and Mitre, whither it was rapidly decided that the injured man must be taken, for it was the only inn at Bradmouth, and the doctor had no place for him in his own house.

At length they arrived, and Henry, who by now was recovering consciousness, was carried into Joan’s room, an ancient oak-panelled apartment on the ground floor. Once this room served as the justice-chamber of the monks; for what was now the Crown and Mitre had been their lock-up and place of assize, when, under royal charter, they exercised legal rights over the inhabitants of Bradmouth. There the doctor and his assistant, who had returned from visiting some case in the country, began the work of setting Henry’s broken leg, aided by Mrs. Gillingwater, Joan’s aunt, a hard-featured, stout and capable-looking woman of middle age. At length the task was completed, and Henry was sent to sleep under the influence of a powerful narcotic.

“And now, sir,” said Mrs. Gillingwater, as Dr. Childs surveyed his patient with a certain grave satisfaction, for he felt that he had done well by a very difficult bit of surgery, “if you have a minute or two to spare, I think that you might give Joan a look: she’s got a nasty hole in her shoulder, and seems shaken and queer.”

Then she led the way across the passage to a little room that in the monastic days had served as a cell, but now was dedicated to the use of Mr. Gillingwater whenever his wife considered him too tipsy to be allowed to share the marital chamber.

Here Joan was lying on a truckle bed, in a half-fainting condition, while near her, waving a lighted candle to and fro over her prostrate form, stood Mr. Gillingwater, a long, thin-faced man, with a weak mouth, who evidently had taken advantage of the general confusion to help himself to the gin bottle.

“Poor dear! poor dear! ain’t it sad to see her dead?” he said, in maudlin tones, dropping the hot grease from the candle upon the face of the defenceless Joan; “and she, what she looks, a real lady. Oh! ain’t it sad to see her dead?” And he wept aloud.

“Get out, you drunken sot, will you!” exclaimed his wife, with savage energy. “Do you want to set the place on fire?” And, snatching the candle from Mr. Gillingwater’s hand, she pushed him through the open door so vigorously that he fell in a heap in the passage. Then she turned to Dr. Childs, and said, “I beg your pardon, sir; but there’s only one way to deal with him when he’s on the drink.”

The doctor smiled, and began to examine Joan’s shoulder.

“It is nothing serious,” he said, when he had washed the wound, “unless the rust from the spike should give some trouble in the healing. Had it been lower down, it would have been another matter, for the lung might have been pierced. As it is, with a little antiseptic ointment and a sleeping draught, I think that your niece will be in a fair way to recovery by to-morrow morning, if she has not caught cold in that damp grass.”

“However did she come by this, sir?” asked Mrs. Gillingwater.

“I understand that Captain Graves climbed the tower to get some young jackdaws. He fell, and she tried to catch him in her arms, but of course was knocked backwards.”

“She always was a good plucked one, was Joan,” said Mrs. Gillingwater, with a certain reluctant pride. “Well, if no harm comes of it, she has brought us a bit of custom this time anyhow, and when we want it bad enough. The Captain is likely to be laid up here some weeks, ain’t he, sir?”

“For a good many weeks, I fear, Mrs. Gillingwater, even if things go well with him.”

“Is he in any danger, then?”

“There is always some danger to a middle-aged man in such a case: it is possible that he may lose his leg, and that is a serious matter.”

“Lord! and all to get her young jackdaws. You have something to answer for, miss, you have,” soliloquised Mrs. Gillingwater aloud; adding, by way of explanation, as they reached the passage, “She’s an unlucky girl, Joan is, for all her good looks – always making trouble, like her mother before her: I suppose it is in the blood.”

Leaving his assistant in charge, Dr. Childs returned home, for he had another case to visit that night. Next morning he wrote two notes – one to Sir Reginald Graves and one to Mr. Levinger, both of whom were patients of his, acquainting them with what had occurred in language as little alarming as possible. Having despatched these letters by special messengers, he walked to the Crown and Mitre. As he had anticipated, except for the pain of the wound in her shoulder, Joan was almost herself again: she had not caught cold, the puncture looked healthy, and already her vigorous young system was shaking off the effects of her shock and distress of mind. Henry also seemed to be progressing as favourably as could be expected; but it was deemed advisable to keep him under the influence of opiates for the present.

“I suppose that we had better send for a trained nurse,” said the doctor. “If I telegraph to London, we could have one down by the evening.”

“If you do, sir, I am sure I don’t know where she’s to sleep,” answered Mrs. Gillingwater; “there isn’t a hole or corner here unless Joan turns out of the little back room, and then there is nowhere for her to go. Can’t I manage for the present, sir, with Joan to help? I’ve had a lot to do with sick folk of all sorts in my day, worse luck, and some knack of dealing with them too, they tell me. Many and many’s the eyes that I have shut for the last time. Then it isn’t as though you was far off neither: you or Mr. Salter can always be in and out if you are wanted.”

“Well,” said the doctor, after reflecting, “we will let the question stand over for the present, and see how the case goes on.”

He knew Mrs. Gillingwater to be a capable and resourceful woman, and one who did not easily tire, for he had had to do with her in numerous maternity cases, where she acted the part of sage-femme with an address that had won her a local reputation.

About twelve o’clock a message came to him to say that Lady Graves and Mr. Levinger were at the inn, and would be glad to speak to him. He found them in the little bar-parlour, and Emma Levinger with them, looking even paler than her wont.

“Oh! doctor, how is my poor son?” said Lady Graves, in a shaken voice. “Mrs. Gillingwater says that I may not see him until I have asked you. I was in bed this morning and not very well when your note came, but Ellen had gone over to Upcott, and of course Sir Reginald could not drive so far, so I got up and came at once.” And she paused, glancing at him anxiously.

“I think that you would have done better to stop where you were, Lady Graves, for you are not looking very grand,” answered Dr. Childs. “I thought, of course, that your daughter would come. Well, it is a bad double fracture, and, unluckily, Captain Graves was left exposed for some hours after the accident; but at present he seems to be going on as well as possible. That is all I can say.”

“How did it happen?” asked Mr. Levinger.

“Joan Haste can tell you better than I can,” the doctor answered. “She is up, for I saw her standing in the passage. I will call her.”

At the mention of Joan’s name Mr. Levinger’s face underwent a singular contraction, that, quick as it was, did not escape the doctor’s observant eye. Indeed, he made a deprecatory movement with his hand, as though he were about to negative the idea of her being brought before them; then hearing Lady Graves’s murmured “by all means,” he seemed to change his mind suddenly and said nothing. Dr. Childs opened the door and called Joan, and presently she stood before them.

Her face was very pale, her under lip was a little cut, and her right hand rested in a sling on the bosom of her simple brown dress; but her very pallor and the anxiety in her dark eyes made her beauty the more remarkable, by touching it with an added refinement. Joan bowed to Mr. Levinger, who acknowledged her salute with a nod, and curtseyed to Lady Graves; then she opened her lips to speak, when her eyes met those of Emma Levinger, and she remained silent.

The two women had seen each other before; in childhood they had even spoken together, though rarely; but since they were grown up they had never come thus face to face, and now it seemed that each of them found a curious fascination in the other. It was of Emma Levinger, Joan remembered, that Captain Graves had spoken on the previous night, when his mind began to wander after the accident; and though she scarcely knew why, this gave her a fresh interest in Joan’s eyes. Why had his thoughts flown to her so soon as his mental balance was destroyed? she wondered. Was he in love with her, or engaged to be married to her? It was possible, for she had heard that he was on his way to stay at Monk’s Lodge, where they never saw any company.

Joan has almost made up her mind, with considerable perspicuity, that there was something of the sort in the air, when she remembered, with a sudden flush of pleasure, that Captain Graves had spoken of herself also yonder in the churchyard, and in singularly flattering terms, which seemed to negative the idea that the fact of a person speaking of another person, when under the influence of delirium, necessarily implied the existence of affection, or even of intimacy, between them. Still, thought Joan, it would not be wonderful if he did love Miss Levinger. Surely that sweet and spiritual face and those solemn grey eyes were such as any man might love.

But if Joan was impressed with Emma, Emma was equally impressed with Joan, for in that instant of the meeting of their gaze, the thought came to her that she had never before seen so physically perfect a specimen of womanhood. Although Emma could theorise against the material, and describe beauty as an accident, and therefore a thing to be despised, she was too honest not to confess to herself her admiration for such an example of it as Joan afforded. This was the girl whose bravery, so she was told, had saved Captain Graves from almost certain death; and, looking at her, Emma felt a pang of envy as she compared her health and shape with her own delicacy and slight proportions. Indeed, there was something more than envy in her mind – something that, if it was not jealousy, at least partook of it. Of late Emma’s thoughts had centred themselves a great deal round Captain Graves, and she was envious of this lovely village girl with whom, in some unknown way, he had become acquainted, and whose good fortune it had been to be able to protect him from the worst effects of his dreadful accident.

At that moment a warning voice seemed to speak in Emma’s heart, telling her that this woman would not readily let go the man whom fate had brought to her, that she would cling to him indeed as closely as though he were her life. It had nothing to do with her, at any rate as yet; still Emma grew terribly afraid as the thought went home, afraid with a strange, impalpable fear she knew not of what. At least she trembled, and her eyes swam, and she wished in her heart that she had never seen Joan Haste, that they might live henceforth at different ends of the world, that she might never see her again.

All this flashed through the minds of the two girls in one short second; the next Emma’s terror, for it may fitly be so called, had come and gone, and Lady Graves was speaking.