Hopes and Fears or, scenes from the life of a spinster

‘You poor thing!’ burst out Robert.  ‘He is deceiving you!  He came back at the end of three weeks.  I heard from my sister that she saw him on Sunday.’

Robert heartily rued his abruptness, as the poor young wife sank back in a deadly swoon.  The grandmother hurried to apply remedies, insisting that the gentleman should not go, and continuing all the time her version of her daughter’s wrongs.  Her last remnant of patience had vanished on learning this deception, and she only wanted to publish her daughter’s claims, proceeding to establish them by hastening in search of the marriage certificate as soon as Edna had begun to revive, but sooner than Robert was satisfied to be left alone with the inanimate, helpless form on the couch.

He was startled when Edna raised her hand, and strove to speak,—‘Sir, do not tell—do not tell my mother where he is.  She must not fret him—she must not tell his friends—he would be angry.’

She ceased as her mother returned with the certificate of the marriage, contracted last July before the registrar of the huge suburban Union to which Wrapworth belonged, the centre of which was so remote, that the pseudo-banns of Owen Charteris Sandbrook and Edna Murrell had attracted no attention.

‘It was very wrong,’ feebly said Edna; ‘I drew him into it!  I loved him so much; and they all talked so after I went in the boat with him, that I thought my character was gone, and I begged him to save me from them.  It was my fault, sir; and I’ve the punishment.  You’ll not betray him, sir; only don’t let that young lady, your sister, trust to him.  Not yet.  My baby and I shall soon be out of her way.’

The calm languor of her tone was almost fearful, and even as she spoke a shuddering seized her, making her tremble convulsively, her teeth knocking together, and the couch shaking under her.

‘You must have instant advice,’ cried Robert.  ‘I will fetch some one.’

‘You won’t betray him,’ almost shrieked Edna.  ‘A little while—stay a little while—he will be free of me.’

There was delirium in look and voice, and he was compelled to pause and assure her that he was only going for the doctor, and would come again before taking any other step.

It was not till the medical man had been summoned that his mind recurred to the words about his sister.  He might have dismissed them as merely the jealous suspicion of the deserted wife, but that he remembered Lucilla’s hint as to an attachment between Owen and Phœbe, and he knew that such would have been most welcome to Miss Charlecote.

‘My Phœbe, my one bright spot!’ was his inward cry, ‘must your guileless happiness be quenched!  O, I would rather have it all over again myself than that one pang should come near you, in your sweetness and innocence, the blessing of us all!  And I not near to guard nor warn!  What may not be passing even now?  Unprincipled, hard-hearted deceiver, walking at large among those gentle, unsuspicious women—trading on their innocent trust!  Would that I had disclosed the villainy I knew of!’

His hand clenched, his brow lowered, and his mouth was set so savagely, that the passing policeman looked in wonder from the dangerous face to the clerical dress.

Early next morning he was at No. 8, and learnt that Mrs. Brook, as the maid called her, had been very ill all night, and that the doctor was still with her.  Begging to see the doctor, Robert found that high fever had set in, an aggravation of the low nervous fever that had been consuming her strength all the spring, and her condition was already such that there was little hope of her surviving the present attack.  She had been raving all night about the young lady with whom Mr. Sandbrook had been walking by moonlight, and when the door of the little adjoining bedroom was open, her moans and broken words were plainly audible.

Robert asked whether he should fetch her husband, and Mrs. Murrell caught at the offer.  Owen’s presence was the single hope of restoring her, and at least he ought to behold the wreck that he had wrought.  Mrs. Murrell gave a terrible thrust by saying, ‘that the young lady at least ought to be let know, that she might not be trusting to him.’

‘Do not fear, Mrs. Murrell,’ he said, almost under his breath.  ‘My only doubt is, whether I can meet Owen Sandbrook as a Christian should.’

Cutting off her counsels on the unconverted nature, he strode off to find his colleague, whom he perplexed by a few rapid words on the necessity of going into the country for the day.  His impatient condition required vehement action; and with a sense of hurrying to rescue Phœbe, he could scarcely brook the slightest delay till he was on his way to Hiltonbury, nor till the train spared him all action could he pause to collect his strength, guard his resentment, or adjust his measures for warning, but not betraying.  He could think of no honourable mode of dealing, save carrying off Owen to London with him at once, sacrificing the sight of his sister for the present, and either writing or going to her afterwards, when the mode of dealing the blow should be more evident.  It cost him keen suffering to believe that this was the sole right course, but he had bound himself to it by his promise to the poor suffering wife, blaming himself for continually putting his sister before her in his plans.

At Elverslope, on his demand for a fly for Hiltonbury, he was answered that all were engaged for the Horticultural Show in the Forest; but the people at the station, knowing him well, made willing exertions to procure a vehicle for him, and a taxed cart soon making its appearance, he desired to be taken, not to the Holt, but to the Forest, where he had no doubt that he should find the object of his search.

This Horticultural Show was the great gaiety of the year.  The society had originated with Humfrey Charlecote, for the benefit of the poor as well as the rich; and the summer exhibition always took place under the trees of a fragment of the old Forest, which still survived at about five miles from Hiltonbury.  The day was a county holiday.  The delicate orchid and the crowned pine were there, with the hairy gooseberry, the cabbage and potato, and the homely cottage-garden nosegay from many a woodland hamlet.  The young ladies competed in collections of dried flowers for a prize botany book; and the subscriptions were so arranged that on this festival each poorer member might, with two companions, be provided with a hearty meal; while grandees and farmers had a luncheon-tent of their own, and regarded the day as a county picnic.

It was a favourite affair with all, intensely enjoyed, and full of good neighbourhood.  Humfrey Charlecote’s spirit never seemed to have deserted it; it was a gathering of distant friends, a delight of children as of the full grown; and while the young were frantic for its gipsying fun, their elders seldom failed to attend, if only in remembrance of poor Mr. Charlecote, ‘who had begged one and all not to let it drop.’

Above all, Honora felt it due to Humfrey to have prize-roots and fruits from the Holt, and would have thought herself fallen, indeed, had the hardest rain kept her from the rendezvous, with one wagon carrying the cottagers’ articles, and another a troop of school-children.  No doubt the Forest would be the place to find Owen Sandbrook, but for the rest—

From the very extremity of his perplexity, Robert’s mind sought relief in external objects.  So joyous were the associations with the Forest road on a horticultural day, that the familiar spots could not but revive them.  Those green glades, where the graceful beeches retreated, making cool green galleries with their slender gleaming stems, reminded him of his putting his new pony to speed to come up with the Holt carriage; that scathed oak had a tradition of lightning connected with it; yonder was the spot where he had shown Lucilla a herd of deer; here the rising ground whence the whole scene could be viewed, and from force of habit he felt exhilarated as he gazed down the slope of heather, where the fine old oaks and beeches, receding, had left an open space, now covered with the well-known tents; there the large one, broadly striped with green, containing the show; there the white marquees for the eaters; the Union Jack’s gay colours floating lazily from a pole in the Outlaw’s Knoll; the dark, full foliage of the forest, and purple tints of the heather setting off the bright female groups in their delicate summer gaieties.  Vehicles of all degrees—smart barouche, lengthy britzschka, light gig, dashing pony-carriage, rattling shanderadan, and gorgeous wagon—were drawn up in treble file, minus their steeds; the sounds of well-known tunes from the band were wafted on the wind, and such an air of jocund peace and festivity pervaded the whole, that for a moment he had a sense of holiday-making ere he sighed at the shade that he was bringing on that scene of merriment.

Reaching the barrier, he paid his entrance-money, and desiring the carriage to wait, walked rapidly down the hill.  On one side of the road was the gradual sweep of open heath, on the other was a rapid slope, shaded by trees, and covered with fern, growing tall and grand as it approached the moist ground in the hollow below.  Voices made him turn his head in that direction.  Aloof from the rest of the throng he beheld two figures half-way down the bank, so nearly hidden among the luxuriant, wing-like fronds of the Osmond royal which they were gathering, that at first only their hats were discernible—a broad gray one, with drooping feather, and a light Oxford boating straw hat.  The merry ring of the clear girlish voice, the deep-toned replies, told him more than his first glance did; and with one inward ejaculation for self-command, he turned aside to the descent.

The rustling among the copsewood caught the ear of Phœbe, who was the highest up, and, springing up like a fawn in the covert, she cried,—‘Robin! dear Robin! how delicious!’ but ere she had made three bounds towards him, his face brought her to a pause, and, in an awe-struck voice, she asked, ‘Robert, what is it?’

‘It does not concern you, dearest; at least, I hope not.  I want Owen Sandbrook.’

‘Then it is she.  O Robin, can you bear it?’ she whispered, clinging to him, terrified by the agitated fondness of his embrace.

‘I know nothing of her,’ was his answer, interrupted by Owen, who, raising his handsome, ruddy face from beneath, shouted mirthfully—

‘Ha! Phœbe, what interloper have you caught?  What, Fulmort, not quite grilled in the Wulstonian oven?’

‘I was in search of you.  Wait there, Phœbe,’ said Robert, advancing to meet Owen, with a gravity of countenance that provoked an impatient gesture, and the question—

‘Come, have it out!  Do you mean that you have been ferreting out some old scrape of mine?’

‘I mean,’ said Robert, looking steadily at him, ‘that I have been called in to baptize your sick child.  Your wife is dying, and you must hasten if you would see her alive.’

‘That won’t do.  You know better than that,’ returned Owen, with ill-concealed agitation, partaking of anger.  ‘She was quite recovered when last I heard, but she is a famous hand at getting up a scene; and that mother of hers would drive Job out of his senses.  They have worked on your weak mind.  I was an ass to trust to the old woman’s dissent for hindering them from finding you out, and getting up a scene.’

‘They did not.  It was by accident that I was the person who answered the summons.  They knew neither me nor my name, so you may acquit them of any preparation.  I recognized your name, which I was desired to give to the child; and then, in spite of wasting, terror, and deadly sickness, I knew the mother.  She has been pining under low nervous fever, still believing you on the Continent; and the discovery that she had been deceived, was such a shock as to bring on a violent attack, which she is not likely to have strength to survive.’

‘I never told her I was still abroad,’ said Owen, in a fretful tone of self-defence.  ‘I only had my letters forwarded through my scout; for I knew I should have no peace nor safety if the old woman knew where to find me, and preach me crazy; and I could not be going to see after her, for, thanks to Honor Charlecote and her schools, every child in Whittingtonia knows me by sight.  I told her to be patient till I had a curacy, and was independent; but it seems she could not be.  I’ll run up as soon as I can get some plea for getting away from the Holt.’

‘Death will leave no time for your excuses,’ said Robert.  ‘By setting off at once, you may catch the five o’clock express at W–’

‘Well, it is your object to have a grand explosion!  When I am cut out, you and Cilly may make a good thing of it.  I wish you joy!  Ha! by Jove!’ he muttered, as he saw Phœbe waiting out of earshot.  And then, turning from Robert, who was dumb in the effort to control a passionate reply, he called out, ‘Good-bye, Phœbe; I beg your pardon, but you see I am summoned.  Family claims are imperative!’

‘What is the matter?’ said the maiden, terrified not only at his tone, but at the gestures of her brother of fierce, suppressed menace towards him, despairing protection towards her.

‘Why, he has told you!  Matter enough, isn’t it?  I’m a married man.  I ask your compassion!’ with a bitter laugh.

‘It is you who have told her,’ said Robert, who, after a desperate effort, had forced all violence from his voice and language.  ‘Traitor as you consider me, your secret had not crossed my lips.  But no—there is no time to waste on disputes.  Your wife is sinking under neglect; and her seeing you once more may depend on your not loitering away these moments.’

‘I don’t believe it.  Canting and tragedy queening.  Taking him in!  I know better!’ muttered Owen, sullenly, as he moved up the bank.

‘O Robin, how can he be so hard?’ whispered Phœbe, as she met her brother’s eyes wistfully fixed on her face.

‘He is altogether selfish and heartless,’ returned Robert, in the same inaudible voice.  ‘My Phœbe, give me this one comfort.  You never listened to him?’

‘There was nothing to listen to,’ said Phœbe, turning her clear, surprised eyes on him.  ‘You couldn’t think him so bad as that.  O Robin, how silly!’

‘What were you doing here?’ he asked, holding her arm tight.

‘Only Miss Fennimore wanted some Osmunda, and Miss Charlecote sent him to show me where it grew; because she was talking to Lady Raymond.’

The free simplicity of her look made Robert breathe freely.  Charity was coming back to him.

At the same moment Owen turned, his face flushed, and full of emotion, but the obduracy gone.

‘I may take a long leave!  When you see Honor Charlecote, Fulmort—’

‘I shall not see her.  I am going back with you,’ said Robert, instantly deciding, now that he felt that he could both leave Phœbe, and trust himself with the offender.

‘You think I want to escape!’

‘No; but I have duties to return to.  Besides, you will find a scene for which you are little prepared; and which will cost you the more for your present mood.  I may be of use there.  Your secret is safe with Phœbe and me.  I promised your wife to keep it, and we will not rob you of the benefit of free confession.’