XVI
"DON'T! DON'T!"
In recalling this startling moment, Deborah wondered as much at her ownaplomb as at that of Judge Ostrander. Not only had she succeeded insuppressing all recognition of what had thus been discovered to her, buthad carried her powers of self-repression so far as to offer, and withgood grace too, to assist him in rehanging the picture. This perfectionof acting had its full reward. With equal composure he excused her fromthe task, and, adding some expression of regret at his well-knowncarelessness in not looking better after his effects, bowed her from theroom with only a slight increase of his usual courteous reserve.
But later, when thought came and with it a certain recollections, whatsignificance the incident acquired in her mind, and what a long line ofterrors it brought in its train!
It was no casual act, this defacing of a son's well-loved features. Ithad a meaning--a dark and desperate meaning. Nor was the study-wall thenatural home of this picture. An unfaded square which she had noted onthe wall-paper of the inner room showed where its original place hadbeen. There in full view of the broken-hearted father when he woke andin darksome watchfulness while he slept, it had played its heavy part inhis long torment--a galling reminder of--what?
It was to answer this question--to face this new view of Oliver and thebearing it had on the relations she had hoped to establish between himand Reuther, that she had waited for the house to be silent and herchild asleep. If the defacing marks she had seen meant that the cause ofseparation between father and son lay in some past fault of Oliverhimself, serious enough for such a symbol to be necessary to reconcilethe judge to their divided lives, she should know it and know it soon.The night should not pass without that review of the past by which aloneshe could now judge Oliver Ostrander.
She had spoken of him as noble; she had forced herself to believe himso, and in profession and in many of his actions he had been so, but hadshe ever been wholly pleased with him? To go back to their firstmeeting, what impression had he made upon her then? Had it beenaltogether favourable and such as would be natural in one of his repute?Hardly; but then the shock of her presentation to one who had possiblyseen her under other and shameful conditions had been great, and herjudgment could scarcely have full play while her whole attention wasabsorbed in watching for some hint of recognition on his part.
But when this apprehension had vanished; when quite assured that he hadfailed to see in the widowed Mrs. Averill the wife of the man who haddied a felon's death in Shelby, had her spirits risen and her eyescleared to his great merits as she had heard them extolled by people ofworth and intellectual standing? Alas, no. There had been something inhis look--a lack of spontaneity which had not fitted in with herexpectations.
And in the months which followed, when as Reuther's suitor she saw himoften and intimately--how had she regarded him then? More leniently ofcourse. In her gratification at prospects so far beyond any she had aright to expect for her child, she had taken less note of thissuccessful man's defects. Peculiarities of conversation and manner whichhad seemed to bespeak a soul far from confident in its hopes, resolvedthemselves into the uneasy moods of a man who had a home he nevervisited, a father he never saw.
But had she been really justified in this easy view of things? If thebreak between his father and himself was the result of nothing deeperthan a difference of temperament, tastes or even opinions, why should hehave shrunk with such morbid distaste from all allusions to that father?Was it natural? She may have looked upon it as being so in the heyday ofher hopes and when she had a secret herself to hide, but could she sodegrade her judgment now?
And what of his conduct towards Reuther? Had that been all her motherheart could ask of a man of his seemingly high instincts? She hadassured his father in her first memorable interview with him that it hadbeen perfectly honourable and above all reproach. And so it had been asfar as mere words went. But words are not all; it is the tender look,the manly bearing, the tone which springs from the heart which tells ingreat crises; and these had all been lacking. Generous as he attemptedto show himself, there was nothing in his bearing to match that ofReuther as she took her quiet leave of him and entered upon a fate somuch bitterer for her than for him.
This lack of grace in him had not passed unnoted by her even at thetime, but being herself so greatly in fault she had ascribed it to therecoil of a proud man from the dread of social humiliation. But it tookanother aspect under the strong light just thrown upon his early life byher discovery in the room below. Nothing but some act, unforgivable andunforgettable would account for that black mark drawn between a father'seyes and his son's face. No bar sinister could tell a stronger tale. Butthis was no bar sinister; rather the deliberate stigmatising of one yetloved, but banned for a reason which was little short of--Here herconclusions stopped; she would not allow her imagination to carry herany farther.
Unhappy mother, just as she saw something like a prospect of releasingher long-dead husband from the odium of an unjust sentence, to be shakenby this new doubt as to the story and character of the man for whoseunion with her beloved child she was so anxiously struggling! Should itnot make her pause? Should she not show wisdom in giving a differentmeaning from any she had hitherto done, to that stern and inexorabledictum of the father, that no marriage between the two could or shouldever be considered?
It was a question for which no ready answer seemed possible in herpresent mood. Better to await the time when some move had to be made orsome definite decision reached. Now she must rest,--rest and not think.
Have any of us ever made the like acknowledgment and then tried tosleep? In half an hour Mrs. Scoville was again upon her feet, this timewith a determination which ignored the hour and welcomed night as thoughit were broad noon day.
There was a room on this upper floor into which neither she nor Reutherhad ever stepped. She had once looked in but that was all.To-night--because she could not sleep; because she must not think--shewas resolved to enter it. Oliver's room! left as he had left it yearsbefore! What might it not tell of a past concerning which she longed tobe reassured?
The father had laid no restrictions upon her, in giving her this floorfor her use. Rights which he ignored she could afford to appropriate.Dressing sufficiently for warmth, she lit a candle, put out the light inher own room and started down the hall.
If she paused on reaching the threshold of this long-closed room, it wasbut natural. The clock on Reuther's mantel had sent its three clearstrokes through the house as her hand fell on the knob, and to herfearing heart and now well-awakened imagination these strokes hadsounded in her ear like a "DON'T! DON'T!" The silence, so gruesome, nowthat this shrill echo had ceased, was poor preparation for her task. Yetwould she have welcomed any sound--the least which could have beenheard? No, that were a worse alternative than silence; and, relieved ofthat momentary obsession consequent upon an undertaking of doubtfuloutcome, she pushed the door fully open and entered.
A smother of dust--an odour of decay--a lack of all order in the room'sarrangements and furnishings--even a general disarray, hallowed, if notaffected, by time--for all this she was prepared. But not for the wildconfusion--the inconceivable litter and all the other signs she sawabout her of a boy's mad packing and reckless departure. Here herimagination, so lively at times, had failed her; and, as her eye becameaccustomed to the semi-obscurity, and she noted the heaps of moulderingclothing lying amid overturned chairs and trampled draperies, she felther heart grow cold with a nameless dread she could only hope tocounteract by quick and impulsive action.
But what action? Was it for her to touch, to rearrange, to render cleanand orderly this place of unknown memories? She shrank withinconceivable distaste from the very idea of such meddling; and, thoughshe saw and noted all, she did not put out so much as a finger towardsany object there till--There was an inner door, and this some impulsedrove her to open. A small closet stood revealed, empty but for onearticle. When she saw this article she gave a great gasp; then sheuttered a low
PSHAW! and with a shrug of the shoulders drew back andflung to the door. But she opened it again. She had to. One cannot livein hideous doubt, without an effort to allay it. She must look at thatsmall, black article again; look at it with candle in hand; see forherself that her fears were without foundation; that a shadow had madethe outline on the wall which--
She found herself laughing. There was nothing else to do. SHE withthoughts like these; SHE, Reuther's mother! Verily, the early hours ofmorning were unsuited for any such work as this. She would go back toher own room and bed--But she only went as far as the bureau where shehad left the candlestick, which having seized, she returned to thecloset and slowly, reluctantly reopened the door. Before her on the wallhung a cap,--and it was no shadow which gave it that look like herhusband's; the broad peak was there. She had not been mistaken; it wasthe duplicate of the one she had picked up in the attic of the ClaymoreInn when that inn was simply a tavern.
Well, and what if it was!--Such was her thought a moment later. Shewould take down the cap, set it before her and look at it till her braingrew clear of its follies.
But after she had it in her hand she found herself looking anywhere butat the cap. She stared at the floor, the walls about, the desk she hadmechanically approached. She even noticed the books lying about on theshelves before her and took down one or two, to glance at theirtitle-pages in a blind curiosity she could not account for the nextminute. Then she found herself looking into a drawer half drawn out andfilled with all sorts of heterogeneous articles: sealing-wax, a roll ofpins, a pen-holder, a knife--A KNIFE! Why should she recoil again atthat? Nothing could be more ordinary than to find a knife in thedesk-drawer of a young man! The fact was not worth a thought; yet beforeshe knew it, her fingers were creeping towards this knife, had picked itup from among the other scattered articles, had closed upon it, let itdrop again, only to seize hold of it yet more determinedly and carry itstraight to the light.
Who spoke? Had any one spoken? Was there any sound in the air at all?She heard none, yet the sense of sound was in her ear, as though it hadbeen and passed. When the glance she threw about her came back to heroutstretched hand, she knew that the cry, if cry it were, had beenwithin, and that the echoes of the room had remained undisturbed. Theknife was lying open on her palm, and from one of the blades the end hadbeen nipped, just enough of it to match--
Was she mad! She thought so for a moment; then she laid down the knifeclose against the cap and contemplated them both for more minutes thanshe ever reckoned.
And the stillness, which had been profound, became deeper yet. Not evenReuther's clock sounded its small note.
The candle fluttering low in its socket roused her at last from herabstraction. Catching up the two articles which had so enthralled her,she restored the one to the closet, the other to the drawer, and, withswift but silent step, regained her own room where she buried her headin her pillow, weeping and praying until the morning light, breaking inupon her grief, awoke her to the obligations of her position and thenecessity of silence concerning all the experiences of this night.