CHAPTER XLIX
Presentiments are no doubt foolish things, and yet, at the time thatAngela was speaking of hers to Mr. Fraser, a consultation was going onin a back study at Isleworth that might almost have justified it. Thefire was the only light in the room, and gathered round it, talkingvery low, their features thrown alternately into strong light and darkshadow, were George Caresfoot and Sir John and Lady Bellamy. It wasevident from the strong expression of interest, almost of excitement,on their faces that they were talking of some matter of greatimportance.
Sir John was, as usual, perched on the edge of his chair, rubbing hisdry hands and eliciting occasional sparks in the shape of remarks, buthe was no longer merry; indeed, he looked ill at ease. George, his redhair all rumpled up, and his long limbs thrust out towards the fire,spoke scarcely at all, but glued his little bloodshot eyes alternatelyon the faces of his companions, and only contributed an occasionalchuckle. But the soul of this witches' gathering was evidently LadyBellamy. She was standing up, and energetically detailing some scheme,the great pupils of her eyes expanding and contracting as the unholyflame within them rose and fell.
"Then that is settled," she said, at last.
George nodded, Bellamy said nothing.
"I suppose that silence gives consent. Very well, I will take thefirst step to-morrow. I do not like Angela Caresfoot, but, upon myword, I shall be sorry for her before she is twenty-four hours older.She is made of too fine a material to be sold into such hands asyours, George Caresfoot."
George looked up menacingly, but said nothing.
"I have often urged you to give this up; now I urge no more--the thingis done in spirit, it may as well be done in reality. I told you longago that it was a most dreadfully wicked thing, and that nothing butevil can come of it. Do not say that I have not warned you."
"Come, stop that devil's talk," growled George.
"Devil's talk!--that is a good word, George, for it is of the devil'swages that I am telling you. Now listen, I am going to prophecy. Acurse will fall upon this house and all within it. Would you like tohave a sign that I speak the truth? Then wait." She was standing up,her hand stretched out, and in the dim light she looked like someheathen princess urging a bloody sacrifice to her gods. Herforebodings terrified her hearers, and, by a common impulse, they roseand moved away from her.
At that moment a strange thing happened. A gust of wind, making itsway from some entrance in the back of the house, burst open the doorof the room in which they were, and entered with a cold flap as ofwings. Next second a terrible crash resounded from the other end ofthe room. George turned white as a sheet, and sank into a chair,cursing feebly. Bellamy gave a sort of howl of terror, and shrank upto his wife, almost falling into the fire in his efforts to get behindher. Lady Bellamy alone, remaining erect and undaunted, laughed aloud.
"Come, one of you brave conspirators against a defenceless girl,strike a light, for the place is as dark as a vault, and let us seewhat has happened. I told you that you should have a sign."
After several efforts, George succeeded in doing as she bade him, andheld a candle forward in his trembling hand.
"Come, don't be foolish," she said; "a picture has fallen, that isall."
He advanced to look at it, and then benefited his companions with afurther assortment of curses. The picture, on examination, proved tobe a large one that he had, some years previously, had painted ofIsleworth, with the Bellamys and himself in the foreground. The framewas shattered, and all the centre of the canvass torn out by theweight of its fall on to a life-sized and beautiful statue ofAndromeda chained to a rock, awaiting her fate with a staring look ofagonized terror in her eyes.
"An omen, a very palpable omen," said Lady Bellamy, with one of herdark smiles. "Isleworth and ourselves destroyed by being smashedagainst a marble girl, who rises uninjured from the wreck. Eh, John?"
"Don't touch me, you sorceress," replied Sir John, who was shakingwith fear. "I believe that you are Satan in person."
"You are strangely complimentary, even for a husband."
"Perhaps I am, but I know your dark ways, and your dealings with yourmaster, and I tell you both what it is; I have done with the job. Iwill have nothing more to do with it. I will know nothing more aboutit."
"You hear what he says," said Lady Bellamy to George. "John does notlike omens. For the last time, will you give it up, or will you goon?"
"I can't give her up--I can't indeed; it would kill me," answeredGeorge, wringing his hands. "There is a fiend driving me along thispath."
"Not a doubt of it," said Sir John, who was staring at the brokenpicture with chattering teeth, and his eyes almost starting out of hishead; "but if I were you, I should get him to drive me a littlestraighter, that's all."
"You are poor creatures, both of you," said Lady Bellamy; "but wewill, then, decide to go on."
"Fiat 'injuria' ruat coelum," said Sir John, who knew a little Latin;and, frightened as he was, could not resist the temptation to air it.
And then they went and left George still contemplating the horror-stricken face of the nude marble virgin whose eyes appeared to gazeupon the ruins of his picture.
Next morning, being Christmas Day, Lady Bellamy went to church, asbehoves a good Christian, and listened to the Divine message of peaceon earth and good-will towards men. So, for the matter of that, didGeorge, and so did Angela. After church, Lady Bellamy went home tolunch, but she was in no mood for eating, so she left the table, andordered the victoria to be round in half an hour.
After church, too, Angela and Mr. Fraser ate their Christmas dinner.Angela's melancholy had to some extent melted beneath the genialinfluence of the Christmas-tide, and her mind had taken comfort fromthe words of peace and everlasting love that she had heard thatmorning, and for awhile, at any rate, she had forgotten herforebodings. The unaccustomed splendour of the dinner, too, haddiverted her attention, for she was easily pleased with such things,and altogether she was in a more comfortable frame of mind than shehad been on the previous evening, and was inclined to indulge in apleasant talk with Mr. Fraser upon various subjects, mostly classicaland Arthurian. She had already cracked some filberts for him, pluckedby herself in the autumn, and specially saved in a damp jar, and wasabout to settle herself in a chair by the fire, when suddenly sheturned white and stood quite still.
"Hark!" she said, "do you hear it?"
"Hear what?"
"Lady Bellamy's horse--the big black horse that trots so fast."
"I can hear nothing, Angela."
"But I can. She is on the high-road yet; she will be here very soon;that horse trots fast."
"Nonsense, Angela; it is some other horse."
But, as he spoke, the sound of a powerful animal trotting very rapidlybecame distinctly audible.
"It has come--the evil news--and she has brought it."
"Rubbish, dear; somebody to see your father, no doubt."
A minute elapsed, and then Mrs. Jakes, now the only servant in thehouse, was heard shuffling along the passage, followed by a firm,light step.
"Don't leave me," said Angela to Mr. Fraser. "God give me strength tobear it," she went on, beneath her breath. She was still standingstaring vacantly towards the door, pale, and her bosom heaving. Theintensity of her anxiety had to some extent communicated itself to Mr.Fraser, for there are few things so catching as anxiety, exceptenthusiasm; he, too, had risen, and was standing in an attitude ofexpectancy.
"Lady Bellamy to see yer," said Mrs. Jakes, pushing her head throughthe half-opened door.
Next second she had entered.
"I must apologize for disturbing you at dinner, Angela," she beganhurriedly, and then stopped and also stood still. There was somethingvery curious about her reception, she thought; both Mr. Fraser andAngela might have been cut out of stone, for neither moved.
Standing thus in the silence of expectancy, the three made a strangepicture. On Lady Bellamy's face there was a look of sterndetermination
and suppressed excitement such as became one about tocommit a crime.
At last she broke the silence.
"I come to bring you bad news, Angela," she said.
"What have you to say? tell me, quick! No, stop, hear me before youspeak. If you have come here with any evil in your heart, or with theintention to deceive or betray, pause before you answer. I am a lonelyand almost friendless woman, and have no claim except upon yourcompassion; but it is not always well to deal ill with such as I,since we have at last a friend whose vengeance you too must fear. So,by the love of Christ and by the presence of the God who made you,speak to me only such truth as you will utter at his judgment. Now,answer, I am ready."
At her words, spoken with an earnestness and in a voice which madethem almost awful, a momentary expression of fear swept across LadyBellamy's face, but it went as quickly as it came, and the hard,determined look returned. The mysterious eyes grew cold and glittered,the head erected itself. At that moment Lady Bellamy distinctlyreminded Mr. Fraser of a hooded cobra about to strike.
"Am I to speak before Mr. Fraser?"
"Speak!"
"What is the good of this high-flown talk, Angela? You seem to know mynews before I give it, and believe me it pains me very much to have togive it. _He is dead, Angela._"
The cobra had struck, but as yet the poison had scarcely begun towork. There was only numbness. Mr. Fraser gave a gasp and halfdropped, half fell, into his chair. The noise attracted Angela'sattention, and pressing her hand to her forehead she turned towardshim with a ghost of a laugh.
"Did I not tell you that this evil woman would bring evil news." Thenaddressing Lady Bellamy, "But stop, you forget what I said to you, youdo not speak the truth. Arthur dead! How can Arthur be dead and Ialive? How is it that I do not know he is dead? Oh, for shame, it isnot true, he is not dead."
"This seems to me to be a thankless as well as a painful task," saidLady Bellamy, hoarsely, "but, if you will not believe me, look here,you know this, I suppose? I took it, as he asked me to do, from hisdead hand that it might be given back to you."
"If Mr. Heigham is dead," said Mr. Fraser, "how do you know it, wheredid he die, and what of?"
"I know it, Mr. Fraser, because it was my sad duty to nurse himthrough his last illness at Madeira. He died of enteric fever. I havegot a copy of his burial certificate here which I had taken from thePortuguese books. He seems to have had no relations living, poor youngman, but Sir John communicated with the family lawyer. Here is thecertificate," and she handed Mr. Fraser a paper written in Portugueseand officially stamped.
"You say," broke in Angela, "that you took this ring from his deadhand, the hand on which I placed it. I do not believe you. Youbeguiled it from his living hand. It cannot be that he is dead; for,if he were, I should have felt it. Oh, Arthur!" and in her misery shestretched out her arms and turned her agonized eyes upwards, "if youare dead, come to me, and let me see your spirit face, and hear thewhisper of your wings. Have you no voice in the silence? You see hedoes not come, he is not dead; if he were dead, Heaven could not holdhim from my side, or, if it could, it would have drawn me up to his."
"My love, my love," said Mr. Fraser, in a scared voice, "it is notGod's will that the dead should come back to us thus----"
"My poor Angela, why will you not believe me? This is so very painful,do you suppose that I want to torture you by saying what is not trueabout your love? The idea is absurd. I had meant to keep it till youwere calmer; but I have a letter for you. Read it and convinceyourself."
Angela almost snatched the paper from her outstretched hand. It ranthus, in characters almost illegible from weakness:--
"Dearest,--Good-bye. I am dying of fever. Lady Bellamy will take back your ring when it is over. Try to forget me, and be happy. Too weak to write more. Good-bye. God----"
At the foot of this broken and almost illegible letter was scrawledthe word, "ARTHUR."
Angela read it slowly, and then at length the poison did its work. Shedid not speak wildly any more, or call upon Arthur; she was stung backto sense, but all the light went out of her eyes.
"It is his writing," she said, slowly. "I beg your pardon. It was goodof you to nurse him."
Then, pressing the paper to her bosom with one hand, with the othershe groped her way towards the door.
"It is very dark," she said.
Lady Bellamy's eyes gave a flash of triumph, and then she stoodwatching the pitiable exhibition of human misery as curiously as evera Roman matron did an expiring gladiator. When Angela was near thedoor, the letter still pressed against her heart, she spoke again.
"The blow comes from God, Angela, and the religion and spiritualtheories which you believe in will bring you consolation. Most likelyit is a blessing in disguise--a thing that you will in time even learnto be thankful for."
Lady Bellamy had overacted her part. The words did not ring true, theyjarred upon Mr. Fraser; much more did they jar upon Angela's tornnerves. Her pale cheek flushed, and she turned and spoke, but therewas no anger in her face, nothing but sorrow that dignified, andunfathomable love lost in its own depths. Only the eyes seemed assightless as those of one walking in her sleep.
"When your hour of dreadful trouble comes, as it will come, pray Godthat there may be none to mock you as you mock me." And she turnedlike a stricken thing, and went slowly out, blindly groping her wayalong.
Her last words had hit the victor hard. Who can say what hidden stringthey touched, or what prescience of evil they awakened? But they wentnigh to felling her. Clutching the mantel-piece, Lady Bellamy gaspedfor air; then, recovering a little, she said:
"Thank God, that is over."
Mr. Fraser scarcely saw this last incident. So overwhelmed was he atthe sight of Angela's agony that he had covered his face with hishand. When he lifted it again, Lady Bellamy was gone, and he wasalone.