CHAPTER XXII
FACILIS DESCENSUS
Let not those who would judge her harshly forget that Julia, to animpulsive and passionate nature, added a special and notabledisadvantage. She had been educated in a sphere alien from that in whichshe now moved. A girl, brought up as Sir George's cousin and among herequals, would have known him to be incapable of treachery as black asthis. Such a girl, certified of his love, not only by his words andlooks but by her own self-respect and pride, would have shut her eyes tothe most pregnant facts and the most cogent inferences; and scorned allher senses, one by one, rather than believe him guilty. She would havefelt, rightly or wrongly, that the thing was impossible; and would havebelieved everything in the world, yes, everything, possible orimpossible--yet never that he had lied when he told her that heloved her.
But Julia had been bred in a lower condition, not far removed from thatof the Pamela to whose good fortune she had humbly likened her own;among people who regarded a Macaroni or a man of fashion as a wolf everseeking to devour. To distrust a gentleman and repel his advances hadbeen one of the first lessons instilled into her opening mind; nor hadshe more than emerged from childhood before she knew that a laced coatforewent destruction, and held the wearer of it a cozener, who inninety-nine cases out of a hundred kept no faith with a woman beneathhim, but lived only to break hearts and bring grey hairs to the grave.
Out of this fixed belief she had been jolted by the upheaval that placedher on a level with Sir George. Persuaded that the convention no longerapplied to herself, she had given the rein to her fancy and her girlishromance, no less than to her generosity; she had indulged in deliciousvisions, and seen them grow real; nor probably in all St. James's wasthere a happier woman than Julia when she found herself possessed ofthis lover of the prohibited class; who to the charms and attractions,the nice-ness and refinement, which she had been bred to consider beyondher reach, added a devotion, the more delightful--since he believed herto be only what she seemed--as it lay in her power to reward it amply.Some women would have swooned with joy over such a conquest effected insuch circumstances. What wonder that Julia was deaf to the warnings andsurmises of Mr. Fishwick, whom delay and the magnitude of the stakesrendered suspicious, as well as to the misgivings of old Mrs. Masterson,slow to grasp a new order of things? It would have been strange had shelistened to either, when youth, and wealth, and love all beckonedone way.
But now, now in the horror and darkness of the post-chaise, the lawyer'swarnings and the old woman's misgivings returned on her with crushingweight; and more and heavier than these, her old belief in theheartlessness, the perfidy of the man of rank. At the statement that aman of the class with whom she had commonly mixed could so smile, whilehe played the villain, as to deceive not only her eyes but herheart--she would have laughed. But on the mind that lay behind thesmooth and elegant mask of a _gentleman's_ face she had no lights; oronly the old lights which showed it desperately wicked. Applying theseto the circumstances, what a lurid glare they shed on his behaviour!How quickly, how suspiciously quickly, had he succumbed to her charms!How abruptly had his insouciance changed to devotion, his impertinenceto respect! How obtuse, how strangely dull had he been in the matter ofher claims and her identity! Finally, with what a smiling visage had helured her to her doom, showed her to his tools, settled to a nicety theleast detail of the crime!
More weighty than any one fact, the thing he had said to her on thestaircase at Oxford came back to her mind. 'If you were a lady,' he hadlisped in smiling insolence, 'I would kiss you and make you my wife.' Inface of those words, she had been rash enough to think that she couldbend him, ignorant that she was more than she seemed, to her purpose.She had quoted those very words to him when she had had it in her mindto surrender--the sweetest surrender in the world. And all the time hehad been fooling her to the top of her bent. All the time he had knownwho she was and been plotting against her devilishly--appointing hourand place and--and it was all over.
It was all over. The sunny visions of love and joy were done! It was allover. When the sharp, fierce pain of the knife had done its worst, theconsciousness of that remained a dead weight on her brain. When theparoxysm of weeping had worn itself out, yet brought no relief to herpassionate nature, a kind of apathy succeeded. She cared nothing whereshe was or what became of her; the worst had happened, the worst beensuffered. To be betrayed, cruelly, heartlessly, without scruple or careby those we love--is there a sharper pain than this? She had sufferedthat, she was suffering it still. What did the rest matter?
Mr. Thomasson might have undeceived her, but the sudden stoppage of thechaise had left no place in the tutor's mind for aught but terror. Atany moment, now the chaise was at a stand, the door might open and he behauled out to meet the fury of his pupil's eye, and feel the smart ofhis brutal whip. It needed no more to sharpen Mr. Thomasson's longears--his eyes were useless; but for a time crouching in his corner andscarce daring to breathe, he heard only the confused muttering ofseveral men talking at a distance. Presently the speakers came nearer,he caught the click of flint on steel, and a bright gleam of lightentered the chaise through a crack in one of the shutters. The men hadlighted a lamp.
It was only a slender shaft that entered, but it fell athwart the girl'sface and showed him her closed eyes. She lay back in her corner, hercheeks colourless, an expression of dull, hopeless suffering stamped onher features. She did not move or open her eyes, and the tutor dared notspeak lest his words should be heard outside. But he looked, havingnothing to check him, and looked; and in spite of his fears and hispreoccupation, the longer he looked the deeper was the impression whichher beauty made on his senses.
He could hear no more of the men's talk than muttered grumblingsplentifully bestrewn with curses; and wonder what was forward and whythey remained inactive grew more and more upon him. At length he roseand applied his eyes to the crack that admitted the light; but he coulddistinguish nothing outside, the lamp, which was close to the window,blinding him. At times he caught the clink of a bottle, and fancied thatthe men were supping; but he knew nothing for certain, and by-and-by thelight was put out. A brief--and agonising--period of silence followed,during which he thought that he caught the distant tramp of horses; buthe had heard the same sound before, it might be the beating of hisheart, and before he could decide, oaths and exclamations broke thesilence, and there was a sudden bustle. In less than a minute the chaiselurched forward, a whip cracked, and they took the road again.
The tutor breathed more freely, and, rid of the fear of being overheard,regained a little of his unctuousness. 'My dear good lady,' he said,moving a trifle nearer to Julia, and even making a timid plunge for herhand, 'you must not give way. I protest you must not give way. Depend onme! Depend on me, and all will be well. I--oh dear, what a bump!I'--this as he retreated precipitately to his corner--'I fear we arestopping!'
They were, but only for an instant, that the lamps might be lighted.Then the chaise rolled on again, but from the way in which it jolted andbounded, shaking its passengers this way and that, it was evident thatit no longer kept the main road. The moment this became clear to Mr.Thomasson his courage vanished as suddenly as it had appeared.
'Where are they taking us?' he cried, rising and sitting down again; andpeering first this way and then the other. 'My G--d, we are undone! Weshall be murdered--I know we shall! Oh dear! what a jolt! They aretaking us to some cut-throat place! There again! Didn't you feel it?Don't you understand, woman? Oh, Lord,' he continued, piteously wringinghis hands, 'why did I mix myself up with this trouble?'
She did not answer, and enraged by her silence and insensibility, thecowardly tutor could have found it in his heart to strike her.Fortunately the ray of light which now penetrated the carriage suggestedan idea which he hastened to carry out. He had no paper, and, givenpaper, he had no ink; but falling back on what he had, he lugged out hissnuff-box and pen-knife, and holding the box in the ray of light, andhimself as still as the road permitted, he set to work, laborious
ly andwith set teeth, to scrawl on the bottom of the box the message of whichwe know. To address it to Mr. Fishwick and sign it Julia were naturalprecautions, since he knew that the girl, and not he, would be theobject of pursuit. When he had finished his task, which was no lightone--the road growing worse and the carriage shaking more and more--hewent to thrust the box under the door, which fitted ill at the bottom.But stooping to remove the straw, he reflected that probably the roadthey were in was a country lane, where the box would be difficult tofind; and in a voice trembling with fear and impatience, he called tothe girl to give him her black kerchief.
She did not ask him why or for what, but complied without opening hereyes. No words could have described her state more eloquently.
He wrapped the thing loosely in the kerchief--which he calculated wouldcatch the passing eye more easily than the box--and knotted the endstogether. But when he went to push the package under the door, it provedtoo bulky; and, with an exclamation of rage, he untied it, and made itup anew and more tightly. At last he thought that he had got it right,and he stooped to feel for the crack; but the carriage, which had beentravelling more and more heavily and slowly, came to a suddenstandstill, and in a panic he sat up, dropping the box and thrusting thestraw over it with his foot.
He had scarcely done this when the door was opened, and the masked man,who had threatened them before, thrust in his head. 'Come out!' he saidcurtly, addressing the tutor, who was the nearer. 'And be sharpabout it!'
But Mr. Thomasson's eyes, peering through the doorway, sought in vainthe least sign of house or village. Beyond the yellow glare cast by thelamp on the wet road, he saw nothing but darkness, night, and the gloomyshapes of trees; and he hung back. 'No,' he said, his voice quaveringwith fear. 'I--my good man, if you will promise--'
The man swore a frightful oath. 'None of your tongue!' he cried, 'butout with you unless you want your throat cut. You cursed, whining,psalm-singing sniveller, you don't know when you are well off'! Outwith you!'
Mr. Thomasson waited for no more, but stumbled out, shaking with fright.
'And you!' the ruffian continued, addressing the girl, 'unless you wantto be thrown out the same way you were thrown in! The sooner I see yourback, my sulky Madam, the better I shall be pleased. No more meddlingwith petticoats for me! This comes of working with fine gentlemen,say I!'
Julia was but half roused. 'Am. I--to get out?' she said dully.
'Ay you are! By G--d, you are a cool one!' the man continued, watchingher in a kind of admiration, as she rose and stepped by him like one ina dream. 'And a pretty one for all your temper! The master is not here,but the man is; and if--'
'Stow it, you fool!' cried a voice from the darkness, 'and get aboard!'
'Who said anything else?' the ruffian retorted, but with a look that,had Julia been more sensible of it, must have chilled her blood. 'Whosaid anything else? So there you are, both of you, and none the worse,I'll take my davy! Lash away, Tim! Make the beggars fly!'
As he uttered the last words he sprang on the wheel, and before thetutor could believe his good fortune, or feel assured that there was notsome cruel deceit playing on him, the carriage splashed up the mud, andrattled away. In a trice the lights grew small and were gone, and thetwo were left standing side by side in the darkness. On one hand a massof trees rose high above them, blotting out the grey sky; on the otherthe faint outline of a low wall appeared to divide the lane in whichthey stood--the mud rising rapidly about their shoes--from a flat aguishexpanse over which the night hung low.
It was a strange position, but neither of the two felt this to the fall;Mr. Thomasson in his thankfulness that at any cost he had eluded Mr.Dunborough's vengeance, Julia because at the moment she cared not whatbecame of her. Naturally, however, Mr. Thomasson, whose satisfactionknew no drawback save that of their present condition, and who had tocongratulate himself on a risk safely run, and a good friend gained, wasthe first to speak.
'My dear young lady,' he said, in an insinuating tone very differentfrom that in which he had called for her kerchief, 'I vow I am morethankful than I can say, that I was able to come to your assistance! Ishudder to think what those ruffians might not have done had you beenalone, and--and unprotected! Now I trust all danger is over. We haveonly to find a house in which we can pass the night, and to-morrow wemay laugh at our troubles!'
She turned her head towards him, 'Laugh?' she said, and a sob took herin the throat.
He felt himself set back; then remembered the delusion under which shelay, and went to dispel it--pompously. But his evil angel was at hisshoulder; again at the last moment he hesitated. Something in thedespondency of the girl's figure, in the hopelessness of her tone, inthe intensity of the grief that choked her utterance, wrought with theremembrance of her beauty and her disorder in the coach, to set hiscrafty mind working in a new direction. He saw that she was for the timeutterly hopeless; utterly heedless what became of herself. That wouldnot last; but his cunning told him that with returning sensibility wouldcome pique, resentment, the desire to be avenged. In such a case one manwas sometimes as good as another. It was impossible to say what shemight not do or be induced to do, if full advantage were taken of amoment so exceptional. Fifty thousand pounds! And her fresh youngbeauty! What an opening it was! The way lay far from clear, the meanswere to find; but faint heart never won fair lady, and Mr. Thomasson hadknown strange things come to pass.
He was quick to choose his part. 'Come, child,' he said, assuming a kindof paternal authority. 'At least we must find a roof. We cannot spendthe night here.'
'No,' she said dully, 'I suppose not.'
'So--shall we go this way?'
'As you please,' she answered.
They started, but had not moved far along the miry road before she spokeagain. 'Do you know,' she asked drearily, 'why they set us down?'
He was puzzled himself as to that, but, 'They may have thought that thepursuit was gaining on them,' he answered, 'and become alarmed.' Whichwas in part the truth; though Mr. Dunborough's failure to appear at therendezvous had been the main factor in determining the men.
'Pursuit?' she said. 'Who would pursue us?'
'Mr. Fishwick,' he suggested.
'Ah!' she answered bitterly; 'he might. If I had listened to him! If Ihad--but it is over now.'
'I wish we could see a light,' Mr. Thomasson said, anxiously lookinginto the darkness, 'or a house of any kind. I wonder where we are.' Shedid not speak.
'I do not know--even what time it is,' he continued pettishly; and heshivered. 'Take care!' She had stumbled and nearly fallen. 'Will you bepleased to take my arm, and we shall be able to proceed more quickly. Iam afraid that your feet are wet.'
Absorbed in her thoughts she did not answer.
'However the ground is rising,' he said. 'By-and-by it will be drierunder foot.'
They were an odd couple to be trudging a strange road, in an unknowncountry, at the dark hour of the night. The stars must have twinkled tosee them. Mr. Thomasson began to own the influence of solitude, andlonged to pat the hand she had passed through his arm--it was the sortof caress that came natural to him; but for the time discretion withheldhim. He had another temptation: to refer to the past, to the old past atthe College, to the part he had taken at the inn, to make some sort ofapology; but again discretion intervened, and he went on in silence.
As he had said, the ground was rising; but the outlook was cheerlessenough, until the moon on a sudden emerged from a bank of cloud anddisclosed the landscape. Mr. Thomasson uttered a cry of relief. Fiftypaces before them the low wall on the right of the lane was broken by apillared gateway, whence the dark thread of an avenue trending acrossthe moonlit flat seemed to point the way to a house.
The tutor pushed the gate open. 'Diana favours you, child,' he said,with a smirk which was lost on Julia. 'It was well she emerged when shedid, for now in a few minutes we shall be safe under a roof. 'Tis agentleman's house too, unless I mistake.'
A more timid or a more suspicious w
oman might have refused to leave theroad, or to tempt the chances of the dark avenue, in his company. ButJulia, whose thoughts were bitterly employed, complied without thoughtor hesitation, perhaps unconsciously. The gate swung to behind them, andthey plodded a hundred yards between the trees arm in arm; then one andthen a second light twinkled out in front. These as they approached werefound to proceed from two windows in the ground floor of a large house.The travellers had not advanced many paces towards them before the peaksof three gables rose above them, vandyking the sky and docking the lastsparse branches of the elms.
Mr. Thomasson's exclamation of relief, as he surveyed the building, wascut short by the harsh rattle of a chain, followed by the roar of awatch-dog, as it bounded from the kennel; in a second a horrid ravingand baying, as of a score of hounds, awoke the night. The startled tutorcame near to dropping his companion's hand, but fortunately thethreshold, dimly pillared and doubtfully Palladian, was near, andresisting the impulse to put himself back to back with the girl--for theprotection of his calves rather than her skirts--the reverend gentlemanhurried to occupy it. Once in that coign of refuge, he hammered on thedoor with the energy of a frightened man.
When his anxiety permitted him to pause, a voice made itself heardwithin, cursing the dogs and roaring for Jarvey. A line of a huntingsong, bawled at the top of a musical voice and ending in a shrill 'ViewHalloa!' followed; then 'To them, beauties; to them!' and the crash ofan overturned chair. Again the house echoed with 'Jarvey, Jarvey!' ontop of which the door opened and an elderly man-servant, with his wigset on askew, his waistcoat unbuttoned, and his mouth twisted into atipsy smile, confronted the wanderers.