CHAPTER I.
THE OPEN DOOR.
I ran down to Brighton for the Sunday. My wife's cousin, GeorgeBaxendale, was stopping there, with the Coopers. The wife and I wereboth to have gone. But our little Minna was very queer--feverish cold,or something--and Lucy did not like to leave her with the nurse. So Iwent down alone.
It was a fine day, for November. We drove over to Bramber--Jack Cooperand his wife, Baxendale, and I. When we got back to Regency Square itwas pretty late. I was to go back by the 8.40. When we had dined I hadto make quite a rush to catch the train. Jack and George both came upto see me off. As the Pullman carriages all seemed full, I got into thecompartment of an ordinary first-class carriage.
"You'll be better in there," said Jack. "You'll have it to yourself."
I did, till just as the train was off. When the train had actuallystarted, a woman came hurrying up the platform. A porter threw open thedoor of my carriage, and she got in. I let her have the seat by thedoor through which she had entered. I went to the other end of thecompartment. I did not feel too much obliged to the porter who hadshown her in. Although it was not a smoking carriage, as I had expectedto have had it to myself, I had intended to smoke all the way to town.In fact, I was smoking at that moment. I hardly knew what to do. Thetrain did not stop till it reached Victoria. There would be noopportunity of changing carriages. I did not relish the idea of notsmoking, while I scarcely knew if I might venture to ask permission tosmoke of the new-comer.
I made up my mind that I would. I had only just lighted a cigar. I hadnot looked at her as she came up the platform, to notice what kind ofperson she was. I had been too much engaged with Jack and George. Iturned to her, raising my hat as I did so.
"May I ask if you object to----"
I had got so far; but I got no farther. She looked at me, and, as shedid so, and I saw her face clearly, and met her eyes, my blood wentcold in my veins.
The woman at the other end of the carriage was either Nelly, or Nelly'sghost. If she was her ghost, then she was the most substantial ghost Ihad ever heard of. And yet I had to stare at her for some moments instupefied silence before I could believe that she was not a ghost.Before I could believe that she was genuine flesh and blood.
She struck me as being as much surprised at seeing me as I was atseeing her--and, at first at any rate, not much better pleased. Westared at each other as if we were moonstruck. She was the first tofind her voice--she always was quicker, in every sense of the word,than I am.
"Tom!" she said. Then gave a sort of gasp.
"Nelly!" It was all I could do to get her name to pass my lips.
I am not going to enter into details as to what I said to her, and asto what she said to me. Nothing pleasant was said on either side. Whena man meets a woman, even after a separation of seven years and more,who has wronged him as Ellen Howth, as she was named when I first knewher, had wronged me, he is not likely to greet her with sugaredphrases, especially when he has had every reason to suppose that hisprayers have been answered, and that she is dead. When I saw that shehad tricked me, for the thousand-and-first time, and that she was notdead, as I have written, my blood went cold. When it warmed, it was notwith love for her.
We quarrelled, as we had done many and many a time before. She had beendrinking. She was always bad enough when sober; when not sober she wasinfinitely worse. Every moment I expected her to assail me withpersonal violence. She threatened to, over and over again. I fearedthat there would be some outrageous scene in the railway carriage.Fearing this, and the scandal which such a thing would necessarilyentail, I formed a wild resolution. I determined that, even while thetrain continued to fly through the air, I would leave the compartmentin which she was, and at any and every risk seek refuge in an adjoiningone.
The resolution was no sooner formed than I proceeded to put it intoexecution. There was no necessity to lower the window; the handle wasinside the carriage. Turning the handle, I rose from my seat. Whethershe mistook or designed to frustrate my purpose, I cannot say. Nosooner did I rise, than she came rushing at me. The violence of herassault took me by surprise. The handle escaping from my grasp, thedoor swung back upon its hinges. She had me by the shoulders. Iendeavoured to wrest myself free. There was a struggle. In thestruggle, unconsciously certainly to me, we must have reversed ourpositions, because, suddenly loosing her grasp of me, before I had thefaintest suspicion of what was about to happen, she had fallenbackwards through the open carriage door, out into the night, and thetrain was going at express speed to town.
It was some moments before I realised what had actually occurred. WhenI did do so, I sat down on the seat in a sort of stupor. I was rousedfrom it by the banging of the carriage door. It was being swungbackwards and forwards by the momentum of the train. I shut it, almostmechanically; as I did so I noticed that the glass was shattered. Itmight have been broken by the banging of the door, or she might havebroken it by striking it in her frantic efforts to clutch at something.
What was I to do? My eyes wandered to the alarm-bell. Should I ring itand stop the train? To what purpose? She might not be dead. Indeed, theprobabilities were that she was, at least, not quite dead. In such acase I knew her well enough to be aware that nothing was more likelythan that she would at once denounce me as her attempted murderer. Thenin what a plight I should be! To the best of my knowledge and beliefshe had brought her fate upon herself. I had nothing to do with it.Undoubtedly, I had not opened the door to hurl her through. It is easyenough after the event to say that at all hazards I ought at once tohave stopped the train, and explained what had occurred. I should havedone so had I been able to foresee the events which followed. I shouldhave been willing to have given a great deal to have saved myself frombearing what I actually have borne. But, at the moment, I foresawnothing. My wits were woolgathering. I was confronted by the thoughtthat, in face of her allegations of my guilt, my protestations ofinnocence might avail but little. I had suffered too much on heraccount already to have any desire to suffer more.
As I sat there thinking, something struck me a severe blow in the face.It was a piece of glass from the broken window which had been loosened,and which had been forced out of its place by the pressure of the wind.I lowered the window, lest the remaining fragments should also bedriven from their places. The sharp edge of the piece of glass had comeinto contact with my cheek. It had cut me to the bone. I put up myhandkerchief to stop the bleeding. As I did so I noticed that myovercoat seemed to have been torn open in the struggle; the top buttonappeared to be missing.
The blood flowed freely from the open wound. The piece of glass seemedto have cut me like a knife. My handkerchief was quite inadequate tostop the flow. It was becoming soaked with blood. While I was wonderingwhat I should do if the bleeding did not shortly cease, the train drewup at Victoria.
The distance between Brighton and town had never before seemed to me tobe so short.