Part 20 (1/2)
They went early to bed, and fell quickly asleep. After having slept, it seemed to her for several hours, Helen woke suddenly with the feeling that something had wakened her, and found that the clock was busy striking, and to her confused fancy had been striking for ever so long before she woke. Its strokes ceased before she was sufficiently awake to count them, but a moment or two afterwards she heard a door shut as it had done the night before.
”It is very annoying that I can't get a good night's rest here,” thought she. A whispered ”Helen,” told her that Edith too was awake.
”The clock _did_ strike thirteen,” said Edith, ”and there _must_ be somebody in that room, for I heard the door shut again.”
”And so did I,” said Helen, whereupon they lay still in awe-struck silence, till they both fell fast asleep again.
The next day was Sat.u.r.day, and though somewhat stiff and tired with their exertions, Friday's programme was repeated. The sketches proceeded satisfactorily, but our heroines were less fortunate in other respects, for just as they were about to leave the Black Lake in the afternoon, the rain came on in torrents. Long before they got back to the farm-house the poor girls were thoroughly drenched. Edith escaped with no ill results, but Helen sat s.h.i.+vering over the fire all the evening, pa.s.sed an uneasy night in which it seemed to her that the clock never left off striking at all, and woke on Sunday morning with every symptom of a delightfully bad cold. The prospect outside was not cheering. Rain, rain, rain. Down it came in torrents. No chance of making their way to the five miles' off church, no chance even of a quiet stroll along the lanes; and, worst of all, no books to read, for such a possibility as a whole day in the house had never presented itself to their inexperienced imaginations! It was very dull. Helen was almost cross with Edith for being so exceedingly sympathetic. It was kind of course, but provoking nevertheless, as to Helen's sensitiveness it seemed to convey a tacit reproach. She would not allow to herself that they were at all to be pitied. All the same she was not sorry when the time came at last for them to go to bed.
”I wish we had brought some sherry with us,” said Edith. ”A little white wine whey would have been the very thing for your cold.”
”What's the good of wis.h.i.+ng,” replied her sister rather snappishly, ”you had better call Mrs. Jones and ask her to make me some gruel.” But on Mrs. Jones's appearance, and when the request had been made, both the girls felt rather surprised at her volunteering the very thing they had been wis.h.i.+ng for.
She had, she said, ”some very nice sherry wine, given her by a friend,”
and many years ago, when she was in service in Chester, she had learnt to make white wine whey. Sure enough a tempting-looking basinful shortly after made its appearance.
Thanks to its soporific influence Helen soon fell asleep, but woke (as she had got strangely into the habit of doing) just at midnight, or as Edith had taken to calling it, ”thirteen o'clock”. The clock was half-way through its striking when she woke, and a sudden impulse seized her to jump up, and, opening the door slightly, to peep out and either see who it was that always shut a door after the clock struck, or, by seeing nothing, satisfy herself that the sound had all along been merely the creation of her own and Edith's imagination.
She opened the door very cautiously, and instantly perceived that there was a light at the end of the pa.s.sage in the recess where stood the clock. Helen's heart beat more loudly, and she wished devoutly that she had allowed her curiosity to remain unsatisfied, when to her horror the light moved out of the recess, and she saw that it was held by a tall dark figure with its back turned towards her. The pa.s.sage was so long and the light flickered so much that it was impossible for her to distinguish anything but the general outline of the person who held it.
Not Mrs. Jones or Griffith, a.s.suredly, but poor Helen was too frightened to do more than lock the door with her trembling fingers and leap back into bed, thereby awakening Edith, who on hearing Helen's story calmly a.s.sured her that she had either been dreaming, or had seen the strange gentleman their fellow-lodger whose existence Helen had rashly dared to question. Oddly enough she had forgotten all about him, and felt somewhat relieved by Edith's matter-of-fact solution.
”Only what should he be doing at the clock at this time of night? I hope he is not out of his mind;”--to which Edith replied:--
”I do believe he gets up to make it strike thirteen on purpose to tease us.”
Monday morning wore a more promising aspect than Sunday, for such clouds as there were, bespoke nothing worse than showers, and our young ladies succeeded in obtaining an hour or two's sketching at the lake. Helen, however, felt still considerably the worse of her terrible wetting, and was actually the first to propose that they should return to the farm-house. Somewhat weakened by her cold, and tired too, she mounted the little pony at Edith's suggestion, and they were proceeding cheerily enough on their way--Griffith, loaded with their painting materials, some little distance behind--when a stumble on the pony's part brought him suddenly to the ground. Helen had been paying little attention to her steed, and, unprepared for the shock, fell on her side with some little force. A most undignified procedure had there been any one to witness it, but which would have drawn forth nothing but a laugh had it not been that in the fall her foot caught in the stirrup. Her sharp cry of pain terrified Edith, who, however, soon succeeded in disentangling her, as the poor little pony remained perfectly quiet, but a moment's examination, and a vain attempt to stand, showed them that the ankle was badly sprained. All that could be done was to mount Helen again as well as Edith and Griffith could manage, and to make the best of their way home. Arrived there, hot applications soon reduced the pain, but it was easy to be seen, even by their inexperienced eyes, that Helen must not attempt to move for several days to come.
Here was a charming ending to their expedition! Helen, even, felt woefully disconcerted, and poor Edith fairly began to cry.
”If it were not that you would not like it, I would write to Mrs.
Lindsay to come and nurse you,” said Edith, ”she is so good and kind, and I know she would come in a minute, for she has nothing to prevent her.”
”Mrs. Lindsay! Edith,” exclaimed Helen indignantly, ”the very last person I would apply to, however good and kind she may be. Do you really think that. I would put myself under such an obligation to the sister of the man I have----” ”Quarrelled with for nothing at all,” said the little voice at the bottom of her heart. Edith said nothing, but for the first time in her life took an independent resolution and acted upon it.
Her love for Helen conquered her fear of displeasing her. What this resolution was we shall not disclose, nor shall we tell whose hand addressed a letter to Mrs. Lindsay carried that evening by the post-boy to Llanfar. The strangest coincidence was that _two_ letters bearing the same direction left the Black Nest Farm that evening.
Tired out with the pain of her ankle, Helen, for the first time since their arrival, slept past midnight and only woke to hear the clock strike five. All too soon for her comfort, for her thoughts were none of the brightest, as she lay waiting for the daylight. Her folly, her headstrong determination, right or wrong, to carry out her own way, began to show themselves to her more clearly; or rather, she began to allow herself to see them in their true light. And when at last the morning came, and she was established for the day on the hard little horse-hair sofa in their sitting-room, her spirits were not improved by the perusal of a letter from her Aunt f.a.n.n.y. The good old lady, after deploring their absence and pathetically describing her anxiety on their behalf, made mention of a visit from Mrs. Lindsay, who had come to tell her how unhappy she was about her brother. ”He left home,” wrote Aunt f.a.n.n.y, ”two days after that unfortunate conversation with you without telling his sister what was the matter. At least she only gathered that something unpleasant had happened from his saying that you were leaving home, and that he did not expect to see you before you went. He left no direction beyond telling her to write to his club, which she has done two or three times, but got no answer. She says he looked so unlike himself that she fears he has fallen ill somewhere and cannot write to tell her. Oh, Helen, I do wish you had never thought of this expedition.”
”How very silly Mrs. Lindsay is to be so fanciful,” said Helen, in which view of the case tender-hearted little Edith did not at all agree, though she hardly dared to say so. They spent a dull day, for Edith would not consent to leave her sister, and their paintings were at a standstill for want of another day's sketching from the original.
”To-morrow, Edith,” said Helen, ”you might go to the lake for an hour or so without me and finish your sketch, and I might go on with mine from yours,” to which Edith made no objection.
By night Helen's feverish uneasiness had increased, and Edith secretly congratulated herself on her resolute step of the day before. And a wretched night followed. In reality Helen was very anxious and unhappy about Malcolm Willoughby, and her dreams were full of terrors that something had befallen him. Through all, the disagreeable clock again thrust forward its ugly face, and she woke in an indescribable state of horror, fancying that the clock was standing by her bedside, striking loudly in her ears to a kind of ”refrain” of the words: ”I told you so.
I told you so.” Of course the clock _was_ striking, and had evidently awakened her by so doing.
”Thirteen again,” whispered Edith, ”it is really very disagreeable.”
”It sounds to _me_ like the voice of my conscience,” said Helen, ”warning me that some terrible punishment is coming upon me for my wicked folly. Yes, Edith, I see it all now, and as soon as ever I can move we shall go home, and I shall ask poor Aunt f.a.n.n.y to forgive me. I wish every other consequence of my wrong-doing could be done away with as easily as her displeasure.” And all her pride broken down, poor Helen burst into tears, and Edith's affectionate words of soothing were of no avail to stop her sobs. She felt rather better in the morning however, partly, perhaps, because the day was bright and sunny. About mid-day she fell into a doze on her sofa, and waking after an hour's sleep was surprised to miss Edith. A note in pencil pinned to the table-cover caught her attention. It bore these words: ”You are so nicely asleep I don't like to waken you. I shall come back as early as I can, but don't be alarmed if I am a little later than you expect.”
”She has gone to finish the sketch,” thought Helen uneasily. ”I wish I had not asked her to do so, it looks dull and overcast.”