Buch lesen: «Thereby Hangs a Tale. Volume One», Seite 13

“And now we’re all happy!”

In fact there were smiles upon every face but Sir Hampton’s, and he, feebly saying he did not like it, was left alone as the party adjourned to the drawing-room.

“Lady Rea, I have you to thank for this,” said Trevor, affectionately. “How am I ever to show it?”

“By being very, very, very kind to my darling there,” said Lady Rea, pitifully; “for you’re a bad, cruel man to come and win away her love.”

Then, of course, there was a great deal more kissing, ending in a burst of merriment; for Fin dashed, wet-eyed, to the piano, and rattled off, “Haste to the Wedding,” running into Mendelssohn’s “Wedding March,” till Tiny went and closed the instrument.

At that moment Edward, the footman, knocked at the door, and entered, saying to Lady Rea —

“If you please, m’lady, Miss Matilda’s took bad, and wants the doctor. Who shall I send?”

“Gracious, Edward! what is it?” said Lady Rea.

“Please, m’lady, they think it’s spasms,” said the footman.

Lady Rea ran out, and the doctor was sent for from St Kitt’s; but, by the time he arrived, Aunt Matty’s spasms were better.

And so Richard Trevor, master of Penreife, became engaged to Valentina Rea, of Tolcarne.

Very Dreamy

Trevor heard it afterwards from Fin, how that mamma saw Captain Vanleigh when he called with Sir Felix; Sir Hampton leaving a note, and – so Fin declared – hiding in the gardener’s toolhouse till the visit was over; and that she had, at the earnest wish of Sir Felix, seen him in the drawing-room.

“Where he made the most downright booby of himself you ever saw,” said Fin.

And the result was that one morning, after the most elaborate fencing had been going on between Trevor and his guests, one vieing with the other in politeness, Pratt met his old schoolfellow on his return from Tolcarne with —

“Thank goodness, Dick, there’s peace in the grove.”

“What do you mean, Franky?” said Trevor, who was rather uneasy at having heard from Lady Rea that Sir Felix and Vanleigh had been up to the house while he was away with the girls, and had a long interview with Sir Hampton and Aunt Matty.

“Mean, Dick? Why, that the telegram has come at last – message from St Kitt’s – Vanleigh and Flick wanted directly in town – so sorry couldn’t stop to say good-bye, and that sort of thing.”

“Then they are gone?”

“Yes. I ordered round the waggonette; and Mrs Lloyd seems in ecstasies at the clear-out, and is getting ready to bestow a benediction on me – for I must be off next.”

“Nonsense, Franky; you are happy enough here.”

“No, old fellow – this Sybarite’s life is spoiling me, and I must go.”

“Why not follow my example, Franky?” said Trevor, laughing.

Pratt shrugged his shoulders, and the matter dropped for the time being.

The next evening the Reas dined at Penreife in great state and dignity – all but Aunt Matty, who steadily refused pardon, and turned her back upon Trevor; while Sir Hampton preserved a dignified composure upon the matter, as if submitting of necessity; for —

“Mark my words, Hampton,” his sister had said, “this ridiculous marriage will never take place. I should as soon expect Finetta to be espoused by that wretched little companion of the seafaring man.”

Sir Hampton grunted, and went to the dinner, which he thoroughly enjoyed, and softened a good deal over his wine; after which, the evening being delicious, he allowed himself to be inveigled into the grounds, where Trevor asked his advice respecting some new forcing-houses which he proposed having, listening to him with deference; and at last, when they strolled in through the open drawing-room window, Sir Hampton said aloud —

“Er-rum – yes, Trevor, I’ll come over with Sanders – say Wednesday – and he shall mark out the lines on the same plan as mine. I think I can put you in the way of many improvements.”

Directly after, he was settled in an easy-chair, with his handkerchief spread upon his knees, thinking – with his eyes closed; and while he thought, everybody spoke in a whisper, for it was a custom with Sir Hampton Rea to think for half an hour after dinner – with his eyes closed: he never took a nap.

Lady Rea, looking rosy, round, and warm, was presiding at the tea-table; and Tiny, blushing and happy, was rearranging some flowers, Frank Pratt helping her in a loving, deferential manner, very different from his general easy-going way; while Fin had caught Trevor by the arm, led him into the far window, and forced him back into a chair, before which she stood, holding up a menacing finger.

“I’m ashamed of you, Dick – I am indeed,” she said, sharply.

“Ashamed!” he exclaimed. “Why?”

“Such cunning, such artfulness! I didn’t give you credit for it.”

“What do you mean?”

“Coaxing pa round like that, when you no more want hothouses than I do. There, go away, sir; I’m disgusted. Look! ma’s beckoning to you.”

In effect, Lady Rea was cautiously making signals from the tea-tray; and on Trevor going to her, Pratt slowly crossed to the window, and began to talk to Fin.

“Do you know, Miss Rea, I find I’ve been here six weeks,” he said awkwardly.

“You don’t say so, Mr Pratt,” said Fin, quietly.

Pratt stared, and went on.

“The time has gone like magic.”

“Has it really?” said Fin, demurely.

“Yes,” said Pratt a little bitterly; “and as I have decided upon returning to town in a day or two, I thought I’d take this opportunity of saying good-bye.”

“I think its the very best thing you can do, Mr Pratt,” said Fin, sharply.

“What, say good-bye?”

“No, go back to town. You will be industrious there. See what’s come to your poor friend by mooning about in the country.”

She nodded her saucy head in the direction of Trevor, who was bending over Tiny – she looking shyly conscious and happy – while Lady Rea beamed upon them both; and Sir Hampton thought so deeply with his eyes closed, that he emitted something much like a stertorous snore.

“Yes, dear old Dick’s very happy,” said Pratt, gravely. “Rich, loved, and with the fixture all sunshine. She’s a sweet girl.”

“Yes, a rose – with a thorn of a sister, ready to pester her husband,” said Fin. “Yes, Mr Pratt, you had better go. It is not good for young men to be idle.”

“So I have been thinking,” said Pratt – “especially poor fellows like myself.”

“How is our little friend?” said Fin, maliciously.

“What little friend?”

“The little, round-cheeked niece of Mrs Lloyd – Polly, isn’t her name?”

“Really, I don’t know, Miss Rea,” said Pratt, smiling.

“Fie, Mr Pratt!” said Fin. “Why, you are always being seen with her in the lane. Is it true you are to be engaged?”

Pratt looked at her sharply.

“Does it give you so much pleasure to tease?” he said, quietly.

“Tease? I thought it was a settled thing.”

“I don’t think you did,” said Pratt, quietly.

“Well,” said Fin, laughing, “Mr Mervyn told me the other day that – oh, look at that now!”

The last words were said by Fin to herself; for as she mentioned Mr Mervyn’s name Pratt turned slowly away, and going to a table began to turn over the leaves of a book.

In the meantime Lady Rea had had a few words with Trevor.

“I declare I felt quite frightened of her, my dear.”

“It’s her way only,” said Trevor, smiling. “She nursed me like a mother, Lady Rea; and she and her husband have for years done almost as they liked here, only checked by the agent and my poor father’s executors, who seem to have come down once a year to look at the place so long as they lived; but they have both gone now.”

“She looked dreadfully cross, though, at Tiny – just as if, my dear, she was horribly jealous of her. And now, Richard, my dear, you won’t be offended if I ask a favour of you?”

“Certainly not,” said Trevor, in the same low whisper in which the conversation was carried on.

“Then make her send that niece of hers away. After what you told me, I’m sure it would be for the best; because while she is here the poor woman will always be thinking of her disappointed plans.”

“Well, but,” said Trevor, smiling, “I was thinking of hurrying on her marriage with my keeper, Humphrey; the poor fellow is desperately fond of her, and, as far as I can make out, the feeling is mutual.”

“Oh, if that’s it,” said Lady Rea, “pray don’t do anything to make the young people unhappy.”

“Yes, Trevor,” said Sir Hampton, “fifty feet by twenty will be the size.”

The conversation was carried on henceforth in voices pitched now in the normal key.

The distance was so short that it was decided to walk back through the moonlit lane, and as Trevor and Pratt accompanied the party, it was a matter of course that Fin should walk papa off first, Lady Rea following with Pratt, and Tiny lingering behind in the silvered arcades – dreamy, loving, too happy to speak, and feeling that if life would but always be the same, how could they ever tire?

Here, in the rugged lane, all was black darkness, and the gnarled tree trunks seemed to spring from sable velvet. A few yards farther, a sheaf of silver arrows seemed shot down through the foliage upon the laced ferns that rose like a tiny forest of palms; down by their side there was the rippling tinkle of water, gurgling amongst stones; and again a few steps, and a pool shone like molten silver. Above all, the air was soft, humid, and balmy; and love seemed breathed in the gentle wind that barely stirred the leaves. They had no need to talk, for it was very sweet; and they could foresee no black clouds to come sweeping across their horizon.

Tolcarne gates at last, new and crest-crowned – good-bye – and then out cigars, and a matter-of-fact walk back, the young men both too dreamy to speak. And after a brief “Good night, Dick, old fellow” – “Good night, Franky, old boy,” each sought his room – Trevor thinking the while of Lady Rea’s words, and how that he had hardly seen Polly lately, while he had been too happy in his love to so much as think of Mrs Lloyd and her baffled plans. For her part, she seemed to have avoided him ever since she had heard of the engagement that he had made.

“Ah, well,” he said, smiling, as he gazed from the open window at the moonlit shimmering sea, “all these things come right in the end. What need have I to trouble, with life so pleasurably spread out before me? Heigho! I don’t deserve such good luck; but I think I can bear it like a good man and true. I wonder, though, whether Frank really cares for little Fin!”

Ten minutes after, Trevor was dreaming happily of his love, without a sign of cloud or storm in his sunlit fancies; but they were gathering fast the while.

A Little Confession

But Mrs Lloyd, though quiet for a time, and letting matters rest till the termination of Vanleigh and Sir Felix Landells’s visit, was anything but dormant.

The fact was, that Vanleigh had been in the way upon more than one occasion. When Polly had been sent for a walk in the hope of enchanting the “young master,” Vanleigh had met her, and been so attentive that the girl had come back at last, sobbing and almost defiant, telling her aunt that sooner than be so treated she would run away back to the mountains in Wales.

This put a stop to it for the time, and Aunt Lloyd waited, hearing rumours that the two London visitors were engaged to the young ladies of Tolcarne, and rubbing her hands thereon, for these were threatened rivals out of the way.

Her encounters with Trevor had been few and far between; but all seemed satisfactory, and, to use her own words, she “bided her time.”

When the news came to her ears, endorsed by the sudden departure of the visitors, and further confirmed by the many visits to Tolcarne, and lastly by the coming of the Reas to Penreife, that Trevor was engaged to Valentina Rea, the woman was furious.

“It shan’t go on, Lloyd – I won’t have it. I’ll put a stop to it. He shall marry Polly, or – ”

“Martha, Martha!” cried her husband, wringing his hands – “you will ruin us.”

“Ruin! I’ll ruin him – an upstart! I’ll have him on his knees to me. After the way in which I brought him up, to turn upon me like this. He shall marry Polly!”

“How can you be so mad?” groaned Lloyd. “Oh, Martha, think of our old age.”

“Think!” said Mrs Lloyd, contemptuously, “I do think. Mad? Isn’t a girl with the blood of the Lloyds in her veins better than the daughter of an upstart London merchant? There – hold your tongue; and don’t you interfere. I’m not going to be stopped in my plans, so I tell you. Lloyd, are you asleep?”

“No,” said her husband, with a heavy sigh, “I wish I was, so as to forget my troubles.”

“You dolt!” exclaimed Mrs Lloyd. “Have you seen Humphrey hanging about lately?”

There was no answer.

“I say, have you seen Humphrey hanging about or talking to Polly lately? I don’t want to think the girl artful; but she has been very quiet, and I hardly like it. Lloyd, do you hear what I say?”

There was a long-drawn breath for reply, and Mrs Lloyd went on making her plans – giving her husband the credit of being asleep.

But the latter was very wide awake, and he had seen something that night of which he did not wish to tell. For while Mrs Lloyd had been busy with the company that evening, there had come a soft tap on the housekeeper’s room window, whose effect was to make little Polly turn violently red in the face, begin to tremble, then, after listening at the door, steal out, little thinking that the butler had seen her go.

Of course it was very artful and very wrong, but it is an acknowledged fact that there is a certain magnetism in love; and, to go back to the simile before used, when the loadstone came what could the industrious little needle do?

The next morning, after breakfast, Mrs Lloyd called Polly to her.

“Found out at last,” thought poor Polly.

She went shivering up to her very stern-countenanced aunt, with the recollection of twenty sweet but stolen meetings on her conscience.

“Go and put on your white muslin dress and blue ribbons, Polly,” said her aunt.

“Are we going out, aunt?” faltered the girl.

“You are, my dear,” said Mrs Lloyd; “so put on your hat – the new one, mind.”

“Please, aunt, I’d rather not go,” faltered the girl.

“Go and dress yourself this minute,” exclaimed the housekeeper, firmly: “and look here, if you dare to cry, and make those eyes red, I’ll punish you.”

Polly shivered, went to her room, and came back, looking as pretty a little rustic rosebud as could be seen for miles around.

“Ah,” said Mrs Lloyd, hanging about her with a grim smile on her face, to give a pull at a plait here, a brush at a fold there, and ending by smoothing the girl’s soft hair – “if he can resist that, he’s no man.”

“Please, aunt, what do you mean?” pleaded the girl. “Don’t send me out again.”

“There are no captains about now, goose, are there?” said the housekeeper, angrily.

“No, aunt, dear,” faltered the girl; “but don’t send me out. What do you mean?”

“What do I mean?” exclaimed Mrs Lloyd; “as if you didn’t know what I mean. To raise the house of Lloyd, child – to make you mistress of Penreife – ”

“Oh, aunt!”

“Instead of letting you throw yourself away upon a common servant.”

“Aunt – aunt, dear!” cried the girl, piteously.

But the woman stopped her.

“Not another word. Now, look here – do I speak plain?”

“Yes, aunt.”

“Hush! – no crying. You are to be Mrs Richard Trevor, with a handsome husband, and plenty of money. If you don’t know what’s good for you, I do. Now go out for a walk; and when he meets you, if you don’t smile on him, and lead him on, I’ll – I’ll – There, I believe I shall poison you!”

The girl turned, shivering, from the fierce-looking face, as if believing the threat, and hurried out of the house.

“If Humphrey don’t take me away I shall go and drown myself,” she cried, with a sob. “Oh, it’s dreadful! He will hate me for this, and if Mr Richard sees me, what will he think!”

Poor Polly’s life had been a very hard one. So accustomed was she to blindly obey, that it never occurred to her that she might take any other route than the one so often indicated by her aunt; and she went as usual – ready to cry, but not daring, and thinking bitterly of her position.

“If I had only been a man,” she thought, “I’d run away to sea, and – here he is.”

“Ah, little maiden,” exclaimed Trevor – for Mrs Lloyd had timed the matter well – “why, how bright and pretty you look!”

“Please, sir, I’m very sorry,” faltered the girl.

“Sorry! Why? Have you come out here,” he continued, suspiciously, “to meet Humphrey?”

“Please, sir – no, sir,” said the girl, looking appealingly in his frank face.

“Having a walk then, eh?”

“Please, sir, aunt sent me,” said the girl.

“Polly, my little maid, I believe you are a good girl,” said Trevor, his face growing dark – “there, don’t cry, I’m not angry with you. Speak out, and trust me. You are not afraid of me?”

“Oh no, sir. Humphrey says you’re so good and kind,” said the girl.

“Thanks to Humphrey for his good opinion,” said Trevor. “But, now, tell me plainly, what does all this mean?”

“Please, sir, I dursen’t,” sobbed the girl.

“Nonsense, child! Tell me directly.”

“Aunt would kill me,” sobbed Polly.

“Stuff, child! Now, be a good, sensible little girl, and fancy I’m Humphrey.”

“Oh, sir – please, sir, I couldn’t do that.”

“Come, come, speak out. Now, do you come of your own accord for these walks?”

“No, sir. I – I – Aunt makes me.”

“I thought so – I supposed so,” said Trevor. “And why do you come?”

“Oh, sir, don’t ask me, please – don’t ask me,” sobbed Polly, now crying out-right.

“Now, look here, my little girl; if you’ll speak plainly perhaps I can help you. Once more, why do you come here? There, there, don’t cry.”

“Oh, please, sir, it’s – it’s aunt’s doing.”

“Well, well, child, speak,” said Trevor, and he took the girl’s hand. “It makes me cross when you will keep on crying.”

“Pray, sir, don’t – pray, don’t,” she sobbed, trying to withdraw her hand. “Oh! what shall I do?”

“Speak put,” said Trevor.

“Aunt – aunt thinks, sir – wants, sir – you to marry me, sir; and oh!” she cried, throwing herself on her knees, and holding up her little hands as in prayer, “I do hate you so – I do, indeed!”

“Thank you, little one,” exclaimed Trevor, laughing merrily. “There, Polly, get up before you stain that pretty dress with the moss. Wipe your little eyes, and leave off hating me as soon as you can, and you shall marry Humphrey.”

“Oh, sir!” faltered Polly, rising.

“There, little one, go and walk about till your eyes are not red; and if you should see Humphrey down by the long copse, where they are repairing the ditches, tell him I shall want to see him about three – no, stop, say this evening. I am going for a drive.”

Polly hesitated a moment, and then caught and kissed his hand, shrinking back the next moment, ashamed at her boldness.

“There, I thought you would not hate me,” said Trevor. “I’ll go back at once and see your aunt. You shan’t be unhappy any more, little maiden.”

“Oh, pray, sir!” cried Polly again.

“I’m master here, my child; and I won’t have anybody about me made unhappy if I can stay it. Now, trot along.”

The girl gave him one timid glance, and then went on, while he turned in the direction of Penreife.

Before he had gone far, though, he turned back, with a smile on his lip.

“I’ll wager a sovereign,” he thought, “that Humphrey was not down at the long copse, but pretty close at hand, watching for the safety of his sweetheart.”

He walked sharply back to a curve in the woodland path, and found that he was right; for some distance ahead he caught sight of Polly’s pretty muslin dress, and across it there was plainly visible a bar of what resembled olive velveteen.

“Eight,” said Trevor, smiling. “Well, why shouldn’t they be happy too? Now, then, to have it out with Mrs Lloyd.”

A Revelation

“If you please,” said a hard, cold voice.

And Richard Trevor started to find himself face to face with the object of his remark, one which he had uttered aloud.

Trevor stood for a moment looking round; but they were quite alone, and standing now in the lane where Mr Mervyn captured Fin Rea in the rugged tree far up the rocky bank.

“You had better return to the house, Mrs Lloyd,” said Trevor, coldly. “I want to speak to you.”

“You can speak now, if you please,” said the woman, in a low, suppressed voice. “I don’t suppose you would like the servants to know.”

Trevor was getting angry, and he took a step towards the woman, and held up a finger.

“You have been watching me, Mrs Lloyd.”

“Yes,” she said, coolly – “I came on purpose.”

“You sent that poor girl here, then, Mrs Lloyd, and you have been playing the spy?”

“You can call it any hard names you like, Mr Richard,” said the woman, defiantly.

She rolled her white apron round her arms, tightened her lips until they formed a thin livid line, and looked at him without flinching.

Trevor bit his lip to keep down his rising passion, and then went on —

“Mrs Lloyd,” he said, “I thought we had made a truce. Mind, you are the one who breaks it, not I.”

The woman laughed mockingly.

“We may as well understand one another,” said Trevor; “so speak out. You have been forcing that poor girl, day after day, to throw herself in my way – have you not?”

“Yes.”

She nodded her head many times, as she said the word with quite a sharp hiss.

“You wanted me to take a fancy to her?”

“Yes.”

“To marry her?”

“Yes.”

“And make her the mistress of Penreife?”

“Yes; and I mean to do it.”

Trevor stared at her, in wonder at the effrontery displayed.

“And, in your foolish vanity, you thought such a thing possible?”

“Yes.”

“Regardless of the poor girl’s feelings?”

“Yes – yes – yes!” said Mrs Lloyd, slowly. “I know what is for her good – and yours.”

“Mrs Lloyd,” said Trevor, coldly, “I would gladly keep to my promise with you, that you should never leave Penreife. If harm to your prospects comes of this, don’t blame me. You had better go back to the house.”

He turned, as if to walk away; but she caught him sharply by the wrist.

“Stop!” she cried, angrily. “Tell me this. Have you been trying to make an engagement with that wax doll up at Tolcarne?”

“You insolent old – There, go back, Mrs Lloyd,” he cried, checking himself. “You must be mad.”

“Mad? Yes, enough to make me, you wild, ungrateful boy,” she cried, her fingers tightening round his wrist, so that it would have taken a violent effort to free himself. “Stop, and listen to me.”

Trevor looked at her, his anger cooling; for he thought the housekeeper was suffering from mental excitement brought on by the disappointment consequent upon the failure of her plans.

“What do you want to say?” he said, quietly.

“A great deal. Ah, you see, you must listen. Now tell me – that Miss Rea, have you been talking to her father and mother?”

“Yes,” said Trevor, thinking it better to humour her till he could get her back to the house.

“Then go and break it all off – at once. Do you hear – at once.”

“And why, pray?” said Trevor, smiling – the position, now that his anger had passed, seeming ridiculous.

“Because you are to marry little Mary, as I wish,” said Mrs Lloyd, in a quick whisper.

“The parties, neither of them being agreed. Come, Mrs Lloyd, let’s get back to the house.”

“Richard,” cried the woman, shaking his arm – “listen. Do you hear me? How dare you laugh at me like this?”

“Come, Mrs Lloyd – come, nurse, what are you thinking about?” said Trevor, good-humouredly. But he was beginning to fret under the opposition.

“Of your fixture – of your good, boy. Now, listen to me, Richard. I have long planned this out. I have brought Mary here, educated her, and prepared her for it.”

“And now she has fallen in love with Humphrey, and they are going to marry,” said Trevor, laughing.

But the smile passed away as he saw the malignant look in the woman’s face.

“Humphrey!” she exclaimed, and as she uttered the name she spat upon the ground – “Humphrey shall go. Humphrey shall not stay here. I hate him! His being here is a curse to me.”

“Her own son. The woman is crazy,” thought Trevor; and he looked anxiously in her eyes.

“Mrs Lloyd,” he began; but she caught him by the other wrist, and her strength in her excitement was prodigious.

“Richard,” she exclaimed, “will you mind me – will you do as I wish, and marry Polly?”

“Come to the house, and let’s talk about it there, nurse,” he said, kindly.

“No – no! here – here! I say you shall have her, or, mark me, you shall rue it. There, I know what you think; but I’m as sane as you are – more sane, for you would throw yourself away, and I won’t let you.”

“Come, Mrs Lloyd, there must be an end to this. Come to the house.”

“Stay where you are, boy,” she cried, with her eyes flashing. “Will you obey me?”

“No – no – no,” said Trevor, impatiently, and he tried to extricate himself. “Nurse, you are mad.”

“Don’t call me nurse,” she cried, viciously. “Do as I bid you, or I’ll make you rue it till your deathbed. But, no, I can’t do that. Richard, you shall mind me – you shall obey me in this. I have a right to be minded.”

“Mrs Lloyd, you have gone to the extent of your right, and beyond it; from henceforth you and your husband must find another home. You shall have a comfortable income, but this cannot go on. There, I cannot leave you in this way – come up to the house.”

He tried to lead her, but she broke away.

“You will have it then?” she hissed, in a hoarse whisper. “Richard, is this the way you treat your mother?”

“My – ”

Trevor started back to the extent of their arms, looking at the woman aghast. The fancy that she was distraught had passed away during the last few minutes, and there was such an air of decision and truth in her words and looks that he staggered beneath the shock. The past, her determined action, her opposition to his will – so different to the behaviour of a dependent, and explained at the time on the score of old service – and many little words and looks, notably her passionate embrace on the night of the encounter in the study, all came back to him like a flash, and he could find no words for quite a minute.

“It’s a lie!” he said at last. “Woman, how dare you? My father was too honourable a gentleman ever to descend to a low intrigue with one of his servants.”

“Yes,” said the woman, “and Martha Jane Lloyd was too good a wife to have listened to him if he had.”

“Then,” cried Trevor, in a fury, “how dare you say what you did?”

“Because, my boy, it is the truth. You are my flesh and blood.”

“You are mad!” exclaimed Trevor. “Loose my wrist, woman, or I shall hurt you.”

He looked sharply round, but there was no help at hand; for his first impulse was to tie her wrists, and have her carried to the house. But she prisoned one of his the tighter, by placing her other bony hand a little higher.

“I’m not mad, Richard,” she said, quietly; “and when you hear me, you will see that you must mind me; for, at a word from me, all your riches would be swept away, and you might change places with your keeper.”

“Humphrey!” ejaculated Richard, his brain in a whirl of doubt. “Tell me – what do you mean?”

“Only this,” said the woman, hoarsely. “That Mrs Trevor and I had sons almost together. Humphrey and you were the two boys. Do you understand?”

“No,” said Richard, fiercely. “Go on.”

“I got my sister, Dinah Price, from Caerwmlych to come and be nurse for both, for I was in the house – the maid Jane, as they called me then. Do you want to hear more?”

“Go on,” said Richard, in a hoarse whisper.

“One day I sat thinking. There was death in the house, Richard, and I was wondering about the fixture – how hard it would be if my fine boy should grow up to poverty through the changes that might take place, and me perhaps sent away by a new mistress. I was jealous, too, of the Trevors’ boy, petted and pampered and waited upon, while my darling had to take his chance. I tell you it made me nearly mad sometimes, for I was ill and weak; and I think the devil came and tempted me, knowing how I was.”

“Go on,” said Richard; for she stopped, and the great drops of sweat were standing on his brow.

“One day, boy, I felt that I could bear it no longer. Dinah had gone down to the kitchen to join the servants watching the funeral; and I sat thinking, when the Trevors’ baby cried, and no one went. I had you on my knee, Richard, nursing you, and I went up, innocently enough, to quiet the motherless little bairn, and as I saw it lying alone there in its cradle, my heart yearned over the poor little thing, and I took it in my arms, when it nestled to my breast so pitifully, that I nursed it as I did you, and sat there with you both in my arms.”

Her voice was very husky now; but her words came firmly, and bore the impress of truth.

“It was then, Richard, that the temptation came; for all at once, as I looked down upon you both, the thought came, and I shivered. Then all opened out before me – a bright life, wealth, position, a great future for the helpless babe I held; and I said why should it not be for my boy. I shrank from it for a moment, not more. Then it seemed so easy, so sure, that I did not hesitate. In two minutes you had on the little master’s night-gown, and he wore yours; and I laid you, Dick – my boy – my flesh and blood, in the cradle, and stole downstairs with theirs.”

There was a faint rustle amongst the leaves overhead; but no one heeded, and the woman went on.

“As soon as I got down, shivering with fear, a sort of hysterical fit came over me, and I got worse; I grew so feverish that I had to lie down, and I was ill for weeks; but that passed off, and the struggle began. Ah, Richard, boy, your poor mother bore it all for you – that you might be rich and happy, while she suffered the tortures of hell; her heart yearning to take you to her heart, hearing you cry as she lay awake at nights with a stranger nursed at her breast. But that passed off when you both grew bigger; and you know how I treated you after, as I saw you grow up. People said I was hard to Humphrey. Perhaps I was, but I was never hard to you; and many a night I’ve cried myself to sleep with joy, when I have found you loving and affectionate, soothing me for the jealous tortures I suffered because I could not call you mine. But I said ‘no, there is no going back; you have made him, let it be.’”

“And Lloyd?” said Richard, hoarsely – “did he know of this?”