Haworth's/Chapter LI
CHAPTER LI.
"TH' ON'Y ONE AS IS NA A FOO'!"
The next day all Broxton knew the story.
"Well, he wur na so soft after aw," more than one excellent matron remarked.
Mr. Ffrench heard the news from his valet in the morning. He had been very unwell for several days. He had eaten nothing and slept very little and had been obliged to call in his physician, who pronounced his case the result of too great mental strain, and prescribed rest. He came down to breakfast with an unwholesome face and trifled with his food without eating it. He glanced furtively at Rachel again and again.
"I shall not go to the Bank to-day," he said timorously at last. "I am worse than ever. I shall remain at home and try to write letters and rest. Are—are you going out?"
"Yes," she answered.
"Oh." Then, after a pause, he said, "I saw Briarley yesterday, and he said Mrs. Dixon was very ill. You sometimes go there, I believe?"
"Yes."
"Suppose—suppose you call this morning to inquire. It looks well to show a—a sort of interest in them. You might take something nourishing with you."
He flinched when she raised her eyes and let them rest a moment upon him. Her look was strongly suggestive of the fact that she could better rely upon the result of her own calculations concerning him than upon the truth of his replies, if she deigned to ask him questions.
"I thought," he faltered, "that it would look well to evince some interest, as the man has been in our employ, and you have had the woman about the house."
"Certainly," she replied, "it would be well enough. I will go."
After breakfast she ordered the carriage and went to her room and made her toilette with some care. Why she did so was best known to herself. Nothing is more certain than that she scarcely expected to produce a great effect upon Granny Dixon. The truth was, she would have made her visit to the Briarley's in any case, and was not in the least moved thereto by her father's unexpected anxiety.
But when she reached the cottage and entered it, she began immediately to repent having come. A neighbor woman sat nursing the youngest Briarley; there was a peculiar hush upon the house and the windows were darkened. She drew back with a feeling of alarm and annoyance.
"What is the matter?" she demanded impatiently of the woman. "Why have you darkened the room?"
"Th' owd lass is deein," was the business-like answer, "an' they're ha'in' some trouble wi' her. She conna even dee loike other foak."
She drew back, her annoyance becoming violent repulsion. She turned pale, and her heart began to beat violently. She knew nothing of death, and was not fearless of it. Her inveterate calm failed her in thus being brought near it.
"I will go away," she said.
And she would have gone, but at that moment there arose a sound of voices in the inner room—Mrs. Briarley's and Janey's, and above theirs Granny Dixon's, brokenly, and yet with what seemed terrible loudness in the hush of the house.
"Bring her i' here!" she was saying. "Bring her i' here an' mak' her—do it!"
And then out came Mrs. Briarley, looking fagged and harassed.
"I ax thy pardon, Miss," she said, "but she says she wants thee. She says she wants thee to be a witness to summat."
"I will not go," she replied. "I—I am going away. I—never saw any one before—in that condition."
But the terrible voice raised itself again, and, despite her terror and anger, held and controlled her.
"I see her!" it cried. "Mak' her coom in. I knowed her gran'feyther—when I wur a lass—seventy year ago!"
"She will na harm thee," said Mrs. Briarley. And partly because of a dread fascination, and partly because the two women regarded her with such amazement, she found herself forced to give way and enter.
It was a small room, and dark and low. The bed was a huge four-poster which had belonged to Granny Dixon herself in her young days. The large-flowered patterns of its chintz hangings were faded with many washings.
Of the woman lying upon it there was little left but skin and bone. She seemed all eyes and voice—eyes which stared and shone in the gloom, and voice which broke upon the silence with an awesome power.
"She's been speaking awmost i' a whisper till to-day," explained Mrs. Briarley, under her breath, "an' aw at onct th' change set in, an' it coom back as loud as ivver."
She lifted her hands, beckoning with crooked fingers.
"Coom tha here," she commanded.
Rachel Ffrench went to her slowly. She had no color left, and all her hauteur could not steady her voice.
"What do you want?" she asked, standing close beside the bed.
For a few seconds there was silence, in which the large eyes wandered from the border of her rich dress to the crown of her hair. Then Granny Dixon spoke out:
"Wheer'st flower " she cried. "Tha'st getten it on thee again. I con smell it."
It was true that she wore it at her throat as she had done before. A panic of disgust took possession of her as she recollected it. It was as if they two were somehow bound together by it. She caught at it with tremulous fingers, and would have flung it away, but it fell from her uncertain clasp upon the bed, and she would not have touched it for worlds.
"Gi' it to me!" commanded Granny Dixon.
"Pick it up for her," she said, turning to Mrs. Briarley, and it was done, and the shrivelled fingers held it and the old eye devoured it.
"He used to wear 'em i' his button-hole," proclaimed the Voice, "an' he wur a han'some chap—seventy year ago."
"Did you send for me to tell me that " demanded Rachel Ffrench.
Granny Dixon turned on her pile of pillows.
"Nay," she said, "an' I'm—forgettin'."
There was a gasp between the two last words, as if suddenly her strength was failing her.
"Get thee a pen—an'—an' write summat," she ordered.
"Get it quickly," said Rachel Ffrench, "and let me humor her and go."
She noticed the little gap between the words herself, and the next instant saw a faint gray pallor spread itself over the old woman's face.
"Get the pen and paper," she repeated, "and call in the woman."
They brought her the pen and paper and called the woman, who came in stolidly, ready for any emergency. Then they waited for commands, but for several seconds there was a dead pause, and Granny Dixon lay back, staring straight before her.
"Quick!" said Rachel Ffrench. "What do you want?"
Granny Dixon rose by a great effort upright from her pillows. She pointed to Mrs. Briarley with the sharp, bony fore-finger.
"I—leave it—aw—to her," she proclaimed,—"ivvery penny! She's th' ony one among 'em as is na a foo'!"
And then she fell back, and panted and stared again.
Mrs. Briarley lifted her apron and burst into tears.
"She means th' brass," she wailed. "Eh! Poor owd lass, who'd ha' thowt it!"
"Do you mean," asked Rachel Ffrench, "that you wish her to have your money?"
A nod was the answer, and Mrs. Briarley shed sympathetic tears again. Here was a reward for her labors indeed.
What she wrote Miss Ffrench scarcely knew. In the end there was her own name signed below, and a black, scrawling mark from Granny Dixon's hand. The woman who had come in made her mark also.
"Mak' a black un," said the testatrix. "Let's ha' it plain."
Then, turning to Rachel:
"Does ta want to know wheer th' money come fro'? Fro' Will Ffrench—fro' him. He wur one o' th' gentry when aw wur said an' done—an' I wur a han'some lass."
When it was done they all stood and looked at each other. Granny Dixon lay back upon her pillows, drawing sharp breaths. She was looking only at Rachel Ffrench. She seemed to have forgotten all the rest of them, and what she had been doing. All that was left of the Voice was a loud, halting whisper.
"Wheer's th' flower? " she said. "I conna smell it."
It was in her hand.
Rachel Ffrench drew back.
"Let me go," she said to Mrs. Briarley. "I cannot stay here."
"He used to wear 'em i' his button-hole," she heard, "—seventy year ago—an' she's th' very moral on him." And scarcely knowing how, she made her way past the women, and out of the house and into the fresh air and sunshine.
"Drive home," she said to the coachman, "as quickly as possible."
She leaned back in a corner of the carriage shuddering. Suddenly she burst into wild tears.
But there were no traces of her excitement when she reached home. She descended from the carriage looking quite herself, and after dismissing it went up to her own room.
About half an hour later she came down and went into the library. Her father was not there, and on inquiring as to his whereabouts from a servant passing the open door, she was told that he had gone out.
He had been writing letters, it was evident. His chair stood before his desk, and there was an addressed envelope lying upon it.
She went to the desk and glanced at it without any special motive for doing so. It was addressed to herself. She opened and read it.
"My dear Rachel," it ran. "In all probability we shall not meet again for some time. I find myself utterly unable to remain to meet the blow which must inevitably fall before many days are over. The anxiety of the past year has made me a coward. I ask your forgiveness for what you may call my desertion of you. We have never relied upon each other much, and you at least are not included in my ruin. You will not be called upon to share my poverty. You had better return to Paris at once. With a faint hope that you will at least pity me,
I remain,
Your affectionate father,
Gerard Ffrench."