The Semi-attached Couple/Chapter 41
CHAPTER XLI
Lord Eskdale thought perhaps less of Lord Teviot's illness, and more of the threatened attack on his name and property, than Lady Eskdale did. He settled, as most men do, that a bad illness is only a decided step to a speedy recovery; and that whoever is very ill one day is sure to be much better the next. But a lawsuit he viewed in its truest and blackest colours; and where so much was at stake, he was eager to take some measures of defence, even before Lord Teviot's return. But the affair was still a mystery: and he could do nothing but wish and wonder. One measure for Helen's comfort he insisted upon, notwithstanding Lady Eskdale's assurances that Helen did not wish for it. He sent Lord Beaufort to join his sister a few hours after her departure; and even Helen felt it to be a relief when she saw her brother's carriage dash up to the door of the noisy, crowded hotel, where she and Mary had, after much difficulty, found rooms. There is something pleasant and cheerful in a large country inn, with a choice of clean, airy rooms, a warm welcome from a fat landlady, and the undivided attentions of the waiter. But at an hotel at a busy seaport town, where large parties land, eager to make a quick transit to London, where whole families arrive, equally eager to obtain accommodation till they enter the floating prisons which are already producing nausea by the view, from the windows, of their constant undulations; where the hall and landing-places are filled with packing-cases, and the entrance is blocked up by trucks; where all the bells are constantly ringing, and it seems to be nobody's business to answer them: all this is very dispiriting. Helen sank down in despair on the horse-hair sofa, which seemed to be constantly slipping from under her, while Mary attempted short voyages of discovery on the stairs, which were cut short by fresh shoals of arrivals and departures; the footman made a failure of his inquiries about packets; and Tomkinson utterly repudiated the bedrooms which were vouchsafed to her as a favour, and declined as an insult. This is one of the situations in which women acquire a wholesome sense of their helplessness, and a conviction that dependence on firmer minds and stronger frames than their own is their natural position in a world of petty difficulties, and Helen hailed her brother's arrival with pleasure.
Lord Beaufort set to work with authority, awed a dingy-looking waiter into attention; majestically intimated that Lady Teviot's room was not fitted for her, and obtained one less noisy and better furnished; and finally went himself to the packet-office, sent in his card, and obtained without difficulty the information he wanted.
"Helen, dearest!" he said on his return, "there is a steamer to start from hence to-morrow; but it seemed so certain by Le Geyt's letter that Teviot would leave Lisbon by the first conveyance, that in my opinion you had better stay here another day or two. Indeed, I am sure of it. You must be tired, and so must Miss Forrester. I advise you to follow her example, and go to bed."
"I am tired; but Mary is not gone to bed; you know her aunt lives about two miles off: and finding you were here to take care of me, she sent for a fly, and went to Mrs. Forrester's. She will come back early to-morrow," she added, seeing a look of surprise and disappointment on her brother's face.
"Yes, she must come back," he said moodily; and he rose and leant against the chimney-piece with an air of painful abstraction.
"Dear Beaufort," said Helen, half smiling, "you do not imagine that Mary is thinking of your old quarrels, and has gone home to avoid you? I assure you that is not the case."
"Is not it?" he said, trying to return her smile; but he relapsed into his absent fit, and then, suddenly kissing his sister, said, "Good-night; you look very tired, and so am I. I hope Miss Forrester will come to breakfast."
"I suppose so," said Helen sleepily. "Good-night, dear. You are going to bed too?"
"Of course"; but when she had left the room, he drew the arm-chair to the fire, and, resting his feet on the fender, sank into deep and melancholy thought. He had met one or two people whom he knew slightly, who had either arrived by the last steamer themselves, or had seen friends who had. They all spoke of Lord Teviot's as a hopeless case. The agent at the office had mentioned that a packet might come in on the following day; it was waiting at Lisbon for a young lord who was very ill; but it was generally understood that he would not live to go on board. Lord Beaufort shuddered as he thought what the next morning might bring to Helen; he felt unequal to cope with her probable grief by himself; and ended by writing a note to Miss Forrester, telling her what he had heard, and imploring her to return as early as possible. He left this note with his servant, to be sent the first thing in the morning, and went to bed anxious, unhappy, and almost desponding.
The next morning Helen came down, looking more cheerful, though she suggested to her brother that she did not think the hotel would do for an invalid; that she had had a very noisy family lodged in the next room to hers; "and Teviot will perhaps be so weak that we may have to stay at Southampton for two or three days." She looked anxiously at her brother, who had hardly spoken all the time breakfast lasted, and intercepted a look of his at Mary that made her heart beat. She dared not ask the question that was on her lips.
"Very true," said Mary, seeing that Lord Beaufort was unable to answer his sister's mute appeal. "You must expect, dearest, that Lord Teviot will indeed be weak and want quiet. I think we might find some lodging just as near as this is to the pier. Indeed, I saw a house to be let some way back from the street, and standing by itself. It was, to be sure, very small."
"Oh, that would not signify if it is quiet. What do you think, Beaufort?"
"That it would be very desirable to get you out of this horrid hole," he said, starting up. "Miss Forrester, perhaps you will show me where this house is, and I will go and see if we can have it. Make some excuse to come with me," he whispered as she leant out of the window to point out the direction she was to take. "I must see you alone."
"Helen," said Mary, "as I have got my bonnet on, perhaps I had better go with Lord Beaufort and see the house. I shall know directly if it will suit you; and in the meanwhile you might be preparing for our moving."
"Very well," said Helen, listlessly. "I will speak to Tomkinson; any house will do, so that there is not this constant racket."
She saw them leave the room with a dreamy feeling of wonder that they should go together, and tried to smile as they went out; but when the door was closed she hid her face in her hands in a state of utter depression. She felt, without owning it to herself, that they knew more of her husband than they had told her; there was almost an angry feeling in her heart against the secrecy which she fancied they observed, and yet a shrinking dread of its being broken. Above all, there was a miserable presentiment of coming evil—that expectation of ill which quickens the hearing, blinds the sight, and seems to clench the heart with a grasp that tightens at every strange sound, at every sudden silence. She was still seated in the same place and position when Mary returned to say that the house was quiet and clean; that Lord Beaufort had hired it, and thought his sister had better go into it without delay. He was gone to make other arrangements for her comfort in the way of servants, provisions, etc., and would not return for another hour.
"He is gone to the pier, Mary?"
"Very likely," she said; "you know the packet may be in to-day."
"Yes, and you and Beaufort know more than that," said Helen, raising her heavy eyes, and fixing them on Mary; "you have heard something you do not choose to tell me. I do not want to hear it," she added, almost fiercely; "it can only be a vague report. I should not believe it."
"Perhaps you are right," said Mary, trying to speak calmly, though her voice was low and shaking. "But, darling, Lord Beaufort thought it better I should tell you that the accounts of your dear husband, brought by some of the passengers by the last steamer, were very alarming."
"We knew that," said Helen, impatiently. "There is always exaggeration in reports of illness. They cannot know so much as we do. Mary, Mary, why do you try to frighten me?"
"Your brother thought that you ought to know all, and I know my own dear friend," she said, fondly caressing her, "will exert herself for the sake of all who love her; for the sake of the husband who may want all her care, all her strength of mind and energy."
"He must, he shall want them and have them," said Helen. "He will be with me to-day." Suddenly her forced coldness gave way, and, throwing her arms round her friend, she said, "Oh, Mary, if I am not to see him alive, what a life of remorse and misery is before me!" Her tears flowed convulsively for a time, and then she said, softly, "God's will be done, but I hope this suspense will not last long; and now let us have everything in readiness."
She rose as she spoke, and began, with shaking hands, to collect the few things that were scattered on the table. She sent Mary to give the necessary orders to the servants, and in a few minutes they had left the hotel, which, for years after, Helen could never think of without a shudder.