Beatrice

"Back," he roared again--"back water!"

They backed, and the boat answered, but nothing was to be seen.

"She"s gone! Oh, Goad, she"s gone!" groaned the old man. "You may put about now, lads, and the Lord"s will be done."

The light from the lantern fell in a little ring upon the seething water. Suddenly something white appeared in the centre of this illuminated ring. Edward stared at it. It was floating upwards. It vanished--it appeared again. It was a woman"s face. With a yell he plunged his arms into the sea.

"I have her--lend an hand, lads."

Another man scrambled forward and together they clutched the object in the water.

"Look out, don"t pull so hard, you fool. Blow me if there ain"t another and she"s got him by the hair. So, _steady, steady!_"

A long heave from strong arms and the senseless form of Beatrice was on the gunwale. Then they pulled up Geoffrey beside her, for they could not loose her desperate grip of his dark hair, and together rolled them into the boat.

"They"re dead, I doubt," said the second man.

"Help turn "em on their faces over the seat, so--let the water drain from their innards. It"s the only chance. Now give me that sail to cover them--so. You"ll live yet, Miss Beatrice, you ain"t dead, I swear. Old Eddard has saved you, Old Eddard and the good Goad together!"

Meanwhile the boat had been got round, and the men were rowing for Bryngelly as warm-hearted sailors will when life is at stake. They all knew Beatrice and loved her, and they remembered it as they rowed. The gloom was little hindrance to them for they could almost have navigated the coast blindfold. Besides here they were sheltered by the reef and sh.o.r.e.

In five minutes they were round a little headland, and the lights of Bryngelly were close before them. On the beach people were moving about with lanterns.

Presently they were there, hanging on their oars for a favourable wave to beach with. At last it came, and they gave way together, running the large boat half out of the surf. A dozen men plunged into the water and dragged her on. They were safe ash.o.r.e.

"Have you got Miss Beatrice?" shouted a voice.

"Ay, we"ve got her and another too, but I doubt they"re gone. Where"s doctor?"

"Here, here!" answered a voice. "Bring the stretchers."

A stout thick-set man, who had been listening, wrapped up in a dark cloak, turned his face away and uttered a groan. Then he followed the others as they went to work, not offering to help, but merely following.

The stretchers were brought and the two bodies laid upon them, face downwards and covered over.

"Where to?" said the bearers as they seized the poles.

"The Vicarage," answered the doctor. "I told them to get things ready there in case they should find her. Run forward one of you and say that we are coming."

The men started at a trot and the crowd ran after them.

"Who is the other?" somebody asked.

"Mr. Bingham--the tall lawyer who came down from London the other day.

Tell policeman--run to his wife. She"s at Mrs. Jones"s, and thinks he has lost his way in the fog coming home from Bell Rock."

The policeman departed on his melancholy errand and the procession moved swiftly across the sandy beach and up the stone-paved way by which boats were dragged down the cliff to the sea. The village of Bryngelly lay to the right. It had grown away from the church, which stood dangerously near the edge of the cliff. On the further side of the church, and a little behind it, partly sheltered from the sea gales by a group of stunted firs, was the Vicarage, a low single-storied stone-roofed building, tenanted for twenty-five years past and more by Beatrice"s father, the Rev. Joseph Granger. The best approach to it from the Bryngelly side was by the churchyard, through which the men with the stretchers were now winding, followed by the crowd of sightseers.

"Might as well leave them here at once," said one of the bearers to the other in Welsh. "I doubt they are both dead enough."

The person addressed a.s.sented, and the thick-set man wrapped in a dark cloak, who was striding along by Beatrice"s stretcher, groaned again.

Clearly, he understood the Welsh tongue. A few seconds more and they were pa.s.sing through the stunted firs up to the Vicarage door. In the doorway stood a group of people. The light from a lamp in the hall struck upon them, throwing them into strong relief. Foremost, holding a lantern in his hand, was a man of about sixty, with snow-white hair which fell in confusion over his rugged forehead. He was of middle height and carried himself with something of a stoop. The eyes were small and shifting, and the mouth hard. He wore short whiskers which, together with the eyebrows, were still tinged with yellow. The face was ruddy and healthy looking, indeed, had it not been for the dirty white tie and shabby black coat, one would have taken him to be what he was in heart, a farmer of the harder sort, somewhat weather-beaten and anxious about the times--a man who would take advantage of every drop in the rate of wages. In fact he was Beatrice"s father, and a clergyman.

By his side, and leaning over him, was Elizabeth, her elder sister.

There was five years between them. She was a poor copy of Beatrice, or, to be more accurate, Beatrice was a grand development of Elizabeth. They both had brown hair, but Elizabeth"s was straighter and faint-coloured, not rich and ruddying into gold. Elizabeth"s eyes were also grey, but it was a cold washed-out grey like that of a February sky. And so with feature after feature, and with the expression also. Beatrice"s was n.o.ble and open, if at times defiant. Looking at her you knew that she might be a mistaken woman, or a headstrong woman, or both, but she could never be a mean woman. Whichever of the ten commandments she might choose to break, it would not be that which forbids us to bear false witness against our neighbour. Anybody might read it in her eyes. But in her sister"s, he might discern her father"s shifty hardness watered by woman"s weaker will into something like cunning. For the rest Elizabeth had a very fair figure, but lacked her sister"s rounded loveliness, though the two were so curiously alike that at a distance you might well mistake the one for the other. One might almost fancy that nature had experimented upon Elizabeth before she made up her mind to produce Beatrice, just to get the lines and distances. The elder sister was to the other what the pale unfinished model of clay is to the polished statue in ivory and gold.

"Oh, my G.o.d! my G.o.d!" groaned the old man; "look, they have got them on the stretchers. They are both dead. Oh, Beatrice! Beatrice! and only this morning I spoke harshly to her."

"Don"t be so foolish, father," said Elizabeth sharply. "They may only be insensible."

"Ah, ah," he answered; "it does not matter to you, _you_ don"t care about your sister. You are jealous of her. But I love her, though we do not understand each other. Here they come. Don"t stand staring there. Go and see that the blankets and things are hot. Stop, doctor, tell me, is she dead?"

"How can I tell till I have seen her?" the doctor answered, roughly shaking him off, and pa.s.sing through the door.

Bryngelly Vicarage was a very simply constructed house. On entering the visitor found himself in a pa.s.sage with doors to the right and left.

That to the right led to the sitting-room, that to the left to the dining-room, both of them long, low and narrow chambers. Following the pa.s.sage down for some seven paces, it terminated in another which ran at right angles to it for the entire length of the house. On the further side of this pa.s.sage were several bedroom doors and a room at each end.

That at the end to the right was occupied by Beatrice and her sister, the next was empty, the third was Mr. Granger"s, and the fourth the spare room. This, with the exception of the kitchens and servants"

sleeping place, which were beyond the dining-room, made up the house.

Fires had been lit in both of the princ.i.p.al rooms. Geoffrey was taken into the dining-room and attended by the doctor"s a.s.sistant, and Beatrice into the sitting-room, and attended by the doctor himself. In a few seconds the place had been cleared of all except the helpers, and the work began. The doctor looked at Beatrice"s cold shrunken form, and at the foam upon her lips. He lifted the eyelid, and held a light before the contracted pupil. Then he shook his head and set to work with a will. We need not follow him through the course of his dreadful labours, with which most people will have some acquaintance. Hopeless as they seemed, he continued them for hour after hour.

Meanwhile the a.s.sistant and some helpers were doing the same service for Geoffrey Bingham, the doctor himself, a thin clever-looking man, occasionally stepping across the pa.s.sage to direct them and see how things were getting on. Now, although Geoffrey had been in the water the longer, his was by far the better case, for when he was immersed he was already insensible, and a person in this condition is very hard to drown. It is your struggling, fighting, breathing creature who is soonest made an end of in deep waters. Therefore it came to pa.s.s that when the scrubbing with hot cloths and the artificial respiration had gone on for somewhere about twenty minutes, Geoffrey suddenly crooked a finger. The doctor"s a.s.sistant, a buoyant youth fresh from the hospitals, gave a yell of exultation, and scrubbed and pushed away with ever-increasing energy. Presently the subject coughed, and a minute later, as the agony of returning life made itself felt, he swore most heartily.

"He"s all right now!" called the a.s.sistant to his employer. "He"s swearing beautifully."

Dr. Chambers, pursuing his melancholy and unpromising task in the other room, smiled sadly, and called to the a.s.sistant to continue the treatment, which he did with much vigour.

Presently Geoffrey came partially to life, still suffering torments. The first thing he grew aware of was that a tall elegant woman was standing over him, looking at him with a half puzzled and half horrified air.

Vaguely he wondered who it might be. The tall form and cold handsome face were so familiar to him, and yet he could not recall the name.

It was not till she spoke that his numbed brain realized that he was looking on his own wife.

"Well, dear," she said, "I am so glad that you are better. You frightened me out of my wits. I thought you were drowned."

"Thank you, Honoria," he said faintly, and then groaned as a fresh attack of tingling pain shook him through and through.

"I hope n.o.body said anything to Effie," Geoffrey said presently.

"Yes, the child would not go to bed because you were not back, and when the policeman came she heard him tell Mrs. Jones that you were drowned, and she has been almost in a fit ever since. They had to hold her to prevent her from running here."

Geoffrey"s white face a.s.sumed an air of the deepest distress. "How could you frighten the child so?" he murmured. "Please go and tell her that I am all right."

"It was not my fault," said Lady Honoria with a shrug of her shapely shoulders. "Besides, I can do nothing with Effie. She goes on like a wild thing about you."

"Please go and tell her, Honoria," said her husband.

"Oh, yes, I"ll go," she answered. "Really I shall not be sorry to get out of this; I begin to feel as though I had been drowned myself;" and she looked at the steaming cloths and shuddered. "Good-bye, Geoffrey. It is an immense relief to find you all right. The policeman made me feel quite queer. I can"t get down to give you a kiss or I would. Well, good-bye for the present, my dear."

"Good-bye, Honoria," said her husband with a faint smile.