This checked him, and he stood thinking.
"Well," she said, "why don"t you ring?"
"I do not ring," he answered, "because on the whole I think I had better let you go. I do not wish to be mixed up with you any more. You have done me mischief enough; you have finished by attempting to murder me. Go; I think that a convent is the best place for you; you are too bad and too dangerous to be left at large."
"/Oh!/" she said, like one in pain. "/Oh!/ and you are the man for whom I have come to this! Oh, G.o.d! it is a cruel world." And she pressed her hands to her heart and stumbled rather than walked to the door.
Reaching it she turned, and her hands still pressing the coa.r.s.e blue gown against her heart, she leaned against the door.
"Edward," she said, in a strained whisper, for her breath came thick, "Edward--I am going for ever--have you /no/ kind word--to say to me?"
He looked at her, a scowl upon his handsome face. Then by way of answer he turned upon his heel.
And so, still holding her hands against her poor broken heart, she went out of the house, out of Boisingham and of touch and knowledge of the world. In after years these two were fated to meet once again, and under circ.u.mstances sufficiently tragic; but the story of that meeting does not lie within the scope of this history. To the world Belle is dead, but there is another world of sickness, and sordid unchanging misery and shame, where the lovely face of Sister Agnes moves to and fro like a ray of heaven"s own light. There those who would know her must go to seek her.
Poor Belle! Poor shamed, deserted woman! She was an evil-doer, and the fatality of love and the unbalanced vigour of her mind, which might, had she been more happily placed, have led her to all things that are pure, and true, and of good report, combined to drag her into shame and wretchedness. But the evil that she did was paid back to her in full measure, pressed down and running over. Few of us need to wait for a place of punishment to get the due of our follies and our sins.
/Here/ we expiate them. They are with us day and night, about our path and about our bed, scourging us with the whips of memory, mocking us with empty longing and the hopelessness of despair. Who can escape the consequence of sin, or even of the misfortune which led to sin?
Certainly Belle did not, nor Mr. Quest, nor even that fierce-hearted harpy who hunted him to his grave.
And so good-bye to Belle. May she find peace in its season!
CHAPTER x.x.xVIII
COLONEL QUARITCH EXPRESSES HIS VIEWS
Meanwhile things had been going very ill at the Castle. Edward Cossey"s lawyers were carrying out their client"s instructions to the letter with a perseverance and ingenuity worthy of a County Court solicitor. Day by day they found a new point upon which to hara.s.s the wretched Squire. Some share of the first expenses connected with the mortgages had, they said, been improperly thrown upon their client, and they again and again demanded, in language which was almost insolent, the immediate payment of the amount. Then there was three months" interest overdue, and this also they pressed and clamoured for, till the old gentleman was nearly driven out of his senses, and as a consequence drove everybody about the place out of theirs.
At last this state of affairs began to tell upon his const.i.tution, which, strong as he was, could not at his age withstand such constant worry. He grew to look years older, his shoulders acquired a stoop, and his memory began to fail him, especially on matters connected with the mortgages and farm accounts. Ida, too, became pale and ill; she caught a heavy cold, which she could not throw off, and her face acquired a permanently pained and yet listless look.
One day, it was on the 15th of December, things reached a climax. When Ida came down to breakfast she found her father busy poring over some more letters from the lawyers.
"What is it now, father?" she said.
"What is it now?" he answered irritably. "What, it"s another claim for two hundred, that"s what it is. I keep telling them to write to my lawyers, but they won"t, at least they write to me too. There, I can"t make head or tail of it. Look here," and he showed her two sides of a big sheet of paper covered with statements of accounts. "Anyhow, I have not got two hundred, that"s clear. I don"t even know where we are going to find the money to pay the three months" interest. I"m worn out, Ida, I"m worn out! There is only one thing left for me to do, and that is to die, and that"s the long and short of it. I get so confused with these figures. I"m an old man now, and all these troubles are too much for me."
"You must not talk like that, father," she answered, not knowing what to say, for affairs were indeed desperate.
"Yes, yes, it"s all very well to talk so, but facts are stubborn. Our family is ruined, and we must accept it."
"Cannot the money be got anyhow? Is there /nothing/ to be done?" she said in despair.
"What is the good of asking me that? There is only one thing that can save us, and you know what it is as well as I do. But you are your own mistress. I have no right to put pressure on you. I don"t wish to put pressure on you. You must please yourself. Meanwhile I think we had better leave this place at once, and go and live in a cottage somewhere, if we can get enough to support us; if not we must starve, I suppose. I cannot keep up appearances any longer."
Ida rose, and with a strange sad light of resolution shining in her eyes, came to where her father was sitting, and putting her hands upon his shoulders, looked him in the face.
"Father," she said, "do you wish me to marry that man?"
"Wish you to marry him? What do you mean?" he said, not without irritation, and avoiding her gaze. "It is no affair of mine. I don"t like the man, if that"s what you mean. He is acting like--well, like the cur that he is, in putting on the screw as he is doing; but, of course, that is the way out of it, and the only way, and there you are."
"Father," she said again, "will you give me ten days, that is, until Christmas Day? If nothing happens between this and then I will marry Mr. Edward Cossey."
A sudden light of hope shone in his eyes. She saw it, though he tried to hide it by turning his head away.
"Oh, yes," he answered, "as you wish; settle it one way or the other on Christmas Day, and then we can go out with the new year. You see your brother James is dead, I have no one left to advise me now, and I suppose that I am getting old. At any rate, things seem to be too much for me. Settle it as you like; settle it as you like," and he got up, leaving his breakfast half swallowed, and went off to moon aimlessly about the park.
So she made up her mind at last. This was the end of her struggling.
She could not let her old father be turned out of house and home to starve, for practically they would starve. She knew her hateful lover well enough to be aware that he would show no mercy. It was a question of the woman or the money, and she was the woman. Either she must let him take her or they must be destroyed; there was no middle course.
And in these circ.u.mstances there was no room for hesitation. Once more her duty became clear to her. She must give up her life, she must give up her love, she must give up herself. Well, so be it. She was weary of the long endeavour against fortune, now she would yield and let the tide of utter misery sweep over her like a sea--to bear her away till at last it brought her to that oblivion in which perchance all things come right or are as though they had never been.
She had scarcely spoken to her lover, Harold Quaritch, for some weeks.
She had as she understood it entered into a kind of unspoken agreement with her father not to do so, and that agreement Harold had realised and respected. Since their last letters to each other they had met once or twice casually or at church, interchanged a few indifferent words, though their eyes spoke another story, touched each other"s hands and parted. That was absolutely all. But now that Ida had come to this momentous decision she felt he had a right to learn it, and so once more she wrote to him. She might have gone to see him or told him to meet her, but she would not. For one thing she did not dare to trust herself on such an errand in his dear company, for another she was too proud, thinking if her father came to hear of it he might consider that it had a clandestine and underhand appearance.
And so she wrote. With all she said we need not concern ourselves. The letter was loving, even pa.s.sionate, more pa.s.sionate perhaps than one would have expected from a woman of Ida"s calm and stately sort. But a mountain may have a heart of fire although it is clad in snows, and so it sometimes is with women who seem cold and unemotional as marble.
Besides, it was her last chance--she could write him no more letters and she had much to say.
"And so I have decided, Harold," she said after telling him of all her doubts and troubles. "I must do it, there is no help for it, as I think you will see. I have asked for ten days" respite. I really hardly know why, except that it is a respite. And now what is there left to say to you except good-bye? I love you, Harold, I make no secret of it, and I shall never love any other. Remember all your life that I love you and have not forgotten you, and never can forget. For people placed as we are there is but one hope--the grave. In the grave earthly considerations fail and earthly contracts end, and there I trust and believe we shall find each other--or at the least forgetfulness. My heart is so sore I know not what to say to you, for it is difficult to put all I feel in words. I am overwhelmed, my spirit is broken, and I wish to heaven that I were dead. Sometimes I almost cease to believe in a G.o.d who can allow His creatures to be so tormented and give us love only that it may be daily dishonoured in our sight; but who am I that I should complain, and after all what are our troubles compared to some we know of? Well, it will come to an end at last, and meanwhile pity me and think of me.
"Pity me and think of me; yes, but never see me more. As soon as this engagement is publicly announced, go away, the further the better.
Yes, go to New Zealand, as you suggested once, and in pity of our human weakness never let me see your face again. Perhaps you may write to me sometimes--if Mr. Cossey will allow it. Go there and occupy yourself, it will divert your mind--you are still too young a man to lay yourself upon the shelf--mix yourself up with the politics of the place, take to writing; anything, so long as you can absorb yourself.
I sent you a photograph of myself (I have nothing better) and a ring which I have worn night and day since I was a child. I think that it will fit your little finger and I hope you will always wear it in memory of me. It was my mother"s. And now it is late and I am tired, and what is there more that a woman can say to the man she loves--and whom she must leave for ever? Only one word--Good-bye. Ida."
When Harold got this letter it fairly broke him down. His hopes had been revived when he thought that all was lost, and now again they were utterly dashed and broken. He could see no way out of it, none at all. He could not quarrel with Ida"s decision, shocking as it was, for the simple reason that he knew in his heart she was acting rightly and even n.o.bly. But, oh, the thought of it made him mad. It is probable that to a man of imagination and deep feeling h.e.l.l itself can invent no more hideous torture than he must undergo in the position in which Harold Quaritch found himself. To truly love some good woman or some woman whom he thinks good--for it comes to the same thing--to love her more than life, to hold her dearer even than his honour, to be, like Harold, beloved in turn; and then to know that this woman, this one thing for which he would count the world well lost, this light that makes his days beautiful, has been taken from him by the bitterness of Fate (not by Death, for that he could bear), taken from him, and given --for money or money"s worth--to some other man! It is, perhaps, better that a man should die than that he should pa.s.s through such an experience as that which threatened Harold Quaritch now: for though the man die not, yet will it kill all that is best in him; and whatever triumphs may await him, whatever women may be ready in the future to pin their favours to his breast, life will never be for him what it might have been, because his lost love took its glory with her.
No wonder, then, that he despaired. No wonder, too, that there rose up in his breast a great anger and indignation against the man who had brought this last extremity of misery upon them. He was just, and could make allowances for his rival"s infatuation--which, indeed, Ida being concerned, it was not difficult for him to understand. But he was also, and above all things, a gentleman; and the spectacle of a woman being inexorably driven into a distasteful marriage by money pressure, put on by the man who wished to gain her, revolted him beyond measure, and, though he was slow to wrath, moved him to fiery indignation. So much did it move him that he took a resolution; Mr.
Cossey should know his mind about the matter, and that at once.
Ringing the bell, he ordered his dog-cart, and drove to Edward Cossey"s rooms with the full intention of giving that gentleman a very unpleasant quarter-of-an-hour.
Mr. Cossey was in. Fearing lest he should refuse to see him, the Colonel followed the servant up the stairs, and entered almost as she announced his name. There was a grim and even a formidable look upon his plain but manly face, and something of menace, too, in his formal and soldierly bearing; nor did his aspect soften when his eyes fell upon the full-length picture of Ida over the mantelpiece.
Edward Cossey rose with astonishment and irritation, not unmixed with nervousness, depicted on his face. The last person whom he wished to see and expected a visit from was Colonel Quaritch, whom in his heart he held in considerable awe. Besides, he had of late received such a series of unpleasant calls that it is not wonderful that he began to dread these interviews.
"Good-day," he said coldly. "Will you be seated?"
The Colonel bowed his head slightly, but he did not sit down.
"To what am I indebted for the pleasure?" began Edward Cossey with much politeness.
"Last time I was here, Mr. Cossey," said the Colonel in his deep voice, speaking very deliberately, "I came to give an explanation; now I come to ask one."
"Indeed!"
"Yes. To come to the point, Miss de la Molle and I are attached to each other, and there has been between us an understanding that this attachment might end in marriage."
"Oh! has there?" said the younger man with a sneer.