Lord Earle told him briefly how they had missed her, and what had been done.
"She must be trying to frighten us," he said; "she must have hidden herself. There can not be anything wrong." Even as he spoke he felt how impossible it was that his dignified Beatrice should have done anything wrong.
He could throw no light upon the subject. He had not seen her since he had kissed her when bidding her goodnight. Her maid was the last person to whom she had spoken. Suzette had left her in her own room, and since then nothing had been seen or heard of Beatrice Earle.
Father and lover went out together. Lord Airlie suggested that she had perhaps gone out into the gardens and had met with some accident there.
They went carefully over every part--there was no trace of Beatrice.
They went through the shrubbery out into the park, where the quiet lake shone amid the green trees.
Suddenly, like the thrust of a sharp sword, the remembrance of the morning spent upon the water came to Lord Airlie. He called to mind Beatrice"s fear--the cold shudder that seized her when she declared that her own face with a mocking smile was looking up at her from the depths of the water.
He walked hurriedly toward the lake. It was calm and clear--the tall trees and green sedges swaying in the wind, the white lilies rising and falling with the ripples. The blue sky and green trees were reflected in the water, the pleasure boat was fastened to the boat house. How was he to know the horrible secret of the lake?
"Come away, Airlie!" cried Lord Earle. "I shall go mad! I will call all the servants, and have a regular search."
In a few minutes the wildest confusion and dismay reigned in the Hall; women wept aloud, and men"s faces grew pale with fear. Their beautiful, brilliant young mistress had disappeared, and none knew her fate. They searched garden, park, and grounds; men in hot haste went hither and thither; while Lady Earle lay half dead with fear, and Lillian rested calmly, knowing nothing of what had happened.
It was Lord Airlie who first suggested that the lake should be dragged.
The sun rode high in the heavens then, and shone gloriously over water and land.
They found the drags, and Hewson, the butler, with Lee and Patson, two gardeners, got into the boat. Father and lover stood side by side on the bank. The boat glided softly over the water; the men had been once round the lake, but without any result. Hope was rising again in Lord Airlie"s heart, when he saw those in the boat look at each other, then at him.
"My lord," said Cowden, Lord Earle"s valet, coming up to Hubert, "pray take my master home; they have found something at the bottom of the lake. Take him home; and please keep Lady Earle and the women all out of the way."
"What is it?" cried Lord Earle. "Speak to me, Airlie. What is it?"
"Come away," said Lord Airlie. "The men will not work while we are here."
They had found something beneath the water; the drags had caught in a woman"s dress; and the men in the boat stood motionless until Lord Earle was out of sight.
Through the depths of water they saw the gleam of a white, dead face, and a floating ma.s.s of dark hair. They raised the body with reverent hands. Strong men wept aloud as they did so. One covered the quiet face, and another wrung the dripping water from the long hair. The sun shone on, as though in mockery, while they carried the drowned girl home.
Slowly and with halting steps they carried her through the warm, sunny park where she was never more to tread, through the bright, sunlit gardens, through the hall and up the broad staircase, the water dripping from her hair and falling in large drops, into the pretty chamber she had so lately quitted full of life and hope. They laid her on the white bed wherefrom her eyes would never more open to the morning light, and went away.
"Drowned, drowned! Drowned and dead!" was the cry that went from lip to lip, till it reached Lord Earle where he sat, trying to soothe his weeping mother. "Drowned! Quite dead!" was the cry that reached Lillian, in her sick room, and brought her down pale and trembling.
"Drowned and dead hours ago," were the words that drove Lord Airlie mad with the bitterness of his woe.
They could not realize it. How had it happened? What had taken her in the dead of the night to the lake?
They sent messengers right and left to summon doctors in hot haste, as though human skill could avail her now.
"I must see her," said Lord Airlie. "If you do not wish to kill me, let me see her."
They allowed him to enter, and Lord Earle and his mother went with him.
None in that room ever forgot his cry--the piercing cry of the strong man in his agony--as he threw himself by the dead girl"s side.
"Beatrice, my love, my darling, why could I not have died for you?"
And then with tears of sympathy they showed him how even in death the white cold hand grasped his locket, holding it so tightly that no ordinary foe could remove it.
"In life and in death!" she had said, and she had kept her word.
Chapter XLII
While the weeping group still stood there, doctors came; they looked at the quiet face, so beautiful in death, and said she had been dead for hours. The words struck those who heard them with unutterable horror.
Dead, while those who loved her so dearly, who would have given their lives for her, had lain sleeping near her, unconscious of her doom--dead, while her lover had waited for her, and her father had been intently thinking of her approaching wedding.
What had she suffered during the night? What awful storm of agony had driven her to the lake? Had she gone thither purposely? Had she wandered to the edge and fallen in, or was there a deeper mystery? Had foul wrong been done to Lord Earle"s daughter while he was so near her, and yet knew nothing of it?
She still wore her pretty pink evening dress. What a mockery it looked! The delicate laces were wet and spoiled; the pink blossoms she had twined in her hair clung to it still; the diamond arrow Lord Airlie had given her fastened them, a diamond brooch was in the bodice of her dress, and a costly bracelet encircled the white, cold arm. She had not, then, removed her jewels or changed her dress. What could have taken her down to the lake? Why was Lord Airlie"s locket so tightly clinched in her hand?
Lord Airlie, when he was calm enough to speak, suggested that she might have fallen asleep, tired, before undressing--that in her sleep she might have walked out, gone to the edge of the lake, and fallen in.
That version spread among the servants. From them it spread like wildfire around the whole country-side; the country papers were filled with it, and the London papers afterward told how "the beautiful Miss Earle" had been drowned while walking in her sleep.
But Lord Airlie"s suggestion did not satisfy Ronald Earle; he would not leave the darkened chamber. Women"s gentle hands removed the bright jewels and the evening dress. Lady Helena, with tears that fell like rain, dried the long, waving hair, and drew it back from the placid brow. She closed the eyes, but she could not cross the white hands on the cold breast. One held the locket in the firm, tight clasp of death, and it could not be moved.
Ronald would not leave the room. Gentle hands finished their task.
Beatrice lay in the awful beauty of death--no pain, no sorrow moving the serene loveliness of her placid brow. He knelt by her side. It was his little Beatrice, this strange, cold, marble statue--his little baby Beatrice, who had leaped in his arms years ago, who had cried and laughed, who had learned in pretty accents to lisp his name--his beautiful child, his proud, bright daughter, who had kissed him the previous night while he spoke jesting words to her about her lover.
And he had never heard her voice since--never would hear it again. Had she called him when the dark waters closed over her bright head?
Cold, motionless, no gleam of life or light--and this was Dora"s little child! He uttered a great cry as the thought struck him: "What would Dora say?" He loved Beatrice; yet for all the long years of her childhood he had been absent from her. How must Dora love the child who had slept on her bosom, and who was now parted from her forever.
And then his thoughts went back to the old subject: "How had it happened? What had taken her to the lake?"
One knelt near who might have told him, but a numb, awful dread had seized upon Lillian. Already weak and ill, she was unable to think, unable to shape her ideas, unable to tell right from wrong.
She alone held the clew to the mystery, and she knelt by that death bed with pale, parted lips and eyes full of terror. Her face startled those who saw it. Her sorrow found no vent in tears; the gentle eyes seemed changed into b.a.l.l.s of fire; she could not realize that it was Beatrice who lay there, so calm and still--Beatrice, who had knelt at her feet and prayed that she would save her--Beatrice, who had believed herself so near the climax of her happiness.
Could she have met Hugh, and had he murdered her? Look where she would, Lillian saw that question written in fiery letters. What ought she to do? Must she tell Lord Earle, or did the promise she had made bind her in death as well as in life. Nothing could restore her sister. Ought she to tell all she knew, and to stain in death the name that was honored and loved?
One of the doctors called in saw the face of Lillian Earle. He went at once to Lady Helena, and told her that if the young lady was not removed from that room, and kept quiet she would be in danger of her life.
"If ever I saw a face denoting that the brain was disturbed," he said, "that is one."
Lillian was taken back to her room, and left with careful nurses. But the doctor"s warning proved true. While Lord Earle wept over the dead child, Lady Helena mourned over the living one, whose life hung by a thread.
The day wore on; the gloom of sorrow and mourning had settled on the Hall. Servants spoke with hushed voices and moved with gentle tread.
Lady Helena sat in the darkened room where Lillian lay. Lord Airlie had shut himself up alone, and Ronald Earle knelt all day by his dead child. In vain they entreated him to move, to take food or wine, to go to his own room. He remained by her, trying to glean from that silent face the secret of her death.
And when night fell again, he sunk exhausted. Feverish slumbers came to him, filled with a haunted dream of Beatrice sinking in the dark water and calling upon him for help. Kindly faces watched over him, kindly hands tended him. The morning sun found him still there.
Lady Helena brought him some tea and besought him to drink it. The parched, dried lips almost refused their office. It was an hour afterward that Hewson entered the room, bearing a letter in his hand.
It was brought, he said by Thomas Ginns, who lived at the cottage past Fair Glenn hills. It had been written by a man who lay dying there, and who had prayed him to take it at once without delay.
"I ventured to bring it to you, my lord," said the butler; "the man seemed to think it a matter of life or death."