I did not go: one invited me, and another invited me, and it was two months, good, before I went down. Ah me! I heard no more of George; he had got into some trouble in London, and was afraid to let it be known where he was. I have never heard of him or his wife to this hour. My aunt was glad to see me for the help I should be to her; but I felt ill always and could not do so much as I used. I didn"t know what ailed me; I didn"t indeed; I did not think it could be much; and then, when the time went on and it all happened, and they knew, and I knew, I came away with the baby because of the reproach and the shame. But George ought not to have left me to myself in London."
And when Jane Ashton repeated all this to Robert, he said Bird deserved to be hanged and quartered.
There came no answer from Captain Bird. Perhaps Ashton of Timberdale did not really expect any would come.
But on the Sunday afternoon, from the train that pa.s.sed Timberdale from Worcester about the time folks came out of church, there descended a poor, weak woman (looking like a girl too) in a worn shawl that was too thin for the weather. She waited until the roads should be clear, as if not wanting to be seen, and then wrapped the shawl close around her arms and went out with her black veil down. It was Lucy Bird. And she was so pretty still, in spite of the wan thin cheeks and the faded clothes!
There were two ways of getting to Jael Batty"s from the station. She took the long and obscure one, and in turning the corner of the lane between the church and Timberdale Court, she met Robert Ashton.
But for her own movement, he might never have noticed her. It was growing dusk; and when she saw him coming, she turned sharp off to a stile and stood as if looking for something in the field. There"s not much to stare at in a ploughed field at dusk, as Ashton of Timberdale knew, and he naturally looked at the person who had gone so fast to do it. Something in the cut of the shoulders struck him as being familiar, and he stopped.
"Lucy! Is it you?"
Of course it was no use her saying it was not. She burst into tears, trembling and shaking. Robert pa.s.sed round her his good strong arm. He guessed what had brought her to Timberdale.
"Lucy, my dear, have you come over from Worcester?"
"Yes," she sobbed. "I shall be better in a minute, Robert. I am a little tired, and the train shook me."
"You should have sent me word, and I would have had a fly at the station."
Sent him word! It was good of Robert to pretend to say that; but he knew that she wouldn"t have presumed to do it. It was that feeling on Lucy"s part that vexed him so much. Since Bird had turned out the villain that he had, Lucy acted, even to her own family, as though she had lost caste, identifying herself with her husband, and humbling herself to them. What though she was part and parcel with the fellow, as Robert said, she was not responsible for his ill-doings.
"Lean on me, Lucy. You must have a good rest."
"Not that way," she said at the bottom of the lane, as he was turning to the Court. "I am going to Jael Batty"s."
"When you have had some rest and refreshment at home."
"I cannot go to your home, Robert."
"Indeed but you can; and will," he answered, leading her on.
"I would rather not. Your wife may not care to receive me."
"Come and try her."
"Robert, I am not fit to see any one: I am not indeed. My spirits are low now, and I often burst into tears for nothing. I have been praying, all the way over, not to meet you. After what was done to you at our house but a week or two ago, I did not expect ever to have been noticed by you again. Jane must hate me."
"Does she! Jane and I have been concocting a charming little plot about you, Lucy. We are going to have your old room made ready, and the sweet-scented lavender sheets put on the bed, and get you over to us.
For good, if you will stop; long enough to recruit your health if you will not. Don"t you remember how you used to talk in the holidays about the home sheets; saying you only got them smelling of soap at school?"
A faint smile, like a shade, flitted over Lucy Bird"s face at the reminiscence.
"I should not know the feel of fine white linen sheets now: coa.r.s.e calico ones have had to content me this many a day. Let me turn, Robert!
For my own sake, I would rather not meet your wife. You cannot know how I feel about seeing old friends; those who--who----"
Those who once knew me, she meant to say; but broke down with a sob.
Robert kept walking on. Lucy was a great deal younger than he, and had been used to yield to him from the time she was a child. Well for her would it have been, that she had yielded to his opinion when Captain Bird came a-courting to Timberdale.
"You have company at your house, perhaps, Robert?"
"There"s not a soul but Jane and me. The Coneys asked us to dine there to-day, but we thought we"d have the first Sunday to ourselves. We went to church this morning; and I came out after dinner to ask after old Arkwright: they fear he is dying."
She made no further opposition, and Robert took her into the Court, to the warm dining-room. Jane was not there. Robert put her into the arm-chair that used to be their father"s, and brought her a gla.s.s of wine.
"No, thank you," she faintly said.
"You must take it, Lucy."
"I am afraid. My head is weak."
"A sign you want something good to strengthen it," he urged; and she drank the wine.
"And now take off your bonnet, Lucy, and make yourself at home, whilst I go to seek Jane," said he.
"Lucy is here," he whispered, when he had found his wife. "The merest shadow you ever saw. A wan, faded thing that one"s heart bleeds to look upon. We must try and keep her for a bit, Jane."
"Oh, Robert, if we can! And nurse her into health."
"And deliver her from that brute she calls husband--as I should prefer to put it, Jane. Her life with him must be something woeful."
When they got in, she was leaning forward in the chair, crying silently.
In the clear old room, with all its familiar features about her, memory could only have its most painful sway. Her grand old father with his grand old white hair used to sit where she was sitting; her brothers had each his appointed place; and she was a lovely bright child amongst them, petted by all; the sentimental girl with her head as brimful of romance as ever the other Lucy Ashton"s had been, when she went out to her trysts with the Master of Ravenswood. Which had been the more bitter fate in after-life--that Lucy"s or this one"s?
Mrs. Ashton went quietly up, put her arms round Lucy, and kissed her many times. She untied the bonnet, which Lucy had not done, and gave it with the shawl to Robert, standing behind. The bright hair fell down in a shower--the bonnet had caught it--and she put her feeble hand up as if to feel the extent of the disaster. It made her look so like the sweet young sister they had all prized, that Robert turned to the window and gave a few stamps, as if his boots were cold.
How she cried!--tears that came from the very heart. Putting her face down on the arm of the chair, she let her grief have its way. Jane held her hand and stroked it lovingly. Robert felt inclined to dash his arms through the dark window-panes on which the fire-light played, in imaginary chastis.e.m.e.nt of the scamp, Bird.
"Could you lend me a shawl of your own, Jane?" she asked, by-and-by, when Robert said they would have tea in--and she glanced down at her shabby brown gown. "I don"t wish the servants to see me like this."
Jane flew out and brought one. A handsome cashmere of scarlet and gold-colour, that her mother had given her before the wedding.
"Just for an hour or two, until I leave," said Lucy, as she covered herself up in it.
"You will not go out of this house to-night, Lucy."
"I must, Robert. You can guess who it was I came to Timberdale to see."
"Of course I can. She is going on all right and getting stronger; so there"s no immediate haste about that. Mr. Bird would not--not come, I suppose."
Lucy did not answer. Robert was right--Bird would not come: his young sister might die where she was or be sheltered in the workhouse, for all the concern he gave himself. For one thing, the man was at his wits" end for money, and not too sure of his own liberty. But Lucy"s conscience had not let her be still: as soon as she had sc.r.a.ped together the means for a third-cla.s.s ticket, she came over.
"The poor girl has lain like a weight upon my mind, since the time when we abandoned her in London," confessed Lucy.
"Why did you abandon her?"
"It was not my fault," murmured Lucy; and Robert felt vexed to have asked the hasty question. "I hoped she went home, as I desired her; but I did not feel sure of it, for Clara was thoughtless. And those unsuspicious country girls cannot take care of themselves too well.
Robert, whatever has happened I regard as our fault," she added, looking up at him with some fever in her eyes.