She fought then, and with one hand free hit Aunt Anne"s face, twisting her body. Then, suddenly weak, so that she saw faintness coming towards her like a cloak, she whispered:
"Oh, Aunt Anne, let me go! Oh, Aunt Anne, let me go! Please, please, let me go!"
Suddenly the house was darkened, at her feet was a gulf of blackness, and into it she tumbled, down, far down, with a last little gasping sigh of distress.
PART III
THE WITCH
CHAPTER I
THE THREE VISITS
On a spring day, early in March of the next year, 1908, Mathew Cardinal thought that he would go and discover how his niece was prospering. He had seen nothing of her for a very long time.
He did not blame himself for this, but then he never blamed himself for anything. A fate, often drunken and always imbecile, was to blame for everything that he did, and he pitied himself sincerely for having to be in the hands of such a creature. He happened to be just now very considerably frightened about himself, more frightened than he had been for a very long time, so frightened in fact that he had drunk nothing for weeks. For many years he had been leading a see-saw existence, and the see-saw had been swung by that mysterious force known as Finance.
He had a real gift for speculation, and had he been granted from birth a large income he might have ended his days as a Justice of the Peace and a Member of Parliament. Unfortunately he had never had any private means, and he had never been able to make enough by his mysterious speculations to float him into security--"Let me once get so far," he would say to himself, "and I am a made man." But drink, an easy tolerance of bad company, and a rather touching conceit had combined to divorce him from so fine a destiny. He had risen, he had fallen, made a good thing out of this tip, been badly done over that, and missed opportunity after opportunity through a fuddled brain and an overweening self-confidence.
Last year for several months everything had succeeded; it was during that happy period that he had visited Maggie. Perhaps it was well for his soul that success had not continued. He was a man whom failure improved, having a certain childish warmth of heart and simplicity of outlook when things went badly with him. Success made him abominably conceited, and being without any morality self-confidence drove him to disastrous lengths. Now once more he was very near destruction and he knew it, very near things like forging and highway robbery, and other things worse than they. He knew that he was very near; he peered over into the pit and did not wish to descend. He was not a bad man, and had he not believed himself to be a clever one all might yet have been well. The temptation of his cleverness lured him on. A stroke of the pen was a very simple thing...
To save his soul he thought that he would go and see Maggie. His affection for her, conceited and selfish though it was, was the most genuine thing in him. For three-quarters of the year he forgot her, but when life went badly he thought of her again--not that he expected to get anything out of her, but she was good to him and she knew nothing about his life, two fine bases for safety.
"What have they been doing to her, those d.a.m.ned hypocrites, I wonder,"
was his thought. He admired, feared, and despised his sisters. "All that stuff about G.o.d" frightened him in spite of himself, and he knew, in his soul, that Anne was no hypocrite.
He rang the bell and faced Martha. He had dressed himself with some care and was altogether more tidy just then, having a new mistress who cared about outside appearances. Also, having been sober for nearly two months, he looked a gentleman.
"Is my niece at home?" he asked, blinking because he was frightened of Martha.
She did not seem to be prepared to let him in.
"Miss Maggie has been very ill," she said, frowning at him.
"Ill?" That really hurt him. He stammered, "Why? ... When?"
She moved aside then for him to pa.s.s into the hall. He came into the dark stuffy place.
"Yes," said Martha. "Just after Christmas. Brain-fever, the doctors said. They thought she"d die for weeks. Had two doctors ... You can"t see her, sir," she ended grumpily.
Then Aunt Anne appeared, coming through the green-baize door.
"Why, Mathew," she said. Mathew thought how ill she looked.
"They"re all ill here," he said to himself.
"So Maggie"s ill," he said, dropping his eyes before her as he always did.
"Yes," Aunt Anne answered. "She was very ill indeed, poor child. I"m glad to see you, Mathew. It"s a long time since you"ve been."
He thought she was gentler to him than she had been, so, mastering his fear of her, fingering his collar, he said:
"Can"t I see her?"
"Well, I"m not ... I think you might. It might do her good. She wants taking out of herself. She comes down for an hour or two every day now.
I"ll go and see." She left him standing alone there. He looked around him, sniffing like a dog. How he hated the house and everything in it!
Always had ... You could smell that fellow Warlock"s trail over everything. The black cat, Tom, came slipping along, looked for a moment as though he would rub himself against Mathew"s stout legs, then decided that he would not. Mysterious this place like a well, with its green shadows. No wonder the poor child had been ill here. At the thought of her being near to death Mathew felt a choke in his throat.
Poor child, never had any fun all her life and then to die in a green well like this. And his sisters wouldn"t care if she did, hard women, hard women. Funny how religion made you hard, darn funny. Good thing he"d been irreligious all his life. Think of his brother Charles! There was religion for you, living with his cook and preaching to her next morning. Bad thing religion!
Aunt Anne returned, coming down the stairs with that queer halting gait of hers.
"Maggie"s in the drawing-room," she said. "She"ll like to see you."
As they went up, Aunt Anne said: "Be careful with her, Mathew. She"s still very weak. Don"t say anything to upset her?"
He mumbled something in his throat. Couldn"t trust him. Of course they couldn"t. Never had ... Fine sort of sisters they were.
Maggie was sitting by the fire, a shawl over her shoulders. By G.o.d, but she looked ill. Mathew had another gulp in his throat. Poor kid, but she did look ill. Poor kid, poor kid.
"Sorry you"ve been bad, Maggie," he said.
She looked up, smiling with pleasure, when she saw who it was. Yes, she was really pleased to see him. But how different a smile from the old one! No blood behind it, none of that old Maggie determination. He was filled with compa.s.sion. He took a chair close beside her and sat down, leaning towards her, his large rather sheepish eye gazing at her.
"What"s been the matter?" he asked.
"I don"t know," Maggie said. "I was suddenly ill one day, and after that I didn"t know any more for weeks. But I"m much better now."
"Well, I"m delighted to hear that anyway," he said heartily. He was determined to cheer her up. "You"ll be as right as rain presently."
"Of course I shall. I"ve felt so lazy, as though I didn"t want to do anything. Now I must stir myself."
"Have the old women been good to you?" he asked, dropping his voice.
"Very," she answered.
"Not bothering you about all their religious tommy-rot?"
She looked down at her hands.
"No," she said.
"And that hypocritical minister of theirs hasn"t been at you again?"
"Mr. Warlock"s dead," she answered very quietly.