"You will perhaps inform the court, Mrs. Compton, why your memory is so exact on this point."
Once more she hesitated for a moment, and then replied--
"It was exactly ten days before my marriage."
"I think that will do, Mrs. Compton. I will trouble you no further," the counsel said.
The hubbub which sprang up upon this seemed to Philip for the moment as if it were directed against his mother, which, of course, was not the case, but intended to express the indignant surprise of the defence at the elaborate examination of a witness who had nothing to say on the main subject.
The leader on the other side, however, though taken by surprise, and denouncing the trick which his learned brother had played upon the court by producing evidence which had really nothing to do with the matter, announced his intention to put a further question or two to Mrs.
Compton. Young Philip in the crowd started again from his seat with the feeling that he would like to fly at that man"s throat.
"Twenty years is a long time," he said, "and it is difficult to be sure of any circ.u.mstance at such a distance. Perhaps the witness will kindly inform us what were the circ.u.mstances which fixed this, no doubt one of many visits, on her mind?"
Elinor turned for the first time to the side from which the question came with a little movement of that impatience which was habitual to her, which three persons in that crowd recognised in a moment as characteristic. One of these was John Tatham, who had brought her to the court, and kept near that she might feel that she was not alone; the other was her son, of whose presence there n.o.body knew; the third, sat with his eyes cast down, and his arms folded on his breast, not looking at her, yet seeing every movement she made.
"It was a very simple circ.u.mstance," she said with the added spirit of that impetuous impulse: but then the hasty movement failed her, and she came back to herself and to a consciousness of the scene in which she stood. A sort of tremulous shiver came into her voice. She paused and then resumed, "There was a calendar hanging in the hall; it caught Mr.
Compton"s eye, and he pointed it out to me. It marked the 6th. He said, "Just ten days----""
Here her voice stopped altogether. She could say no more. And there was an answering pause throughout the whole crowded court, a holding of the general breath, the response to a note of pa.s.sion seldom struck in such a place. Even in the cross-examination there was a pause.
"Till when? What was the other date referred to?"
"The sixteenth of September," she said in a voice that was scarcely audible to the crowd. She added still more low so that the judge curved his hand over his ear to hear her, "Our wedding-day."
"I regret to enter into private matters, Mrs. Compton, but I believe it is not a secret that your married life came to a--more rapid conclusion than could have been augured from such a beginning. May I ask what your reasons were for----"
But here the other counsel sprang to his feet, and the contention arose again. Such a question was not clearly permissible. And the prosecution was perfectly satisfied with the evidence. It narrowed the question by the production of this clear and unquestionable testimony--the gentleman whom it had been attempted to involve being thus placed out of the question, and all the statements of the previous witness about the moustache which he could not see, etc., set aside.
Philip, it may be supposed, paid little attention to this further discussion. His eyes and thoughts were fixed upon his mother, who for a minute or two stood motionless through it, as pale as ever, but with her head a little thrown back, facing, though not looking at, the circling lines of faces. Had she seen anything she must have seen the tall boy standing up as pale as she, following her movements with an unconscious repet.i.tion which was more than sympathy, never taking his gaze from her face.
And then presently her place was empty, and she was gone.
Philip was not aware how the discussion of the lawyers ended, but only that in a moment there was vacancy where his mother had been standing, and his gaze seemed thrown back to him by the blank where she had been.
He was left in the midst of the crowd, which, after that one keen sensation, fell back upon the real trial with interest much less keen.
CHAPTER XLV.
Philip did not know how long he remained, almost paralysed, in the court, dazed in his mind, incapable of movement. He was in the centre of a long row of people, and to make his way out was difficult. He felt that the noise would call attention to him, and that he might be somehow identified--identified, as what? He did not know--his head was not clear enough to give any reason. When he came more to himself, and his eyes regained a little their power of vision, it seemed to him that everybody had stolen away. There was the judge, indeed, still sitting imperturbable, the jury restless in their box, the lawyers going on with their eternal quarrel over a bewildered witness, all puppets carrying on some unintelligible, wearisome, automaton process, contending, contending for ever about nothing. But all that had secured Philip"s attention was gone. John Tatham"s head was no longer visible under the witness-box; the ladies had disappeared from their elevated seats; the man with the opera-gla.s.s was gone. They were all gone, and the empty husks of a question which only concerned the comfort and life of the commonplace culprit in the dock were being turned over and over like chaff by the wind. And yet it was some time before poor young Pippo, shy of attracting attention, feeling some subtle change even in himself which he did not understand, afraid to have people look at him and divine him, knowing more of him perhaps than he himself knew, could make up his mind to move. He might have remained there till the court broke up but for the movement of some one beside him, who gathered up his hat and umbrella, and with some commotion pushed his way between the rows of seats. Philip followed, thankful of the opportunity, and, as it happened, the sensation of the day being over, many others followed too, and thus he got out into the curious, wondering daylight, which seemed to look him in the face, as if this Philip had never been seen by it before. That was the impression given him--that when he first came out the atmosphere quivered round him with a strange novelty, as if he were some other being, some one without a name, new to the world, new to himself. He did not seem sure that he would know his way home, and yet he did not call a pa.s.sing hansom, as he would have done yesterday, with a schoolboy"s pleasure in a.s.suming a man"s careless, easy ways. It is a long way from the Law Courts to Ebury Street, but it seemed a kind of satisfaction to be in motion, to walk on along the crowded streets. And, as a matter of fact, Philip did lose his way, and got himself entangled in a web of narrow streets and monotonous little openings, all so like each other that it took him a long time to extricate himself and find again the thread of a locality known to him. He did not know what he was to do when he got in. Should he find her there, in the little dingy drawing-room as usual, with the tea on the table? Would she receive him with her usual smile, and ask where he had been and what he had seen, and if the Musgraves had enjoyed it, exactly as if nothing had happened?
Even this wonder was faint in Philip"s mind, for the chief wonder to him was himself, and to find out how he had changed since the morning--what he was now, who he was? what were the relations to him of other people, of that other Philip Compton who had been seated in the court with the opera-gla.s.s, who had arrived at Windyhill to visit Elinor Dennistoun on the 6th of September, 1863, twenty years ago? Who was that man? and what was he, himself Philip Compton, of Lakeside, named Pippo, whom his mother had never once in all his life called by his real name?
To his great wonder, and yet almost relief, Philip found that his mother had not yet returned when he got to Ebury Street. "Mrs. Compton said as she would very likely be late. Can I get you some tea, sir? or, perhaps you haven"t had your lunch? you"re looking tired and worrited," said the landlady, who had known Pippo all his life. He consented to have tea, partly to fill up the time, and went up languidly to the deserted room, which looked so miserable and desert a place without her who put a soul into it and made it home. He did not know what to do with himself, poor boy, but sat down vacantly, and stared into empty s.p.a.ce, seeing, wherever he turned, the rows of faces, the ladies making signs to each other, the red robes of the judge, the lawyers contending, and that motionless pale figure in the witness-box. He shut his eyes and saw the whole scene, then opened them again, and still saw it--the dingy walls disappearing, the greyness of the afternoon giving a depth and distance to the limited s.p.a.ce. Should he always carry it about with him wherever he went, the vision of that court, the shock of that revelation? And yet he did not yet know what the revelation was; the confusion in his mind was too great, and the dust and mist that rose up about him as all the old building of his life crumbled and fell away.
"I"m sure as it"s that nasty trial, sir, as has been turning your mamma all out of her usual ways," said the landlady, appearing with her tray.
"Oh, the trial! Did you know about the trial?" said Philip.
"Not, Mr. Pippo, as ever she mentioned it to me. Mrs. Compton is a lady as isn"t that confidential, though always an affable lady, and not a bit proud; but when you"ve known folks for years and years, and take an interest, and put this and that together---- Dear, dear, I hope as you don"t think it"s taking a liberty. It"s more kindness nor curiosity, and I hope as you won"t mention it to your mamma."
Pippo shook his head and waved his hand, at once to satisfy the woman and dismiss her if possible; but this was not so easy to do.
"And Lord St. Serf so bad, sir," she said. "Lord, to think that before we know where we are there may be such changes, and new names, and no knowing what to say! But it"s best not to talk of it till it comes to pa.s.s, for there"s many a slip between the cup and the lip, and there"s no saying what will happen with a man that"s been a-dying for years and years."
What did the woman mean? He got rid of her at length, chiefly by dint of making no reply: and then, to tell the truth, Pippo"s eye had been caught by the pile of sandwiches which the kind woman, pitying his tired looks, had brought up with the tea. He was ashamed of himself for being hungry in such a dreadful emergency as this, but he was so, and could not help it, though nothing would have made him confess so much, or even touch the sandwiches till she had gone away. He pretended to ignore them till the door was shut after her, but could not help vividly remembering that he had eaten nothing since the morning. The sandwiches did him a little good in his mind as well as in his body. He got rid of the vision of the faces and of the red figure on the bench. He began to believe that when he saw her she would tell him. Had she not said so? That after awhile he should hear everything, and that all should be as it was before? All as it was before--in the time when she told him everything, even things that Granny did not know. But she had never told him this, and the other day she had told him that it was other people"s secrets, not her own, that she was keeping from him. "Other people"s secrets"--the secrets of the man who was Philip Compton, who went to Windyhill on the 6th of September, ten days before Elinor Dennistoun"s marriage day.
"What Philip Compton? Who was he? What had he to do with her? What, oh, what," Pippo said to himself, "has he to do with me?" After all, that was the most tremendous question. The others, or anything that had happened twenty years ago, were nothing to that.
Meanwhile Elinor, of all places in the world, was in John Tatham"s chambers, to which he had taken her to rest. I cannot tell how Mr.
Tatham, a man so much occupied, managed to subtract from all he had to do almost a whole day to see his cousin through the trial, and stand by her, sparing her all the lesser annoyances which surround and exaggerate such a great fact. He had brought her out into the fresh air, feeling that movement was the best thing for her, and instead of taking her home in the carriage which was waiting, had made her walk with him, supported on his arm, on which she hung in a sort of suspended life, across the street to the Temple, hoping thus to bring her back, by the necessity of exertion, to herself. And indeed she was almost more restored to herself by this remedy than John Tatham had expected or hoped. For though he placed her in the great easy-chair, in which her slender person was engulfed and supported, expecting her to rest there and lie motionless, perhaps even to faint, as women are supposed to do when it is particularly inconvenient and uncomfortable, Elinor had not been there two minutes before she rose up again and began to walk about the room, with an aspect so unlike that of an exhausted and perhaps fainting woman, that even John, used as he was to her capricious ways, was confounded.
Instead of being subdued and thankful that it was over, and this dreadful crisis in her life accomplished, Elinor walked up and down, wringing her hands, moaning and murmuring to herself; what was it she was saying? "G.o.d forgive me! G.o.d forgive me!" over and over and over, unconscious apparently that she was not alone, that any one heard or observed her. No doubt there is in all our actions, the very best, much for G.o.d to forgive; mingled motives, imperfect deeds, thoughts full of alloy and selfishness; but in what her conscience could accuse her now he could not understand. She might be to blame in respect to her husband, though he was very loth to allow the possibility; but in this act of her life, which had been so great a strain upon her, it was surely without any selfishness, for his interest only, not for her own.
And yet John had never seen such a fervour of penitence, so strong a consciousness of evil done. He went up to her and laid his hand upon her arm.
"Elinor, you are worn out. You have done too much. Will you try and rest a little here, or shall I take you home?"
She started violently when he touched her. "What was I saying?" she said.
"It does not matter what you were saying. Sit down and rest. You will wear yourself out. Don"t think any more. Take this and rest a little, and then I will take you home."
"It is easy to say so," she said, with a faint smile. "Don"t think! Is it possible to stop thinking at one"s pleasure?"
"Yes," said John, "quite possible; we must all do it or we should die.
And now your trial"s over, Nelly, for goodness" sake exert yourself and throw it off. You have done your duty."
"My duty! do you think that was my duty? Oh, John, there are so many ways to look at it."
"Only one way, when you have a man"s safety in your hands."
"Only one way--when one has a man"s safety--his honour, honour! Do you think a woman is justified in whatever she does, to save that?"
"I don"t understand you, Elinor; in anything you have done, or could do, certainly you are justified. My dear Nelly, sit down and take this. And then I will take you home."
She took the wine from his hand and swallowed a little of it; and then looking up into his face with the faint smile which she put on when she expected to be blamed, and intended to deprecate and disarm him, as she had done so often: "I don"t know," she said, "that I am so anxious to get home, John. You were to take Pippo to dine with you, and to the House to-night."
"So I was," he said. "We did not know what day you would be called. It is a great nuisance, but if you think the boy would be disappointed not to go----"
"He would be much, much disappointed. The first chance he has had of hearing a debate."
"He would be much better at home, taking care of you."
"As if I wanted taking care of! or as if the boy, who has always been the object of everybody"s care himself, would be the proper person to do it! If he had been a girl, perhaps--but it is a little late at this time of day to wish for that now."
"You were to tell him everything to-night, Elinor."
"Oh, I was to tell him! Do you think I have not had enough for one day?
enough to wear me out body and soul? You have just been telling me so, John."