"No, Miss Ada--I mean Mrs Norton--_not yet--not yet_! but unless some one interferes there soon will be! Oh, "m! I didn"t care to go to the Rectory, for I knew that they wouldn"t believe me there! but I"m afraid something dreadful will happen to my poor dear lady! I have come to you because you are her cousin, and I know you loved her, though things have gone so crooked since. But what shall we do, "m? for since that last time when my lady met Mr Norton in the wood, and Sir Murray caught them--" Jane ceased, for Ada Norton leaped to her feet as if some galvanic shock had pa.s.sed through her frame.
"Oh, what am I saying, ma"am? I didn"t think that you"d take it in that way, nor yet that you wouldn"t know of it. It was nothing, ma"am; only Sir Murray was telling my lady of it; and she said that they met by accident, and that almost all her words to him were to send her love to you, ma"am."
"It was, then, upon that occasion?" said Ada Norton, in agitated tones.
"Yes, "m; and I was in the dressing-room, and heard all. Not that Sir Murray spoke angrily, but in a curious, sneering tone that frightens my lady; and ever since then she"s been ill, and taking medicine; and--oh, "m!--you would not get me into trouble for trying to do what"s right by my lady?"
"No--no," said Ada, who was trying to recall her husband"s words when he had told her of his last meeting with Lady Gernon, for he had said nothing respecting the coming of Sir Murray.
"Well, ma"am," sobbed Jane, "since then"--she sank her voice into a whisper, and sent a thrill of horror through Ada Norton as she spoke--"since then, ma"am, I"m sure Sir Murray has been trying to poison her!"
"Poison my cousin, Lady Gernon?" exclaimed Ada. "Nonsense! Absurd!
Jane, you are mad!"
"I hope I am, ma"am, about that--indeed I do!" cried Jane, earnestly.
"But what have you seen? What do you know?" exclaimed Mrs Norton.
"I haven"t seen anything, ma"am, except Sir Murray coming sometimes out of the dressing-room, where the medicine"s kept; and I don"t know anything except that my lady"s medicine always tastes different, and looks different, when it"s been in the dressing-room a day or two; and every week it turns a darker colour, and tastes stronger than it did the week before. And besides all that, though Sir Murray smiles, and pretends to talk pleasant to the poor dear, suffering angel, than whom a better woman never lived, he hates her dreadfully, and more and more every day."
"And how long has this been going on?" said Mrs Norton, with a faint smile.
"Weeks now, ma"am," said Jane. "But I see you don"t believe me."
"I believe you to be a good, affectionate girl, Jane," said Mrs Norton, "and that you love your mistress; but this seems to me to be a fearful and perfectly unfounded suspicion--one that I am glad, for every one"s sake, that you have hinted to no one else. Think of the absurdity of the thing. This has, you say, been going on for weeks; and yet, you see, your mistress is not poisoned yet."
"No, ma"am, not yet," said Jane, meaningly.
"Well, then, my good girl, how do you account for that?"
"Because, ma"am," said Jane, in a whisper, "she"s never taken any of the medicine but once."
"How? What do you mean?" exclaimed Mrs Norton.
"I"ve managed to get the stuff made up at two places, ma"am," whispered Jane. "One lot"s fetched by the footman from one chemist"s, at Marshton, and I get the gardener to go to another chemist"s for the other. I only had to send the doctor"s paper, and the medicine comes just like what Sir Murray knows is sent for."
"Well," exclaimed Ada, impatiently.
"Well, "m," whispered Jane, "that which her ladyship takes I keep locked up, and that which stands on the dressing-table gets poured out of the window, a little at a time, upon the flower-beds."
Ada Norton sat silently gazing at Jane for a few minutes before she spoke.
"Jane," she said, "this is a fearful charge!" and she shuddered. "I must think about it, and before many hours I will come over to the Castle, and see either Sir Murray or Lady Gernon. Do not be afraid; I will not implicate you in any way. I must see Mr Elstree, and I will try to make some plan--to arrange something definite; but your words have confused me--almost taken away my breath. The thing seems so monstrous, and even now I cannot believe it true! But I should not feel that I had done my duty if, after what you have said, I did not take some steps; so rest a.s.sured that I will do something, and at once."
Jane rose to go, and, trembling and excited, Ada Norton sat for some hours, pondering whether she should ask her husband"s advice, ending by putting it off till the next day, when it happened that it was out of her power.
Book 1, Chapter x.x.xIV.
NOT AT HOME.
"Did you see the laird?" said McCray, coming slowly forth from behind some bushes, after Jane had been standing some few minutes in the lane where she had left him to wait.
"The laird!" said Jane, starting. "Why, who do you mean?"
"Mean? Why, Sir Mooray himself. I saw him turn round to have a good look at ye, as ye came across the home close from the Hall. And ye didna see him?"
"No--no--no!" sobbed Jane. "Oh dear--oh dear! I"m undone!"
"Nay--nay, _ye"re_ not, la.s.sie; for I"ll a"ways stand by ye. Dinna greet aboot that. Ye didna tell me why ye came, but I know it"s for some good, and that ye"ll tell me all in good time."
"That I will, indeed!" sobbed Jane; "but don"t ask me now!"
"Nay, then, I"m not speering to know," said Sandy, contentedly. "He was riding the grey horse, ye ken, and he seemed to catch sight o" ye all at aince; when, thinking it wasna warth while for twa to be in trouble, I hid myself in the bushes till he"d gone by."
The next day, one anxiously looked forward to by more than one of the characters in this story, came in due course; and, towards evening, Lady Gernon slowly pa.s.sed through the hall door, basket in hand, and making her way across the lawn, disappeared from the sight of Sandy McCray behind some bushes at the edge of the park.
The hours sped on, and Ada Norton drove up in one of Chunt"s flys from the village public-house, after waiting some time at the Rectory, in a vain endeavour to see Mr Elstree, who was from home. She had, after many hours" thought, but a vague idea of the best plan to pursue, and even now questioned the wisdom of her course. In fact, more than once the check-string had been in her hand to arrest the driver, and order him to return to the Hall; but, from sheer shame at her vacillation, she let it fall again, and gazed slowly out from the fly-window at the glorious sweep of the n.o.ble domain through which she was being driven, and sighed again and again as she thought of the misery of its owners.
She half shrank from meeting Lady Gernon, for she felt that, in spite of all her a.s.surances to the contrary, her cousin must feel something of repugnance to the woman who had, as it were, taken her place. Not that she had robbed Lady Gernon of her happiness; she had been ready to resign all hope, and had given up, stifling her own feelings, when duty told her that she was called upon so to act. But could Marion feel the same?
She asked herself that question as the fly drove up to the n.o.ble front of the great mansion; and then, rousing herself for the task in hand, she prepared to meet her cousin.
"Not at home," was the answer given by the footman to the driver; when Ada beckoned the man to the fly door--a slow-speaking, insolent menial, who had, before now, performed Sir Murray"s liest in acting the part of spy.
"I think," said Ada, "that my cousin would see me, even if she is confined to her room."
"Sir Murray give orders, mum, that they were not at home to visitors from the Hall; and, besides, my lady ain"t in."
Ada Norton felt that it was cowardly, but it was with a sense of relief that she sank back against the cushions, and began to turn over in her mind what course she ought to pursue. She dreaded the exciting effect it might have upon her husband, if she revealed to him the words she had heard from Jane; and, trembling with an anxiety she could not drive away, she returned to the Hall, to find that Captain Norton had gone out.
"Packed a carpet bag, ma"am," said the servant, "and then wrote a note for you, after sending for Master Brace, and kissing him."
The note was on the table, and s.n.a.t.c.hing it up, Ada Norton read as follows:--
"Dearest Ada,
"Do not think hardly of me. I could not help myself; but I know you will not judge me harshly. More when I write again; but _give no information of my movements to a soul_. I shall be away some time, but I have made full arrangements with Garland and Son about you. Philip."
Abrupt, enigmatical, and strange; but it was like him. There was a vein of affection, though, running through it all. He had made arrangements for her; but the tears dimmed Ada Norton"s eyes as she stood with the letter in her hands. What could it all mean? she thought. Had it anything to do with the mining transaction? Should she drive over to Marshton the next day, and ask Messrs. Garland and Son, her husband"s solicitors? No, she would not do that; it would be like prying into his affairs. She had always had faith in him, so far, and that faith should continue to the end.
She dashed away the tears heroically, little thinking how soon and how sorely she was to be tried. It was nothing new for Norton to absent himself, and she could wait patiently for his return. "Like a good wife," she said, smilingly; and then, sitting down, she took her work, but only for it to fall into her lap, as she tried to divine what would be her best plan to adopt in connection with the strange information which had the day before been imparted to her.
Book 1, Chapter x.x.xV.
A STORM AT MERLAND.
Sir Murray Gernon had, during the past few weeks, made a good deal of use of his horses--another sign, the stablemen observed, of a returning good state of things, for they were growing quite tired of doing nothing but taking the horses out for exercise. But Sir Murray"s rides were only round and about his own estate: he never went far, though he was out for hours at a time; and the day before there was again a fierce look upon his face, as he caught sight of Jane Barker hurriedly leaving Merland Hall.
"Of course!" he said; he might have known that before. Time proved all things, and here, at length, was before his eyes the arrangement by which letters and messages had been conveyed.