Book: The Evil Genius

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She had left the door of the room open. One of the servants of
the hotel appeared outside in the passage. He spoke to some
person behind him. "Perhaps the book has been left in here," he
suggested. A gentle voice answered: "I hope the lady and
gentleman will excuse me, if I ask leave to look for my book."
She stepped into the room to make her apologies.

Herbert Linley and Sydney Westerfield looked at the woman whom
they had outraged. The woman whom they had outraged paused, and
looked back at them.

The hotel servant was surprised at their not speaking to each
other. He was a stupid man; he thought the gentlefolks were
strangely unlike gentlefolks in general; they seemed not to know
what to say. Herbert happened to be standing nearest to him; he
felt that it would be civil to the gentleman to offer a word of
explanation.

"The lady had these rooms, sir. She has come back from the
station to look for a book that has been left behind."

Herbert signed to him to go. As the man turned to obey, he drew
back. Sydney had moved to the door before him, to leave the room.
Herbert refused to permit it. "Stay here," he said to her gently;
"this room is yours."

Sydney hesitated. Herbert addressed her again. He pointed to his
divorced wife. "You see how that lady is looking at you," he
said; "I beg that you will not submit to insult from anybody."

Sydney obeyed him: she returned to the room.

Catherine's voice was heard for the first time. She addressed
herself to Sydney with a quiet dignity--far removed from anger,
further removed still from contempt.

"You were about to leave the room," she said. "I notice--as an
act of justice to _you_--that my presence arouses some sense of
shame."

Herbert turned to Sydney; trying to recover herself, she stood
near the table. "Give me the book," he said; "the sooner this
comes to an end the better for her, the better for us." Sydney
gave him the book. With a visible effort, he matched Catherine's
self-control; after all, she had remembered his gift! He offered
the book to her.

She still kept her eyes fixed on Sydney--still spoke to Sydney.

"Tell him," she said, "that I refuse to receive the book."

Sydney attempted to obey. At the first words she uttered, Herbert
checked her once more.

"I have begged you already not to submit to insult." He turned to
Catherine. "The book is yours, madam. Why do you refuse to take
it?"

She looked at him for the first time. A proud sense of wrong
flashed at him its keenly felt indignation in her first glance.
"Your hands and her hands have touched it," she answered. "I
leave it to _you_ and to _her_."

Those words stung him. "Contempt," he said, "is bitter indeed on
your lips."

"Do you presume to resent my contempt?"

"I forbid you to insult Miss Westerfield." With that reply, he
turned to Sydney. "You shall not suffer while I can prevent it,"
he said tenderly, and approached to put his arm round her. She
looked at Catherine, and drew back from his embrace, gently
repelling him by a gesture.

Catherine felt and respected the true delicacy, the true
penitence, expressed in that action. She advanced to Sydney.
"Miss Westerfield," she said, "I will take the book--from you."

Sydney gave back the book without a word; in her position silence
was the truest gratitude. Quietly and firmly Catherine removed
the blank leaf on which Herbert had written, and laid it before
him on the table. "I return your inscription. It means nothing
now." Those words were steadily pronounced; not the slightest
appearance of temper accompanied them. She moved slowly to the
door and looked back at Sydney. "Make some allowance for what I
have suffered," she said gently. "If I have wounded you, I regret
it." The faint sound of her dress on the carpet was heard in the
perfect stillness, and lost again. They saw her no more.

Herbert approached Sydney. It was a moment when he was bound to
assure her of his sympathy. He felt for her. In his inmost heart
he felt for her. As he drew nearer, he saw tears in her eyes; but
they seemed to have risen without her knowledge. Hardly conscious
of his presence, she stood before him--lost in thought.

He endeavored to rouse her. "Did I protect you from insult?" he
asked.

She said absently: "Yes!"

"Will you do as I do, dear? Will you try to forget?"

She said: "I will try to atone," and moved toward the door of her
room. The reply surprised him; but it was no time then to ask for
an explanation.

"Would you like to lie down, Sydney, and rest?"

"Yes."

She took his arm. He led her to the door of her room. "Is there
anything else I can do for you?" he asked.

"Nothing, thank you."

She closed the door--and abruptly opened it again. "One thing
more," she said. "Kiss me."

He kissed her tenderly. Returning to the sitting-room, he looked
back across the passage. Her door was shut.

His head was heavy; his mind felt confused. He threw himself on
the sofa--utterly exhausted by the ordeal through which he had
passed. In grief, in fear, in pain, the time still comes when
Nature claims her rights. The wretched worn-out man fell into a
restless sleep. He was awakened by the waiter, laying the cloth
for dinner. "It's just ready, sir," the servant announced; "shall
I knock at the lady's door?"

Herbert got up and went to her room.

He entered softly, fearing to disturb her if she too had slept.
No sign of her was to be seen. She had evidently not rested on
her bed. A morsel of paper lay on the smooth coverlet. There was
only a line written on it: "You may yet be happy--and it may
perhaps be my doing."

He stood, looking at that last line of her writing, in the empty
room. His despair and his submission spoke in the only words that
escaped him:

"I have deserved it!"




FIFTH BOOK.


Chapter XXXVIII.



Hear the Lawyer.


"Mr. Herbert Linley, I ask permission to reply to your inquiries
in writing, because it is quite likely that some of the opinions
you will find here might offend you if I expressed them
personally. I can relieve your anxiety on the subject of Miss
Sydney Westerfield. But I must be allowed to do so in my own
way--without any other restraints than those which I think it
becoming to an honorable man to impose on himself.

"You are quite right in supposing that Miss Westerfield had heard
me spoken of at Mount Morven, as the agent and legal adviser of
the lady who was formerly your wife. What purpose led her to
apply to me, under these circumstances, you will presently
discover. As to the means by which she found her way to my
office, I may remind you that any directory would give her the
necessary information.

"Miss Westerfield's object was to tell me, in the first place,
that her guilty life with you was at an end. She has left your
protection--not to return to it. I was sorry to see (though she
tried to hide it from me) how keenly she felt the parting. You
have been dearly loved by two sweet women, and they have thrown
their hearts away on you--as women will.

"Having explained the circumstances so far, Miss Westerfield next
mentioned the motive which had brought her to my office. She
asked if I would inform her of Mrs. Norman's address.

"This request, I confess, astonished me.

"To my mind she was, of all persons, the last who ought to
contemplate communicating in any way with Mrs. Norman. I say this
to you; but I refrained from saying it to her. What I did venture
to do was to ask for her reasons. She answered that they were
reasons which would embarrass her if she communicated them to a
stranger.

"After this reply, I declined to give her the information she
wanted.

"Not unprepared, as it appeared to me, for my refusal, she asked
next if I was willing to tell her where she might find your
brother, Mr. Randal Linley. In this case I was glad to comply
with her request. She could address herself to no person worthier
to advise her than your brother. In giving her his address in
London, I told her that he was absent on a visit to some friends,
and that he was expected to return in a week's time.

"She thanked me, and rose to go.

"I confess I was interested in her. Perhaps I thought of the time
when she might have been as dear to her father as my own
daughters are to me. I asked if her parents were living: they
were dead. My next question was: 'Have you any friends in
London?' She answered: 'I have no friends.' It was said with a
resignation so very sad in so young a creature that I was really
distressed. I ran the risk of offending her--and asked if she
felt any embarrassment in respect of money. She said: 'I have
some small savings from my salary when I was a governess.' The
change in her tone told me that she was alluding to the time of
her residence at Mount Morven. It was impossible to look at this
friendless girl, and not feel some anxiety about the lodging
which she might have chosen in such a place as London. She had
fortunately come to me from the railway, and had not thought yet
of where she was to live. At last I was able to be of some use to
her. My senior clerk took care of Miss Westerfield, and left her
among respectable people, in whose house she could live cheaply
and safely. Where that house is, I refuse (for her sake) to tell
you. She shall not be disturbed.

"After a week had passed I received a visit from my good friend,
Randal Linley.

"He had on that day seen Miss Westerfield. She had said to him
what she had said to me, and had repeated the request which I
thought it unwise to grant; owning to your brother, however, the
motives which she had refused to confide to me. He was so
strongly impressed by the sacrifice of herself which this
penitent woman had made, that he was at first disposed to trust
her with Mrs. Norman's address.

"Reflection, however, convinced him that her motives, pure and
disinterested as they undoubtedly were, did not justify him in
letting her expose herself to the consequences which might follow
the proposed interview. All that he engaged to do was to repeat
to Mrs. Norman what Miss Westerfield had said, and to inform the
young lady of the result.

"In the intervals of business, I had felt some uneasiness when I
thought of Miss Westerfield's prospects. Your good brother at
once set all anxiety on this subject at rest.

"He proposed to place Miss Westerfield under the care of an old
and dear friend of her late father--Captain Bennydeck. Her
voluntary separation from you offered to your brother, and to the
Captain, the opportunity for which they had both been waiting.
Captain Bennydeck was then cruising at sea in his yacht.
Immediately on his return, Miss Westerfield's inclination would
be consulted, and she would no doubt eagerly embrace the
opportunity of being introduced to her father's friend.

"I have now communicated all that I know, in reply to the
questions which you have addressed to me. Let me earnestly advise
you to make the one reparation to this poor girl which is in your
power. Resign yourself to a separation which is not only for her
good, but for yours.--SAMUEL SARRAZIN."



Chapter XXXIX.


Listen to Reason.


Not having heard from Captain Bennydeck for some little time,
Randal thought it desirable in Sydney's interests to make
inquiries at his club. Nothing was known of the Captain's
movements there. On the chance of getting the information that he
wanted, Randal wrote to the hotel at Sandyseal.

The landlord's reply a little surprised him.

Some days since, the yacht had again appeared in the bay. Captain
Bennydeck had landed, to all appearance in fairly good health;
and had left by an early train for London. The sailing-master
announced that he had orders to take the vessel back to her
port--with no other explanation than that the cruise was over.
This alternative in the Captain's plans (terminating the voyage a
month earlier than his arrangements had contemplated) puzzled
Randal. He called at his friend's private residence, only to hear
from the servants that they had seen nothing of their master.
Randal waited a while in London, on the chance that Bennydeck
might pay him a visit.

During this interval his patience was rewarded in an unexpected
manner. He discovered the Captain's address by means of a letter
from Catherine, dated "Buck's Hotel, Sydenham." Having gently
reproached him for not writing to her or calling on her, she
invited him to dinner at the hotel. Her letter concluded in these
words: "You will only meet one person besides ourselves--your
friend, and (since we last met) our friend too. Captain Bennydeck
has got tired of the sea. He is staying at this hotel, to try the
air of Sydenham, and he finds that it agrees with him."

These lines set Randal thinking seriously.

To represent Bennydeck as being "tired of the sea," and as being
willing to try, in place of the breezy Channel, the air of a
suburb of London, was to make excuses too perfectly futile and
absurd to deceive any one who knew the Captain. In spite of the
appearance of innocence which pervaded Catherine's letter, the
true motive for breaking off his cruise might be found, as Randal
concluded, in Catherine herself. Her residence at the sea-side,
helped by the lapse of time, had restored to her personal
attractions almost all they had lost under the deteriorating
influences of care and grief; and her change of name must have
protected her from a discovery of the Divorce which would have
shocked a man so sincerely religious as Bennydeck. Had her beauty
fascinated him? Was she aware of the interest that he felt in
her? and was it secretly understood and returned? Randal wrote
to accept the invitation; determining to present himself before
the appointed hour, and to question Catherine privately, without
giving her the advantage over him of preparing herself for the
interview.

In the short time that passed before the day of the dinner,
distressing circumstances strengthened his resolution. After
months of separation, he received a visit from Herbert.

Was this man--haggard, pallid, shabby, looking at him piteously
with bloodshot eyes--the handsome, pleasant, prosperous brother
whom he remembered? Randal was so grieved, that he was for a
moment unable to utter a word. He could only point to a seat.
Herbert dropped into the chair as if he was reduced to the last
extremity of fatigue. And yet he spoke roughly; he looked like an
angry man brought to bay.

"I seem to frighten you," he said.

"You distress me, Herbert, more than words can say."

"Give me a glass of wine. I've been walking--I don't know where.
A long distance; I'm dead beat."

He drank the wine greedily. Whatever reviving effect it might
otherwise have produced on him, it made no change in the
threatening gloom of his manner. In a man morally weak, calamity
(suffered without resisting power) breaks its way through the
surface which exhibits a gentleman, and shows the naked nature
which claims kindred with our ancestor the savage.

"Do you feel better, Herbert?"

He put down the empty glass, taking no notice of his brother's
question. "Randal," he said, "you know where Sydney is."

Randal admitted it.

"Give me her address. My mind's in such a state I can't remember
it; write it down."

"No, Herbert."

"You won't write it? and you won't give it?"

"I will do neither the one nor the other. Go back to your chair;
fierce looks and clinched fists don't frighten me. Miss
Westerfield is quite right in separating herself from you. And
you are quite wrong in wishing to go back to her. There are my
reasons. Try to understand them. And, once again, sit down."

He spoke sternly--with his heart aching for his brother all the
time. He was right. The one way is the positive way, when a man
who suffers trouble is degraded by it.

The poor wretch sank under Randal's firm voice and steady eye.

"Don't be hard on me," he said. "I think a man in my situation is
to be pitied--especially by his brother. I'm not like you; I'm
not accustomed to live alone. I've been accustomed to having a
kind woman to talk to me, and take care of me. You don't know
what it is to be used to seeing a pretty creature, always nicely
dressed, always about the room--thinking so much of you, and so
little of herself--and then to be left alone as I am left, out in
the dark. I haven't got my wife; she has thrown me over, and
taken my child away from me. And, now, Sydney's taken away from
me next. I'm alone. Do you hear that? Alone! Take the poker there
out of the fireplace. Give me back Sydney, or knock out my
brains. I haven't courage enough to do it for myself. Oh, why did
I engage that governess! I was so happy, Randal, with Catherine
and little Kitty."

He laid his head wearily on the back of his chair. Randal offered
him more wine; he refused it.

"I'm afraid," he said. "Wine maddens me if I take too much of it.
You have heard of men forgetting their sorrows in drink. I tried
it yesterday; it set my brains on fire; I'm feeling that glass I
took just now. No! I'm not faint. It eases my head when I rest
like this. Shake hands, Randal; we have never had any unfriendly
words; we mustn't begin now. There's something perverse about me.
I didn't know how fond I was of Sydney till I lost her; I didn't
know how fond I was of my wife till I left her." He paused, and
put his hand to his fevered head. Was his mind wandering into
some other train of thought? He astonished his brother by a new
entreaty--the last imaginable entreaty that Randal expected to
hear. "Dear old fellow, I want you to do me a favor. Tell me
where my wife is living now?"

"Surely," Randal answered, "you know that she is no longer your
wife?"

"Never mind that! I have something to say to her."

"You can't do it."

"Can _you_ do it? Will you give her a message?"

"Let me hear what it is first."

Herbert lifted his head, and laid his hand earnestly on his
brother's arm. When he said his next words he was almost like his
old self again.

"Say that I'm lonely, say that I'm dying for want of a little
comfort--ask her to let me see Kitty."

His tone touched Randal to the quick. "I feel for you, Herbert,"
he said, warmly. "She shall have your message; all that I can do
to persuade her shall be done."

"As soon as possible?"

"Yes--as soon as possible."

"And you won't forget? No, no; of course you won't forget." He
tried to rise, and fell back again into his chair. "Let me rest a
little," he pleaded, "if I'm not in the way. I'm not fit company
for you, I know; I'll go when you tell me."

Randal refused to let him go at all. "You will stay here with me;
and if I happen to be away, there will be somebody in the house,
who is almost as fond of you as I am." He mentioned the name of
one of the old servants at Mount Morven, who had attached himself
to Randal after the breakup of the family. "And now rest," he
said, "and let me put this cushion under your head."

Herbert answered: "It's like being at home again"--and composed
himself to rest.



Chapter XL.


Keep Your Temper.


On the next day but one, Randal arranged his departure for
Sydenham, so as to arrive at the hotel an hour before the time
appointed for the dinner. His prospects of success, in pleading
for a favorable reception of his brother's message, were so
uncertain that he refrained--in fear of raising hopes which he
might not be able to justify--from taking Herbert into his
confidence. No one knew on what errand he was bent, when he left
the house. As he took his place in the carriage, the newspaper
boy appeared at the window as usual. The new number of a popular
weekly journal had that day been published. Randal bought it.

After reading one or two of the political articles, he arrived at
the columns specially devoted to "Fashionable Intelligence."
Caring nothing for that sort of news, he was turning over the
pages in search of the literary and dramatic articles, when a
name not unfamiliar to him caught his eye. He read the paragraph
in which it appeared.


"The charming widow, Mrs. Norman, is, we hear, among the
distinguished guests staying at Buck's Hotel. It is whispered
that the lady is to be shortly united to a retired naval officer
of Arctic fame; now better known, perhaps, as one of our leading
philanthropists."

The allusion to Bennydeck was too plain to be mistaken. Randal
looked again at the first words in the paragraph. "The charming
widow!" Was it possible that this last word referred to
Catherine? To suppose her capable of assuming to be a widow,
and--if the child asked questions--of telling Kitty that her
father was dead, was, in Randal's estimation, to wrong her
cruelly. With his own suspicions steadily contradicting him, he
arrived at the hotel, obstinately believing that "the charming
widow" would prove to be a stranger.

A first disappointment was in store for him when he entered the
house. Mrs. Norman and her little daughter were out driving with
a friend, and were expected to return in good time for dinner.
Mrs. Presty was at home; she was reported to be in the garden of
the hotel.

Randal found her comfortably established in a summerhouse, with
her knitting in her hands, and a newspaper on her lap. She
advanced to meet him, all smiles and amiability. "How nice of you
to come so soon!" she began. Her keen penetration discovered
something in his face which checked the gayety of her welcome.
"You don't mean to say that you are going to spoil our pleasant
little dinner by bringing bad news!" she added, looking at him
suspiciously.

"It depends on you to decide that," Randal replied.

"How very complimentary to a poor useless old woman! Don't be
mysterious, my dear. I don't belong to the generation which
raises storms in tea-cups, and calls skirmishes with savages
battles. Out with it!"

Randal handed his paper to her, open at the right place. "There
is my news," he said.

Mrs. Presty looked at the paragraph, and handed _her_ newspaper
to Randal.

"I am indeed sorry to spoil your dramatic effect," she said. "But
you ought to have known that we are only half an hour behind you,
at Sydenham, in the matter of news. The report is premature, my
good friend. But if these newspaper people waited to find out
whether a report is true or false, how much gossip would society
get in its favorite newspapers? Besides, if it isn't true now, it
will be true next week. The author only says, 'It's whispered.'
How delicate of him! What a perfect gentleman!"

"Am I really to understand, Mrs. Presty, that Catherine--"

"You are to understand that Catherine is a widow. I say it with
pride, a widow of my making!"

"If this is one of your jokes, ma'am--"

"Nothing of the sort, sir."

"Are you aware, Mrs. Presty, that my brother--"

"Oh, don't talk of your brother! He's an obstacle in our way, and
we have been compelled to get rid of him."

Randal drew back a step. Mrs. Presty's audacity was something
more than he could understand. "Is this woman mad?" he said to
himself.

"Sit down," said Mrs. Presty. "If you are determined to make a
serious business of it--if you insist on my justifying
myself--you are to be pitied for not possessing a sense of humor,
but you shall have your own way. I am put on my defense. Very
well. You shall hear how my divorced daughter and my poor little
grandchild were treated at Sandyseal, after you left us."

Having related the circumstances, she suggested that Randal
should put himself in Catherine's place, before he ventured on
expressing an opinion. "Would you have exposed yourself to be
humiliated again in the same way?" she asked. "And would you have
seen your child made to suffer as well as yourself?"

"I should have kept in retirement for the future," he answered,
"and not have trusted my child and myself among strangers in
hotels."

"Ah, indeed? And you would have condemned your poor little
daughter to solitude? You would have seen her pining for the
company of other children, and would have had no mercy on her? I
wonder what you would have done when Captain Bennydeck paid us a
visit at the seaside? He was introduced to Mrs. Norman, and to
Mrs. Norman's little girl, and we were all charmed with him. When
he and I happened to be left together he naturally wondered,
after having seen the beautiful wife, where the lucky husband
might be. If he had asked you about Mr. Norman, how would you
have answered him?"

"I should have told the truth."

"You would have said there was no Mr. Norman?"

"Yes."

"Exactly what I did! And the Captain of course concluded (after
having been introduced to Kitty) that Mrs. Norman was a widow. If
I had set him right, what would have become of my daughter's
reputation? If I had told the truth at this hotel, when everybody
wanted to know what Mrs. Norman, that handsome lady, was--what
would the consequences have been to Catherine and her little
girl? No! no! I have made the best of a miserable situation; I
have consulted the tranquillity of a cruelly injured woman and an
innocent child--with this inevitable result; I have been obliged
to treat your brother like a character in a novel. I have
ship-wrecked Herbert as the shortest way of answering
inconvenient questions. Vessel found bottom upward in the middle
of the Atlantic, and everybody on board drowned, of course. Worse
stories have been printed; I do assure you, worse stories have
been printed."

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