Мэри Элизабет Брэддон
Wyllard's Weird
"I trust if Sir William Spencer come that he will be able to give you a more hopeful opinion."
"Yes, I am putting my trust in that. But I am full of fear. Dr. Danvers has such a shrewd clever air. He does not look the kind of man to be mistaken."
"But in these nervous disorders there is always room for error. You must hope for the best."
"I will try to hope, for Julian's sake. Goodbye. I must go back to my place at his bedside. I don't want him to see a strange face when he awakes."
"Good-bye. Remember, if there is any service I can render you, the slightest or the greatest, you have only to command me. I shall call this evening to hear how your patient progresses, and if Spencer is coming. But I shall not ask to see you."
He left the hotel full of trouble at the agony of one he loved. He thought of Dora in her helplessness, her loneliness, watching the slow decay of that vigorous frame, the gradual extinction of that powerful mind. What martyrdom could be more terrible for a tender-hearted woman?
He called at the Windsor in the evening. The patient was much the same. Sir William Spencer was expected at eight o'clock next morning.
Edward Heathcote was watching in front of the hotel when the physician drove up in a fly from the station. Dr. Danvers had gone into the hotel a few minutes before. Heathcote waited to see Sir William Spencer leave the hotel in the same fly, accompanied to the carriage door by Dr. Danvers. They were talking as they came out of the porte-cochère, and their faces were very grave. Heathcote felt that the great English doctor had not left hope behind him in those rooms on the first floor, with their sunny windows facing the palace-garden. He had not the heart to intrude upon Dora immediately after the consultation, though he was very anxious to hear Sir William's verdict. He watched the fly drive away, while Dr. Danvers walked briskly in the opposite direction: and then he strolled along the Rue de Rivoli towards the Palais Royal, hardly knowing where he went, so deeply were his thoughts occupied by the grief of the woman he loved.
What if Julian Wyllard were to die, that successful rival of his, the man who had stolen his plighted wife from him? The thought would come, though Heathcote tried to shut his mind against it, though he hated himself for harbouring so selfish an idea. The question would shape itself in his mind, would be answered somehow or other.
If Julian Wyllard were to die, and Dora were again free to wed whom she chose? Would the old love be rekindled in her heart? Would the old lover seem nearer and dearer to her than any other man on earth? Would she reward him for long years of patient devotion, for a faithfulness that had never wavered? Alas, no, he could hope for no such reward, he who had married within a year or two of losing her, who had, in the world's eye, consoled himself speedily for that loss. Could he go to her and say, "I never loved my wife; I married her out of pity; my love was given to you, and you alone!"
That was his secret. To Dora Wyllard he must have seemed as fickle as the common herd of men, who change their loves as easily as they change their tailors. He could put forward no claim for past constancy. No, were she once again free, it would be by the devotion of the future that he must win her.
And then he recalled what the physician had said about Julian Wyllard's malady. It would be a slow and lingering disease – a decay of years, perhaps. He saw the dark possibility of such a martyrdom. Dora's life would be worn and wasted in the attendance upon that decaying frame, that sorely tried mind and temper. She would sacrifice health, spirits, life itself, perhaps, in her devotion to her afflicted husband. And when the end at last came – the dismal end of all her care and tenderness – would she be a woman to be wooed and won? Would not life for her be over, all possibility of happiness for ever gone? Only a little respite, a little rest remaining before the grave should close on her broken heart.
No, there was no ground for selfish rejoicing, for wicked hope, in Julian Wyllard's malady.
Heathcote ordered a simple breakfast in one of the quietest cafés in the Palais Royal, and lingered over the meal and the newspapers till he was able to present himself with a better grace at the Windsor. He had some difficulty in reading the news of the day with attention, or even comprehension, so full were his thoughts. He recalled Julian Wyllard's manner and bearing during the last few months, and wondered at the vigour, the freshness of mind, the power which had been so obvious in every look, and tone, and gesture. That such a man could suddenly be struck down without a day's warning, without any imaginable cause, had seemed almost incomprehensible. Had the nature of the attack been different, the thing would have appeared less inexplicable. An apoplectic fit striking down the strong man in his might, as if from the blow of a Nasmyth hammer, would have seemed far more in character with the nature of the patient, his vigorous manhood, his appearance of physical power.
Heathcote called at the Windsor between twelve and one o'clock, and had only a few minutes to wait in the salon before he was joined by Mrs. Wyllard.
She was very pale, but she was more composed than on the previous day. Her countenance had a rigid look, Heathcote thought; as if she had schooled herself to composure by a severe mental effort. The hand she gave him was deadly cold.
"I trust you have good news for me," he said. "Is Spencer more hopeful than your Paris physician?"
"No, there is no hope. I had a long talk with both the doctors after their consultation. It was very difficult to wring the truth from them both – to get them to be quite candid. They seemed to pity me so much. They were full of kindness. As if kindness or pity would help me in my trouble for him! Nothing can help me – no one – except God. And perhaps He will not. It seems that in this life there are a certain number of victims, chosen haphazard, who must suffer mysterious, purposeless agonies. And Julian is to be one of those sufferers. It is bitter, inexplicable, cruel. My soul revolts against these fruitless punishments."
"Tell me what Sir William said."
"The worst. Julian's symptoms indicate a disease of the spinal cord: progressive muscular atrophy, Sir William called it, a disease generally caused by excessive muscular activity, but in this case due to the strain upon the mind. He will waste away inch by inch, hour by hour, and he will suffer terribly. Yes, that is the worst. This gradual decay will be a long martyrdom. He will be dependent on opiates for relief. I am to take comfort in the thought that his pain can be soothed by repeated injections of morphia; that a sleeping draught will give him a little rest at night. He is to exist under the influence of narcotics; he who a few months ago seemed the incarnation of health and vigour."
"A few months ago, you say. Then you have remarked a change in him of late?" inquired Heathcote.
"Yes, there has been a change, subtle, mysterious. I could not describe the symptoms to Sir William Spencer. But there was a curious alteration in his ways and manner. He was much more irritable. He had strange intervals of silence."
"Can you recall the beginning of this alteration?"
"Hardly. It was a change that seems to have had no beginning. It was so gradual – imperceptible almost. It was during that very oppressive weather early in August that I noticed he was looking ill and haggard. I thought that he was angry and worried about Bothwell, and that he was vexed at the stupidity of his bailiff, who had mismanaged one of the farms, and involved him in a law-suit with a tenant. I fancied these things were worrying him, and that the excessive heat was making him ill. I begged him to take medical advice; but he was angry at the suggestion, and declared that he never felt better in his life."
"What does Sir William advise?"
"That we should go back to Penmorval at once, or at least as soon as the proper arrangements can be made for the journey. I have telegraphed to Julian's valet to come here immediately, and Sir William will send a trained nurse from London by the evening mail. We shall have plenty of help. Fortunately it is Julian's own wish to go back to Cornwall."
"Is there any improvement in his state today?"
"I dare not say there is improvement. He is very calm, quite resigned. The physicians told him the nature of his malady; but they did not tell him that it is hopeless. They left his own intelligence to discover that; and I fear he knows the truth only too well already. Would you like to see him, if he is inclined to receive you?"
"Yes, I should much like to see him."
Dora went into the adjoining room, and closed the door behind her. She reopened it almost immediately, and beckoned to Heathcote, who went in with careful footstep and bated breath, almost as he might have entered the chamber of death.
Julian Wyllard was reclining on a sofa, his head and shoulders propped up by pillows, his legs covered with a fur rug. There was something in the very position of the body, so straight, so rigid a line from the waist downwards, which told of that death in life that had fallen upon the strong man; the man whom Edward Heathcote had last seen erect, in all the vigour of manhood, tall, broad-shouldered, powerful.
"Well, Heathcote, you have come to see the wreck of proud humanity," he said, with a half-sad, half-cynical smile. "You did not know when you were with us the other night that my race was so nearly run, that I was to break down in the middle of the course. I have had my warnings, but I made light of them, and the blow came unexpectedly at last. But it has left the brain clear. That is some comfort. Sit down; I want to talk to you – and Dora – seriously."
He was very pale – white even to the lips, and his wife was watching him anxiously, surprised at the signs of profound agitation in him who had been so calm after the physicians had left him.
"I am very sorry for you, Wyllard; sorry with all my heart," said Heathcote earnestly, as he took the chair nearest the sofa, while Dora seated herself on the other side, close to her husband.
"You are more than good. I am assured that everybody will – pity me," this with a smile of bitterest meaning. "But I want to talk to you about two people in whom you and Dora are both interested – your very lovable sister, and my wife's scapegrace cousin. They are devoted to each other; it seems, and except for this little cloud upon Bothwell's character, I take it you had no objection to the match."
"That was my chief objection."
"Forgive me for saying that it was a most foolish one. Because a few country bumpkins take it into their heads to suspect a gentleman – "
"Pardon me, Mr. Wyllard, if I confess that I was among those bumpkins. Mr. Grahame's refusal to answer Mr. Distin's questions, and his obvious agitation, led me to believe that he was concerned in that girl's death. I am thankful to be able to say that my discoveries on this side of the Channel all point in a different direction, while on the other hand my sister assures me that her lover has satisfactorily explained the reason of his peculiar conduct at the inquest."
"You have no further objection to Bothwell as a husband for your sister?"
"No, my esteem for the race from which he sprang is a strong reason why I should sanction the match; although worldly wisdom is decidedly against a girl's marriage with a man who was a soldier, and who is – nothing."
"It shall be our business – Dora's and mine – to reconcile worldly wisdom and foolish love. My wife tells me that her cousin has turned over a new leaf – that he has schemed out a new career, and has set to work with a wonderful amount of energy – just that strong purpose which has been lacking in him hitherto."
"I have heard as much, and a good deal more than this, from my sister."
"Well, then, my dear Heathcote, all I need add is that means shall not be wanting to my wife's kinsman to enable him to carry out the scheme of life which he has made for himself, comfortably and creditably. Dora and I are both rich. We have no children. We can afford to be generous in the present; and those we love must naturally profit by our wealth in the future. Dora's fortune will, in all likelihood, go to Bothwell's children. In a word, your sister is not asked to marry a pauper."
"I have never thought of the question from a financial standpoint."
"But it must be not the less agreeable to you to know that the financial aspect is satisfactory," answered Wyllard. "And now what is to hinder a speedy marriage? It is my wife's wish, Bothwell's wish, mine, everybody's, so far as I can understand, except yours. You are the only hindrance. Heathcote, I want to see Bothwell and Hilda married before I die."
"Julian!" cried his wife, with a stifled sob.
"O my dearest, I am not going to leave you yet awhile," answered her husband, clasping her hand, and raising it to his lips with infinite tenderness. "My doctors promise me a slow deliverance. But when a man has begun to die, were it never so gradually, it is time for him to set his house in order. I should like to see Bothwell and Hilda married in Bodmin Church, before the eyes of the people who have maligned my wife's kinsman. I should like the wedding to take place as soon as possible."
"I am sure Hilda's brother will not refuse your request," said Dora, with a pleading look at Heathcote.
"If Hilda and her lover can fulfil their own scheme of happiness by a speedy marriage, I will not be a stumbling-block," said Heathcote.
After this they talked for a little while on indifferent subjects, and of the journey back to Cornwall – that tedious journey of a helpless invalid which would be so different from any previous experience of Julian Wyllard's. He spoke of it lightly enough, affecting a philosophical disdain for the changes and chances of this little life: but Heathcote marked the quiver of his lip, the look of pain, which neither pride nor stoicism could suppress.
Yes, it was a hard thing for such a man, in the very prime of life, handsome, clever, prosperous, to be so struck down: and it could but be said that Julian Wyllard carried himself firmly under the trial.
Heathcote and Dora parted sorrowfully outside the sick-room.
"Is it not good of him to wish to see Bothwell's happiness secured?" she said.
"It is very good of him to think of any one except himself at such a moment," answered Heathcote.
"I am so glad he has won your consent to an early marriage. And now that you have given that consent – now that we are all assured of the folly of any suspicion pointing at Bothwell – I conclude that you will trouble yourself no more about the mystery of that poor girl's death."
"There you are mistaken. I shall go on with my investigation, in the cause of justice. Besides, Bothwell's character can never be thoroughly rehabilitated till the real criminal is found; and, for a third reason, I am interested in this strange story as a work of art. Good-bye, Mrs. Wyllard; if I can be of any use to you to-morrow in helping to move your invalid, pray send for me. If not, I suppose we shall not meet till I call on you at Penmorval. I leave the business of Hilda's marriage to your discretion. She cannot have a better adviser than you, and whatever plans you make I shall sanction."
He left the hotel and strolled slowly towards the Madeleine, hardly knowing what he should do with the rest of his day. He had an appointment with Sigismond Trottier in the evening. That gentleman and he were to meet at the Gymnase at the first performance of a new play, and they were to sup at Vachette's afterwards, when Heathcote was to hear any fresh facts that the paragraphist might have gathered for him relating to the mysterious Georges and the once celebrated Mdlle. Prévol. Trottier had promised to hunt up the few men who had been intimate with Georges, and to get all the information he could from them.
In front of the Madeleine Heathcote was overtaken by that good-natured merchant, Gustav Blümenlein, who had felt so much pleasure in showing his apartments to Mrs. Wyllard. They walked on together for a short distance, in the direction of the Blümenlein establishment, and Heathcote told the merchant of his predecessor's sudden illness.
Monsieur Blümenlein was interested and sympathetic, and as they were now in front of his office, he insisted upon Mr. Heathcote going in to smoke a cigarette, or share a bottle of Lafitte with him. Heathcote refused the Lafitte, but accepted the cigarette, not sorry to find an excuse for revisiting his rival's old abode. He blamed himself for this curiosity about Julian Wyllard's youth, as an unworthy and petty feeling: yet, he could not resist the temptation to gratify that curiosity which chance had thrown in his way.
They went through the offices, where clerks were working at their ledgers, and warehousemen hurrying in and out, and passed into the library – that handsome and somewhat luxurious apartment, which remained in all things, save the books upon the shelves, exactly as Julian Wyllard had left it.
"Did you know him twenty years ago?" asked Blümenlein, after they had talked of the late tenant, and his successful career in Paris.
"No, I never saw him till just before his marriage, about seven years ago."
"Ah, then you did not know him as a young man. I have a photograph of him in that drawer, yonder," pointing to a writing-table by the fireplace, "taken fifteen years ago, when he was beginning to make his fortune; when the Crédit Mauresque was at the height of its popularity. It went to smash afterwards, as, no doubt, you know; but Wyllard contrived to get out of it with clean hands – only just contrived."
"You mean to say that his part of the transaction was open to doubt?"
"My dear sir, on the Bourse, during the Empire, everything was, more or less, open to doubt. There were only two irrefragable facts in the financial world of that time. There was a great deal of money made, and a great deal of money lost. Mr. Wyllard was a very clever man, and he contrived to be from first to last on the winning side. Nobody ever brought any charge of foul play against him; and, in this matter, he was luckier, or cleverer, than the majority of his compeers."
"I should like to see that photograph of which you spoke just now," said Heathcote.
"You shall see it. A clever face, a remarkable face, I take it," answered Blümenlein, unlocking a drawer, and producing a photograph.
Yes, it was a fine head, a powerful head, instinct with wondrous vitality, with the energy of a man bound to dominate others, in any sphere of life; a master of whatever craft he practised. It was not the face of abstract intellect. The white, cold light of the student did not illumine those eyes, nor did the calm of the student's tranquil temper inform the mouth. There was passion in the face; strongest human feelings were expressed there; the love of love, the hate of hate.
"It is a marvellous face for a money-grubber," exclaimed Heathcote, "an extraordinary countenance for a man who could shut himself from all the charms of the world, such a world as the Second Empire – a man who could be indifferent to art, beauty, wit, music, social pleasures of all kinds, and live only for his cash-box and bank-book. Difficult to reconcile this face with the life which we are told Wyllard led in these rooms."
"It is more than difficult," said Blümenlein; "it is, to my mind, impossible to believe in so monstrous an anomaly as that sordid life endured for nearly ten years by such a temperament as that which the photograph indicates. I am something of a physiognomist, and I think I know what that face means; if faces have any meaning whatever. It means strong feeling, a fervid imagination, a mind that could not be satisfied with the triumphs of successful finance. It means a nature in which the heart must have fair play. Whatever Julian Wyllard's life may have appeared in the eyes of the men with whom he had business relations – however he may have contrived to pass for the serious genius of finance, old before his time, the embodiment of abstruse calculations and far-seeing policy – be sure that the life was not a barren life, and that fiery passions were factors in the sum of that existence."
"But his life seems to have been patent to all the world."
"Yes, Mr. Heathcote, the life he led in public. But who knows how he may have plunged into the dissipations of Paris after office hours? That little door in the alcove has its significance, you may be sure. I made light of it in Mrs. Wyllard's presence, for I know that women are jealous even of the past. Why should I deprive her of the pleasure of considering her husband a model of propriety, in the remote past as well as in the present? I affected – for that dear lady's sake – to believe the side door the work of a prior tenant to Mr. Wyllard. But I happen to have documentary evidence that Mr. Wyllard had the door made for him in the third year of his tenancy. I found the receipted account of the builder who made it, among some papers left by my predecessor at the back of a cupboard."
"Then you think that Wyllard was a man with two faces?"
"I do," replied Blümenlein: "I think that Wyllard, the speculator and financier, was one man – but that there was another man of whose life the world knew nothing, and who went out and came in between dusk and dawn by that side door in the court."
