A Changed Heart Part 44

"Did you find Cherrie?" serenely repeated Captain Cavendish.

"No," said Val. "Do you know where she is!"

The question might have disconcerted any other man, but it only made the young officer stare.

"I! My dear fellow, I don't understand you!"

"Oh, yes, you do," said Mr. Blake. "I think you are about as apt to know the hiding-place of little Cherrie as any other man in this province.

That she is in hiding I am positive; and I'll ferret her out yet, as sure as my name's Blake."

There was a certain determination in Mr. Blake's voice that the captain by no means liked, but he only laughed indifferently.

"Success to you! No one will be more rejoiced to see the little dear back in Speckport than I! The place is a desert without her; but I give you my word of honor, Blake, she might be in the moon for all I know to the contrary."

And in saying this, Captain Cavendish spoke the truth, for Cherrie had not yet written.

The notion had been vaguely floating through Val's mind, ever since the robbery and murder and Cherrie's flight, that the English officer was in some way connected with the affair. He might even have mentally suspected him of the crime, but for one circ.u.mstance. It was at precisely eleven o'clock Midge had first been alarmed by the flying footsteps of the a.s.sa.s.sin; and at precisely eleven the Princess Royal had left Speckport, with the captain on board. It was clear he could not be in two places at once; so Val had acquitted him of the murder, but not of knowing Cherrie's whereabouts. Even now, he was anything but ready to take him at his word, but it was useless to press the question.

"How do they get on in Cottage Street?" he asked. "I presume you are there every day."

"I call every day, of course," replied Captain Cavendish, a slight flush coloring his nonchalant face; "but I never see any one except Midge, or that other girl."

"Betsy Ann?"

"I suppose so. No one is permitted to enter, it appears, except your sister and Miss Blair."

"Indeed," said Val; "I should think you would have the entry above all others. Have you not seen Nathalie since those melancholy changes have occurred?"

"Yes. Once."

"Ah! At Cottage Street?"

"Yes."

"Well," said Val, who was never restrained by sentimental delicacy, "what did she say?"

"Not much, but what she did say was exceedingly to the point. She gave me my _coup de conge_."

"You don't say so! Did you take it?"

"What could I do? She was inexorable! Of course, as a man of honor, I should have made her my wife, in spite of all, but she was determined."

A queer smile went wandering for a second or two round Mr. Blake's mouth, but he instantly called his risible faculties to order, and became grave again.

"How are they? How do they take Charley's escape?"

"Mrs. Marsh is poorly--confined to her bed, I believe, but Nathalie, they tell me, appears better, and takes care of her mother. Your sister, however, will be able to tell you all particulars."

"I say, Cavendish," exclaimed Val, "you could go in for Jane McGregor, now. She is nearly as rich as poor Natty was to be."

"Bah! What do I care for her riches?"

"Oh, yes, I understand; but just reflect that her papa will give her ten thousand pounds on her wedding-day, and three times that much at his death; and I am sure you will be brought to take pity on her."

"Take pity on her?"

"Tah! Tah! Tah!" cried Val; "don't play innocent. You know as well as I do, she is dying for you."

"But, my dear Blake," expostulated the captain, "she has red hair and freckles."

"Auburn hair--auburn! As for the freckles, her guineas will cover them.

Will you come in?" They were at the office door, but Captain Cavendish declined.

"I have to go to barracks," he said. "Good morning."

Mr. Blake spent some two hours in his office, attending to business, and then sallied forth again. His steps were bent in the direction of Cottage Street, where he expected to find his sister. The house looked as if some one were dead within--the blinds all down, the doors all closed--and no one visible within or without. It was Midge who opened the door, in answer to his loud knock. "How are you, Midge?" inquired Mr. Blake, striding in, "and how are Mrs. and Miss Marsh?"

Midge's reply was a prolonged and dismal narrative of the sufferings of both. The elder lady was unable to leave her bed--she had fretted herself into a low, nervous fever, and was so cross, and captious, and quarrelsome, and peevish, that she made the lives of every one in the house a misery to them. She did nothing but sigh, and cry, and moan, and complain from morning till night, and from night till morning. Nothing they did pleased her.

Of Nathalie, Midge had the reverse of this story to tell--she never complained at all. No, Midge wished she would; her mute despair was far harder to bear than the weary complainings of her mother. She sat by that petulant invalid mother's side the livelong day, holding cooling drinks to her poor parched lips, bathing the hot brow and hands, and smoothing the tossed pillow; rarely speaking, save to ask or answer some question; never replying to the endless reproaches of the sick woman; never uttering one complaint or shedding one tear.

Mr. Val Blake was ushered by Midge into the darkened chamber of Mrs.

Marsh, and looked at Nathalie sitting by her bedside. In spite of what he had heard, he was shocked at the change which the past week had made in her--shocked at the wasted and shadowy form, the wan, transparent hands, the hollow eyes and haggard cheeks. She was dressed in mourning, and the c.r.a.pe and bombazine made her look quite ghastly by contrast.

Mr. Blake's visit was not a long one. Nathalie scarcely spoke at all, and his sister was not there. Mrs. Marsh, who had been asleep when he entered, awoke presently, and poured her dreary wailings into his ear.

Val consoled her as well as he could; but there was no balm in Gilead for her, and he was glad when he could with decency get out of the reach of her querulous voice. Her time, of late, seemed pretty equally divided between dozing and bewailings; and she fretted herself into another slumber shortly after.

Left alone, Nathalie Marsh sat by the window, while the dull afternoon wore away, looking out over the gloomy bay, with a darkly brooding face.

Her desolation had never seemed so present to her as on this eerie evening. She had been stunned and stupefied by the rapidly-falling blows, but the after-pain was far more acute and keen than that first dull sense of suffering. "Ruined and disgraced!" they were the two ugly words on which all the changes of her thoughts rang. Ruined and disgraced! Yes, she was that; and she who had once been the belle and boast of the town could never hold up her head there any more. How those who had envied and hated her for her beauty and her prosperity, would exult over her now! What had she done that such misery should fall upon her? What had she done?

The little house in Cottage Street was very still. Mrs. Marsh yet dozed fitfully; Midge had gone out to give herself an airing, and Betsy Ann was standing in the open front door, looking drearily out at the rain, which was beginning to fall with the night. Like Mariana, she was "a-weary,"--though, not being quite so far gone in the blues as that forlorn lady, she did not wish she was dead--and was staring dismally at the slanting rain, when the rustle of a dress on the stairs made her turn round, and become transfixed with amazement at beholding Miss Marsh, in bonnet and shawl, arrayed to go out. Betsy Ann recoiled as if she had seen a ghost, for the white face of the young lady looked awfully corpse-like, in contrast with her sable wrappings.

"Good gracious me! Miss Natty!" she gasped, "you're never going out in this here rain! Ye'll get your death!"

If Nathalie heard her, she did not heed, for she walked steadily out and on through the wet evening, until she was lost to Betsy Ann's shivered view. There were very few abroad that rainy evening, and those few hurried along with bent heads and uplifted umbrellas, and saw not the black figure flitting by them in the gloom. On she steadfastly went, through the soaking rain, heeding it no more than if it were rays of sunshine; on, with one purpose in her face, with her eyes ever turned in one direction--toward the sea.

Cottage Street wound away with a path that led directly to the sh.o.r.e. It had been familiar to her all her life, and there was an old disused wharf at the end, where she and Charley had used to play in the sunny summer days long ago--a hundred years ago, it seemed, at the least. It was a useless old wharf, rotten, and slippery, and dangerous, to which boats were made fast, and where fishermen mended their nets. To this wharf Nathalie made her way in the thickening darkness, the piteous rain beating in her face, the sea-wind fluttering her black vail and soaking dress. Heaven knows what purpose the poor half-delirious girl had in her mind! Perhaps only to stand on the familiar spot, and listen to the familiar voices of the wind and waves dashing against the rotten logs and slimy planks of the old wharf, on which she had spent so many happy hours. No one ever knew how it was; and we must only pity her in her dumb agony of despair, and think as mercifully of the dark and distracted soul as we can. The night was dark, the wharf dangerous and slippery with the rain, and one might easily miss their footing and fall. Who can say how it was? but there was a suppressed cry--the last wail of that despairing soul--a sullen plunge, a struggle in the black and dreadful waters, another smothered cry, and then the wharf was empty, and the devouring waves had closed over the golden head of Nathalie Marsh!

In the roar of the surf on the sh.o.r.e, and the wailing cry of the night wind, there was no voice to tell what had happened in the lonely gloom of the rainy night. No, surely, or the faithful servant, who entered the cottage dripping, after her const.i.tutional, would have fled wildly to the scene of the tragedy, instead of standing there in the kitchen, talking to Betsy Ann, as she placed her wet umbrella in a corner to drip.

"I went up to Miss Jo's," said Midge, shaking herself, and giving Betsy Ann an impromptu shower-bath, "and she made me stay for tea, and fetch this umberel home. How's the Missis--asleep?"

"Yes," said Betsy Ann, looking nervous and scared, for she was mortally afraid of the dwarf; "but you didn't--I mean to say, was not Miss Natty to Blake's?"

"Miss--What!" screamed Midge; "how should Miss Natty get there, stupid!

Isn't she in her own room?"

"No, she ain't," said Betsy Ann, looking still more scared; "and I don't know where she is, neither! She came down stairs just afore dark, with her things on, and went out in all the rain. She wouldn't tell me where she was going, and she wouldn't stay in for me; and you needn't look so mad about it, for I couldn't help it! There!"