A Woman's Burden Part 38

He helped her in, and confided d.i.c.ky to the care of the cabby. The boy's proposition suited him in every way. Indeed, it had been an essential part of his plan. As for Hilda, she had a very shrewd idea of what she might expect. It is only fair to her to say that she hesitated--but the eloquent appeal from those blue eyes of Gerald's had been too much for her. She was surprised at herself now, for her heart was beating as she had never known it beat before.

"I wish you could get a hansom," she said; "we shall be hours getting home in this."

"And would that be so very terrible?" he asked. "It would not have been once, Hilda."

"Oh, Gerald, don't talk about that. You know that is all over and done with now."

"It is _not_ over, Hilda--it never has been over, we need never have parted but for you. For these two years I have been longing for a chance of seeing you alone. I have got it now, and I'm not going to lose it."

"What is it you want? You forget Miriam----"

"Oh, hang Miriam! I wish I could forget her. But she's not the sort of person one can forget, worse luck. Hilda, it was cruel of you to drive me to her----"

"Cruel of _me_? _I_ drove you to Miriam? Really, Gerald, if that's the kind of thing you're going to say, I am sorry I allowed you to come at all. You know perfectly well things were not in my hands. I had to do as I was told. And you--well, you and Miriam were always what you call 'good friends.'"

"You managed to console yourself pretty quickly any way."

"Not so quickly as you, I believe," retorted Hilda.

"I console myself? A pretty sort of consolation mine has been! You at least have the satisfaction of having plenty of money. If it were only the other way round, I tell you, Hilda, I wouldn't hesitate for one moment; I'd clear out with you to-morrow."

"Indeed, that's taking me a little bit for granted, isn't it? You don't seem to count the cost--to me! Remember, the unfortunate woman always pays in these cases, as indeed she does in most others, as far as I can see. No, Gerald, you've got to stick to your bargain and I to mine. I was always fond of you, you know. But Fate evidently didn't intend us for one another."

"If only I thought you really cared for me still--Hilda, tell me you do; say you do care for me now as you used to do."

"Gerald, I forbid you to behave like this. Are you crazy? What do you expect this sort of thing to lead to?--ruin, absolute ruin, in every way for me--yes, and for you too for that matter."

"I don't care--I care for nothing but you. I will have you, I----"

He was blind with pa.s.sion now, and she saw it. Without another word she pushed his arm aside, and letting down the window, called upon the driver to stop.

"Very well," he said, when he saw what she had done. "I have finished with you from this moment. Remember, whatever happens is your doing."

"Will you help d.i.c.ky inside, please, and tell the driver to go on?"

Her intense placidity infuriated him only the more. He seized her wrist roughly and twisted it, glaring at her. Then he banged the door and strode away.

Without word or sound--though he had hurt her wrist badly--she jumped out of the cab and got d.i.c.ky down from his perch. She bade the driver go on to the hotel. Then she leaned back in her seat and smiled, well pleased with herself. Placed as she was she couldn't have done better, she thought. He was as much in love with her as ever, that was quite certain. He would not be content to leave her like that. She had thrilled at his savage clutch of her, painful though it was. It meant that he was hers, body and soul. He would come at her bidding--he would be her slave. But not now was he for her or she for him. There might come a time, perhaps----

But that was another story. Now, she was face to face, she knew, with the crucial point of her life. On her immediate action depended everything. The will was in her possession to do with it what she would.

What should she do with it? Destroy it--destroy it--destroy it--the words seemed to buzz continually in her brain.

She was so completely engrossed that she did not notice that they had arrived at the hotel. The porter came to the door. Taking d.i.c.ky by the hand, she went straight upstairs to their private sitting-room. Her husband was there reading the paper. She was surprised to see him.

"Dear me," she said, "you here, John? I thought you surely would be at the club. You don't mind if I leave the boy with you till Kimber can take him? I have such a splitting headache that I must go straight and lie down."

"Sorry, Hilda--leave him by all means." She certainly looked tired he thought.

In her own room, having dismissed her maid, she threw herself on the bed, and fell to thinking again. Five minutes after she rang the bell.

"Kimber," she said, as the maid appeared, "I am shivering--just put a match to the fire. That will do, thank you; you needn't wait."

As the fire burned up she rose from the bed, and settled herself on the rug by the hearth. Then she took the will from the pocket of her dress and spread it out before her. She read it from beginning to end. And so she learned how Miriam, if she had done this thing, had sacrificed herself in the doing of it. Could _she_ have sacrificed herself like that? No--emphatically no. Could Miriam? She was obliged to confess to herself that she thought she could--and had. But the confession galled her ever so, and she hated her the more for it. And then for a moment she gave way to her hate.

"She shall not have it," she almost hissed; "nor shall she have _him_ much longer. Yes, I'll burn it I'll teach her not to try conclusions with me!"

At that moment her meditations were interrupted. The door opened, and her husband, pale and short of breath, literally burst into the room.

Their eyes met. Instinctively she knew that _he_ knew. Without a moment's hesitation she threw the will into the fire. Catching her round the waist he flung her quickly to one side and rescued it.

"Just in time," he panted; "only just in time!"

CHAPTER VI.

SOME MUTUAL COMPLIMENTS AND A CONFESSION.

In silence husband and wife stared at each other--she as furious with anger at discovery as with the knowledge that therewith all chance of her retaining wealth and position was at an end; he, astonished at the utter want of scruple, at the horrid immorality in the nature of the woman whom he had chosen to bear his name. It was as much as he could do to contain himself. Every instinct within him revolted at the cowardly criminality at which he had caught her red-handed. He wondered she had not been afraid, if only of her own skin.

"Do you realise what I have saved you from?" he asked sternly; "that but for the innocent betrayal of you by that little boy downstairs, you would now be a common felon and answerable to the law--_you_, my wife, the mistress of Thorpe Manor! Hilda, speak--for G.o.d's sake speak."

For some moments she did not answer. One feeling now had come uppermost in her--the feeling of hate and loathing for Miriam, intensified by the knowledge of her husband's admiration for her, while she, his wife, stood debased utterly in his eyes. The whole fury of her puny vindictive nature was striving to be let loose. At last she answered him.

"I have nothing to say," she said, "beyond this--that I am glad at last you know your _friend_ for what she is--that even if your wife, as you say, was in danger of jeopardising her liberty, the pure, beautiful, saintly creature whom you so admire _has_ done so long ago, since she is nothing but a common thief!"

"Hilda, how dare you! Upon my word, I begin to think you've lost your senses."

"Indeed; you'll find that whatever I may have lost, I still have _them_.

You must allow me to repeat that your friend is a common thief, and therefore a criminal. She stole this will."

"_She stole that will?_--why, woman, how can you say such a thing. Mrs.

Arkel is the soul of honour."

"I thought you'd be surprised. Evidently d.i.c.ky didn't tell you everything. As it happens, I myself saw it abstracted by him quite accidentally this afternoon from some false bottom, or rather, top, of her work-box, which no doubt has proved eminently useful to her before this, during her career."

"Hilda, for G.o.d's sake don't be so spiteful--if you have any decent womanhood in you don't crush it. Miriam Arkel is no thief. You may have found this will in her box, as you say. But she did not steal it. It was taken from Barton's table on Christmas night by--by Julia Darrow!"

"Julia Darrow? Impossible! Who told you that tale?"

"The person who saw her take it."

"I don't believe it--what motive had she?--none; besides, if that is so, how came it in the saintly Miriam's keeping--such _very secure_ keeping too--at least she thought so."

The Major listened to her no longer. He became intent upon the contents of the will, and motioned to his wife to sit down. She continued her verbal fusillade none the less scathingly for lack of reply. At last she seemed to be approaching finality.

"You may talk as you like," she said (perhaps because he was not talking at all), "nothing will convince me that the woman is innocent. She stole that will out of sheer spite at me--to prevent my marrying Gerald."