Elster's Folly Part 39

"Will n.o.body put this disreputable parson outside?" raved the dowager.

"I do not seek to bring reproach home to you; let that, ladies, lie between yourselves and conscience. I only draw your attention to the facts; which have been sufficiently patent to the world, whatever Lord Hartledon may think. And now I have said my say, and leave you; but I declare that were I performing this burlesque of a marriage, as that young clergyman is about to do, I should feel my prayers for the divine blessing to attend it were but a vain mockery."

He turned to leave the chapel with quick steps, when Lord Hartledon, shaking off Maude, darted forward and caught his arm.

"You will tell me one thing at least: Is Anne _not_ going to marry Colonel Barnaby?"

"Sir!" thundered the doctor. "Going to marry _whom_?"

"I heard it," he faltered. "I believed it to be the truth."

"You may have heard it, but you did not believe it, Lord Hartledon. You knew Anne better. Do not add this false excuse to the rest."

Pleasant! Infinitely so for the bridegroom's tingling ears. Dr. Ashton walked out of the chapel, and Val stood for a few moments where he was, looking up and down in the dim light. It might be that in his mental confusion he was deliberating what his course should be; but thought and common sense came to him, and he knew he could not desert Lady Maude, having brought matters so far to an end.

"Proceed," he said to the young clergyman, stalking back to the altar.

"Get--it--over quickly."

Mr. Carr unfolded his arms and approached Lord Hartledon. He was the only one who had caught the expression of the bride's face when Hartledon dropped her arm. It spoke of bitter malice; it spoke, now that he had returned to her, of an evil triumph; and it occurred to Thomas Carr to think that he should not like a wife of his to be seen with that expression on her bridal face.

"Lord Hartledon, you must excuse me if I do not remain to countenance this wedding," he said in low but distinct tones. "Before hearing what I have heard from that good man, I had hesitated about it; but I was lost in surprise. Fare you well. I shall have left by the time you quit the chapel."

He held out his hand, and Val mechanically shook it. The retreating steps of Mr. Carr, following in the wake of Dr. Ashton, were heard, as Lord Hartledon spoke again to the clergyman with irritable sharpness:

"Why don't you begin?"

And the countess-dowager fanned herself complacently, and neither she nor Maude cared for the absence of a groomsman. But Maude was not quite hardened yet; and the shame of her situation was tingeing her eyelids.

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE STRANGER.

Lord Hartledon was leading his bride through the chapel at the conclusion of the ceremony, when his attention was caught by something outside one of the windows. At first he thought it was a black cat curled up in some impossible fashion, but soon saw it was a dark human face. And that face he discovered to be Mr. Pike's, peering earnestly in.

"Hedges, send that man away. How dare he intrude himself in this manner?

How has he got up to the window?"

For these windows were high beyond the ordinary height of man. Hedges went out, a sharp reprimand on his tongue, and found that Mr. Pike had been at the trouble of carrying a heap of stones from a distance and piling them up to stand upon.

"Well, you must have a curiosity!" he exclaimed, in his surprise. "Just put those stones back in their places, and take yourself away."

"You are right," said the man. "I have a curiosity in all that concerns the new lord. But I am going away now."

He leaped down as he spoke, and began to replace the stones. Hedges went in again.

The carriage, waiting to convey them away, was already at the door, the impatient horses pawing the ground. Maude changed her dress with all speed; and in driving down the road by starlight they overtook Thomas Carr, carrying his own portmanteau. Lord Hartledon let down the window impulsively, as if he would have spoken, but seemed to recollect himself, and drew it up again.

"What is it?" asked Maude.

"Mr. Carr."

It was the first word he had spoken to her since the ceremony. His silence had frightened her: what if he should resent on _her_ the cruel words spoken by Dr. Ashton? Sick, trembling, her beautiful face humble and tearful enough now, she bent it on his shoulder in a shower of bitter tears.

"Oh, Percival, Percival! surely you are not going to punish me for what has pa.s.sed?"

A moment's struggle with himself, and he turned and took both her hands in his.

"It may be that neither of us is free from blame, Maude, in regard to the past. All we can now do, as it seems to me, is to forget it together, and make the best of the future."

"And you will forget Anne Ashton?" she whispered.

"Of course I shall forget her. I ask nothing better than to forget her from this moment. I have made _you_ my wife; and I will try to make your happiness."

He bent and kissed her face. Maude, in some restlessness, as it seemed, withdrew to her own corner of the carriage and cried softly; and Lord Hartledon let down the gla.s.s again to look back after Thomas Carr and his portmanteau in the starlight.

The only perfectly satisfied person was the countess-dowager. All the little annoying hindrances went for nothing now that the desired end was accomplished, and she was in high feather when she bade adieu to the amiable young clergyman, who had to depart that night for his curacy, ten miles away, to be in readiness for the morrow's services.

"If you please, my lady, Captain Kirton has been asking for you once or twice," said Hedges, entering the dowager's private sitting-room.

"Then Captain Kirton must ask," retorted the dowager, who was sitting down to her letters, which she had left unopened since their arrival in the morning, in her anxiety for other interests. "Hedges, I should like some supper: I had only a scrambling sort of dinner. You can bring it up here. Something nice; and a bottle of champagne."

Hedges withdrew with the order, and Lady Kirton applied herself to her letters. The first she opened was from the daughter who had married the French count. It told a pitiful tale of distress, and humbly craved to be permitted to come over on a fortnight's visit, she and her two sickly children, "for a little change."

"I dare say!" emphatically cried the dowager. "What next? No, thank you, my lady; now that I have at least a firm footing in this house--as that blessed parson said--I am not going to risk it by filling it with every bothering child I possess. Bob departs as soon as his leg's well. Why what's this?"

She had come upon a concluding line as she was returning the letter to the envelope. "P.S. If I don't hear from you _very_ decisively to the contrary, I shall come, and trust to your good nature to forgive it. I want to see Bob."

"Oh, that's it, is it!" said the dowager. "She means to come, whether I will or no. That girl always had enough impudence for a dozen."

Drawing a sheet of paper out of her desk, she wrote a few rapid lines.

"Dear Jane,

"For _mercy's_ sake keep those _poor_ children and yourself _away_! We have had an _aweful infectious fever_ rageing in the place, which it was thought to be _cured_, but it's on the break _out_ again-several _deaths_, Hartledon and Maude (_married_ of course) have gone out of its reach and I'm thinking of it if _Bob's_ leg which is _better_ permits. You'd not like I dare say to see the children in a _coffin apiece_ and yourself in a _third_, as might be the end. _Small-pox_ is raging at _Garchester_ a neighbouring town, that _will_ be awful if it gets to _us_ and I _hear_ it's on the _road_ and with kind love _believe_ me your affectionate_

"MOTHER.

"P.S. I am sorry for _what_ you tell me about _Ugo_ and the _state_ of affairs chey vous. But you know you _would marry_ him so there's _n.o.body_ to blame. Ah! _Maude_ has gone by _my_ advice and done as _I_ said and the consequence is _she's_ a peeress for life and got a handsome young husband _without_ a _will_ of his own."

The countess-dowager was not very adroit at spelling and composition, whether French or English, as you observe. She made an end of her correspondence, and sat down to a delicious little supper alone; as she best liked to enjoy these treats. The champagne was excellent, and she poured out a full tumbler of it at once, by way of wishing good luck to Maude's triumphant wedding.

"And it _is_ a triumph!" she said, as she put down the empty gla.s.s. "I hope it will bring Jane and the rest to a sense of _their_ folly."

A triumph? If you could only have looked into the future, Lady Kirton!