XXVI.
I relate in my own words the strange story Mrs. Carew imparted to me.Although she had erred, her confession was like a rift of sweet lightin the dark clouds which hung over Rosemullion. It brought more thanhope and comfort to my old heart--it brought joy. In a very fewmoments you will understand the meaning of my words.
Transport yourself back to the village of Nerac, a year after themarriage of Lauretta and Gabriel Carew. Business of a particularnature took Carew from Nerac for a space of three months; he wasabsent that time, much against his will, for his wife was near herconfinement. This took place safely two weeks after his departure, andhe was duly informed of the event. All was well at home; Lauretta andher baby girl were thriving. The days and the weeks passed until twomonths went by. Carew, in his letters to his wife, expressed theprofoundest joy at this precious home blessing. Smarting as he wasduring that period from the growing coldness of the villagers towardshim, and chafing at the injustice of the world, he placed anextravagant value upon this baby girl, who would be, he said, a charmagainst all evil. He longed for the time when he could hold thisblessing in his loving arms; now his happiness was complete; he askedfor no greater treasure. In the growth and development of the newyoung life he would find solace and consolation. His wife was enjoinedto take the most tender care of their child. "You and she are one,"Carew wrote. "Each is incomplete without the other. I cannot think ofyou now apart. Were I to lose one my life would be plunged intodarkness." Then befel an event which brought horror and grief toLauretta. It happened that her nurse had fallen sick, and wascompelled to go to her own home; there was no other female servant inthe establishment capable of undertaking a nurse's duties, andLauretta therefore took them cheerfully on herself. Two months, as Ihave said, had passed after the birth of the baby girl. Carew wasexpected home in a fortnight.
In the dead of night, when all in the house were asleep, with theexception of Lauretta, she, watching by the cradle of her baby, hearda sound of moaning without. She listened intently; it was her own namethat she heard uttered in accents of deepest pain and suffering. Itwas a wild night; heavy rain was falling, the wind was raging; andthrough the sounds of the storm came the wailing of her name, withhalf-choked sobs and entreaties for help and pity.
It was but an hour before that Lauretta, awaking, had heard proceedfrom her baby-girl lying in the cradle by her bedside, some lightsounds of difficult breathing which had alarmed her. She got up anddressed, and tended her baby, who, after a while, seemed a littleeasier; but with the natural anxiety of a young mother Laurettaremained awake watching her child.
The moans for help outside appeared to be especially addressed to herand to her alone, and she seemed to recognise the voice. She creptsoftly down, and unfastened the door.
"Who is there?" she asked, during a lull in the storm.
The answer came--"Patricia! Help me! Oh help me, and let no one know!"
It was Emilius's wife.
Lauretta assisted her indoors. The poor girl was in a pitiable plight.Famished, ragged, penniless, with a baby in her arms. Both werewringing wet. The pelting rain had soaked them through and through.
Throbbing with sympathy and compassion Lauretta quickly undressedPatricia's baby, and put it in her own warm bed. They had by this timereached Lauretta's bedroom, in which her own child was lying. Laurettawished to call the servants, but Patricia sobbed that she would flythe house if any eyes but Lauretta's rested on her. It appeared,according to the poor girl's story, that her father was in pursuit ofher, and had vowed to kill her and her baby.
"He will kill me--he will kill me!" moaned Patricia. "No one must knowI have been here but you--no one, no one!"
And then she rocked herself hysterically and cried, "What will becomeof my poor baby-girl--what will become of her? I heard that yourhusband was not here, and it gave me courage to crawl to you. Not thatit matters much. It isn't for myself I care. My father may kill me--Ihave not long to live--but my baby, my baby! Oh, save my darling, saveher for the sake of my innocent Emilius!"
It was then that Lauretta noticed for the first time, signs inPatricia's face which, interpreted by her fear and the poor girl'swords, seemed to be signs of approaching death. And still Patriciainsisted that she would not remain in the house; no force orentreaties could make her.
"What, then, can I do for you?" asked Lauretta; she had already givenPatricia food and money.
"Take care of my child," replied Patricia. "Bring her up as your own.Let her never know her father's disgrace, her mother's shame. It willbe an angel's deed! For pity's sake, do not deny me! You are rich, andcan afford the charity--and if, in your husband's life there has beenguilt, this act of charity will atone for it. See here--look on herinnocent face. Having the power, you have not the heart to deny me.Ah, if your angel mother were alive, I should appeal to her, andshould not appeal in vain! She loved Emilius, and believed in hisinnocence--yes, to the last she believed in it. I know it for acertainty. You, too, loved my poor martyred husband, and he loved andhonoured you and yours with all the strength of his faithful heart. Heis innocent, innocent, I tell you! God forbid that I should accuse anyone of being guilty--I am too desperate and despairing, and my child'slife, the salvation of her soul, are at stake. When your saintedmother died, did all goodness die out of the world? Ah, no--it is notpossible; you live again in her. In you she lives again, and all hermercy and sweet kindness which caused us all, from the highest to thelowest, to worship her, to look upon her as something holy. For hersake, if not for my own, you cannot, cannot deny me this charity, youwho have it in your power to grant it!"
All this, and more. To say that Lauretta's heart was touched isinadequate; it overflowed; it yearned to assist the suffering mother,so near to her through her young motherhood, through the old ties withEmilius and Eric. A choking cry from her own baby-girl caused her torush to the cradle. Within the hour a fatal circumstance occurred.Lauretta's baby drew her last breath.
It has nearly all my days been my belief that everything in human lifeis to be accounted for by human standards. I am shaken in this belief.In this death of Lauretta's baby I seem to see the finger of fate.
Vain to attempt to describe the agonising grief of the young mother.So overpowering was it that she lost consciousness. She recovered hersenses when the storm had passed and the morning's light was shiningon her. When she awoke to reality, what did she see?
Her husband had suddenly and unexpectedly returned home. She was inbed, and he was sitting by her side.
"Gabriel, Gabriel!" she cried, and, overcome by the terror of hergreat loss, she would have lost consciousness again but for anunaccountable joyousness in his manner, which mingled strangely withthe sympathy he must have felt for her suffering condition.
"It was, doubtless, the storm," he said soothingly. "It raged sofiercely for an hour and more, that I am told it exceeded in violenceanything of a like kind that has been experienced in these parts forthe last fifty years. No wonder it has had such an effect upon you.Half the trees in our garden are uprooted. It hastened my steps home,for I know how these convulsions of nature affect you. But as you see,the danger has passed; the sun is shining brightly; but not morebrightly in the heavens than it is shining in my heart."
She listened to him in amazement, and raising herself in bed shelooked around for Patricia. She saw no sign of the hapless woman. Thecradle in which her baby-girl had died was by the side of the bed.Carew bent over it and said in a tone of ecstasy:
"Mildred--Mildred! Our Mildred--our dear ewe lamb! How sweetly andsoundly she sleeps! Oh, my darling wife! What care I for the injusticeof the world now that this treasure is ours? My sweet--my sweet! Yourecompense for all. Do you know, Lauretta, as travelling home I nearedthe beloved spot which contained you and our treasure, my heart almoststood still at the fear that I should not find you both well. Andnow--how can I be sufficiently grateful? Of no account to me is allthat transpires outside the circle which contains you and my de
ar onein the cradle here? I set great store upon our child, Lauretta. She isto me a guarantee of all that is worth living for in the present andthe future. When I arrived home and found you prostrate I was at firstoverwhelmed, but I soon discovered that you had fainted, and I judgedrightly, did I not, dear wife of my heart, that, not being strong, youkept it from me while we were apart, in order not to distress me? Butnow all is well--all shall be well. See, Lauretta, she opens her eyes,our darling. The question is, can I raise her safely and place her byyour side? Yes, it is done, and I am the happiest father in theworld!"
Was she dreaming? In the clothes in which her child died rested thischild of Patricia's, smiling, blooming, laughing and crowing asLauretta drew her to her breast. Carew's delight, his gratitude, hisworship of the babe he believed to be his own, the superstitious storehe set upon her young life, were so unbounded, that Lauretta did notdare to undeceive him. She feared, if she told him the truth, that itwould unsettle his reason, and produce between her and him a gulfwhich could never be bridged over. She accepted the strangecombination of circumstances, and held her tongue. Her own dear babewas dead, but this new Mildred, whom she grew to love truly as if shewere her own, remained, and grew to what she is, a flower of beauty,goodness, and sweetness. Nothing more did Lauretta hear of Patricia;whether she died or lived was not known to her. It is but adetail--but necessary to complete the story--to state here thatPatricia lived but a few months after the occurrence of this strangeevent. More important is it to state that, in some unexplained way,Emilius learns that his daughter lived, and that the Carews werebringing her up as if she were a child of their own. His term ofimprisonment over, he had come now to claim her.
It would be impossible for me to give expression to my feelings ofgratitude at this wonderful revelation. The despair into which I hadfallen at the contemplation of the wrecking of my dear son Reginald'shappiness vanished. A fair future lay still before him, and the mostcherished hopes of his heart would be realised. I was sure thatEmilius would not mar them. A nature so noble as his, so strong insuffering, so heroic in the highest form of human endurance, could notlend itself to the committal of a petty act of selfishness whereby thechild upon whose memory he had lived during his cruel and unjustimprisonment would be rendered miserable and unhappy. To this martyredman I was ready to bow my head, ready to give him my friendship, mysympathy, my heart's best fruits of confidence and esteem. Thinking ofhim, I was awed that a man could live through the anguish that hadbeen his portion, and still retain the inherent dignity and nobilityof a great and noble nature.