Part 52 (2/2)

She still held the packet Wharton had given her in her hand. As though for air, she had thrown back the black gauze veil she had worn all through the trial, and, as they pa.s.sed through the lights of the town, Aldous could see in her face the signs--the plain, startling signs--of the effect of these weeks upon her. Pale, exhausted, yet showing in every movement the nervous excitement which was driving her on--his heart sank as he looked at her--foreseeing what was to come.

As soon as the main street had been left behind, he put his head out of the window, and gave the coachman, who had been told to go to Mellor, the new order.

”Will you mind if I don't talk?” said Marcella, when he was again beside her. ”I think I am tired out, but I might rest now a little. When we get to the Court, will you ask Miss Raeburn to let me have some food in her sitting-room? Then, at nine o'clock or so, may I come down and see Lord Maxwell and you--together?”

What she said, and the manner in which she said it, could only add to his uneasiness; but he a.s.sented, put a cus.h.i.+on behind her, wrapped the rugs round her, and then sat silent, train after train of close and anxious thought pa.s.sing through his mind as they rolled along the dark roads.

When they arrived at Maxwell Court, the sound of the carriage brought Lord Maxwell and Miss Raeburn at once into the hall.

Aldous went forward in front of Marcella. ”I have brought Marcella,” he said hastily to his aunt. ”Will you take her upstairs to your sitting-room, and let her have some food and rest? She is not fit for the exertion of dinner, but she wishes to speak to my grandfather afterwards.”

Lord Maxwell had already hurried to meet the black-veiled figure standing proudly in the dim light of the outer hall.

”My dear! my dear!” he said, drawing her arm within his, and patting her hand in fatherly fas.h.i.+on. ”How worn-out you look!--Yes, certainly--Agneta, take her up and let her rest--And you wish to speak to me afterwards? Of course, my dear, of course--at any time.”

Miss Raeburn, controlling herself absolutely, partly because of Aldous's manner, partly because of the servants, took her guest upstairs straightway, put her on the sofa in a cheerful sitting-room with a bright fire, and then, shrewdly guessing that she herself could not possibly be a congenial companion to the girl at such a moment, whatever might have happened or might be going to happen, she looked at her watch, said that she must go down to dinner, and promptly left her to the charge of a kind elderly maid, who was to do and get for her whatever she would.

Marcella made herself swallow some food and wine. Then she said that she wished to be alone and rest for an hour, and would come downstairs at nine o'clock. The maid, shocked by her pallor, was loth to leave her, but Marcella insisted.

When she was left alone she drew herself up to the fire and tried hard to get warm, as she had tried to eat. When in this way a portion of physical ease and strength had come back to her, she took out the pet.i.tion from its envelope and read it carefully. As she did so her lip relaxed, her eye recovered something of its brightness. All the points that had occurred to her confusedly, amateurishly, throughout the day, were here thrown into luminous and admirable form. She had listened to them indeed, as urged by Wharton in his concluding speech to the jury, but it had not, alas! seemed so marvellous to her then, as it did now, that, _after_ such a plea, the judge should have summed up as he did.

When she had finished it and had sat thinking awhile over the declining fire, an idea struck her. She took a piece of paper from Miss Raeburn's desk, and wrote on it:

”Will you read this--and Lord Maxwell--before I come down? I forgot that you had not seen it.--M.”

A ring at the bell brought the maid.

”Will you please get this taken to Mr. Raeburn? And then, don't disturb me again for half an hour.”

And for that time she lay in Miss Raeburn's favourite chair, outwardly at rest. Inwardly she was ranging all her arguments, marshalling all her forces.

When the chiming clock in the great hall below struck nine, she got up and put the lamp for a moment on the mantelpiece, which held a mirror.

She had already bathed her face and smoothed her hair. But she looked at herself again with attention, drew down the thick front waves of hair a little lower on the white brow, as she liked to have them, and once more straightened the collar and cuffs which were the only relief to her plain black dress.

The house as she stepped out into it seemed very still. Perfumed breaths of flowers and pot-pourri ascended from the hall. The pictures along the walls as she pa.s.sed were those same Caroline and early Georgian beauties that had so flas.h.i.+ngly suggested her own future rule in this domain on the day when Aldous proposed to her.

She felt suddenly very shrinking and lonely as she went downstairs. The ticking of a large clock somewhere--the short, screaming note of Miss Raeburn's parrot in one of the ground-floor rooms--these sounds and the beating of her own heart seemed to have the vast house to themselves.

No!--that was a door opening--Aldous coming to fetch her. She drew a childish breath of comfort.

He sprang up the stairs, two or three steps at a time, as he saw her coming.

”Are you rested--were they good to you? Oh! my precious one!--how pale you are still! Will you come and see my--grandfather now? He is quite ready.”

She let him lead her in. Lord Maxwell was standing by his writing-table, leaning over the pet.i.tion which was open before him--one hand upon it.

At sight of her he lifted his white head. His fine aquiline face was grave and disturbed. But nothing could have been kinder or more courtly than his manner as he came towards her.

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