Part 14 (1/2)

It was Mr. St. Claire who opened the trunk, from which one of the servants had removed the rope, while Frank sat near still trembling in every limb, and watching anxiously as article after article was taken out and examined, but afforded no satisfaction whatever, or gave any sign by which the stranger might be traced.

There was a black alpaca dress and a few coa.r.s.e garments which must have belonged to the woman. Some of them bore the initials 'N.B.,' some were without a mark, and all were cheap and plain, like the clothes of a servant before her head is turned and she apes her mistress' wardrobe.

The child's dresses were of a better quality, and one embroidered petticoat bore the name 'Jerrine,' while the letter 'J.' was upon them all, except a towel of the finest linen, on one corner of which was the letter 'M.' worked with colored floss.

'Jerrine!' Mr. St. Claire repeated, p.r.o.nouncing it 'Jerreen.' 'That is a French name, and a pretty one. It is the child's, of course.'

To this no one replied, and he continued his examination of the trunk until it was quite empty.

'That is all,' he said in a tone of disappointment; and Frank, who had been sitting by and holding some of the things in his lap as they were taken from the trunk, answered, faintly:

'No, here is a book. It was done up in a handkerchief,' and he held up what proved to be a German Bible; but he did not tell that he had found something else, which he had thrust into his pocket when no one was looking at him.

What he had found was a photograph, which had slipped from the leaves of the Bible, and at sight of the face, of which he only had a glimpse, every drop of blood seemed to leave his heart and came surging to his brain, making him so giddy and wild that he did not realise what he was doing when he hid away the picture until he could examine it by himself.

Once in his pocket he dared not take it out, although he raised his hand two or three times to do so, but was as often deterred by the thought that everybody would think that he had intended to hide it and suspect his motive. So he kept quiet and saw them examine the book, the blank page of which had been torn half off, leaving only the last three letters of what must have been the owner's name, '----ich'--that was all, and might as well not have been there, for any light it shed upon the matter.

Opening the book by chance at 1st Corinthians, 2nd chapter, Mr. St.

Claire, who could read German much better than he could speak it, saw pencil-marks around the ninth verse, and read aloud:

'Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man the things which G.o.d hath prepared for them that love Him.'

On the margin opposite this verse was written, in a girlish hand:

'Think of me as there when you read this, and do not be sorry.'

A lock of soft, golden hair, which might have been cut from a baby's head, and a few faded flowers, which still gave forth a faint perfume like heliotrope, were tied with a bit of thread, and lying between the leaves. And except that the book was full of marked pa.s.sages, chiefly comforting and conciliatory, there was nothing more to indicate the character of the owner.

'If this Bible were hers, she was a good woman,' Mr. St. Claire said, laying his hand reverently upon the forehead of the dead, while Frank, who saw another meaning between the lines, shook like one in an ague fit, for he did not believe that those hands, so pulseless and cold, had ever traced the words, 'Think of me as there when you read this, and do not be sorry.' She who wrote them might be, and probably was dead, but her grave was far away, and the fact did not at all change the duty which he owed to her and him for whom the message was intended.

'What shall I say to Arthur, and how shall I tell him,' he was wondering to himself, when Mr. St. Claire roused him by saying:

'You seem greatly unstrung by what has happened. I never saw you look so ill.'

'Yes, I feel as if I had murdered her by not sending John to the station,' Frank stammered, glad to offer this as an excuse for his manner, which he knew must seem strange and unnatural.

'You are too sensitive altogether. John might not have seen her, she hurried off so fast, and you have no particular reason to think she was coming here,' Mr. St. Claire said, adding: 'We'd better leave her now.

We can do nothing more until the coroner comes, which will hardly be to-day. I hear the roads are all blocked and impa.s.sable. Let everything remain in the trunk where he can see them.'

Mechanically Mrs. Tracy, who was present, put the different articles into the trunk, leaving the Bible on the top, and then followed her husband from the room. She knew there was more affecting him than the fact that a dead woman was in the house, or that he had not sent John to the station. But what it was she could not guess, unless, and she, too, felt faint and giddy for a moment, as a new idea entered her mind.

'Frank,' she said to him when they were alone for a few moments, 'Arthur had a fancy that Gretchen was coming last night. You do not think this woman is she?'

'Gretchen? No. Don't be a fool, Dolly. Gretchen is fair and young, and the woman is old and black as the ace of spades. Gretchen! No, indeed!'

He did not show her the picture he had secreted; he knew she would not approve of the act, and if she had no suspicion with regard to the woman and the child he did not care to share his with her, particularly as it was only a suspicion, and so far as he could judge in his perturbed state of mind, nothing he could do would ever make things sure. His wife seemed to have forgotten the child at the cottage, and he would not bring it to her mind until it was necessary to do so. Just then Charles came to the room and said that his master was very much excited and wished to know the reason for so much commotion in the house, and why so many people were coming and going down and up the avenue.

'I thought it better that you should tell him,' Charles added, and with a sinking heart Frank started for his brother's room.

He had not seen him before that day, and now as he looked at him it seemed to him that he had grown older since the previous night, for there were lines about his mouth, and his face was very thin and pale.