Part 72 (1/2)
”Pity? Pity for you! Why, are you not his wife?”
”Yes, yes, yes, but you cannot understand. I cannot explain. Help me to get away from here. I must go--to my friends.”
”Go? To your friends?” said the woman, looking perplexed. ”What, have you quarrelled already?”
”Oh, do not ask me--I cannot tell you,” cried Gertrude piteously; ”only help me to escape from here, and I will pray for you to my dying day.”
”What good's that?” said the woman mockingly. ”I'm so bad that no one could pray me good. I'm a curse and a misery, and everything that's bad. Pray, indeed! I've prayed hundreds of times that I might die, but it's no good.”
”Have you no heart--no feeling?” cried Gertrude, going down upon her knees.
”Not a bit,” said the woman bitterly. ”They crushed one and hardened the other till it all died.”
”Let me pa.s.s you then!” cried Gertrude angrily. ”I will not stay.”
”If I let you pa.s.s, you could not get away. The doors are locked below, and you could not find the keys. You don't want to go.”
”What can I say--how am I to tell you that I would give the world to get away from here?” cried Gertrude. ”Oh, for Heaven's sake save me before he comes again!”
”He will not come again. He is downstairs drunk. He is always either drunk or mad. And so you are the new Mrs John Huish?”
”Yes, yes!” cried Gertrude; and then wildly, ”Tell me, it is not true?
You--you--cannot be his wife!”
”The parson said I was when we were married--Mrs Frank Riversley.”
”Ah!” cried Gertrude joyously. ”Sometimes,” continued the woman, as if she enjoyed torturing her rival; ”lately he has called himself John Huish--since he has neglected me so much to go to clubs and chambers.”
”Oh!” sighed Gertrude.
”But I never complained.”
”I cannot bear this,” moaned Gertrude to herself; and then, fighting down the emotion, she crept upon her knees to the woman and clasped her hand.
”Let me go,” she moaned. ”Let me get away from here, and I will bless you. Ask anything of me you like, and it shall be yours, only get me away.”
”You don't want to go,” said the woman mockingly. ”It's all a sham.”
”How can I prove to you that I mean it?” cried Gertrude.
”I don't know; I only know that if I did he would kill me.”
”Oh no, no; he dare not touch you. Come with me, then, and I'll see that you are not hurt.”
”Are you in earnest? Better not. I ought to be in bed now--sick almost to death. Better stay,” she said mockingly. ”This may kill me. I hope it will, and then you can be happy--with him!”
”No! no! no!” cried Gertrude wildly. ”Never again. I did not know. It is too dreadful! Woman, if you hope for mercy at the last, help me to get away before I see that man again.”
”That man? that man?”