Part 84 (2/2)

Beth asked Minna where Drew, the housemaid, was.

”It's her afternoon out, ma'am,” Minna answered.

”So it is,” said Beth. ”I had forgotten.”

”Do you want anything, ma'am?” Minna asked. ”You're looking poorly.

Would you like a cup o' tea?”

”No, thank you,” Beth rejoined, then changed her mind. ”Yes, I should, though. Get me one while I'm taking my things off, and bring it to me in the dining-room. Where is your master?”

”I don't know, ma'am. I've not heard if he's come in; but it's full early for him yet,” Minna replied, as she took off her working ap.r.o.n.

While she was talking to the girl, the worry in Beth's head stopped, and she felt as usual. Going quietly upstairs, she fancied she heard some one moving in her bedroom, and, entering it by way of the dressing-room, she discovered Dan on his knees on the floor, prying into one of the boxes she had had with her at Ilverthorpe, and kept locked until she should feel inclined to unpack it. He seemed to have had all the contents out, and was just deftly repacking it. As he replaced the dresses, he felt in the pocket of each, and in one he found an old letter which he read.

Beth withdrew on tiptoe, and went downstairs again, wondering at the man. She took off her hat and jacket, and ensconced herself with the newspaper in an easy-chair. Minna came presently with fragrant tea and hot b.u.t.tered toast, and talked cheerfully about some of her own interests. Beth treated her servants like human beings, and rarely had any trouble with them. She had learnt the art from Harriet, who had awakened her sympathies, and taught her practically, when she was a child, what servants have to suffer; and ”well loved and well served”

exactly described what Beth was as a mistress. When Minna withdrew, and Beth had had her tea and toast, she felt quite right again, and read the paper with interest. The shock of the real trouble had ousted the imaginary one for the moment.

The next morning, however, as she toiled with flushed face and weary brain, stultifying her work with painful elaboration, she was seized with another fit of jealous rage, just as she had been the day before.

Her mind in a moment, like a calm sea caught by a sudden tempest, seethed with horrible suspicions of her husband. His gross ideas, expressed in coa.r.s.e language, had hitherto been banished from her mind by her natural refinement; but now, like the works of a disordered machine, whirling with irresponsible force, thoughts suggested by him came crowding in the language he habitually used, and she found herself accusing him with conviction of all she had ever heard others accused of by him. For a little she pursued this turn of thought, then all at once she jumped up and rushed downstairs, goaded again to act--to avenge herself--to dog him down to one of his haunts, and there confront him, revile him, expose him.

It was a tranquil grey day in early autumn, the kind of day, full of quiet charm, which had always been grateful to Beth; but now, as she stood on the doorstep, with wrinkled forehead, dilated eyes, and compressed lips, putting her gloves on in feverish haste, she felt no tranquillising charm, and saw no beauty in the tangled hedgerows bright with briony berries, the tinted beeches, the Canadian poplars whispering mysteriously by the watercourse at the end of the meadow, the glossy iridescent plumes of the rooks that pa.s.sed in little parties silhouetted darkly bright against the empty sky; it was all without significance to her; her further faculty was suspended, and even the recollection of anything she had been wont to feel had lapsed, and she perceived no more in the scene surrounding, in the colours and forms of things, the sounds and motions, than those perceive whose eyes have never been opened to anything beyond what appears to the grazing cattle. In many a heavy hour she had found delight in nature; but now, again, she had lost that solace; the glory had departed, and she had sunk to one of the lowest depths of human pain.

Not understanding the frightful affliction that had come upon her, she made no attempt to control her disordered fancy, but hurried off into the town, and hovered about the places which Dan had pointed out as being of special evil interest, and searched the streets for him, acting upon the impulse without a doubt of the propriety of what she was doing. Had the obsession taken another form, had it seemed right to her to murder him, the necessity would have been as imperative, and she would have murdered him, not only without compunction, but with a sense of satisfaction in the deed.

She pursued her search for hours, but did not find him; then went home, and there he was, standing on the doorstep, looking out for her.

”Where on earth have you been?” he said.

”Where on earth have you been yourself?” she rejoined.

”Minding my own business,” he answered.

”So have I,” she retorted, pus.h.i.+ng past him into the hall.

He had never seen her like that before, and he stood looking after her in perplexity.

She went upstairs and threw herself on her bed. The worry in her head was awful. Turn and toss as she would, the one idea pursued her, until at last she groaned aloud, ”O G.o.d! release me from this dreadful man!”

After a time, being thoroughly exhausted, she dropped into a troubled sleep.

When she awoke, Dan was standing looking at her.

”Aren't you well, Beth?” he said. ”You've been moaning and muttering and carrying on in your sleep as if you'd got fever.”

”I don't think I am well,” she answered in her natural manner, the pressure on her brain being easier at the moment of awakening.

He felt her pulse. ”You'd better get into bed,” he said, ”and I'll fetch you a sedative draught. You'll be all right in the morning.”

Beth was only too thankful to get into bed. When he returned with the draught, she asked him if he were going out again.

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