Volume Iii Part 3 (1/2)

Mrs. Dorriman's patience was at an end.

”You must prove that your news is true,” she said, ”before venturing to condole with my brother or with me; and Mrs. Wymans--we know each other very slightly, and I must ask you to be so very kind as to leave me.”

Mrs. Wymans, a woman upon whom it was very difficult indeed to make any impression, was, for once in her life, completely taken aback by the sudden a.s.sertion of herself in a woman she had looked upon as an amiable fool. Her farewells were uttered with rapidity, and she left the room and the house quite unable to comprehend how her visit had failed, or why it was she was made to feel that her intrusion was an impertinence.

Mrs. Dorriman, left alone, tried to collect her thoughts and not to take this story for granted. If it was true, even that the child was dead, why did not Grace or Jean or some one telegraph?

All at once what she had dreaded and expected came to her--once again a telegram was brought to her.

”Poor Margaret in frightful distress--her child is dead--scarlet fever.”

The relief of this last information, after all she had dreaded, broke her down. She sobbed for some moments very piteously.

Then she went to Mr. Sandford and astonished him by the way she put the matter before him.

”It is such a relief!” she began, incoherently, and not telling him what the relief was: then she added, the tears rolling over her face, ”Poor Margaret's child is dead!”

Mr. Sandford was shocked, but failed to understand why this news, which affected him so slightly, was a relief.

”Was anything wrong about the child?” he asked.

”Wrong with it?”

”Yes; why is its death a relief to you?”

”Oh, brother!” she answered, hysterically, ”Not its death--but the way it died.”

He understood that some worse fate had been suggested to her, and he tried to console her--

”I have seen copies of all the correspondence that took place when Drayton was under restraint before,” he said, ”and it distinctly says that he was obstinate and very troublesome, but never violent.”

Mrs. Dorriman tried hard to think this was consoling but failed to do so.

The horror of it was almost unbearable, and she left the room unable to face any discussion about it, even with her brother; utterly and entirely wretched, and longing to be able to see any one element of consolation in the position, for Margaret's sake.

CHAPTER II.

At the Limes the position of affairs became more terrible every day for Margaret. Mr. Drayton was always sullen, silent, and watchful, and the incessant watchfulness broke down her nerves. She had long fits of crying, without herself being aware of it. The women-servants had left, and she could not replace them; the one woman who came by day to clean and cook (and could do neither) was the only one besides her nurse, and Margaret lived in dread of her leaving her.

There came a day when Mr. Drayton had a very terrible outbreak with the man, who up till now had got on with him. And the scene ended in his also going--telling Mrs. Drayton that he had been engaged to look after an inebriate, and not a madman.

”You think him mad?” faltered Margaret, looking anxiously at him, a ray of hope coming to her. If this man who had experience thought so, might he not convince the doctors?

”I think so; at least I know he is mad at times. No man in his senses would go on as he has done,” and the man smoothed out his collar regardless of Mrs. Drayton's presence. ”You see he is very dangerous and very cunning, and that's where it is. You might have any number of doctors to see him, and before them he controls himself so that no one would believe him to be what he is. I never was treated so before,” and he smoothed his hair and prepared to leave her.

”Can you not stop?” whispered Margaret, in greater agitation; ”I--I am frightened.”

”I cannot stop because now he's took against me,” he answered, ”and he shouts the moment he sees me. I've lost all control of him, and my staying would do no good to you or to no one else.”

Poor Margaret looked despairingly at him, and, a little moved by her expression, he said briskly--