Helen Vardon's confession
floor, where he ushered me into a bedroom and stood by the door with
an embarrassed and rather deprecating air, casting a glance of obvious
disparagement over its somewhat meagre appointments.
“It’s a poor place to bring you to, Helen,” he remarked, “but that can
be mended. It was good enough for a bachelor. You’ll find the wardrobe
and chest of drawers empty when you send for your things. Mine are in
the dressing-room--that little room to the right. And now I’ll leave
you in possession for the present.”
With this he went out, closing the door behind him, and I heard his
soft, heavy tread descending the stairs.
For some time after he had gone I stood looking about me in absolute
dismay. The room was mean almost to sordidness--surprisingly mean for
the habitation of an admittedly wealthy man. But it was not that which
filled me with consternation. Delicately as I had been brought up, the
mere surroundings of life were of no great consideration to me. What
appalled me utterly was the feeling, now brought home to me with
overwhelming force, that I was no more my own; that I had surrendered
myself to the possession of another person, a strange man, towards
whom I felt a growing repugnance. This was not my room: it was our
room. No longer had I any rights of privacy or of personal reticence.
I was his, “to have and to hold from this day forward,” with no power
of escape or protest against the most repulsive familiarities. I had
voluntarily surrendered, not only my liberty, but even the appearance
of security from the most outrageous intrusions.
Of course I had known all this before. But in the hurry and rush, the
alarms and agitations of the events that had forced me to my hasty
decision, perception had been partly obscured. I had known what I was
doing, but had only dimly realized. It had needed the sight of that
mean room, with its significant contents and the presence of that man
who stood at my side as joint occupier, to light up the vague
perception into realization of the most horrid vividness.
Presently I began, with the dull curiosity of a prisoner introduced to
a new cell, to explore the room, opening the empty wardrobe and
pulling out the ill-fitting drawers of the plain pine chest. Then I
peeped into the dressing-room--a bare little closet, furnished with a
wash-stand, a dressing-table and a chest of drawers--and even stepped
in to glance over the half-blind down into the garden and street
beyond. I was about to turn away when I noticed a man approaching the
house at a rapid pace; and in an instant my heart leaped with mingled
joy and alarm.
It was my father.
I watched him nervously as he strode towards the house, and my fears
rose with each step that he took. Every movement was expressive of
excitement and anger; the swift stride, the forward-thrust chin, the
very set of the shoulders; the way in which he grasped his stick by
the middle, as if aiming a blow, was full of menace. As he drew nearer
I shrank behind the curtain, but still watched him; watched him with
growing alarm, for now I could see that his eyes were wild under the
frowning brows, his mouth was set and his face was of a strange,
blotchy, purple colour. He looked as if he had been drinking, but I
knew he had not.
As he reached the gate, he wrenched it open violently, and, entering,
slammed it behind him; a thing I had never before known him to do. He
strode up the path, without a glance upwards, and disappeared from my
sight, and a moment later there came a wild jangling of the bell,
followed by a thundering knock at the door.
I hesitated, undecided what I should do. Should I go down and meet him
with appeasing words, or should I wait until the first explosion of
his wrath had subsided? I crept out of the bedroom to the landing and
stood with my hand on the baluster rail, listening. I heard Mr. Otway
walk along the hall, softly and rather slowly. I heard him open the
door, and then my father’s voice rose, loud and fierce.
“Where is my daughter, Otway? Is she here?”
“Yes,” Mr. Otway replied; “she is upstairs. We have just returned from
the church.”
“Do you mean to say,” my father demanded, “that the marriage has
actually taken place?”
“Yes,” Mr. Otway answered. “We were married half an hour ago.”
“What!” roared my father. “After my letter! Did you tell her about
that letter? You didn’t, you damned scoundrel! You’ve tricked her!
You’ve swindled her!”
“As to your letter, Mr. Vardon,” I heard Mr. Otway reply, “I haven’t
seen it myself, yet. The morning’s correspondence is still----”
Here a door closed, and his voice became inaudible. They had gone into
one of the rooms. I staggered back into the bedroom and sank on to a
chair, trembling from head to foot. In the name of God, what did my
father mean? Tricked! Swindled! Could it be true? Was it actually
possible that I had been lured into the arms of this ungainly lout by
a false pretence? It was incredible. And yet----
As the first shock of this amazing statement began to pass off, a
storm of anger and indignation arose in my breast; and I was on the
point of rising to go down and confront Mr. Otway, when the house
shook to a heavy concussion. I sprang from the chair, and flying on
the wings of terror down the stairs, opened the first door that I came
to.
Years have rolled by since that unforgettable moment, but even now, as
I write, the tableau that met my eyes as I opened the door rises
before me vivid and distinct as the dreadful reality. I saw it even
then but for a single instant, as I darted into the room; but it has
remained with me and will remain till my dying day.
My father lay motionless on the floor near the fire-place; his face an
awful, livid grey, his eyes staring fixedly at the ceiling; and from a
small wound on the right side of his forehead a few drops of dark
blood trickled down his temple. Beside him, and stooping over him,
stood Mr. Otway, with ashen face and dropped jaw, the very picture of
horror and mortal fear; and in Mr. Otway’s right hand was grasped my
father’s stick, a stout Malacca, with a heavily-loaded silver knob.
I flew past him and sank on my knees by my father’s side; and in that
moment I knew that my father was dead. I had never seen a dead person
before. But it was unmistakable. I spoke to him; I called to him in an
agonised whisper; I patted his head and touched his face. But all the
while I knew that he was dead; that he was gone from me for ever. Even
as I looked at him, the livid grey of his face faded to a dead white;
the staring eyes relaxed and seemed to sink into their sockets; and
the mouth slowly fell open. It was death. I knew it. Dazed, stricken,
almost bereft of consciousness and the power of thought, I knew it,
with the dull certainty of despair.
As I had entered the room, Mr. Otway had started up with a look of
terror, and when I sank at my father’s side, I had heard him move away
softly towards the writing-table. He was now back and once more
stooping over my father’s body. I felt that he was there, although my
eyes were fixed on that pallid face that gave back no answering
glance. Presently he spoke, in a hushed, awe-stricken whisper.
“This is terrible, Helen! Can’t we do anything?”
I looked up at him with a sudden flush of loathing and detestation;
and as I looked, I noticed that he no longer held the stick. I rose
slowly to my feet and faced him.
“No,” I answered. “He is dead. He is dead. Mr. Otway, you have killed
my father.”
As I faced him, he shrank away from me, staring at me as if I had been
some horrid apparition. His face, blanched to a horrible white and
shiny with sweat, was dreadful to look upon; the face of abject,
mortal terror.
“Helen!” he gasped. “Helen! For God’s sake don’t look at me like that!
It was not I who killed him. I swear to God it was not. He fainted. I
was trying to take the stick from him--I had to, or he would have
killed me--and his head struck the mantelpiece. Then he fainted and
fell. I am telling you the truth, Helen. I am, before God!”
To this I made no reply. Whether I believed him or not, I cannot say.
Stunned as I was by this frightful thing that had befallen, I could
only look at him with utter loathing as the cause of it all.
“Helen!” he continued, imploringly, “say you believe me! I swear I
never touched him. And don’t look at me like that! Helen! Why do you
look at me in that awful way?”
He clasped his hands, and, casting a fearful glance at my poor
father’s corpse, moaned: “My God! my God! but this is horrible!
Horrible! Do you think he is really dead? Don’t you think--can’t we do
anything? If a doctor were here--if we only had someone to send----
Shall I go and fetch a doctor, Helen?”
“Yes,” I answered, “you had better.”
“I will,” he said. “But you do believe me, don’t you? I swear----”
“You had better go at once, Mr. Otway,” I interrupted.
He gave me one pitiful glance of appeal, and then, with a despairing
moan, turned and left the room. I heard him hurry along the hall and a
moment later the outer door closed.
Once more I sank on my knees beside my father, and, taking the passive
hand in mine, looked into the pallid face, dimly surprised to find
something new and unfamiliar creeping into it. I did not weep. The
blow was too crushing, too overwhelming to call forth common emotion.
Nor did I think coherently; but knelt, looking dumbly into the face
that was my father’s, and yet was not, wrapped in a sort of dreadful
trance, conscious only of bitter pain and a sense of unutterable loss.
After a time--I do not know how long--I became aware of sounds of
movement in the house, and presently soft footsteps approached the
room. The door, which Mr. Otway had left ajar, opened with a faint
creak, and the voice of Mrs. Gregg ejaculated: “Sakes! What’s this?”
She stole on tip-toe into the room until she stood beside me, looking
down with a scared expression as my father’s corpse.
“Why!” she exclaimed, “the man’s dead! Who is he?”
“He is my father, Mrs. Gregg,” I replied.
She stood for some time in silence, apparently considering the import
of my answer. Then she walked round and looked down curiously at the
wound on the forehead.
“Where is Mr. Otway?” she asked.
“He has gone to fetch a doctor,” I answered.
“A doctor!” she repeated. “And what might be the good of a doctor when
the man is dead? D’ye know how it happened?”
Before I had time to reply to her question, there came the sound of a
latch-key inserted into the hall door. She turned quickly and made as
if she would leave the room, but, as she reached the threshold, Mr.
Otway entered, followed by the doctor, and she fell back to let them
pass. I rose to my feet, and the doctor--a hard-faced, middle-aged man
whom I knew by sight--knelt down in my place. He lifted the limp hand
and laid his finger on the wrist; he raised the eyelid and touched the
glazing eyeball; then drawing out his stethoscope he listened for some
time at the chest over the region of the heart. And meanwhile we all
stood watching him in a profound silence through which the ticking of
the clock broke noisily, as it had done on that fateful night when I
had sat in this very room unconsciously preparing the elements of this
tragedy.
At length the doctor rose, and, folding his stethoscope, deliberately
slipped it into his pocket and turned to Mr. Otway.
“I am sorry to say that it is as you feared,” said he. “He is quite
dead. From what you have told me, I should say it was a case of heart
failure from over-excitement. Have there been any previous attacks?”
“No,” I answered. “But I think Dr. Sharpe considered that his heart
was weak.”
“Ah! He did, did he? Well, I had better call on Dr. Sharpe and hear
what he knows about the case.” He walked round, and, stooping down,