Saved from herself or, On the edge of doom
piled high on the head; the dress was of the latter part of the last
century.
“So you are the lady that walks! And you are a little like me, which is
all the better,” she murmured. “And if you are a wise ghost, you will
help me, and not hinder me, for you and I are all the defense Cristiane
le Marchant has.”
Her eyes, that were full of a strange compelling, were fastened on the
picture. Childish and far-fetched as it was, it seemed to the girl that
she was bending something to her own ends, something both wickeder and
weaker than she. A strange delight thrilled her.
“I am not afraid any more!” she cried out, with soft rapture, “and I
remember the tune now.”
With a noiseless movement, she was at the spinet, under her fingers the
whole tune tinkled out, and this time there was no dread in her of a
lurking terror behind. Ghost, imagination, mice--whatever it was--she,
Ismay Trelane, was its mistress, by the very courage of her heart.
There was nothing there, nothing! Yet there should be a terror there
that would walk in darkness, and hear, and know, and see, till Marcus
Wray was thwarted in this house, at least.
The cold air of the room had struck to her bones, and she drew her warm
gown about her as she turned to go. She had learned enough to go on.
From now, not a word spoken at midnight, or a trap laid, would escape
Ismay Trelane. She was laughing to herself as she walked to the door.
But as she turned the handle, she stopped.
The spinet was playing. Clear, unearthly, that strange tune tinkled
out, under her very eyes.
Whatever it was, it was very queer. She stared incredulously, as Thomas
had done, but, unlike Thomas, she was not frightened.
“Thank you!” she said gravely, and without bravado. “If you are a
musical box, or whatever you are, you are going to be my friend.” And
without a tremor she turned to the uncanny thing when its tune was
done, and peered once more into its depths.
Had she been blind before? For now she saw plainly enough a small brass
bracket, black with age, almost invisible in dust. It was a plain
oblong slip, about the size of a railway-ticket, and it stuck out from
the inside of the case.
Leaning down, Ismay pressed it, ever so lightly.
Almost immediately the weird music poured into the room.
The girl saw the whole thing now. The woman to whom it belonged had had
it made, so that she might hear the tune she loved without playing it.
Her threat to her servant had been a grim and mocking jest.
Very quietly, she put out her light and went out into the dark hall and
down-stairs, and yet she was trembling. If it were all a trick, why had
her candle gone out?
“If I had once been frightened I should have died of it, up there in
the moonlight!” she said to herself, with conviction.
CHAPTER XIX.
AT THE GATE OF HEAVEN.
Time hung heavily on Mrs. Trelane’s hands for all the comfort and
luxury of the house.
She missed the freedom, missed the theaters, the little suppers at
restaurants, missed more than either the companionship of the men who
were wont to gather round her in London--gentlemen with reputations out
at elbows, but clever, amusing, the very salt of life to Helen Trelane.
Therefore, she said at breakfast, with a little distasteful sigh, that
she must go to London, to see the dressmaker.
Ismay lifted her brows.
“I wouldn’t, if I were you. You can bully people better in writing.”
Her tone was very significant.
She supposed the “dressmaker” meant an appeal to the mercy of a man who
had none, and then a mad whirl of amusement, her mourning thrown to the
winds.
But she was wrong. Mrs. Trelane had no thought of Wray.
“I really must go,” she said, “annoying as it is. Should you mind,
Cristiane?”
“Not a bit. You won’t stay long, will you? I shall teach Ismay to ride
while you are gone,” with a little, affectionate glance. “We shall be
quite happy.”
“Oh, no! Not long, of course.”
In spite of herself, her tone was joyous as a child’s. To be in London,
with money, to drink deep of life again. No wonder her voice betrayed
her.
Ismay followed her to her room, where she stood, in her smart mourning.
“The Gaiety, the Café Royal, and cards afterward till daylight may be
amusing,” she observed cuttingly, “but they are not worth your neck.”
“What do you mean?” In her annoyance, Mrs. Trelane almost dropped the
bottle of peach-blossom scent in her hand.
“I mean you’ll go to London, and wear a white gown in the evenings,
with a string of mock pearls round your neck. Because the gossip
about Lord Abbotsford has died away you are quite comfortable,” Ismay
retorted; “and about now the police will be waking up to their work.
London will not be a good retreat for the person who killed him!”
“Ismay!” The scent-bottle crashed on the floor now from the loosened
fingers; strong and sickly, its contents flooded the room. “Ismay, are
you mad? What has come over you? You know that”--her voice fell to a
frightened whisper--“that he was dead when I went there.” She looked
old and wretched as she stood, ready dressed to start.
“I know what you choose to tell me. Oh! mother,” passionately, “let us
both go away from here, go somewhere that is safe, and live quietly,
you and I. I’ll work for you----”
A laugh cut her short. Yet Mrs. Trelane stood, wringing her hands.
“You know we can’t get away,” she cried, “and why should we? I never
killed Abbotsford!”
“Then why are you so frightened of Marcus Wray?” deliberately.
“You little fool. I took the diamonds!” She stooped and picked up
the fragments of her cut-glass bottle. “You know all I did,” she
cried, straightening herself to face her daughter, her clean-cut
face very pale. “What on earth has changed you, till you talk like a
Sunday-school book? What has become of your fine plan for securing Mr.
Cylmer, that you try to frighten me into leaving here with your silly,
lying accusation? You work for me?” she laughed miserably. “Would you
take in washing?”
Ismay’s passion of earnestness left her with her old manners, her old
catlike grace. She flung herself into a chair.
“Never mind what I’d do. I meant it,” she retorted. “As for Mr. Cylmer,
you can let him alone. I would have let him go--for you--five minutes
ago. But I don’t think I would--now! Go to London,” politely, “but
don’t forget my advice. You ought to know by this time it’s more lucky
to take it.”
“I know you are an ungrateful little idiot,” said Mrs. Trelane angrily.
And with that for her only farewell, she swept down-stairs to get into
her carriage. Ismay turning pious was a good joke. As for Cylmer, it
was simply girlish boasting. Mrs. Trelane felt quite safe on that score
as she drove away. It was not in the least likely that he would come to
Marchant’s Hold, or that Ismay would get hold of him, and bring down
the wrath of Marcus Wray. All girls had a hero, usually out of reach.
Why should Ismay be superior to the rest? And as for Wray and his awful
schemes, with his absence their very memory had vanished from the
light mind of the woman who lived to please herself. It was all absurd
nonsense, he would not dare to go any farther with it.
All her fears soothed to rest, she proceeded to spend a cheerful
afternoon on reaching London, little knowing how she had rocked her
troubles to sleep with lying hopes.
In his chambers, Marcus Wray sat reading a short newspaper paragraph
over and over, his fingers tapping at his knee, his lips hard set.
Only a short paragraph, but it meant danger, and he frowned as he read.
Helen Trelane up in London, dressed in her best, was like a child
playing with a smoking bomb; if Mr. Wray had known of it he would have
packed her straight off to the country, and gone with her himself,
which it was well for Ismay that he did not do.
She was very nervous about the sudden freak her mother had taken;
in some way or other it was sure to mean more trouble. And she was
disappointed about her afternoon.
At lunch Cristiane had mentioned carelessly that Cylmer had sent a
groom over with the horse borrowed the day before; that was all, but
Ismay knew he had meant to come himself, and had thought better of it.
She would not listen when Cristiane proposed lending her a habit and
taking her out riding.
“I think I’ve got a headache,” she said wearily. “You go for a ride,
and I’ll walk a little by myself. I’ll be all right at tea-time.”
She strolled out through the quiet winter lanes when Cristiane was
gone. She was very pale to-day, very languid, a presentiment of evil
was heavy at her heart. Her mother had been mad to go to London; she
herself was more idiotic, still, to think that Miles Cylmer would ever
care for her.
Tired at last, she sat down on a stile between two fields, and leaned
back, staring in front of her. Somehow, her heart was faint within her
to-day, but why any more than yesterday?
“Because I sha’n’t see him, and I want him,” she thought dreamily. “I
want something that will strengthen me, something that I can look back
to, and think that nothing matters since I was happy once. And I will
be happy. I will!”
Her scarlet mouth was so determined that a man who had come up
unnoticed smiled as he saw it. Yet briefly, for her face was
pathetically weary, more than ever it bore that prophecy of tragedy
that seemed so out of place for Ismay Trelane.
“Where are your thoughts?” Cylmer said lightly. “Oh, did I startle you?”
For Ismay, who never blushed, had turned first a faint rose, then a
fiery scarlet, that burned on her smooth cheeks.
“My thoughts?” Confused, she put her hands to her face. “Oh, anywhere.
Yes, of course, you startled me.” But she was mistress of herself again
now, and she smiled into his eyes as he stood before her, cap in hand.
“I’m so sorry. Can you forgive me?” Why did the girl’s glance go to his
head like wine? Why did he think of nothing, want nothing, but to sit
and talk with the daughter of an adventuress whom he scarcely knew?
He sat down beside her on the stile.
“I was going to see you,” he said, “though, I must say, I was shy about
it. Your mother, with excellent reason, hates me.”
“My mother has gone to London,” simply.
“And I don’t think Cristiane is overfond of my society.”
“Why not?” she asked languidly.
“Good taste, I suppose,” was the answer, and both laughed.
“I was taking you something. Will you have it?” he asked, and she saw
that he carried something. Before she could answer he had laid in her
lap a great bunch of roses, crimson, sweet smelling.
The girl stared at them as they lay in her lap. In all her life no one
had ever given her a flower. She put the roses to her face with a quick
tenderness no one had ever seen in her.
As she looked up at him, her eyes were very deep and soft. She held the
roses tightly in both hands.
“Why are you giving them to me?” she said wonderingly.
“Because you’ve had so little. Because I thought you might like them.”
“I do.” Her voice was very low. “But how do you know I’ve had--so
little?”
“Lord De Fort told me,” was on his tongue, but it stuck there.
“Do you remember that night at the Palace?” he asked, instead. “Shall I
tell you what I saw there? A girl in a threadbare black gown, worn at
the elbows, and too thin for the weather; a girl who was pale and very
tired, but more beautiful than any woman I had ever seen. Do you know
that, Ismay?”
“No,” she whispered.
“Then you know now,” he retorted, his face very pale, his eyes, that
were so sweet, close to hers. “I thought I cared for some one else,
then--now I know that I would let everything in this world go to be
with you--even honor!”
Why did the two last words almost stop her heart, that was beating so
quick? Why should Ismay Trelane, to whom honor was but a foolish thing,