The ghost of Charlotte Cray, and other stories

THE GHOST OF CHARLOTTE CRAY AND OTHER STORIES. BY FLORENCE MARRYAT (MRS. FRANCIS LEAN), AUTHOR OF “LOVE’S CONFLICT,” “FACING THE FOOTLIGHTS,” ETC., ETC. _COPYRIGHT EDITION._ LEIPZIG BERNHARD TAUCHNITZ 1883. _The Right of Translation is reserved._ CONTENTS. THE GHOST OF CHARLOTTE CRAY THE INVISIBLE TENANTS OF RUSHMERE AMY’S LOVER LITTLE WHITE SOULS STILL WATERS CHIT-CHAT FROM ANDALUSIA THE SECRET OF ECONOMY “MOTHER” IN THE HEART OF THE ARDENNES A MIDSUMMER’S NIGHTMARE THE GHOST OF CHARLOTTE CRAY. Mr. Sigismund Braggett was sitting in the little room he called his study, wrapped in a profound--not to say a mournful--reverie. Now, there was nothing in the present life nor surroundings of Mr. Braggett to account for such a demonstration. He was a publisher and bookseller; a man well to do, with a thriving business in the city, and the prettiest of all pretty villas at Streatham. And he was only just turned forty; had not a grey hair in his head nor a false tooth in his mouth; and had been married but three short months to one of the fairest and most affectionate specimens of English womanhood that ever transformed a bachelor’s quarters into Paradise. What more could Mr. Sigismund Braggett possibly want? Nothing! His trouble lay in the fact that he had got rather more than he wanted. Most of us have our little peccadilloes in this world--awkward reminiscences that we would like to bury five fathoms deep, and never hear mentioned again, but that have an uncomfortable habit of cropping up at the most inconvenient moments; and no mortal is more likely to be troubled with them than a middle-aged bachelor who has taken to matrimony. Mr. Sigismund Braggett had no idea what he was going in for when he led the blushing Emily Primrose up to the altar, and swore to be hers, and hers only, until death should them part. He had no conception a woman’s curiosity could be so keen, her tongue so long, and her inventive faculties so correct. He had spent whole days before the fatal moment of marriage in burning letters, erasing initials, destroying locks of hair, and making offerings of affection look as if he had purchased them with his own money. But it had been of little avail. Mrs. Braggett had swooped down upon him like a beautiful bird of prey, and wheedled, coaxed, or kissed him out of half his secrets before he knew what he was about. But he had never told her about Charlotte Cray. And now he almost wished that he had done so, for Charlotte Cray was the cause of his present dejected mood. Now, there are ladies _and_ ladies in this world. Some are very shy, and will only permit themselves to be wooed by stealth. Others, again, are the pursuers rather than the pursued, and chase the wounded or the flying even to the very doors of their stronghold, or lie in wait for them like an octopus, stretching out their tentacles on every side in search of victims. And to the latter class Miss Charlotte Cray decidedly belonged. Not a person worth mourning over, you will naturally say. But, then, Mr. Sigismund Braggett had not behaved well to her. She was one of the “peccadilloes.” She was an authoress--not an author, mind you, which term smacks more of the profession than the sex--but an “authoress,” with lots of the “ladylike” about the plots of her stories and metre of her rhymes. They had come together in the sweet connection of publisher and writer--had met first in a dingy, dusty little office at the back of his house of business, and laid the foundation of their friendship with the average amount of chaffering and prevarication that usually attend such proceedings. Mr. Braggett ran a risk in publishing Miss Cray’s tales or verses, but he found her useful in so many other ways that he used occasionally to hold forth a sop to Cerberus in the shape of publicity for the sake of keeping her in his employ. For Miss Charlotte Cray--who was as old as himself, and had arrived at the period of life when women are said to pray “Any, good Lord, any!”--was really a clever woman, and could turn her hand to most things required of her, or upon which she had set her mind; and she had most decidedly set her mind upon marrying Mr. Braggett, and he--to serve his own purposes--had permitted her to cherish the idea, and this was the Nemesis that was weighing him down in the study at the present moment. He had complimented Miss Cray, and given her presents, and taken her out a-pleasuring, all because she was useful to him, and did odd jobs that no one else would undertake, and for less than any one else would have accepted; and he had known the while that she was in love with him, and that she believed he was in love with her. He had not thought much of it at the time. He had not then made up his mind to marry Emily Primrose, and considered that what pleased Miss Cray, and harmed no one else, was fair play for all sides. But he had come to see things differently now. He had been married three months, and the first two weeks had been very bitter ones to him. Miss Cray had written him torrents of reproaches during that unhappy period, besides calling day after day at his office to deliver them in person. This and her threats had frightened him out of his life. He had lived in hourly terror lest the clerks should overhear what passed at their interviews, or that his wife should be made acquainted with them. He had implored Miss Cray, both by word of mouth and letter, to cease her persecution of him; but all the reply he received was that he was a base and perjured man, and that she should continue to call at his office, and write to him through the penny post, until he had introduced her to his wife. For therein lay the height and depth of his offending. He had been afraid to bring Emily and Miss Cray together, and the latter resented the omission as an insult. It was bad enough to find that Sigismund Braggett, whose hair she wore next her heart, and whose photograph stood as in a shrine upon her bedroom mantelpiece, had married another woman, without giving her even the chance of a refusal, but it was worse still to come to the conclusion that he did not intend her to have a glimpse into the garden of Eden he had created for himself. Miss Cray was a lady of vivid imagination and strong aspirations. All was not lost in her ideas, although Mr. Braggett _had_ proved false to the hopes he had raised. Wives did not live for ever; and the chances and changes of this life were so numerous, that stranger things had happened than that Mr. Braggett might think fit to make better use of the second opportunity afforded him than he had done of the first. But if she were not to continue even his friend, it was too hard. But the perjured publisher had continued resolute, notwithstanding all Miss Cray’s persecution, and now he had neither seen nor heard from her for a month; and, manlike, he was beginning to wonder what had become of her, and whether she had found anybody to console her for his untruth. Mr. Braggett did not wish to comfort Miss Cray himself; but he did not quite like the notion of her being comforted. After all--so he soliloquised--he had been very cruel to her; for the poor thing was devoted to him. How her eyes used to sparkle and her cheek to flush when she entered his office, and how eagerly she would undertake any work for him, however disagreeable to perform! He knew well that she had expected to be Mrs. Braggett, and it must have been a terrible disappointment to her when he married Emily Primrose. Why had he not asked her out to Violet Villa since? What harm could she do as a visitor there? particularly if he cautioned her first as to the peculiarity of Mrs. Braggett’s disposition, and the quickness with which her jealousy was excited. It was close upon Christmas-time, the period when all old friends meet together and patch up, if they cannot entirely forget, everything that has annoyed them in the past. Mr. Braggett pictured to himself the poor old maid sitting solitary in her small rooms at Hammersmith, no longer able to live in the expectation of seeing his manly form at the wicket-gate, about to enter and cheer her solitude. The thought smote him as a two-edged sword, and he sat down at once and penned Miss Charlotte a note, in which he inquired after her health, and hoped that they should soon see her at Violet Villa. He felt much better after this note was written and despatched. He came out of the little study and entered the cheerful drawing-room, and sat with his pretty wife by the light of the fire, telling her of the lonely lady to whom he had just proposed to introduce her. “An old friend of mine, Emily. A clever, agreeable woman, though rather eccentric. You will be polite to her, I know, for my sake.” “An _old_ woman, is she?” said Mrs. Braggett, elevating her eyebrows. “And what do you call ‘old,’ Siggy, I should like to know?” “Twice as old as yourself, my dear--five-and-forty at the very least, and not personable-looking, even for that age. Yet I think you will find her a pleasant companion, and I am sure she will be enchanted with you.” “I don’t know that: clever women don’t like me, as a rule, though I don’t know why.” “They are jealous of your beauty, my darling; but Miss Cray is above such meanness, and will value you for your own sake.” “She’d better not let me catch her valuing me for _yours_,” responded Mrs. Braggett, with a flash of the eye that made her husband ready to regret the dangerous experiment he was about to make of bringing together two women who had each, in her own way, a claim upon him, and each the will to maintain it. So he dropped the subject of Miss Charlotte Cray, and took to admiring his wife’s complexion instead, so that the evening passed harmoniously, and both parties were satisfied. For two days Mr. Braggett received no answer from Miss Cray, which rather surprised him. He had quite expected that on the reception of his invitation she would rush down to his office and into his arms, behind the shelter of the ground-glass door that enclosed his chair of authority. For Miss Charlotte had been used on occasions to indulge in rapturous demonstrations of the sort, and the remembrance of Mrs. Braggett located in Violet Villa would have been no obstacle whatever to her. She believed she had a prior claim to Mr. Braggett. However, nothing of the kind happened, and the perjured publisher was becoming strongly imbued with the idea that he must go out to Hammersmith and see if he could not make his peace with her in person, particularly as he had several odd jobs for Christmastide, which no one could undertake so well as herself, when a letter with a black-edged border was put into his hand. He opened it mechanically, not knowing the writing; but its contents shocked him beyond measure. “Honoured Sir,--I am sorry to tell you that Miss Cray died at my house a week ago, and was buried yesterday. She spoke of you several times during her last illness, and if you would like to hear any further particulars, and will call on me at the old address, I shall be most happy to furnish you with them.--Yours respectfully, “Mary Thompson.” When Mr. Braggett read this news, you might have knocked him over with a feather. It is not always true that a living dog is better than a dead lion. Some people gain considerably in the estimation of their friends by leaving this world, and Miss Charlotte Cray was one of them. Her persecution had ceased for ever, and her amiable weaknesses were alone held in remembrance. Mr. Braggett felt a positive relief in the knowledge that his dead friend and his wife would never now be