Sarah Matilda, not apprehending this compliment quite as Uncle Silas meant it, dropped a courtesy, notwithstanding her agitation, and, wiping her eyes, said, with a blubbered smile —
“You’re very kind, sure.”
“I hope, for both your sakes, she has got a little money. I don’t see how you are to live else. You’re too lazy for a game-keeper; and I don’t think you could keep a pot-house, you are so addicted to drinking and quarrelling. The only thing I am quite clear upon is, that you and your wife must find some other abode than this. You shall depart this evening: and now, Mr. and Mrs. Dudley Ruthyn, you may quit this room, if you please.”
Uncle Silas had risen, and made them one of his old courtly bows, smiling a death-like sneer, and pointing to the door with his trembling fingers.
“Come, will ye?” said Dudley, grinding his teeth. “You’re pretty well done here.”
Not half understanding the situation, but looking woefully bewildered, she dropped a farewell courtesy at the door.
“Will ye cut?” barked Dudley, in a tone that made her jump; and suddenly, without looking about, he strode after her from the room.
“Maud, how shall I recover this? The vulgar villain — the fool! What an abyss were we approaching! and for me the last hope gone — and for me utter, utter, irretrievable ruin.”
He was passing his fingers tremulously back and forward along the top of the mantelpiece, like a man in search of something, and continued so, looking along it, feebly and vacantly, although there was nothing there.
“I wish, uncle — you do not know how much I wish — I could be of any use to you. Maybe I can?”
He turned, and looked at me sharply.
“Maybe you can,” he echoed slowly. “Yes, maybe you can,” he repeated more briskly. “Let us — let us see — let us think — that d —— fellow! — my head!”
“You’re not well, uncle?”
“Oh! yes, very well. We’ll talk in the evening — I’ll send for you.”
I found Wyat in the next room, and told her to hasten, as I thought he was ill. I hope it was not very selfish, but such had grown to be my horror of seeing him in one of his strange seizures, that I hastened from the room precipitately — partly to escape the risk of being asked to remain.
The walls of Bartram House are thick, and the recess at the doorway deep. As I closed my uncle’s door, I heard Dudley’s voice on the stairs. I did not wish to be seen by him or by his “lady,” as his poor wife called herself, who was engaged in vehement dialogue with him as I emerged, and not caring either to re-enter my uncle’s room, I remained quietly ensconced within the heavy door-case, in which position I overheard Dudley say with a savage snarl —
“You’ll jest go back the way ye came. I’ not goin’ wi’ ye, if that’s what ye be drivin’ at — dang your impitins!”
“Oh! Dudley, dear, what have I done — what have I done — ye hate me so?”
“What a’ ye done? ye vicious little beast ye! You’ve got us turned out an’ disinherited wi’ yer d —— d bosh, that’s all; don’t ye think it’s enough?”
I could only hear her sobs and shrill tones in reply, for they were descending the stairs; and Mary Quince reported to me, in a horrified sort of way, that she saw him bundle her into the fly at the door, like a truss of hay into a hay-loft. And he stood with his head in at the window, scolding her, till it drove away.
“I knew he wor jawing her, poor thing! by the way he kep’ waggin’ his head — an’ he had his fist inside, a shakin’ in her face I’m sure he looked wicked enough for anything; an’ she a crying like a babby, an’ lookin’ back, an’ wavin’ her wet handkicher to him — poor thing! — and she so young! ’Tis a pity. Dear me! I often think, Miss, ’tis well for me I never was married. And see how we all would like to get husbands for all that, though so few is happy together. ’Tis a queer world, and them that’s single is maybe the best off after all.”
Chapter 52.
The Picture of a Wolf
I WENT DOWN that evening to the sitting-room which had been assigned to Milly and me, in search of a book — my good Mary Quince always attending me. The door was a little open, and I was startled by the light of a candle proceeding from the fire-side, together with a considerable aroma of tobacco and brandy.
On my little work-table, which he had drawn beside the hearth, lay Dudley’s pipe, his brandy-flask, and an empty tumbler; and he was sitting with one foot on the fender, his elbow on his knee, and his head resting in his hand, weeping. His back being a little toward the door, he did not perceive us; and we saw him rub his knuckles in his eyes, and heard the sounds of his selfish lamentation.
Mary and I stole away quietly, leaving him in possession, wondering when he was to leave the house, according to the sentence which I had heard pronounced upon him.
I was delighted to see old “Giblets” quietly strapping his luggage in the hall, and heard from him in a whisper that he was to leave that evening by rail — he did not know whither.
About half an hour afterwards, Mary Quince, going out to reconnoitre, heard from old Wyat in the lobby that he had just started to meet the train.
Blessed be heaven for that deliverance! An evil spirit had been cast out, and the house looked lighter and happier. It was not until I sat down in the quiet of my room that the scenes and images of that agitating day began to move before my memory in orderly procession, and for the first time I appreciated, with a stunning sense of horror and a perfect rapture of thanksgiving, the value of my escape and the immensity of the danger which had threatened me. It may have been miserable weakness — I think it was. But I was young, nervous, and afflicted with a troublesome sort of conscience, which occasionally went mad, and insisted, in small things as well as great, upon sacrifices which my reason now assures me were absurd. Of Dudley I had a perfect horror; and yet had that system of solicitation, that dreadful and direct appeal to my compassion, that placing of my feeble girlhood in the seat of the arbiter of my aged uncle’s hope or despair, been long persisted in, my resistance might have been worn out — who can tell? — and I self-sacrificed! Just as criminals in Germany are teased, and watched, and cross-examined, year after year, incessantly, into a sort of madness; and worn out with the suspense, the iteration, the self-restraint, and insupportable fatigue, they at last cut all short, accuse themselves, and go infinitely relieved to the scaffold — you may guess, then, for me, nervous, self-diffident, and alone, how intense was the comfort of knowing that Dudley was actually married, and the harrowing importunity which had just commenced for ever silenced.
That night I saw my uncle. I pitied him, though I feared him. I was longing to tell him how anxious I was to help him, if only he could point out the way. It was in substance what I had already said, but now strongly urged. He brightened; he sat up perpendicularly in his chair with a countenance, not weak or fatuous now, but resolute and searching, and which contracted into dark thought or calculation as I talked.
I dare say I spoke confusedly enough. I was always nervous in his presence; there was, I fancy, something mesmeric in the odd sort of influence which, without effort, he exercised over my imagination.
Sometimes this grew into a dismal panic, and Uncle Silas — polished, mild — seemed unaccountably horrible to me. Then it was no longer an accidental fascination of electro-biology. It was something more. His nature was incomprehensible by me. He was without the nobleness, without the freshness, without the softness, without the frivolities of human nature as I had experienced, either within myself or in other persons. I instinctively felt that appeals to sympathies or feelings could no more affect him than a marble monument. He seemed to accommodate his conversation