Читать книгу A Life Sentence - Sergeant Adeline - Страница 10

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"But, dear me, Mr. Lepel," said Mrs. Rumbold, "there's no place for a child like that but the workhouse."

Hubert stood before the Rector's wife in a pretty little room opening out upon the Rectory garden. Jenny had been left in the hall, seated on one of the high-backed wooden chairs, while her protector told his tale. Mrs. Rumbold—a short, stout, elderly woman with a good-natured smile irradiating her broad face and kind blue eyes—sat erect in the basket-chair wherein her portly frame more usually reclined, and positively gasped as she heard his story.

"To think of that child's behavior! I assure you, Mr. Lepel, that we tried to do our duty. We knew how painful it would be for the dear General and Miss Vane if any member of that wretched man's family were left in the village, and we thought it simplified matters so much that there was only one child—didn't we, Alfred?"

Alfred was the Rector, a tall thin man, very slow in expressing his ideas, and therefore generally resigning the task of doing so to his wife's more nimble tongue. On this occasion, unready as usual with a response, he crossed his legs one over the other, cleared his throat, and had just prepared to utter the words, "We did indeed, my dear," when Mrs. Rumbold was off again.

"Some neighbors took care of her before the trial," she said confidentially. "Indeed we paid them a small sum for doing so, Mr. Lepel—we didn't like to send the child to the workhouse before we knew how matters would turn out. But, when the poor wretched man was condemned, I said to Alfred,'We really can't let the Smiths be burdened any longer with Andrew Westwood's child—she must go to the Union!' And Alfred actually went to Westwood, and asked him if he had any relatives to whom the child could be sent—didn't you, Alfred?—and, when he said that there were none, and that the girl might as well be brought up in the workhouse as anywhere else, for she would always be an outcast like himself—I quote his very words, Mr. Lepel—his graceless, reckless, wicked words!—why, then, I just put on my hat and cloak, and I went to the Smiths at once, and I said, 'Mrs. Smith, I've come to take little Westwood to the workhouse;' and take her I did that very afternoon."

"Do you know when she ran away?" Hubert asked.

Mrs. Rumbold shook her head.

"I haven't heard. Not more than a day or two ago, I should fancy, for nobody seems to have been looking for her in this direction. I wonder she came back to Beechfield, the hardened little thing!"

"Oh, come, I don't think she is that, Mrs. Rumbold!" said Hubert, affecting a lightness which assuredly he did not feel. "I fancy that she wandered back to Beechfield out of love for her father and her old home, poor child. She is not to be blamed for her father's sins, surely!" he added, seeing rather an odd expression on Mrs. Rumbold's face as the involuntary words of pity passed his lips.

"Oh, no, no—of course not!" Mrs. Rumbold hastened to reply. "It is very kind of you, Mr. Lepel, and very kind of Miss Vane too, to interest yourselves in the fate of Andrew Westwood's daughter—very Christian, I am sure!"

"I don't know that," said Hubert, somewhat awkwardly. "I fancy that my cousin simply wishes to get the child away from the place before the General is well enough to go out again—I suppose he knows her by sight. It would be painful to him—and little Enid might come to hear."

"Of course, of course! I quite understand, Mr. Lepel. And the Churton workhouse is so near Beechfield too!"

"She shall not go back to the workhouse," said Hubert, with firmness. "I am resolved on that!"

"An orphanage, I suppose? Well, we might get her into an orphanage if we paid a small sum for her; but who would pay? There's the Anglican Sisterhood at East Winstead—not that I quite approve of Sisterhoods myself," said Mrs. Rumbold grimly—"but I know that in this case the Sisters are doing a good work and for a small annual payment——"

"I don't much like the idea of a Sisterhood. Do you know of a smaller place—an ordinary school perhaps—where she could be taken in and clothed and taught and civilised?"

"No, Mr. Lepel, I don't. You could not send a child like that to a lady's house without letting the whole story be told; and who would take her then? In a charitable institution, now, she could be admitted, and no questions asked."

"I did not think—I did not exactly want to find a charitable institution," said Hubert, suddenly seeing that his position would appear very strange in the Rumbolds' eyes, and yet resolved to stick to his point. No, whatever happened, "little Westwood," as Mrs. Rumbold called her, should not be brought up as a "charity-girl." He had an instinctive understanding of the suffering that the child would endure if she were not in kindly hands; and he did not think that the atmosphere of a large semi-public institution would be favorable to her future welfare.

Mrs. Rumbold looked at him in open-eyed perplexity.

"But, Mr. Lepel, what do you want?"

"I want the child to be happy," Hubert cried, with some vexation—"I want her to be where she will never be taunted with her father's position, where she will be kindly treated, and brought up to earn her own living in a suitable way."

"Then," said the Rector, startling both his hearers by the ponderous solemnity of his tones, "send her to Winstead."

Hubert turned towards him respectfully.

"You think so, sir?"

"The Sisters are good women," said Mr. Rumbold. "They love the children and train them well. I have twice sent orphans from this village to their care, and in each case I believe that there could not have been a happier result."

"You'll be charmed if you go over the house at Winstead, Mr. Lepel," said Mrs. Rumbold coaxingly. "Do go over and see yourself what it is like. Such a lovely house, half covered with purple clematis and Virginia creeper, and a dear little chapel, and beautiful grounds! And the expense is quite trifling—twelve or sixteen pounds a year, I believe, for each of the dear little orphans!"

"If you speak so highly of it, I am sure I may take it on trust," answered Hubert, with a smile. He was growing weary of the discussion. "Take the child and do the best for her, will you, Mrs. Rumbold? My cousin and I will supply all funds that may be needed."

"I am sure that's very good of you, Mr. Lepel. The child couldn't be happier anywhere than she will be at Winstead. Alfred will write at once about it—will you not, Alfred?"

Alfred bowed assent.

"I suppose it will take a few days to settle," said Hubert, looking from one to the other. "In the meantime——"

"Oh, in the meantime she can stay here!" said Mrs. Rumbold expansively. "She will be no trouble, poor thing! I can put up a little bed for her in one of the attics."

"She's not very clean, I'm afraid, Mrs. Rumbold. She looks exceedingly black."

"I expect that the black's all on the surface," said the Rector's wife. "You needn't laugh, Alfred; Mr. Lepel knows what I mean, I'm sure. The child's been in the workhouse for more than a fortnight, and has left it only for the last day or two; she is just dusty and grimy with the heat and exercise, and will be glad of a bath, poor thing! I'll make her look beautiful before she goes to Winstead, you'll see."

"Then I may leave her in your charge? It is exceedingly good of you," said Hubert, rising to take his leave. "I don't know what I should have done with her but for you."

"My dear Mr. Lepel, I am sure the goodness is all on your side!" cried Mrs. Rumbold. "I should not have thought of a gentleman like you, one of your family, troubling himself about a ragged miserable child like this little Westwood girl. I'm sure she ought to be eternally grateful to you all!"

"Oh, by-the-bye," said Hubert, turning round as he was nearing the door, "you have reminded me of something that I may as well mention now, Mrs. Rumbold! Oblige me by not telling any one that I—we have anything to do with providing for the child. Do not speak of it to the girl herself or to any one in the village. And pray do not allude to it in conversation with my cousins at the Hall!"

"If you wish it, of course I will not mention it to any one," said Mrs. Rumbold, bridling a little at what she conceived to be an imputation on her discretion. "You may trust me, I am sure, Mr. Lepel. We will not breathe a word."

"And particularly not a word to the child herself," Hubert said, turning his eyes upon the Rector's wife with such earnestness in their troubled depths that she was quite impressed. "I do not wish her to be burdened with the feeling that she owes anything to us."

"Oh, Mr. Lepel, how generous, how delicate-minded!" cried the effusive little woman, throwing up her hands in admiration. "Now I wouldn't have believed that there was a young man that could be so thoughtful of others' feelings—I wouldn't indeed, Mr. Hubert! Must you go? Won't you stay and have dinner with us to-night?"

"Thank you—no; I am engaged—a dinner in town," said Hubert hastily. "I will leave you my address"—he produced a card from his pocket-book, and with it a ten-pound note—"and this will perhaps be useful in getting clothes and things of that kind for her. If you want more, you will let me know."

He escaped with difficulty from Mrs. Rumbold's rapturous expression of surprise at his liberality, and at last got out into the hall. Andrew Westwood's little girl was still sitting on the chair where she had been placed, her hands crossed before her on her lap, her bare feet swinging idly to and fro, her dark eyes fixed vaguely on the trees and shrubs of the Rectory garden, which she could see from the hall window. Hubert paused beside her and spoke.

"I am going to leave you with this lady—Mrs. Rumbold," he said. "You know her already, and know that she will be kind to you. You are to go to a good school, where I hope that you will be happy."

The child's eyes dilated as she listened to him.

"Are you going away?" she said.

"Yes; I am going back to London," the young man answered kindly. "You will stay here, like a good little girl, won't you?"

"Do you want me to?" she said, pushing her hair back from her forehead and gazing at him anxiously.

"Yes, I do."

She nodded. "I'll stay," she said curtly.

And then she lapsed once more into her former state of silence and sullenness; and Hubert left her with a smile of farewell and a secret aspiration that he might not see her again; for it seemed to him that he could never look upon the face of Andrew Westwood's daughter without a pang.

He decided to catch the seven o'clock train to London.

"You'll be late for your engagement, I am afraid," Mrs. Rumbold said to him; thinking of his excuse for running away.

He only smiled and nodded as he walked off, by way of reply. His dinner in town, he knew well enough, would be eaten in solitude at his club. He had no other engagement; but he would have invented half a hundred excuses sooner than stay an hour longer than was necessary under General Vane's hospitable roof.

He dined silently and expeditiously at his club, and then made his way through the lighted streets to his lodgings in Bloomsbury. A barrister by profession, he had found his real vocation in literature, and he liked to live within easy reach of libraries and newspaper offices. He had been making a fair income lately, and his earnings were very acceptable to him, for he was not a man of particularly economical habits. He had about a hundred a year of his own, and Miss Vane allowed him another hundred—all else had to be won by the work of his own hands. And yet, as he passed up the staircase to his own rooms, he was wondering whether he could not manage to dispense with Miss Vane's hundred a year.

He had let himself in with his latch-key, and the room which he entered was lighted only by the lamps in the street. He had not been expected so early, and his landlady had forgotten to bring the lamp which he was in the habit of using. He struck a match and lit the gas, pulled down the blinds, and threw himself with a heavy sigh into the great leathern arm-chair that stood before his writing-table.

He felt mortally tired. The events of the day had been such as would have tried a strong man's nerve, and Hubert Lepel was at this time out of sorts, physically as well as mentally. He had seldom gone through such hours of keen torture as he had borne that day; and his face—pale, worn, miserable—seemed to have lost all its youth as he lay back in the great arm-chair and thought of the past.

He rose at last with an impatient word.

"It is madness to brood over what cannot be undone," he said to himself. "I must 'dree my own weird' without a word to any living soul. Florence has my secret, and I have hers; to her I am bound by a tie that nothing on earth can break. And I can have no other ties. I am bad enough, Heaven knows, but I am not so bad as to render myself responsible for the happiness of a wife, for the welfare of children, for a home! With this hanging over me, how can I hope for any happiness in life? I am as much under punishment as poor Westwood in his prison-cell. I have no rights, no hopes, no love. A life sentence did I say that he had received? And have I not a life sentence too?"

He was standing beside his writing-table, and his eyes fell upon a photograph which had adorned it for the last six months. It represented a girl's face—a bright, pretty, careless face, with large eyes and parted smiling lips. For the first time he did not admire it very much; for the first time he found it a trifle soulless and vapid.

"Poor Mary," he said, looking at it with a kind of wonder in his eyes—"what will she say when she finds that I do not go to her father's house any more? I do not think that she will care very much. She has seen little enough of me lately! I could not ask her now to link her fate with mine, poor child! She would hate me if she knew. Best to forget her, as she will forget me!"

He took the photograph out of its frame and deliberately tore it across; then he set himself to reduce it to the smallest possible fragments, until they lay in a little heap upon his writing-table. His face was grave and rigid as he performed the task, but it showed little trace of pain. His fancy for "Mary," the pretty daughter of an old professor, had taken no deep root. Henceforth it vanished from his life, his memory, his heart. "Mary," like all his other dreams, was dead to him.

A knock at the door startled him as he completed his work. A servant brought in a telegram, which he tore open hastily. As he expected, it was from Miss Vane.

"Marion died this evening at seven o'clock, from syncope of the heart. Funeral on Thursday."

"Another victim!" Hubert said to himself, laying down the pink paper with something like a groan. "Am I responsible for this too? A life sentence, did I say? It would take a hundred lives to compensate for all the harm that Florence and I have done!"