Читать книгу In Silk Attire: A Novel - William Black - Страница 3

Of what befel Lord Knottingley in England – of the influences brought to bear on him, of the acquaintances and relatives who counselled him (if he did receive any counsel but from his own inclination) – his wife never knew anything. Week after week passed, and she heard nothing from England. Again and again she wrote: there was no answer. But at length there arrived at Thun his lordship's man of business, Mr. Chetwynd, who brought with him all the news for which she had sought.

She was seated at the window overlooking the lake, oppressed and almost terrified by the strange shadows which the sunset was weaving among the mountains opposite. The sun had so far sunk that only the peaks of the splendid hills burned like tongues of fire; and in the deep valleys on the eastern side the thick purple darkness was giving birth to a cold grey mist which crept along in nebulous masses like the progress of a great army. Down at the opposite shore the mist got bluer and denser; and over all the lake the faint haze dulled the sombre glow caught from the lurid red above. Up there, high over the mountains, there were other mountains and valleys; and, as she looked, she thought she saw an angel, with streaming violet hair which floated away eastward, and he held to his mouth a trumpet, white as silver, which almost touched the peak of the Wetterhorn; and then the long, flowing robes of scarlet and gold became an island, with a fringe of yellow light that dazzled her sad eyes. When she turned rapidly to see that a servant had brought her a letter, the same cloud-visions danced before her, pictured in flames upon the darkness of the room.

"Will it please your ladyship to see Mr. Chetwynd this evening or to-morrow morning?" the servant inquired.

"Did Mr. Chetwynd bring this letter?" she asked, hurriedly.

"Yes, your ladyship," said the man.

"Tell him I will see him this evening – by-and-by – in half an hour."

Standing there, with a faint pink light streaming in upon the paper, she read these words:

"DEAR ANNIE, – Things have changed greatly since I was in England before; and my present visit seems to have brought me back again to life. It would be impossible for me to let you know how many reflections have been suggested to me since I came here; and perhaps I ought to go on at once to the main purport of my letter. You are my wife —legally married– as you know; and no one can deprive you of the privileges pertaining to your rank, any more than they can deprive you of my esteem and affection. At the same time you know how very exclusive my friends are; and I am convinced that for you to seek companionship with them would only bring you discomfort and vexation. Now your own good sense, my dear, will show you that I cannot always remain away from England and allow my property to be left in the hands of agents. I see so many alterations for the worse, and so much urgent need for improvement, that I am certain I must remain in England for several years, if not for life. Now, my dear, I have a proposal to make which you will think cruel at first; but which – I know well – you will afterwards regard as being the wisest thing you could do for all of us. Nobody here seems to know of our marriage; certainly none of my own family seem to take it for granted that I have a wife living; and if I were to bring you over I should have to introduce you, with explanations which would be awkward to both you and me – which, indeed, would be insultingto you. What I desire you to do is to remain in the house you now occupy, which shall be yours; a sufficient income – to be named by yourself – will be settled upon you; and Annie will be supplied with whatever governesses and masters she requires. I hope you will see the propriety of this arrangement; and more particularly on account of one circumstance which, unfortunately, I am compelled to explain. You know I never allowed you to become friends with any of the English people we met in Italy. The reason was simply that they, in common with my relatives, believed that you and I were not married; and could I drag you, my dear, into the ignominy of an explanation? For the same reason, I hope you will conceal your real rank in the event of your ever meeting with English people at Thun; and while I wait your answer – which I trust you will calmly consider – I am, whatever unhappy circumstances may divide us,

"Your loving husband,

"HARRY ORMOND."

She read this letter to the very end, and seemed not to understand it; she was only conscious of a dull sense of pain. Then she turned away from it – from its callous phrases, its weak reasoning, its obvious lies, all of which seemed a message from a stranger, not from Harry Ormond – and accidentally she caught a glimpse of herself in a mirror. She saw there what recalled her to herself; for the ghastly face she beheld, tinged with the faint glow of the sunset, was terror-stricken and wild. In the next second she had banished that look; she rang the bell; and then stood erect and firm, with all the fire of her old profession tingling in her.

"Bid Mr. Chetwynd come here," she said to the servant.

In a minute or two the door was again opened, and there entered a tall, grey-haired man, with a grave and rather kindly expression of face.

She held out the letter, and said, in a cold, clear tone:

"Do you know the contents of this letter?"

"I do, your ladyship," said he.

"And you have been sent to see what money I should take for keeping out of the way, and not troubling Lord Knottingley? Very well – "

"I assure your ladyship – "

"You need not speak," she said, with a dignity of gesture which abashed him – which made him regard her with the half-frightened, half-admiring look she had many a time seen on the faces of the scene-shifters after one of her passionate climaxes – "I presume I am still the Marchioness of Knottingley?"

"Certainly."

"And my husband has commissioned you to receive my instructions?"

"He has, your ladyship; and if you would only allow me to explain the circumstances – "

"Mr. Chetwynd, you and I used to talk frankly with each other. I hope you will not embarrass yourself by making an apology for his lordship, when he himself has done that so admirably in this letter. Now, be good enough to attend to what I say. You will secure for me and my daughter a passage to America by the earliest vessel we can reach from here; and to-morrow morning you will accompany us on the first stage of the journey. I will take so much money from you as will land us in New York; whatever surplus there may be will be returned to Lord Knottingley."

"May I beg your ladyship to consider – to remain here until I communicate with his lordship?"

"I have considered," she said, calmly, in a tone which put an end to further remonstrance, "and I do not choose to remain in this house another day."

So Mr. Chetwynd withdrew. He saw nothing of this strangely self-possessed woman until the carriage was at the door next morning, ready to take her from the house which she had cast for ever behind her.

When he did see her he scarcely recognised her. She was haggard and white; her eyes were red and wild; she appeared to be utterly broken down. She was dressed in black, and so was the little girl she led by the hand. He did not know that she had spent the entire night in her daughter's room, and that it was not sleep which had occupied those long hours.

So it was that Annie Napier and her daughter arrived in America; and there she went again upon the stage, under the name of Annie Brunel, and earned a living for both of them. But the old fire had gone out; and there was not one who recognised in the actress her who had several years before been the idol of London. One message only she sent to her husband; and it was written, immediately on her reaching New York, in these words:

"HARRY ORMOND, – I married you for your love. When you take that from me, I do not care to have anything in its place. Nor need you try to buy my silence; I shall never trouble you.

"ANNIE NAPIER."

On the receipt of that brief note, Harry Ormond had a severe fit of compunction. The freedom of his new life was strong upon him, however; and in process of time he, like most men of his stamp, grew to have a conviction that he was not responsible for the wrong he had done. If she had wilfully relinquished the luxury he offered her, was he to blame?

Ten years afterwards, Lord Knottingley lay very sick. He was surrounded by attentive relatives, who, having affectionately interested themselves in him during his life, naturally expected to be paid for their solicitude at his death. But at the last moment remorse struck him. As the drowning man is said to be confronted by a ghastly panorama of his whole life, so he, in these last hours, recalled the old tenderness and love of his youth, which he had so cruelly outraged. He would have sent for her then; he would have braved the ridicule and indignation which he had once so feared; but it was too late. One act of reparation was alone possible. When Harry Ormond Marquis of Knottingley died, it was found that he had left, by a will dated only a few days before his death, his whole property to his wife, of whom nobody knew anything, accompanying the bequest with such expressions of affection and penitence as sorely puzzled his lady relatives.

Not for several months did the lawyers who acted for the trustees discover where the missing wife had taken up her abode in America; and then an elderly gentleman waited upon the actress to break the news of her husband's death, and to invite her to become the mistress of a large property and the wearer of a proud title.

"How pleased she will be!" he had said to himself, before seeing her.

Once in her presence, however, he did not so tastily judge the tender-eyed, beautiful, melancholy woman; and it was with all the delicacy he could command that he told his story, and watched its effect upon her handsome, sad face.

But these ten years of labour had not quite broken Annie Napier's spirit. Out of her grief and her tears – for she was a woman, and could not help still loving the lover of her youth – she rose with her old grandeur of manner, and refused the offer. Not theatrically, nor angrily, but simply and definitely, so that the messenger from England, perplexed and astonished, could only beg of her to think, not of herself, but of her daughter.

"My daughter," she said, perhaps rather bitterly, "will never seek, any more than myself, to go amongst those people. God knows that it is she alone whom I consider in everything I do. I have taught her to earn her own bread; and I will teach her that her only chance of happiness is to marry, if she does marry, in her own profession. You appear to be surprised, sir; but what I say to you is not the result of any hasty impulse. Have you seen her?" she added, with a touch of pride. "Have you seen her since you came over? Some years hence you may find her in England, and she will reap my old triumphs again."

"If you will only consider what you are taking from her – the position she would hold – the – "

For an instant the large dark eyes of the actress were filled with a strange, wistful look; was she striving – as we often do strive – to anticipate the current of years, and look over the long future lying in wait for this girl of hers?

"I have considered, sir, many a year ago. She has been brought up in perfect ignorance of her birth and name; and there is no one of her associates who knows our secret. So she will remain."

This unlooked-for termination to his mission so astounded the lawyer, that he could not at first comprehend the decision of her tone.

"You will understand, madam," he said, "that professionally I have no resource but to return to England with your message. But may I not beg you to reflect? Is it not possible that you have been moved to this decision by a – what shall I say? – a view of things which may appear natural to you in your professional life, but which is looked upon otherwise by the outside world? – "

"You think I am led astray by theatrical notions of life?" she said, with a smile. "It was my experience of your 'outside world' which made me resolve that my girl should never suffer that which I have suffered. The resolution is a very old one, sir. But supposing that I should die, would she then have this property – would it belong to her?"

"Undoubtedly, if she chooses to accept it."

After a few moments' silence, the prudent and tender mother having calculated every possibility which might affect her daughter's happiness, she said to him:

"In that case, sir, I can always provide against her suffering want. I will give her to-day your address in England, and tell her that if at any future time I am taken from her, and if she should ever be in need, she can go to you; and then, sir, you will remember who Annie Brunel is."

"And you absolutely condemn your daughter to be an actress, when a word from you could make her an English lady – "

The woman before him drew herself up.

"When my daughter ceases to believe that an actress may be a lady, it will be time for her to apply to you for the rank she has lost."