"Ha, ha, ha!" Aram might well laugh; for when had any one shown himself able to withstand the powers of Mr. Chaffanbra.s.s?

"They say he is a sharp fellow," said Mr. Chaffanbra.s.s. "Well, we must be off. When those gentlemen at the West End get into Parliament it does not do to keep them waiting. Let one of your fellows get a cab." And then the barrister and the attorney started from Bucklersbury for the general meeting of their forces to be held in the Old Square, Lincoln's Inn.

We have heard how it came to pa.s.s that Felix Graham had been induced to become one of that legal phalanx which was employed on behalf of Lady Mason. It was now some days since he had left Noningsby, and those days with him had been very busy. He had never yet undertaken the defence of a person in a criminal court, and had much to learn,--or perhaps he rather fancied that he had. And then that affair of Mary Snow's new lover was not found to arrange itself altogether easily. When he came to the details of his dealings with the different parties, every one wanted from him twice as much money as he had expected. The chemist was very willing to have a partner, but then a partnership in his business was, according to his view of the matter, a peculiarly expensive luxury. Snow pere, moreover, came forward with claims which he rested on various arguments, that Graham found it almost impossible to resist them. At first,--that is immediately subsequent to the interview between him and his patron described in a preceding chapter, Graham had been visited by a very repulsive attorney who had talked loudly about the cruel wrongs of his ill-used client. This phasis of the affair would have been by far the preferable one; but the attorney and his client probably disagreed. Snow wanted immediate money, and as no immediate money was forthcoming through the attorney, he threw himself repentant at Graham's feet, and took himself off with twenty shillings. But his penitence, and his wants, and his tears, and the thwarted ambition of his parental mind were endless; and poor Felix hardly knew where to turn himself without seeing him. It seemed probable that every denizen of the courts of law in London would be told before long the sad tale of Mary Snow's injuries. And then Mrs. Thomas wanted money,--more money than she had a right to want in accordance with the terms of their mutual agreement. "She had been very much put about," she said,--"dreadfully put about. She had had to change her servant three times. There was no knowing the trouble Mary Snow had given her. She had, in a great measure, been forced to sacrifice her school." Poor woman! she thought she was telling the truth while making these false plaints. She did not mean to be dishonest, but it is so easy to be dishonest without meaning it when one is very poor!

Mary Snow herself made no claim on her lost lover, no claim for money or for aught besides. When he parted from her on that day without kissing her, Mary Snow knew that all that was over. But not the less did Graham recognise her claim. The very bonnet which she must wear when she stood before the altar with Fitzallen must be paid for out of Graham's pocket. That hobby of moulding a young lady is perhaps of all hobbies the most expensive to which a young gentleman can apply himself.

And in these days he heard no word from Noningsby. Augustus Staveley was up in town, and once or twice they saw each other. But, as may easily be imagined, nothing was said between them about Madeline. As Augustus had once declared, a man does not talk to his friend about his own sister. And then hearing nothing--as indeed how could he have heard anything?--Graham endeavoured to a.s.sure himself that that was all over. His hopes had ran high at that moment when his last interview with the judge had taken place; but after all to what did that amount? He had never even asked Madeline to love him. He had been such a fool that he had made no use of those opportunities which chance had thrown in his way. He had been told that he might fairly aspire to the hand of any lady. And yet when he had really loved, and the girl whom he had loved had been close to him, he had not dared to speak to her! How could he now expect that she, in his absence, should care for him?

With all these little troubles around him he went to work on Lady Mason's case, and at first felt thoroughly well inclined to give her all the aid in his power. He saw Mr. Furnival on different occasions, and did much to charm that gentleman by his enthusiasm in this matter. Mr. Furnival himself could no longer be as enthusiastic as he had been. The skill of a lawyer he would still give if necessary, but the ardour of the loving friend was waxing colder from day to day.

Would it not be better, if such might be possible, that the whole affair should be given up to the hands of Chaffanbra.s.s who could be energetic without belief, and of Graham who was energetic because he believed? So he would say to himself frequently. But then he would think again of her pale face and acknowledge that this was impossible. He must go on till the end. But, nevertheless, if this young man could believe, would it not be well that he should bear the brunt of the battle? That fighting of a battle without belief is, I think, the sorriest task which ever falls to the lot of any man.

But, as the day grew nigh, a shadow of unbelief, a dim pa.s.sing shade--a shade which would pa.s.s, and then return, and then pa.s.s again--flitted also across the mind of Felix Graham. His theory had been, and still was, that those two witnesses, Kenneby and Bolster, were suborned by Dockwrath to swear falsely. He had commenced by looking at the matter with a full confidence in his client's innocence, a confidence which had come from the outer world, from his social convictions, and the knowledge which he had of the confidence of others. Then it had been necessary for him to reconcile the stories which Kenneby and Bolster were prepared to tell with this strong confidence, and he could only do so by believing that they were both false and had been thus suborned. But what if they were not false? What if he were judging them wrongfully? I do not say that he had ceased to believe in Lady Mason; but a shadow of doubt would occasionally cross his mind, and give to the whole affair an aspect which to him was very tragical.

He had reached Mr. Furnival's chambers on this day some few minutes before his new allies, and as he was seated there discussing the matter which was now so interesting to them all, he blurted out a question which nearly confounded the elder barrister.

"I suppose there can really be no doubt as to her innocence?"

What was Mr. Furnival to say? Mr. Chaffanbra.s.s and Mr. Aram had asked no such question. Mr. Round had asked no such question when he had discussed the whole matter confidentially with him. It was a sort of question never put to professional men, and one which Felix Graham should not have asked. Nevertheless it must be answered.

"Eh?" he said.

"I suppose we may take it for granted that Lady Mason is really innocent,--that is, free from all falsehood or fraud in this matter?"

"Really innocent! Oh yes; I presume we take that for granted, as a matter of course."

"But you yourself, Mr. Furnival; you have no doubt about it? You have been concerned in this matter from the beginning, and therefore I have no hesitation in asking you."

But that was exactly the reason why he should have hesitated! At least so Mr. Furnival thought. "Who; I? No; I have no doubt; none in the least," said he. And thus the lie, which he had been trying to avoid, was at last told.

The a.s.surance thus given was very complete as far as the words were concerned; but there was something in the tone of Mr. Furnival's voice, which did not quite satisfy Felix Graham. It was not that he thought that Mr. Furnival had spoken falsely, but the answer had not been made in a manner to set his own mind at rest. Why had not Mr.

Furnival answered him with enthusiasm? Why had he not, on behalf of his old friend, shown something like indignation that any such doubt should have been expressed? His words had been words of a.s.surance; but, considering the subject, his tone had contained no a.s.surance.

And thus the shadow of doubt flitted backwards and forwards before Graham's mind.

Then the general meeting of the four lawyers was held, and the various arrangements necessary for the coming contest were settled.

No such impertinent questions were asked then, nor were there any communications between them of a confidential nature. Mr.

Chaffanbra.s.s and Solomon Aram might whisper together, as might also Mr. Furnival and Felix Graham; but there could be no whispering when all the four were a.s.sembled. The programme of their battle was settled, and then they parted with the understanding that they were to meet again in the court-house at Alston.

CHAPTER LXIII.

THE EVENING BEFORE THE TRIAL.

The eve of the trial had now come, and still there had been no confidence between the mother and the son. No words of kindness had been spoken with reference to that terrible event which was so near at hand. Lucius had in his manner been courteous to his mother, but he had at the same time been very stern. He had seemed to make no allowance for her sorrows, never saying to her one of those soft words which we all love to hear from those around us when we are suffering. Why should she suffer thus? Had she chosen to lean upon him, he would have borne on her behalf all this trouble and vexation.

As to her being guilty--as to her being found guilty by any twelve jurymen in England,--no such idea ever entered his head. I have said that many people had begun to suspect; but no such suspicions had reached his ears. What man, unless it should be Dockwrath, would whisper to the son the possibility of his mother's guilt? Dockwrath had done more than whisper it; but the words of such a man could have no avail with him against his mother's character.

On that day Mrs. Orme had been with Lady Mason for some hours, and had used all her eloquence to induce the mother even then to divulge her secret to her son. Mrs. Orme had suggested that Sir Peregrine should tell him; she had offered to tell him herself; she had proposed that Lady Mason should write to Lucius. But all had been of no avail. Lady Mason had argued, and had argued with some truth, that it was too late to tell him now, with the view of obtaining from him support during the trial. If he were now told, he would not recover from the first shock of the blow in time to appear in court without showing on his brow the perturbation of his spirit. His terrible grief would reveal the secret to every one. "When it is over,"--she had whispered at last, as Mrs. Orme continued to press upon her the absolute necessity that Lucius should give up the property,--"when it is over, you shall do it."

With this Mrs. Orme was obliged to rest contented. She had not the heart to remind Lady Mason how probable it was that the truth might be told out to all the world during the next two or three days;--that a verdict of Guilty might make any further telling unnecessary. And indeed it was not needed that she should do so. In this respect Lady Mason was fully aware of the nature of the ground on which she stood.

Mrs. Orme had sat with her the whole afternoon, only leaving herself time to be ready for Sir Peregrine's dinner; and as she left her she promised to be with her early on the following morning to go with her down to the court. Mr. Aram was also to come to the Farm for her, and a closed carriage had been ordered from the inn for the occasion.

"You won't let him prevent you?" were the last words she spoke, as Mrs. Orme then left her.

"He will not wish to do so," said Mrs. Orme. "He has already given me his permission. He never goes back from his word, you know."

This had been said in allusion to Sir Peregrine. When Mrs. Orme had first proposed to accompany Lady Mason to the court and to sit by her side during the whole trial, he had been much startled. He had been startled, and for a time had been very unwilling to accede to such a step. The place which she now proposed to fill was one which he had intended to fill himself;--but he had intended to stand by an innocent, injured lady, not a perpetrator of midnight forgery. He had intended to support a spotless being, who would then be his wife,--not a woman who for years had lived on the proceeds of fraud and felony, committed by herself!

"Edith," he had said, "you know that I am unwilling to oppose you; but I think that in this your feelings are carrying you too far."

"No, father," she answered, not giving way at all, or showing herself minded to be turned from her purpose by anything he might say.

"Do not think so; think of her misery. How could she endure it by herself?"

"Think of her guilt, Edith!"

"I will leave others to think of that. But, father, her guilt will not stain me. Are we not bound to remember what injury she might have done to us, and how we might still have been ignorant of all this, had not she herself confessed it--for our sakes--for our sakes, father?"

And then Sir Peregrine gave way. When this argument was used to him, he was forced to yield. It was true that, had not that woman been as generous as she was guilty, he would now have been bound to share her shame. The whole of this affair, taken together, had nearly laid him prostrate; but that which had gone the farthest towards effecting this ruin, was the feeling that he owed so much to Lady Mason. As regarded the outer world, the injury to him would have been much more terrible had he married her; men would then have declared that all was over with him; but as regards the inner man, I doubt whether he would not have borne that better. It was easier for him to sustain an injury than a favour,--than a favour from one whom his judgment compelled him to disown as a friend.

But he had given way, and it was understood at The Cleeve that Mrs.

Orme was to remain by Lady Mason's side during the trial. To the general household there was nothing in this that was wonderful. They knew only of the old friendship. To them the question of her guilt was still an open question. As others had begun to doubt, so had they; but no one then presumed that Sir Peregrine or Mrs. Orme had any doubt. That they were a.s.sured of her innocence was the conviction of all Hamworth and its neighbourhood.

"He never goes back from his word, you know," Mrs. Orme had said; and then she kissed Lady Mason, and went her way. She had never left her without a kiss, had never greeted her without a warm pressure of the hand, since that day on which the secret had been told in Sir Peregrine's library. It would be impossible to describe how great had been the worth of this affection to Lady Mason; but it may almost be said that it had kept her alive. She herself had said but little about it, uttering but few thanks; but not the less had she recognised the value of what had been done for her. She had even become more free herself in her intercourse with Mrs. Orme,--more open in her mode of speech,--had put herself more on an equality with her friend, since there had ceased to be anything hidden between them. Previously Lady Mason had felt, and had occasionally expressed the feeling, that she was hardly fit to a.s.sociate on equal terms with Mrs. Orme; but now there was none of this,--now, as they sat together for hours and hours, they spoke, and argued, and lived together as though they were equal. But nevertheless, could she have shown her love by any great deed, there was nothing which Lady Mason would not have done for Mrs. Orme.

She was now left alone, and according to her daily custom would remain there till the servant told her that Mr. Lucius was waiting for her in the dining-room. In an early part of this story I have endeavoured to describe how this woman sat alone, with deep sorrow in her heart and deep thought on her mind, when she first learned what terrible things were coming on her. The idea, however, which the reader will have conceived of her as she sat there will have come to him from the skill of the artist, and not from the words of the writer. If that drawing is now near him, let him go back to it. Lady Mason was again sitting in the same room--that pleasant room, looking out through the verandah on to the sloping lawn, and in the same chair; one hand again rested open on the arm of the chair, while the other supported her face as she leaned upon her elbow; and the sorrow was still in her heart, and the deep thought in her mind. But the lines of her face were altered, and the spirit expressed by it was changed. There was less of beauty, less of charm, less of softness; but in spite of all that she had gone through there was more of strength,--more of the power to resist all that this world could do to her.

It would be wrong to say that she was in any degree a hypocrite. A man is no more a hypocrite because his manner and gait when he is alone are different from those which he a.s.sumes in company, than he is for wearing a dressing-gown in the morning, whereas he puts on a black coat in the evening. Lady Mason in the present crisis of her life endeavoured to be true in all her dealings with Mrs. Orme; but nevertheless Mrs. Orme had not yet read her character. As she now sat thinking of what the morrow would bring upon her,--thinking of all that the malice of that man Dockwrath had brought upon her,--she resolved that she would still struggle on with a bold front. It had been brought home to her that he, her son, the being for whom her soul had been imperilled, and all her hopes for this world destroyed,--that he must be told of his mother's guilt and shame. Let him be told, and then let him leave her while his anguish and the feeling of his shame were hot upon him. Should she be still a free woman when this trial was over she would move herself away at once, and then let him be told. But still it would be well--well for his sake, that his mother should not be found guilty by the law. It was still worth her while to struggle. The world was very hard to her, bruising her to the very soul at every turn, allowing her no hope, offering to her no drop of cool water in her thirst. But still for him there was some future career; and that career perhaps need not be blotted by the public notice of his mother's guilt. She would still fight against her foes,--still show to that court, and to the world that would then gaze at her, a front on which guilt should not seem to have laid its hideous, defacing hand.

There was much that was wonderful about this woman. While she was with those who regarded her with kindness she could be so soft and womanly; and then, when alone, she could be so stern and hard! And it may be said that she felt but little pity for herself. Though she recognised the extent of her misery, she did not complain of it. Even in her inmost thoughts her plaint was this,--that he, her son, should be doomed to suffer so deeply for her sin! Sometimes she would utter to that other mother a word of wailing, in that he would not be soft to her; but even in that she did not mean to complain of him. She knew in her heart of hearts that she had no right to expect such softness. She knew that it was better that it should be as it now was. Had he stayed with her from morn till evening, speaking kind words to her, how could she have failed to tell him? In sickness it may irk us because we are not allowed to take the cool drink that would be grateful; but what man in his senses would willingly swallow that by which his very life would be endangered? It was thus she thought of her son, and what his love might have been to her.

Yes; she would still bear up, as she had borne up at that other trial. She would dress herself with care, and go down into the court with a smooth brow. Men, as they looked at her, should not at once say, "Behold the face of a guilty woman!" There was still a chance in the battle, though the odds were so tremendously against her. It might be that there was but little to which she could look forward, even though the verdict of the jury should be in her favour; but all that she regarded as removed from her by a great interval. She had promised that Lucius should know all after the trial,--that he should know all, so that the property might be restored to its rightful owner; and she was fully resolved that this promise should be kept.

But nevertheless there was a long interval. If she could battle through this first danger,--if by the skill of her lawyers she could avert the public declaration of her guilt, might not the chances of war still take some further turn in her favour? And thus, though her face was pale with suffering and thin with care, though she had realised the fact that nothing short of a miracle could save her,--still she would hope for that miracle.

But the absolute bodily labour which she was forced to endure was so hard upon her! She would dress herself, and smooth her brow for the trial; but that dressing herself, and that maintenance of a smooth brow would impose upon her an amount of toil which would almost overtask her physical strength. O reader, have you ever known what it is to rouse yourself and go out to the world on your daily business, when all the inner man has revolted against work, when a day of rest has seemed to you to be worth a year of life? If she could have rested now, it would have been worth many years of life,--worth all her life. She longed for rest,--to be able to lay aside the terrible fatigue of being ever on the watch. From the burden of that necessity she had never been free since her crime had been first committed.

She had never known true rest. She had not once trusted herself to sleep without the feeling that her first waking thought would be one of horror, as the remembrance of her position came upon her. In every word she spoke, in every trifling action of her life, it was necessary that she should ask herself how that word and action might tell upon her chances of escape. She had striven to be true and honest,--true and honest with the exception of that one deed. But that one deed had communicated its poison to her whole life. Truth and honesty,--fair, unblemished truth and open-handed, fearless honesty,--had been impossible to her. Before she could be true and honest it would be necessary that she should go back and cleanse herself from the poison of that deed. Such cleansing is to be done.

Men have sinned deep as she had sinned, and, lepers though they have been, they have afterwards been clean. But that task of cleansing oneself is not an easy one;--the waters of that Jordan in which it is needful to wash are scalding hot. The cool neighbouring streams of life's pleasant valleys will by no means suffice.

Since she had been home at Orley Farm she had been very scrupulous as to going down into the parlour both at breakfast and at dinner, so that she might take her meals with her son. She had not as yet omitted this on one occasion, although sometimes the task of sitting through the dinner was very severe upon her. On the present occasion, the last day that remained to her before the trial--perhaps the last evening on which she would ever watch the sun set from those windows, she thought that she would spare herself. "Tell Mr. Lucius," she said to the servant who came to summon her, "that I would be obliged to him if he would sit down without me. Tell him that I am not ill, but that I would rather not go down to dinner!" But before the girl was on the stairs she had changed her mind. Why should she now ask for this mercy? What did it matter? So she gathered herself up from the chair, and going forth from the room, stopped the message before it was delivered. She would bear on to the end.

She sat through the dinner, and answered the ordinary questions which Lucius put to her with her ordinary voice, and then, as was her custom, she kissed his brow as she left the room. It must be remembered that they were still mother and son, and that there had been no quarrel between them. And now, as she went up stairs, he followed her into the drawing-room. His custom had been to remain below, and though he had usually seen her again during the evening, there had seldom or never been any social intercourse between them.

On the present occasion, however, he followed her, and closing the door for her as he entered the room, he sat himself down on the sofa, close to her chair.

"Mother," he said, putting out his hand and touching her arm, "things between us are not as they should be."

She shuddered, not at the touch, but at the words. Things were not as they should be between them. "No," she said. "But I am sure of this, Lucius, that you never had an unkind thought in your heart towards me."