The Haute Noblesse - Part 72
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Part 72

Aunt Marguerite stepped out into the pa.s.sage, her head erect, and her stiff silk training noisily behind her, to go to her own room, but the way was barred by the presence of Liza, who was down on the floor crouched in a heap, sobbing pa.s.sionately, with her ap.r.o.n up to her eyes.

"Get up!" said Aunt Marguerite imperiously, as she struck at the girl's hand with her fan.

Liza leaped to her feet, looked aghast at the figure before her, and fled, while Aunt Marguerite strode into her room, and loudly closed the door. As she pa.s.sed her niece's chamber, Louise was clasped tightly in Madelaine's arms, and it was long before the two girls were seated, hand in hand, gazing wonderingly at the inroads made so soon by grief.

"It is so horrible--all so horrible," whispered Madelaine at last, for the silence was for long unbroken, save by an occasional sob.

Louise looked at her wildly, and then burst into a pa.s.sion of tears.

"Maddy!" she cried at last, "is it all true?"

They could say no more, but sat gathering comfort from the sympathetic grasp of each other's hands.

At last, in a dull heavy way, the words came, each sounding as if the speaker were in despair, but willing to suffer so that her companion might be spared, and by degrees Louise learned that Van Heldre still lay in the same insensible state, the awaking from which Madelaine shrank from with horror, lest it should mean the return for a brief time of sense before the great final change.

"I could not come to you," said Louise, after a long silence, as she gazed wistfully in her friend's face, "and thought we should never meet again as friends."

"You should have known me better," replied Madelaine. "It is very terrible, such a--such a--oh Louy, dearest, there must have been some mistake. Harry--Harry could not have been so base."

Louise was silent for a time. At last she spoke.

"There must be times," she said gently, "when even the best of us are not answerable for our actions. He must have been mad. It was when, too--he had--promised--he had told me--that in the future--oh," she cried, shuddering, as she covered her face with her hands, "it can't be true--it cannot be true."

Again there was a long silence in the room, whose drawn-down blind turned the light of a sickly yellow hue. But the window was open, and from time to time the soft sea breeze wafted the blind inward, and a bright ray of sunny light streamed in like hope across the two bent forms.

"I must not stay long," said Madelaine. "I shiver whenever I am away, lest--"

"No, no," cried Louise, pa.s.sionately, as she strained her friend to her breast, "we will not despond yet. All this comes across our lives like a dense black cloud, and there must be a great change in the future.

Your father will recover."

"I pray that he may," said Madelaine.

"And I will not believe that Harry is--dead."

"I pray that he may be alive, Louy, to come some time in the future to ask forgiveness of my father. For I did love him, Louy; at first as a sister might the brother with whom she had played from childhood, and of late in sorrow and anguish, as the woman whom he had always said he loved. I fought with it, oh, so hard, but the love was there, and even when I was most hard and cold--"

"And he believed you cared for Mr Leslie."

The words slipped from Louise Vine's lips like an escaped thought, and the moment they were spoken, she shrank away with her pale cheeks crimsoning, and she gazed guiltily at her companion.

"It was a foolish fancy on his part," said Madelaine gravely. "I cannot blame myself for anything I ever said or did to your brother. If I had been wrong, my lapse would have come upon me now like the lash of a whip; but in the long hours of my watches by my poor father's bed, I have gone over it again and again, and I cannot feel that I have been wrong."

Louise drew her more closely to her breast.

"Maddy," she whispered, "years will have to pa.s.s, and we must separate.

The pleasant old days must end, but some day, when all these horrors have been softened by time, we may call each other sister again, and in the long dark interval you will not forget."

"Forget!" said Madelaine, with a smile full of sadness. "You know that we shall always be unchanged."

"Going--so soon?" exclaimed Louise, for her friend had risen.

"He is lying yonder," said Madelaine. "I must go back. I could not stay away long from you though without a word."

They stood for a few moments clasped in each other's arms, and then in a slow, sad way, went hand in hand towards the door. As she opened it for her friend to pa.s.s through, Louise shrank back from the burst of sunshine that flooded the pa.s.sage, and placed her hand across her eyes.

It was a momentary act, and then she drew a long breath and followed her friend, as if her example had given the needed strength, and acted as an impetus to raise her from the lethargic state into which she had fallen.

In this spirit she went down with her to the door, when, as their steps sounded on the hall floor, the dining-room door was thrown open quickly, and Vine stood in the darkened opening, gazing wildly at the veiled figure of Madelaine.

"Van Heldre?" he said, in an excited whisper; "not--not--" He could not finish his speech, but stood with his hand pressed to his throat.

"My father's state is still unchanged," said Madelaine gently.

"Then there may yet be hope, there may yet be hope," said Vine hoa.r.s.ely as he shrank once more into the darkened room.

"Mr Vine," said Madelaine piteously, as she stood with extended hands asking sympathy in her grievous trouble.

"My child!" he cried, as he caught her to his breast, and she clung there sobbing bitterly. Then he softly disengaged her hands from his neck. "No, no," he said dreamily, "I am guilty too; I must never take you to my heart again."

"What have I done?" sobbed Madelaine, as she clung to him still.

"You?" he said fondly. "Ah! it was once my dream that you would be more and more my child. Little Madelaine!"

He drew her to his breast again, kissed her with spasmodic eagerness, and then held out a hand to Louise, who flew to his breast as with an angry, malicious look, Aunt Marguerite advanced to the end of the landing and looked down at the sobbing group.

"Good-bye!" whispered the stricken man hoa.r.s.ely, "good-bye, my child. I am weak and helpless. I hardly know what I say; but you must come here no more. Good-bye."

He turned from them hastily, and glided back into the darkened room, where Louise followed him, as Madelaine went slowly down toward the town.

Vine was seated before the empty grate, his head resting on his hand, as Louise went to his side, and he started as if from a dream when she touched his shoulder.

"You, my child?" he said, sinking back. "Ah, stay with me--pray with me. It is so hard to bear alone."

CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE.

THE OLD WATCHDOG.

The silence as if of death reigned for days and days at Van Heldre's house, which, unasked, old Crampton had made his residence. In a quiet furtive way he had taken possession of the inner office, to which he had brought from his own house a sofa-cushion and pillow, carrying them there one dark night unseen, and at times, no doubt, he must have lain down and slept; but to all there it was a mystery when he did take his rest.

If Mrs Van Heldre called him to partake of a meal he came. If he was forgotten he ate one of a store of captain's biscuits which he kept in his desk along with his very strong tobacco, which flavoured the said biscuits in a way that, being a regular smoker, he did not notice, while at ten o'clock he regularly went out into the yard to have his pipe. He was always ready to sit up and watch, but, to his great annoyance, he had few opportunities, the task being shared between Madelaine and her mother.

As to the business of the office, that went on as usual as far as the regular routine was concerned, everything fresh being put back till the princ.i.p.al resumed his place at his desk. Bills of lading, the smelting-house accounts bank deposits, and the rest, all were attended to, just as if Van Heldre had been there instead of lying above between life and death. From time to time Mrs Van Heldre came down to him to beg that he would ask for everything he wanted.

"I cannot help neglecting you, Mr Crampton," she said with her hands playing about the b.u.t.tons of her dress.

"Never you mind about me, ma'am," he said, admonishing her with a pen-holder. "I'm all right, and waiting to take my turn."

"Yes, yes, you're very good, Mr Crampton, and you will see that everything goes on right, so that when he comes down he may find that we have not neglected any single thing."