While the weeping group still stood there, doctors came; they looked at the quiet face, so beautiful in death, and said she had been dead for hours. The words struck those who heard them with unutterable horror. Dead, while those who loved her so dearly, who would have given their lives for her, had lain sleeping near her, unconscious of her doom—dead, while her lover had waited for her, and her father had been intently thinking of her approaching wedding.
What had she suffered during the night? What awful storm of agony had driven her to the lake? Had she gone thither purposely? Had she wandered to the edge and fallen in, or was there a deeper mystery? Had foul wrong been done to Lord Earle's daughter while he was so near her, and yet knew nothing of it?
She still wore her pretty pink evening dress. What a mockery it looked! The delicate laces were wet and spoiled; the pink blossoms she had twined in her hair clung to it still; the diamond arrow Lord Airlie had given her fastened them, a diamond brooch was in the bodice of her dress, and a costly bracelet encircled the white, cold arm. She had not, then, removed her jewels or changed her dress. What could have taken her down to the lake? Why was Lord Airlie's locket so tightly clinched in her hand?
Lord Airlie, when he was calm enough to speak, suggested that she might have fallen asleep, tired, before undressing—that in her sleep she might have walked out, gone to the edge of the lake, and fallen in.
That version spread among the servants. From them it spread like wildfire around the whole country-side; the country papers were filled with it, and the London papers afterward told how "the beautiful Miss Earle" had been drowned while walking in her sleep.
But Lord Airlie's suggestion did not satisfy Ronald Earle; he would not leave the darkened chamber. Women's gentle hands removed the bright jewels and the evening dress. Lady Helena, with tears that fell like rain, dried the long, waving hair, and drew it back from the placid brow. She closed the eyes, but she could not cross the white hands on the cold breast. One held the locket in the firm, tight clasp of death, and it could not be moved.
Ronald would not leave the room. Gentle hands finished their task. Beatrice lay in the awful beauty of death—no pain, no sorrow moving the serene loveliness of her placid brow. He knelt by her side. It was his little Beatrice, this strange, cold, marble statue—his little baby Beatrice, who had leaped in his arms years ago, who had cried and laughed, who had learned in pretty accents to lisp his name—his beautiful child, his proud, bright daughter, who had kissed him the previous night while he spoke jesting words to her about her lover. And he had never heard her voice since—never would hear it again. Had she called him when the dark waters closed over her bright head?
Cold, motionless, no gleam of life or light—and this was Dora's little child! He uttered a great cry as the thought struck him: "What would Dora say?" He loved Beatrice; yet for all the long years of her childhood he had been absent from her. How must Dora love the child who had slept on her bosom, and who was now parted from her forever.
And then his thoughts went back to the old subject: "How had it happened? What had taken her to the lake?"
One knelt near who might have told him, but a numb, awful dread had seized upon Lillian. Already weak and ill, she was unable to think, unable to shape her ideas, unable to tell right from wrong.
She alone held the clew to the mystery, and she knelt by that death bed with pale, parted lips and eyes full of terror. Her face startled those who saw it. Her sorrow found no vent in tears; the gentle eyes seemed changed into balls of fire; she could not realize that it was Beatrice who lay there, so calm and still—Beatrice, who had knelt at her feet and prayed that she would save her—Beatrice, who had believed herself so near the climax of her happiness.
Could she have met Hugh, and had he murdered her? Look where she would, Lillian saw that question written in fiery letters. What ought she to do? Must she tell Lord Earle, or did the promise she had made bind her in death as well as in life. Nothing could restore her sister. Ought she to tell all she knew, and to stain in death the name that was honored and loved?
One of the doctors called in saw the face of Lillian Earle. He went at once to Lady Helena, and told her that if the young lady was not removed from that room, and kept quiet she would be in danger of her life.
"If ever I saw a face denoting that the brain was disturbed," he said, "that is one."
Lillian was taken back to her room, and left with careful nurses. But the doctor's warning proved true. While Lord Earle wept over the dead child, Lady Helena mourned over the living one, whose life hung by a thread.
The day wore on; the gloom of sorrow and mourning had settled on the Hall. Servants spoke with hushed voices and moved with gentle tread. Lady Helena sat in the darkened room where Lillian lay. Lord Airlie had shut himself up alone, and Ronald Earle knelt all day by his dead child. In vain they entreated him to move, to take food or wine, to go to his own room. He remained by her, trying to glean from that silent face the secret of her death.
And when night fell again, he sunk exhausted. Feverish slumbers came to him, filled with a haunted dream of Beatrice sinking in the dark water and calling upon him for help. Kindly faces watched over him, kindly hands tended him. The morning sun found him still there.
Lady Helena brought him some tea and besought him to drink it. The parched, dried lips almost refused their office. It was an hour afterward that Hewson entered the room, bearing a letter in his hand. It was brought, he said by Thomas Ginns, who lived at the cottage past Fair Glenn hills. It had been written by a man who lay dying there, and who had prayed him to take it at once without delay.
"I ventured to bring it to you, my lord," said the butler; "the man seemed to think it a matter of life or death."
Lord Earle took the letter from his hands—he tried to open it, but the trembling fingers seemed powerless. He signed to Hewson to leave the room, and, placing the letter upon the table, resumed his melancholy watch. But in some strange way his thoughts wandered to the missive. What might it not contain, brought to him, too, in the solemn death chamber? He opened it, and found many sheets of closely covered paper. On the first was written "The Confession of Hugh Fernely."
The name told him nothing. Suddenly an idea came to him—could this confession have anything to do with the fate of the beloved child who lay before him? Kneeling by the dead child's side, he turned over the leaf and read as follows:
"Lord Earle, I am dying—the hand tracing this will soon be cold. Before I die I must confess my crime. Even now, perhaps, you are kneeling by the side of the child lost to you for all time. My lord, I killed her.
"I met her first nearly three years ago, at Knutsford; she was out alone, and I saw her. I loved her then as I love her now. By mere accident I heard her deplore the lonely, isolated life she led, and that in such terms that I pitied her. She was young, beautiful, full of life and spirits; she was pining away in that remote home, shut out from the living world she longed for with a longing I can not put into words. I spoke to her—do not blame her, she was a beautiful, ignorant child—I spoke to her, asking some questions about the road, and she replied. Looking at her face, I swore that I would release her from the life she hated, and take her where she would be happy.
"I met her again and again. Heaven pardon me if I did my best to awake an interest in her girlish heart! I told her stories of travel and adventure that stirred all the romance in her nature. With the keen instinct of love I understood her character, and played upon its weakness while I worshiped its strength.
"She told me of a sad, patient young mother who never smiled, of a father who was abroad and would not return for many years. Pardon me, my lord, if, in common with many others, I believed this story to be one to appease her. Pardon me, if I doubted as many others did—whether the sad young mother was your wife.
"I imagined that I was going to rescue her from a false position when I asked her to be my wife. She said her mother dreaded all mention of love and lovers, and I prayed her to keep my love a secret from all the world.
"I make no excuses for myself; she was young and innocent as a dreaming child. I ought to have looked on her beautiful face and left her. My lord, am I altogether to blame? The lonely young girl at Knutsford pined for what I could give her—happiness and pleasure did not seem so far removed from me. Had she been in her proper place I could never have addressed her.
"Not to you can I tell the details of my love story—how I worshiped with passionate love the beautiful, innocent child who smiled into my face and drank in my words. I asked her to be my wife, and she promised. My lord, I never for a moment dreamed that she would ever have a home with you—it did not seem to me possible. I intended to return and marry her, firmly believing that in some respects my rank and condition in life were better than her own. She promised to be true to me, to love no one else, to wait for me, and to marry me when I returned.
"I believe now that she never loved me. My love and devotion were but a pleasant interruption in the monotony of her life. They were to blame also who allowed her no pleasures—who forced her to resort to this stolen one.
"My lord, I placed a ring upon your daughter's finger, and pledged my faith to her. I can not tell you what my love was like; it was a fierce fire that consumed me night and day.
"I was to return and claim her in two years. Absence made me love her more. I came back, rich in gold, my heart full of happiness, hope making everything bright and beautiful. I went straight to Knutsford—alas! she was no longer there! And then I heard that the girl I loved so deeply and so dearly was Lord Earle's daughter.
"I did not dream of losing her; birth, title, and position seemed as nothing beside my mighty, passionate love. I thought nothing of your consent, but only of her; and I went to Earlescourt. My lord, I wrote to her, and my heart was in every line. She sent me a cold reply. I wrote again; I swore I would see her. She sent her sister to me with the reply. Then I grew desperate, and vowed I would lay my claim before you. I asked her to meet me out in the grounds, at night, unseen and unknown. She consented, and on Thursday night I met her near the shrubbery.
"How I remember her pretty pleading words, her beautiful proud face! She asked me to release her. She said that it had all been child's play—a foolish mistake—and that if I would give her her freedom from a foolish promise she would always be my friend. At first I would not hear of it; but who could have refused her? If she had told me to lie down at her feet and let her trample the life out of me, I should have submitted.
"I promised to think of her request, and we walked on to the border of the lake. Every hair upon her head was sacred to me; the pretty, proud ways that tormented me delighted me, too. I promised I would release her, and give her the freedom she asked, if she told me I was not giving her up to another. She would not. Some few words drove me mad with jealous rage—yes, mad; the blood seemed to boil in my veins. Suddenly I caught sight of a golden locket on her neck, and I asked her whose portrait it contained. She refused to tell me. In the madness of my rage I tried to snatch it from her. She caught it in her hands, and, shrinking back from me, fell into the lake.
"I swear it was a sheer accident—I would not have hurt a hair of her head; but, oh! My lord, pardon me—pardon me, for Heaven's sake—I might have saved her and I did not; I might have plunged in after her and brought her back, but jealousy whispered to me, 'Do not save her for another—let her die.' I stood upon the bank, and saw the water close over her head. I saw the white hand thrown up in wild appeal, and never moved or stirred. I stood by the lake-side all night, and fled when the morning dawned in the sky.
"I killed her. I might have saved her, but did not. Anger of yours can add nothing to my torture; think what it has been. I was a strong man two days since; when the sun sets I shall be numbered with the dead. I do not wish to screen myself from justice. I have to meet the wrath of Heaven, and that appalls me as the anger of man never could. Send the officers of the law for me. If I am not dead, let them take me; if I am, let them bury me as they would a dog. I ask no mercy, no compassion nor forgiveness; I do not merit it.
"If by any torture, any death, I could undo what I have done, and save her, I would suffer the extremity of pain; but I can not. My deed will be judged in eternity.
"My lord, I write this confession partly to ease my own conscience, party to shield others from unjust blame. Do not curse me because, through my mad jealousy, my miserable revenge, as fair and pure a child as father ever loved has gone to her rest."
So the strange letter concluded. Lord Earle read every word, looking over and anon at the quiet, dead face that had kept the secret hidden. Every word seemed burned in upon his brain; every word seemed to rise before him like an accusing spirit.
He stood face to face at last with the sin of his youth; it had found him out. The willful, wanton disobedience, the marriage that had broken his father's heart, and struck Ronald himself from the roll of useful men; the willful, cruel neglect of duty; the throwing off of all ties; the indulgence in proud, unforgiving temper, the abandonment of wife and children—all ended there. But for his sins and errors, that white, still figure might now have been radiant with life and beauty.
The thought stung him with cruel pain. It was his own fault. Beatrice might have erred in meeting Hugh Fernely; Fernely had done wrong in trying to win that young child-like heart for his own; but he who left his children to strange hands, who neglected all duties of parentage, had surely done the greatest wrong.
For the first time his utter neglect of duty came home to him. He had thought himself rather a modern hero, but now he caught a glimpse of himself as he was in reality. He saw that he was not even a brave man; for a brave man neglects no duty. It was pitiful to see how sorrow bent his stately figure and lined his proud face. He leaned over his dead child, and cried to her to pardon him, for it was all his fault. Lady Helena, seeking him in the gloom of that solemn death chamber, found him weeping as strong men seldom weep.
He did not give her the letter, nor tell her aught of Hugh Fernely's confession. He turned to her with as sad a face as man ever wore.
"Mother," he said, "I want my kinsman, Lionel Dacre. Let him be sent for, and ask him to come without delay."
In this, the crowning sorrow of his life, he could not stand alone. He must have some one to think and to plan for him, some one to help him bear the burden that seemed too heavy for him to carry. Some one must see the unhappy man who had written that letter, and it should be a kinsman of his own.
Not the brave, sad young lover, fighting alone with his sorrow he must never know the tragedy of that brief life, to him her memory must be sacred and untarnished, unmarred by the knowledge of her folly.
Lady Helena was not long in discovering Lionel Dacre's whereabouts. One of the footmen who had attended him to the station remembered the name of the place for which he had taken a ticket. Lady Helena knew that Sir William Greston lived close by, and she sent at once to his house.
Fortunately the messenger found him. Startled and horrified by the news, Lionel lost no time in returning. He could not realize that his beautiful young cousin was really dead. Her face, in its smiling brightness, haunted him. Her voice seemed to mingle with the wild clang of the iron wheels. She was dead, and he was going to console her father.
No particulars of her death had reached him; he now only knew that she had walked out in her sleep, and had fallen into the lake.
Twenty-four hours had not elapsed since Lord Earle cried out in grief for his young kinsman, yet already he stood by his side.
"Persuade him to leave that room," said Lady Helena. "Since our darling was carried there he has never left her side."
Lionel did as requested. He went straight to the library, and sent for Lord Earle, saying that he could not at present look upon the sad sight in the gloomy death chamber.
While waiting there, he heard of Lillian's dangerous illness. Lady Helena told him how she had changed before her sister's death; and, despite the young man's anger, his heart was sore and heavy.
He hardly recognized Lord Earle in the aged, altered man who soon stood before him. The long watch, the bitter remorse, the miserable consciousness of his own folly and errors had written strange lines upon his face.
"I sent for you, Lionel," he said, "because I am in trouble—so great that I can no longer bear it alone. You must think and work for me; I can do neither for myself."
Looking into his kinsman's face, Lionel felt that more than the death of his child weighed upon the heart and mind of Ronald Earle.
"There are secrets in every family," said Ronald; "henceforth there will be one in mine—and it will be the true story of my daughter's death. While I knelt yesterday by her side, this letter was brought to me. Read it, Lionel; then act for me."
He read it slowly, tears gathering fast in his eyes, his lips quivering, and his hands tightly clinched.
"My poor Beatrice!" he exclaimed; and then the strength of his young manhood gave way, and Lionel Dacre wept as he had never wept before. "The mean, pitiful scoundrel!" he cried, angry indignation rising as he thought of her cruel death. "The wretched villain—to stand by while she died!"
"Hush!" said Lord Earle. "He has gone to his account. What have you to say to me, Lionel? Because I had a miserable quarrel with my wife I abandoned my children. I never cared to see them from the time they were babes until they were women grown. How guilty am I? That man believed he was about to raise Beatrice in the social scale when he asked her to be his wife, or as he says, he would never have dreamed of proposing to marry my daughter. If he merits blame, what do I deserve?"
"It was a false position, certainly," replied Lionel Dacre.
"This secret must be kept inviolate," said Lord Earle. "Lord Airlie must never know it—it would kill Lady Helena, I believe. One thing puzzles me, Lionel—Fernely says Lillian met him. I do not think that is true."
"It is!" cried Lionel, a sudden light breaking in upon him. "I saw her with him. Oh, Lord Earle, you may be proud of Lillian! She is the noblest, truest girl that ever lived. Why, she sacrificed her own love, her own happiness, for her sister! She loved me; and when this wedding, which will never now take place, was over, I intended to ask you to give me Lillian. One night, quite accidentally, while I was wandering in the grounds with a cigar, I saw her speaking to a stranger, her fair sweet face full of pity and compassion, which I mistook for love. Shame to me that I was base enough to doubt her—that I spoke to her the words I uttered! I demanded to know who it was she had met, and why she had met him. She asked me to trust her, saying she could not tell me. I stabbed her with cruel words, and left her vowing that I would never see her again. Her sister must have trusted her with her secret, and she would not divulge it."
"We can not ask her now," said Lord Earle; "my mother tells me she is very ill."
"I must see her," cried Lionel, "and ask her to pardon me if she can. What am I to do for you, Lord Earle? Command me as though I were your own son."
"I want you to go to the cottage," said Ronald, "and see if the man is living or dead. You will know how to act. I need not ask a kinsman and a gentleman to keep my secret."
In a few minutes Lionel Dacre was on his way to the cottage, riding as though it were for dear life. Death had been still more swift. Hugh Fernely lay dead.
The cottager's wife told Lionel how the children out at play had found a man lying in the dank grass near the pond, and how her husband, in his own strong arms, had brought him to their abode. He lay still for many hours, and then asked for pen and ink. He was writing, she said, nearly all night, and afterward prayed her husband to take the letter to Lord Earle. The man refused any nourishment. Two hours later they went in to persuade him to take some food, and found him lying dead, his face turned to the morning sky.
Lionel Dacre entered the room. The hot anger died out of his heart as he saw the anguish death had marked upon the white countenance. What torture must the man have suffered, what hours of untold agony, to have destroyed him in so short a time! The dark, handsome face appeared to indicate that the man had been dying for years.
Lionel turned reverently away. Man is weak and powerless before death. In a few words he told the woman that she should be amply rewarded for her kindness, and that he himself would defray all expenses.
"He was perhaps an old servant of my lord's?" she said.
"No," was the reply; "Lord Earle did not know him—had never seen him; but the poor man was well known to one of Lord Earle's friends."
Thanks to Lionel's words, the faintest shadow of suspicion was never raised. Of the two deaths, that of Miss Earle excited all attention and aroused all sympathy. No one spoke of Hugh Fernely, or connected him with the occurrence at the Hall.
There was an inquest, and men decided that he had "died by the visitation of God." No one knew the agony that had cast him prostrate in the thick, dank grass, no one knew the unendurable anguish that had shortened his life.
When Lionel returned to the Hall, he went straight to Lord Earle.
"I was too late," he said; "the man had been dead some hours."
His name was not mentioned between them again. Lord Earle never inquired where he was buried—he never knew.
The gloom had deepened at the Hall. Lillian Earle lay nigh unto death. Many believed that the master of Earlescourt would soon be a childless man. He could not realize it. They told him how she lay with the cruel raging fever sapping her life, but he seemed to forget the living child in mourning for the one that lay dead.
In compliance with Lionel's prayer, Lady Helena took him into the sick room where Lillian lay. She did not know him; the gentle, tender eyes were full of dread and fear; the fair, pure face was burning with the flush of fever; the hot, dry lips were never still. She talked incessantly—at times of Knutsford and Beatrice—then prayed in her sweet, sad voice that Lionel would trust her—only trust her; when Beatrice was married she would tell him all.
He turned away; her eyes had lingered on his face, but no gleam of recognition came into them.
"You do not think she will die?" he asked of Lady Helena; and she never forgot his voice or his manner.
"We hope not," she said; "life and death are in higher hands than ours. If you wish to help her, pray for her."
In after years Lionel Dacre like to remember that the best and most fervent prayers of his life had been offered for gentle, innocent Lillian Earle.
As he turned to quit the chamber he heard her crying for her mother. She wanted her mother—why was she not there? He looked at Lady Helena; she understood him.
"I have written," she said. "I sent for Dora yesterday; she will be here soon."
All books are sourced from Project Gutenberg