JOAN HASTE by H. RIDER HAGGARD (e reader comics TXT) 📕

There were only two roads by which Henry could approach Monk's Lodge: the cliff road; and that which ran, through woodlands for the most part, to the Vale station, half a mile away. Joan knew that about three hundred yards from the Lodge at the end of the shrubberies, there was a summer-house commanding a view of the cliff and sea, and standing within twenty paces of the station road. Here she placed herself, so as to be able to intercept Henry by whichever route he should come; for she wished their meeting to be secret, and, for obvious reasons, she did not dare to await him in the immediate neighbourhood of the house.

She came to the summer-house, a rustic building surrounded at a little distance by trees, and much overgrown with masses of ivy and other creeping plants. Here Joan sat herself down, and picking up a mouldering novel left there long ago by Emma, she held it in her hand as though she were reading, while over the top of it she watched the two roads anxiously.

Nearly an hour passed, and as yet no one had gone by whom even at that distance she could possibly mistake for Henry; when suddenly her heart bounded within her, for a hundred yards or more away, and just at the turn of the station road, a view of which she commanded through a gap in the trees, she caught sight of the figure of a man who walked with a limp. Hastening from the summer-house, she pushed her way through the undergrowth and the hedge beyond, taking her stand at a bend in the path. Here she waited, listening to the sound of approaching footsteps and of a man's voice, Henry's voice, humming a tune that at the time was popular in the streets of London. A few seconds passed, which to her seemed like an age, and he was round the corner advancing towards her, swinging his stick as he came. So intent was he upon his thoughts, or on the tune that he was humming, that he never saw her until they were face to face. Then, catching sight of a lady in a grey dress, he stepped to one side, lifting his hand to his hat--looked up at her, and stopped dead.

"Henry," she said in a low voice.

"What! are you here, Joan," he asked, "and in that dress? For a moment you frightened me like a ghost--a ghost of the past."

"I am a ghost of the past," she answered. "Yes, that is all I am--a ghost. Come in here, Henry; I wish to speak to you."

He followed her without a word, and presently they were standing together in the summer-house.

Henry opened his lips as though to speak; but apparently thought better of it, for he said nothing, and it was Joan who broke that painful silence.

"I have waited for you here," she began confusedly, "because I have things that I must tell you in private."

"Yes, Mrs. Rock," he answered; "but do you not think, under all the circumstances, that it would be better if you told them to me in public? You know this kind of meeting might be misunderstood."

"Do not speak to me like that, I beg," she said, clasping her hands and looking at him imploringly; then added, "and do not call me by that name: I cannot bear it from you, at any rate as yet."

"I understand that it is your name, and I have no title to use any other."

"Yes, it is my name," she answered passionately; "but do you know why?"

"I know nothing except what your letters and your husband have told me, and really I do not think that I have any right to inquire further."

"No, but I have a right to tell you. You think that I threw you over, do you not, and married Mr. Rock for my own reasons?"

"I must confess that I do; you would scarcely have married him for anybody else's reasons."

"So you believe. Now listen to me: I married Samuel Rock in order that you might marry Emma Levinger. I meant to marry you, Henry, but your mother came to me and implored me not to do so, so I took this means of putting myself out of the reach of temptation."

"My mother came to you, and you did /that!/ Why, you must be mad!"

"Perhaps; but so it is, and the plot has answered very well, especially as our child is dead."

"Our child!" he said, turning deathly pale: "was there any child?"

"Yes, Henry; and she was very like you. Her name was Joan. I thought that you would wish her to be called Joan. I buried her about a month ago."

For a moment he hid his face in his hands, then said, "Perhaps, Joan, you will explain, for I am bewildered."

So she told him all.

"Fate and our own folly have dealt very hardly with us, Joan," he said in a quiet voice when she had finished; "and now I do not see what there is to be done. We are both of us married, and there is nothing between us except our past and our dead child. By Heaven! you are a noble woman, but also you are a foolish one. Why could you not consult me instead of listening to my mother, or to any one else who chose to plead with you in my interests--and their own?"

"If I had consulted you, Henry, by now I should have been your wife."

"Well, and was that so terrible a prospect to you? As you know, I asked nothing better; and it chanced that I was able to obtain a promise of employment abroad which would have supported both of us in comfort. Or--answer me truly, Joan--did you, on the whole, as he told me, think that you would do better to marry Mr. Rock?"

"If Mr. Rock said that," she answered, looking at him steadily, "he said what he knew to be false, since before I married him I told him all the facts and bargained that I should live apart from him for a while. Oh! Henry, how can you doubt me? I tell you that I hate this man whom I have married for your sake, that the sight of him is dreadful to me, and that I had sooner live in prison than with him. And yet to-day I go to him."

"I do not doubt you, Joan," he answered, in a voice that betrayed the extremity of his distress; "but the thing is so appalling that it paralyses me, and I know neither what to do nor to say. Do you want help to get away from him?"

She shook her head sadly, and answered, "I can escape from him in one way only, Henry--by death, for my bargain was that when the time of grace was ended I would come to be his faithful wife. After all he is my husband, and my duty is towards him."

"I suppose so--curse him for a cringing hound. Oh, Joan! The thought of it drives me mad, and I am helpless. I cannot in honour even say the words that lie upon my tongue."

"I know," she answered; "say nothing, only tell me that you believe me."

"Of course I believe you; but my belief will not save you from Samuel Rock, or me from my remorse."

"Perhaps not, dear," she answered quietly, "but since there is no escape we must accept the inevitable; doubtless things will settle themselves sooner or later. And now there is another matter of which I want to speak to you. You know your father-in-law is very ill, dying indeed, and yesterday he telegraphed for me to come to see him from London. What do you think that he had to tell me?"

Henry shook his head.

"This: that I am his legitimate daughter; for it seems that in marrying your wife's mother he committed bigamy, although he did not mean to do so."

"Oh! this is too much," said Henry. "Either you are mistaken, Joan, or we are all living in a web of lies and intrigues."

"I do not think that I am mistaken." Then briefly, but with perfect clearness, she repeated to him the story that Mr. Levinger had told her on the previous night, producing in proof of it the certificates of her mother's marriage and of her own birth.

"Why, then," he burst out when she had finished, "this old rogue has betrayed me as well as you! Now I understand why he was so anxious that I should marry his daughter. Did /she/ know anything of this, Joan?"

"Not a word. Do not blame her, Henry, for she is innocent, and it is in order that she may never know, that I have repeated this story to you. Look, there go the proofs of it--the only ones." And taking the two certificates, she tore them into a hundred fragments and scattered them to the winds.

"What are you doing?" he said. "But it does not matter; they are only copies."

"It will be difficult for you to find the originals," she answered, with a sad smile, "for I was careful that you should see neither the name of the parish where my mother was married, nor the place of the registration of my birth."

"I will get those out of /him/," he said grimly, nodding his head towards the house.

"If you care for me at all, Henry, you will do nothing of the sort--for your wife's sake. I have been nameless so long that I can well afford to remain so; but should Lady Graves discover the secret of her birth and of her father's conduct, it would half kill her."

"That is true, Joan; and yet justice should be done to you. Oh! was ever a man placed so cruelly? What you have said about the money is just, for it is Emma's by right, but the name is yours."

"Yes, Henry; but remember that if you make a stir about the name, attempts will certainly be made to rob your wife of her fortune."

"By whom?"

"By my husband, to whose house I must now be going."

For a few moments there was silence, then Joan spoke again:--

"I forgot, Henry: I have something to give you that you may like to keep," and she took a tiny packet from her breast.

"What is it?" he said, shrinking back a little.

"Only--a lock of the--baby's hair." And she kissed it and gave it to him.

He placed the paper in his purse calmly enough. Then he broke down.

"Oh! my God," he said, with a groan, "forgive me, but this is more than I can bear."

Another second, and they were sobbing in each other's arms, seeing nothing of a man, with a face made devilish by hate and jealousy, who craned his head forward to watch them from the shelter of a thick bush some few yards away.

When Joan parted from Henry she walked quickly to Monk's Vale station to catch the train. Arriving just in time, she bought a third-class ticket to Bradmouth, and got into an empty carriage. Already they were starting, when the door opened, and a man entered the compartment.