Run to Earth by Mary Elizabeth Braddon (ready player one ebook TXT) 📕

was a man whom some people would have called plain. But the dark sallow

face, with its irregular features, was illuminated by an expression of

mingled intelligence and amiability, which possessed a charm for all

judges worth pleasing.

Lionel was the clergyman, Douglas the lawyer, or rather law-student,

for the glory of his maiden brief was yet to come.

How Reginald envied these fortunate kinsmen! He hated them with

passionate hate. He looked from them to Honoria, the woman against whom

he had plotted—the woman who triumphed in spite of him—for he could

not imagine that grief for a dead husband could have any place in the

heart of a woman who found herself mistress of such a domain as

Raynham, and its dependencies.

Lady Eversleigh’s astonishment was unbounded. This will placed her in

even a loftier position than that which she had occupied when possessed

of the confidence and affection of her husband. For her pride there was

some consolation in this thought; but the triumph, which was sweet to

the proud spirit, afforded no balm for the wounded heart. He was gone—

he whose love had made her mistress of that wealth and splendour. He

was gone from her for ever, and he had died believing her false.

In the midst of her triumph the widow bowed her head upon her hands,

and sobbed convulsively. The tears wrung from her in this moment were

the first she had shed that day, and they were very bitter.

Reginald Eversleigh watched her with scorn and hatred in his heart.

“What do you say now, Lionel?” he said to his cousin, when the three

young men had left the dining-hall, and were seated at luncheon in a

smaller chamber. “You did not think my respected aunt a clever actress

when she fainted before the doors of the mausoleum. You will at least

acknowledge that the piece of acting she favoured us with just now was

superb.”

“What do you mean by ‘a piece of acting’?”

“That outburst of grief which my lady indulged in, when she found

herself mistress of Raynham.”

“I believe that it was genuine,” answered Mr. Dale, gravely.

“Oh, you think the inheritance a fitting subject for lamentation?”

“No, Reginald. I think a woman who had wronged her husband, and had

been the indirect cause of his death, might well feel sorrow when she

discovered how deeply she had been loved, and how fully she had been

trusted by that generous husband.”

“Bah!” cried Reginald, contemptuously. “I tell you, man, Lady

Eversleigh is a consummate actress, though she never acted before a

better audience than the clodhoppers at a country fair. Do you know who

my lady was when Sir Oswald picked her out of the gutter? If you don’t,

I’ll enlighten you. She was a street ballad-singer, whom the baronet

found one night starving in the market-place of a country town. He

picked her up—out of charity; and because the creature happened to

have a pretty face, he was weak enough to marry her.”

“Respect the follies of the dead,” replied Lionel. “My uncle’s love was

generous. I only regret that the object of it was so unworthy.”

“Oh!” exclaimed Reginald, “I thought just now that you sympathized with

my lady.”

“I sympathize with every remorseful sinner,” said Lionel.

“Ah, that’s your shop!” cried Reginald, who could not conceal his

bitter feelings. “You sympathize with Lady Eversleigh because she is a

wealthy sinner, and mistress of Raynham Castle. Perhaps you’ll stop

here and try to step into Sir Oswald’s shoes. I don’t know whether

there’s any law against a man marrying his uncle’s widow.”

“You insult me, and you insult the dead, Sir Reginald, by the tone in

which you discuss these things,” answered Lionel Dale. “I shall leave

Raynham by this evening’s coach, and there is little likelihood that

Lady Eversleigh and I shall ever meet again. It is not for me to judge

her sins, or penetrate the secrets of her heart. I believe that her

grief to-day was thoroughly genuine. It is not because a woman has

sinned that she must needs be incapable of any womanly feeling.”

“You are in a very charitable humour, Lionel,” said Sir Reginald, with

a sneer; “but you can afford to be charitable.”

Mr. Dale did not reply to this insolent speech.

Sir Reginald Eversleigh and his two cousins left the village of Raynham

by the same coach. The evening was finer than the day had been, and a

full moon steeped the landscape in her soft light, as the travellers

looked their last on the grand old castle.

The baronet contemplated the scene with unmitigated rage.

“Hers!” he muttered; “hers! to have and hold so long as she lives! A

nameless woman has tricked me out of the inheritance which should have

been mine. But let her beware! Despair is bold, and I may yet discover

some mode of vengeance.”

While the departing traveller mused thus, a pale woman stood at one of

the windows of Raynham Castle, looking out upon the woods, over which

the moon sailed in all her glory.

“Mine!” she said to herself; “those lands and woods belong to me!—to

me, who have stood face to face with starvation!—to me, who have

considered it a privilege to sleep in an empty barn! They are mine; but

the possession of them brings no pleasure. My life has been blighted by

a wrong so cruel, that wealth and position are worthless in my eyes.”

*

CHAPTER XIII.

IN YOUR PATIENCE YE ARE STRONG.

Early upon the morning after the funeral, a lad from the village of

Raynham presented himself at the principal door of the servants’

offices, and asked to see Lady Eversleigh’s maid.

The young woman who filled that office was summoned, and came to

inquire the business of the messenger.

Her name was Jane Payland; she was a Londoner by birth, and a citizen

of the world by education.

She had known very little of either comfort or prosperity before she

entered the service of Lady Eversleigh. She was, therefore, in some

measure at least, devoted to the interests of that mistress, and she

was inclined to believe in her innocence; though, even to her, the

story of the night in Yarborough Tower seemed almost too wild and

improbable for belief.

Jane Payland was about twenty-four years of age, tall, slim, and

active. She had no pretensions to beauty; but was the sort of person

who is generally called ladylike.

This morning she went to the little lobby, in which the boy had been

told to wait, indignant at the impertinence of anyone who could dare to

intrude upon her mistress at such a time.

“Who are you, and what do you want?” she asked angrily.

“If you please, ma’am, I’m Widow Beckett’s son,” the boy answered, in

evident terror of the young woman in the rustling black silk dress and

smart cap; “and I’ve brought this letter, please; and I was only to

give it to the lady’s own maid, please.

“I am her own maid,” answered Jane.

The boy handed her a dirty-looking letter, directed, in a bold clear

hand, to Lady Eversleigh.

“Who gave you this?” asked Jane Payland, looking at the dirty envelope

with extreme disgust.

“It was a tramp as give it me—a tramp as I met in the village; and

I’m to wait for an answer, please, and I’m to take it to him at the

‘Hen and Chickens.’”

“How dare you bring Lady Eversleigh a letter given you by a tramp—a

begging letter, of course? I wonder at your impudence.”

“I didn’t go to do no harm,” expostulated Master Beckett. “He says to

me, he says, ‘If her ladyship once sets eyes upon that letter, she’ll

arnswer it fast enough; and now you cut and run,’ he says; ‘it’s a

matter of life and death, it is, and it won’t do to waste time over

it.’”

These words were rather startling to the mind of Jane Payland. What was

she to do? Her own idea was, that the letter was the concoction of some

practised impostor, and that it would be an act of folly to take it to

her mistress. But what if the letter should be really of importance?

What if there should be some meaning in the boy’s words? Was it not her

duty to convey the letter to Lady Eversleigh?

“Stay here till I return,” she said, pointing to a bench in the lobby.

The boy seated himself on the extremest edge of the bench, with his hat

on his knees, and Jane Payland left him.

She went straight to the suite of apartments occupied by Lady

Eversleigh.

Honoria did not raise her eyes when Jane Payland entered the room.

There was a gloomy abstraction in her face, and melancholy engrossed

her thoughts.

“I beg pardon for disturbing you, my lady,” said Jane; “but a lad from

the village has brought a letter, given him by a tramp; and, according

to his account, the man talked in such a very strange manner that I

thought I really ought to tell you, my lady; and—”

To the surprise of Jane Payland, Lady Eversleigh started suddenly from

her seat, and advanced towards her, awakened into sudden life and

energy as by a spell.

“Give me the letter,” she cried, abruptly.

She took the soiled and crumpled envelope from her servant’s hand with

a hasty gesture.

“You may go,” she said; “I will ring when I want you.”

Jane Payland would have given a good deal to see that letter opened;

but she had no excuse for remaining longer in the room. So she

departed, and went to her lady’s dressing-room, which, as well as all

the other apartments, opened out of the corridor.

In about a quarter of an hour, Lady Eversleigh’s bell rang, and Jane

hurried to the morning-room.

She found her mistress still seated by the hearth. Her desk stood open

on the table by her side; and on the desk lay a letter, so newly

addressed that the ink on the envelope was still wet.

“You will take that to the lad who is waiting,” said Honoria, pointing

to this newly-written letter.

“Yes, my lady.”

Jane Payland departed. On the way between Lady Eversleigh’s room and

the lobby in the servants’ offices, she had ample leisure to examine

the letter.

It was addressed—

“Mr. Brown, at the ‘Hen and Chickens.’”

It was sealed with a plain seal. Jane Payland was very well acquainted

with the writing of her mistress, and she perceived at once that this

letter was not directed in Lady Eversleigh’s usual hand.

The writing had been disguised. It was evident, therefore, that this

was a letter which Lady Eversleigh would have shrunk from avowing as

her own.

Every moment the mystery grew darker. Jane Payland liked her mistress;

but there were two things which she liked still better. Those two

things were power and gain. She perceived in the possession of her

lady’s secrets a high-road to the mastery of both. Thus it happened

that, when she had very nearly arrived at the lobby where the boy was

waiting, Jane Payland suddenly changed her mind, and darted off in

another direction.

She hurried along a narrow passage, up the servants’ staircase, and

into her own room. Here she remained for some fifteen or twenty

minutes, occupied with some task which required the aid of a lighted

candle.

At