Page:All the Year Round - Series 2 - Volume 1.djvu/343

Charles Dickens] mind, be affected; such wildness in your eyes, I would caution you to take care. Now, do listen to me," he added earnestly; "the truth is, we all noticed and watched you from the beginning, that is my girls and I; they thought you were something like a poor brother of theirs, though I don't see it. Then that dean told us something about you and that pretty creature you have at home, and the sickness and the going away, and all that. So you see we read it like a story book."

I was getting tired of all this, and answered, I confess, rather rudely. "Every one thinks themselves entitled to meddle with my affairs."

"Now," he went on, "let us look at this like two Englishmen. I tell you this will be a bad business. My girls and I, we know this place by heart, and the people, and the diseases, for we have been coming here many years. I tell you that the only course for you is to leave, and leave with us, this very day, by the four o'clock train. We shall take care of you; the girls will talk to you, will keep your mind from thinking. We shall rob you from your own home for three or four days at the least, and send you back to that dear girl of yours a different being from what you are now."

"And then," I said, "do you know what is to follow—can you guess what that home will become when its master returns?"

"Well, as to that, also, I wish to speak to you. If your money loss has not been very considerable, I should be glad to help you to replace it."

I was touched with his generosity—these were no mean platitudes; but all this only added to my degradation. A mere stranger, like one who has seen some squalid beggar in the street, and is, of course, privileged to ask the story, the minute details, and then in return, offers his coppers. Thank God, I have not fallen quite so low as that!

I declined civilly and coldly. I was in no such violent hurry to go, neither was I quite so weak as he imagined. I could fortunately control myself, I said, in presence of the danger, and more fortunate still, had no money to throw away. I made him a bow, and went away. He had not found me so easy to settle, as he had once done the county lord on the magistrates' bench.

Yet my heart turned towards his daughters and their gentle invitation, and I thought again and again wistfully of the tempting programme he had laid out. The horrid monotony of the day, dragging on, and dragging me with it, was something terrible to return to. It seemed endless; and the wearing equilibrium and suspense of another day was something to shrink from. I wanted to rush away into the world—anywhere; but my gold, my gold, kept crying to me from its prison. I might as well have just dropped a hundred gold pieces in the street, and have tried to pass on without picking them up.

And yet I felt it was the only thing, the only salvation. The wild, horrid dream or nightmare in which I was writhing and groaning must be broken through, if I could but awaken in the pure, innocent air.

There was their gambling music coming dulled through the trees; it made me shiver again. I could see the colours glittering among the leaves in the old sickening promenade; there is a devil in every one of these objects—band, fiddlers, players, all combined to drive me frantic.

I heard a gentle voice beside me. "Why will you not do," said she—it was Constance alone—"why will you not do as papa says? Indeed you look ill, and so feverish and excited. Do be advised by me. I have had my little losses recollect, and under your guidance; so I have a claim on you, and—you will come with us I know?"

"And leave my money to these swindling scoundrels—make them a present of it? I can't, I won't; you don't know, or can't know. I can't go—I dare not stay. O was there ever such a pitiable condition?"

"Yes," she said, softly, "many thousand times worse—you might be a thousand times worse. You should do as papa says. Once out of these dense clouds everything will seem bright, and natural, and rational. Do come, we will be so pleasant."

Again the satanic music came muffled through the trees, and made every fibre in my frame jar—sent a panic into my very brain, called up the whole hateful scene again. I saw the conspirators stripping victims, with the dull wearing monotony going on like eternal punishment. I could not stand more of that.

"Oh, let me go!" I said, I fear very wildly. "Oh, let me go with you—do, I conjure you!—anywhere! Let me go away out of this; if I stay it will kill me!"

She said they would call for me at half-past three. I walked home rapidly. Yes, it was assuredly all for the best. The moment that firm resolution was taken, it was