Page:Once a Week Jul - Dec 1859.pdf/332

 15, 1859.] started, turned suddenly thoughtful, and listened with still greater attention.

“Crowe,” he said at last, “have you seen this Lady Beauchamp??

“No, sir.”

“Well, I will accompany you when you go on your errand. I have rather a fancy to see her, and shall watch as she steps into her carriage, without interfering, of course, with you and the old fool. So she is shamming piety, is she? Humph! I think I see my way through this business, but what a double distilled ass Sir John Beauchamp must be!”

Punctually at the appointed hour Rossi and Crowe walked to Hampton Street, where they separated. The carriage—a very gaudy concern, quite new—drove up to the door, the footman handed in some prayer-books, and as he loudly shouted to the coachman, “Salem Chapel!” Rossi passed, as if accidentally, and had a good view of the lady within. Meanwhile Crowe came as directed, and concealed himself in the shadow of the portico, where he was almost instantly joined by a man from within the house.

“All right, sir?”

“Yes, thank you for coming so punctually. We will take a cab at the corner of the street.”

But as they were crossing to the stand the baronet's own carriage came wheeling swiftly back with his wife within. The old man stood as if paralysed. The wheel struck him and he fell heavily to the ground. Crowe and Rossi helped him up; he was sensible, but unable to move.

“I much fear my leg is broken,” he muttered, groaning with pain.

Rossi lifted up his body, Crowe gently took the legs, and they carried him back to his own house. There was clearly no other course to take. Through the hall they passed (for the door was open and the carriage still waiting), followed by the astonished footman. They laid his master on the first sofa they met with, and ordered the servant to run quickly for the family surgeon. He disappeared, and Lady Beauchamp, who had merely returned for her purse, entered the room. She looked with little emotion at her injured husband, but when she caught sight of Crowe kneeling beside him her face changed fearfully; her eyes dilated; her lips quivered; her colour fled; it was not surprise only—not fear, but a host of conflicting passions which held her mute; trembling, unable to withdraw her eyes from Crowe, who, poor fellow, shrank from her gaze and hid his face in both hands. Rossi, who watched acutely the whole group, saw that Sir John's attention was arrested to the singular expression of his wife's face, and walked up to the statue-like form and laid his hand firmly on her arm. She turned to him and gave a piercing shriek.

“I have recently, madam,” he said coolly, “been in the company of a gentleman who was looking for you, and who will be delighted to hear you are so comfortably located. I mean your husband.”

“Sir, you must be mistaken,” exclaimed Sir John, somewhat fiercely, “that lady is my wife.”

“That she cannot be, Sir John. I tell you I was only yesterday with her husband; his name is Henry Fisher, alias Baron Ormoffz, alias Count Des Prés; and I myself had the honour of giving away this lady to him in the Church of St. Sulpice in Paris some eighteen years ago, she being then the famous actress, Sophy Vernon. She cannot be your wife, consequently, and will not, I know, deny the truth of my statement, of which abundant proofs exist, as she well knows, including her most respectable spouse in person.”

“But why does she stare so at him?” asked the old man after a long pause, glancing at Crowe.

“Poor fellow,” replied the manager in a low tone, “he is her son; she sold him to me years ago; he had a sweet voice, and I made something of him till he lost it. He is an honest fellow, is Crowe; she has been a brute to him as to every one else. Ah, sir, you are not her only dupe!”

The doctor's brougham now drove up to the door, a little confusion ensued, in the midst of which Lady Beauchamp, who had remained perfectly silent, disappeared. At his own request Rossi and Crowe helped to move the patient to his bed, and waited till the broken limb was set; but before the doctor had re-entered his brougham, Lady Beauchamp had driven off quietly and unquestioned in her own carriage to the nearest railway-station, carrying with her all the jewels and loose cash on which she could lay her hands. When the old man was subsequently informed of this, he only uttered a deep groan; it may have been grief—it may have been disappointment; it sounded very like a sigh of relief! Ah! what a life he had led since he picked up, at a foreign watering-place, that apparent mirror of virtue and propriety. Poor weak old creature! his property, his actions, his very soul had passed into her hands, and she had acted her part, the most important of all her rôles, with a perfection equalled only by the completeness of her depravity. She had joined a religious sect, and confined herself to the society of a few of its ministers, because she hoped amongst them to escape detection, and yet to command a certain amount of worship and admiration which was necessary to her happiness, but she looked eagerly forward to a day when she should be set at liberty to fly with her ill-gotten, yet hardly-earned, gain to a climate and habits more congenial to her tastes. The sudden appearance of her son and the well-known Rossi was a blow she had never anticipated.

As for poor Crowe, he was so accustomed to that peculiar form of misery, that his shame at this new discovery of his mother's infamy was soon overpowered by the delight of being sent to bring Mrs. Neville and her children to the bed-side of her father. It was a mission requiring delicacy and tenderness, and all felt none would acquit himself more satisfactorily than Crowe, whose gentle heart supplied the place of tact, talent, quickness—in short of everything in which he was deficient. His heart throbbed with pleasure as he knocked at the door. She herself opened it; her sweet, peculiar smile lighting up her face and his, as she welcomed him kindly. She led him in and resumed her work, and as Crowe remained silent awhile, she forgot, as she often did, his presence, and began singing a canzonet of Haydn's, as she diligently plied her needle. Crowe's eyes filled with tears,