Page:Once a Week Volume V.djvu/143

136 Scotch peer. I knew him. A kind, honest, straightforward man, but not over-gifted with wisdom. He and his wife lived in Scotland, hardly ever coming to London. Once after we were both married Middy and I met. I danced with her. The chain was still round her neck. I am afraid to say how deeply I drank that night at supper, without being in the very slightest degree intoxicated. Port wine had as little effect on me as water. Occasionally, on the birth of one of my children, congratulatory letters passed between her and me. She, poor thing, had no children. Every August brought us a hamper of grouse from Scotland; every Christmas took from Curzon Street a cod’s head and shoulders, oysters, &c., directed to Middy’s husband. Those presents also occasioned a biennial interchange of letters.

People say that all married persons have a secret corner in their hearts, not at all of necessity a guilty one, which they never, by any chance betray to their partners for life. May be so. All I know is that I never told my wife of my antecedents in connection with Middy.

“On the 25th inst., aged twenty-six, owing to a fall from her horse, Evelina, the beloved wife of”

I started, dropped the “Times.” Good gracious! poor Middy then is dead. Hastily I looked round—my wife was not in the room. The paper, properly folded, was quickly replaced on the table and off I went to chambers. Presently I heard a great fuss in my ante-room, and my clerk’s voice expostulating in no mild terms:

“You can’t come in. Well, I tell you, you shan’t come in. My master, Mr. Stonhouse, won’t be disturbed by the like of you.”

I rang my bell.

“Who is that?”

“Some poor woman, sir. She says she must and will see you herself. I have threatened to give her into custody, but she won’t go away, and won’t tell me her business.”

“What is she like?”

“I can hardly tell, but I think, sir, she is a Scotchwoman.”

“Show her in.”

In she came, and asked me if I was indeed Mr. Counsellor Stonhouse, then would I just open that parcel and see if it was all right. I recognised Middy’s writing, opened the packet with trembling hands:

“It is all right,” said I, offering the woman a sovereign, and adding, “can I do anything more for you?”

“No, sir; many thanks to you, but my travelling expenses have been paid, and as for the rest I would do anything in the wide world for that dear gude leddy, who, when alive, was so kind to me and my puir bairns.”

With that she departed. Again my bell sounded, and the clerk, on intruding his inquisitive face, was told, “Do not let me be disturbed by anybody on any account for the next hour.”

The last words I heard before settling down to my reverie were,

“My good woman, why could you not give me that parcel instead of taking it to Mr. Stonhouse yourself?”

“Gang to the deil wi’ ye, ye auld fule; do ye think that packet was for the likes of ye to handle; ha, ha, ye auld fuie.”

The door was indignantly slammed. Poor Middy had chosen a coarse-tongued but faithful messenger. The packet contained a letter, my picture, a song, and the chain and locket.

The letter was written of course under most highly excited feelings, if not actually under the influence of delirium. I put it, the picture, and the song into my fire. The burden of the song (I had often heard her sing it) was, “Will she love you as I do?” The locket I dropped into the Thames that night. The chain my eldest daughter wears round her neck. In my pocket-book I have the tress of hair she gave me in the railway carriage when under such strange circumstances we first met.

Frank had finished. For a quarter of an hour neither of us spoke. It was dark. I could not see his face. Once I heard him mutter “Poor, poor Middy.” It might have been poor dear Middy. I am not sure. Tears, I fancied, were trickling down his cheeks. Not in the slightest degree from a wish to hurt or annoy him, but more from carelessness and heedlessness than anything else, I thought I would try to ascertain his real feelings. In a few moments he said:

“Any more wine, Charles?”

“No, thank you,” replied I; “but, Frank, I say, did you ever read Ivanhoe, and do you remember just at the end, where Walter Scott says with reference to Ivanhoe, Rebecca, and Rowena, that—”

I had gone too far.

“Temple,” said he sharply, addressing me by my surname, “you said you would have no more wine; if you are not going to the ladies, I am.”

He moved towards the door, but returned, took my hand, squeezed it, and said, “Charlie, I did not mean to be so abrupt. I hardly knew what I was saying. I feel a little relieved at having told you this chapter of my life; but mind,” whispered he, almost fiercely, “mind never allude again to what I have to-night related.”

We went upstairs—Frank going first—to his dressing-room, probably to wash away traces of emotion. A quarter of an hour later, with his rich tenor voice, he was joining in some merry glee. As I looked at him, I thought how little sometimes do our nearest and dearest relations and friends know of what passes beneath the surface. Oh, how little did I conjecture what was coming when first I heard the commencing words of the story,

“Pray, sir, are you a gentleman?”

2em

was the close of our Christmas dinner, and we were draining the last bottle of the old Madeira. The vintage was exhausted; and we knew, when we reverentially placed the aged flask on the table, that under existing circumstances, it was to us as the sole survivor of an Indian race—the last of the Madeiras.