Anne Hereford. Mrs. Henry Wood
said my prayers, and----"
"You had--WHAT?"
"I was much alarmed; I thought I might have to stay in the wood until morning, and I could only pray to God to protect me: I knew that harm would not come to me then. It must have been a quarter of an hour in all: so you see Mr. Heneage did not do it in the heat of passion, in running after him: he must have done it deliberately."
"I don't care," she repeated to herself, in a sort of defiant voice; "I know George Heneage did not wilfully shoot Philip King. If he did do it, it was an accident; but I don't believe he did."
"If he did not, why did he hide in the wood, and look as if he had done something wrong, Selina? Why did he not go boldly up, and see what was amiss with Philip King, as Mr. Edwin Barley did?"
"There is no accounting for what people do in these moments of confusion and terror: some act in one way, some in another," she said, slowly. "Anne, I don't like to speak out openly to you--what I fear and what I don't fear. It was imperative upon George Heneage to hasten home--and he may not have believed that Philip King was really dead."
"But, Selina----"
"Go! go! lie down there," she said, drawing me to the distant sofa, and pushing me on it, with the pillow over my head. "You are asleep, mind! He might think I had been tutoring you."
So sudden and unexpected was the movement, I could only obey, and lie still. Selina unbolted the door, and was back in her seat before Mr. Edwin Barley entered the room.
"Are you coming down to dinner, Selina?"
"Dinner! It is well for you that you can eat it," was her answer. "You must dine without me to-day--those who dine at all. Now, don't disturb that sleeping child, Mr. Barley! I was just going to send her to bed."
"It might do you more good to eat dinner than to roam about in a night-fog," was Mr. Edwin Barley's rejoinder. "It is rather curious you should choose such a night as this to be out, half-naked."
"Not curious," she said, coldly: "very natural."
"Very! Especially that you should be tearing up and down the wood paths, like a mad woman. Others saw you as well as myself, and are speaking of it."
"Let them speak."
"But for what purpose were you there?"
"I was looking for George Heneage. There! you may make the most of it."
"Did you find him?"
"No. I wish I had: I wish I had. I should have learnt from him the truth of this night's business; for the truth, as I believe, has not come to light yet."
"What do you suppose to be the truth?" he returned, in a tone of surprise; whether natural, or assumed, who could say?
"No matter--no matter now: it is something that I scarcely dare to glance at. Better, even, that Heneage had done it, than--than--what I am thinking of. My head is confused to-night," she broke off; "my mind unhinged--hardly sane. You had better leave me, Mr. Barley."
"You had better come and eat a bit of dinner," he said, roughly, but not unkindly. "None of us can touch much, I daresay, but we are going to sit down. William is staying, and so is Martin. Won't you come and try to take a bit? Or shall I send you something up?"
"It would be of no use."
Mr. Edwin Barley looked at her: she was shivering outwardly and inwardly. I could just see out under the corner of the cushion.
"You have caught a violent cold, Selina. How could you think of going out?"
"I will tell you," she added, in a more conciliating spirit. "I went out because you went. To prevent any encounter between you and George Heneage,--I mean any violence. After that, I stayed looking for him."
"You need not have feared violence from me. I should have handed him over to the police, nothing more."
"There was a mocking sound in his voice as he spoke. Selina sat down and put her feet on the fender.
"I hate to dine without somebody at the table's head," Mr. Edwin Barley said, turning to the door. "If you will not come, I shall ask Charlotte Delves to sit down."
"It is nothing to me who sits down when I am not there."
He departed with the ungracious reply ringing in his ears: and ungracious I felt it to be. She bolted the door again, and pulled the blue velvet cushion off my head.
"Are you smothered, child? Get up. Now, mark me: you must not say a word to Mr. Edwin Barley of what happened at the summer-house. Do not mention it at all--to him, or to any one else."
"But suppose I am asked, Selina?"
"How can you be asked? Philip King is gone, poor fellow; George Heneage is not here, and who else is there to ask you? You surely have not spoken of it already?" she continued, in a tone of alarm.
I had not spoken of it to any one, and told her so. Jemima had questioned me as to the cause of my terror, when I ran in from the wood, and I said I had heard a shot and a scream I had not courage to say more.
"That's well," said Selina.
She sent me to rest, ordering Jemima to stay by me until I was asleep. "The child may feel nervous," she remarked to her, in an undertone, but the words reached me. And I suppose Jemima felt nervous, for one of the other maids came too.
The night passed; the morning came, Sunday, and with it illness for Mrs. Edwin Barley. I gathered from Jemima's conversation, while she was dressing me, that Selina had slept alone: Mr. Edwin Barley, with his brother and some more gentlemen, had been out a great part of the night looking for George Heneage. It was so near morning when they got back that he would not go to his wife's room for fear of disturbing her.
I ran in when I went downstairs. She lay in bed, and her voice, as she spoke to me, did not sound like her own.
"Are you ill, Selina? Why do you speak so hoarsely?"
"I feel very ill, Anne. My throat is bad--or my chest, I can scarcely tell which: perhaps it is both. Go downstairs, and send Miss Delves to me."
I have said that I was an imaginative, thoughtful, excitable child, and as I hastened to obey her, one sole recollection (I could have said fear) kept running through my brain. It was the oracular observation made by Duff, relating to his mistress and the fog: "It's enough to give her her death!" Suppose she had caught her death? My fingers, fastening my narrow waist-band, trembled at the thought.
The first thing I saw when I went down was a large high screen of many folds, raised across the hall, shutting out part of it from view. It seemed to strike me back with fear. Sarah was coming out of the dining-room with a duster in her hand: it was early yet. I caught hold of her gown.
"Sarah, what is behind there?"
"The same that was last night, Miss," she answered. "Nothing is to be moved until the coroner has come.
"Have they taken Mr. Heneage?"
"Not that I have heard of, Miss. One of the police was in just now, and he told Miss Delves there was no news."
"I want to find Miss Delves. Where is she?"
"In master's study. You can go in. Don't you know which it is? It's that room built out at the back, half-way up the first flight of stairs. You can see the door from here."
In the study sat Mr. Barley and Mr. Edwin Barley at breakfast, Charlotte Delves serving them. I gave her my aunt's message, but was nearly scared out of my senses at being laid hold of by Mr. Edwin Barley.
"Go up at once, Charlotte, and see what it is," he said. "How do you say, little one--that her throat is bad?"
"Yes, sir; she cannot speak well."
"No wonder; she has only herself to thank," he muttered, as Charlotte Delves left the room. "The wonder would be if she were not ill."
"Why?"