We had many, too many, of his prescriptions in our house.
The servant's doubts of my patience proved to have been well founded. I got tired of waiting, and went home before the doctor returned.
From morning to night, nothing has been seen of Mrs. Tenbruggen to-day. Nor has any apology for her neglect of us been received, fond as she is of writing little notes. Has that story in my Diary driven her away? Let me see what to-morrow may bring forth.
To-day has brought forth--nothing. Mrs. Tenbruggen still keeps away from us. It looks as if my Diary had something to do with the mystery of her absence.
I am not in good spirits to-day. My nerves--if I have such things, which is more than I know by my own experience--have been a little shaken by a horrid dream. The medical information, which my thirst for knowledge absorbed in the doctor's consulting-room, turned traitor--armed itself with the grotesque horrors of nightmare--and so thoroughly frightened me that I was on the point of being foolish enough to destroy my notes. I thought better of it, and my notes are safe under lock and key.
Mr. Philip Dunboyne is trying to pave the way for his flight from this house. He speaks of friends in London, whose interest will help him to find the employment which is the object of his ambition. "In a few days more," he said, "I shall ask for leave of absence."
Instead of looking at me, his eyes wandered to the window; his fingers played restlessly with his watch-chain while he spoke. I thought I would give him a chance, a last chance, of making the atonement that he owes to me. This shows shameful weakness, on my part. Does my own resolution startle me? Or does the wretch appeal--to what? To my pity? It cannot be my love; I am positively sure that I hate him. Well, I am not the first girl who had been an unanswerable riddle to herself.
"Is there any other motive for your departure?" I asked.
"What other motive can there be?" he replied. I put what I had to say to him in plainer words still. "Tell me, Philip, are you beginning to wish that you were a free man again?"
He still prevaricated. Was this because he is afraid of me, or because he is not quite brute enough to insult me to my face? I tried again for the third and last time. I almost put the words into his mouth.
"I fancy you have been out of temper lately," I said. "You have not been your own kinder and better self. Is this the right interpretation of the change that I think I see in you?"
He answered: "I have not been very well lately."
"And that is all?"
"Yes--that is all."
There was no more to be said; I turned away to leave the room. He followed me to the door. After a momentary hesitation, he made the attempt to kiss me. I only looked at him--he drew back from me in silence. I left the new Judas, standing alone, while the shades of evening began to gather over the room.
Third Period (continued).
EVENTS IN THE FAMILY, RELATED BY MISS JILLGALL.
CHAPTER LVIII.
DANGER.
"If anything of importance happens, I trust to you to write an account of it, and to send the writing to me. I will come to you at once, if I see reason to believe that my presence is required." Those lines, in your last kind reply to me, rouse my courage, dear Mr. Governor, and sharpen the vigilance which has always been one of the strong points in my character. Every suspicious circumstance which occurs in this house will be (so to speak) seized on by my pen, and will find itself (so to speak again) placed on its trial, before your unerring judgment! Let the wicked tremble! I mention no names.
Taking up my narrative where it came to an end when I last wrote, I have to say a word first on the subject of my discoveries, in regard to Philip's movements.
The advertisement of a private inquiry office, which I read in a newspaper, put the thing into my head. I provided myself with money to pay the expenses by--I blush while I write it--pawning my watch. This humiliation of my poor self has been rewarded by success. Skilled investigation has proved that our young man has come to his senses again, exactly as I supposed. On each occasion when he was suspiciously absent from the house, he has been followed to the farm. I have been staying there myself for a day or two, in the hope of persuading Eunice to relent. The hope has not yet been realized. But Philip's devotion, assisted by my influence, will yet prevail. Let me not despair.
Whether Helena knows positively that she has lost her wicked hold on Philip I cannot say. It seems hardly possible that she could have made the discovery just yet. The one thing of which I am certain is, that she looks like a fiend.
Philip has wisely taken my advice, and employed pious fraud. He will get away from the wretch, who has tempted him once and may tempt him again, under pretense of using the interest of his friends in London to find a place under Government. He has not been very well for the last day or two, and the execution of our project is in consequence delayed.
I have news of Mrs. Tenbruggen which will, I think, surprise you.
She has kept away from us in a most unaccountable manner. I called on her at the hotel, and heard she was engaged with her lawyer. On the next day, she suddenly returned to her old habits, and paid the customary visit. I observed a similar alteration in her state of feeling. She is now coldly civil to Helena; and she asks after Eunice with a maternal interest touching to see--I said to her: "Elizabeth, you appear to have changed your opinion of the two girls, since I saw you." She answered, with a delightful candor which reminded me of old times: "Completely!" I said: "A woman of your intellectual caliber, dear, doesn't change her mind without a good reason for it." Elizabeth cordially agreed with me. I ventured to be a little more explicit: "You have no doubt made some interesting discovery." Elizabeth agreed again; and I ventured again: "I suppose I may not ask what the discovery is?" "No, Selina, you may not ask."
This is curious; but it is nothing to what I have got to tell you next. Just as I was longing to take her to my bosom again as my friend and confidante, Elizabeth has disappeared. And, alas! alas! there is a reason for it which no sympathetic person can dispute.
I have just received some overwhelming news, in the form of a neat parcel, addressed to myself.
There has been a scandal at the hotel. That monster in human form, Elizabeth's husband, is aware of his wife's professional fame, has heard of the large sums of money which she earns as the greatest living professor of massage, has been long on the lookout for her, and has discovered her at last. He has not only forced his way into her sitting-room at the hotel; he insists on her living with him again; her money being the attraction, it is needless to say. If she refuses, he threatens her with the law, the barbarous law, which, to use his own coarse expression, will "restore his conjugal rights."
All this I gather from the narrative of my unhappy friend, which forms one of the two inclosures in her parcel.