An Innocent Sinner. A psychological romance

Front matter

SINNEK SINNER. 31 Pegcfjological Eomancr. II V MABEL COLLINS. " We sit in smooth content with wonted mien ! Comes whirling by the awful unforeseen : Throws our best balanced plans in hocus-pocus, And turns short views of life all out of focus ; Shakes our eels-centre, makes us well-awake — Find where we are, and what new road to take.'* ( Travels of a Journeyman.' IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON : TINSLEY BROTHERS, 8, CATHERINE ST., STRAND. 1877. [Alt Rights Reserved.] PRINTED BY TAYLOR AN U CO., LITTLE QUEKN STREET, LINCOLN'S INN FIELDS.

Preface

. — ♦ — In this story, which is based upon a situation that has afforded food for romancists from all time, the author has had to face the assertion of M. Dumas fill, that on this subject, " It is absolutely necessary to say something new. . . . Predecessors have passed that way, and have shut the door behind them." M. Emile Girardin had asked his opinion on a dramatic work, which his critic allowed to be clever ; but, said he : — " We have all posed our conclusions on this eternal subject. Yours is not a conclusion at all." The present writer is prepared to be considered no more successful in this respect than M. Girardin ! M. Dumas instances well-known plays in which the same situation has been elaborated, and every conceivable mode of escape from it exhausted. The author of these volumes believes that in them a new combination is effected, by simply placing one of the actors in the little drama in a state in which people are conventionally supposed to give up all interest in this particular stage, and in the actors upon it.

On this subject every one has an opinion ; but within the covers of a novel let us lay aside opinions : we are in the world of romance. Leaving behind the grosser life of the French school, the writer has dared to treat this situation from a purely psychological point of view. CONTENTS OF VOL. I.

Sibyl Begins to be Perplexed 217

Chapter XVI

A Cool Little Woman ... .236 " Astrologos. I have known men who died, and came to life again ; I have known men who died, and came to death again ; I have known men who neither lived nor died at all, But were pure phantoms, shadows on the atmosphere. Raphael. Poor ghosts ! who shivered through the world." ' The Comedy of Dreams' Mortimer Collins. CHAPTEE I. THE DOCTOR AT HOME. " Crabbed age and youth Cannot live together." Sandville is a tolerably brisk country town; being near enough to London to attract many city men as residents in tbe summer months, it catches a savour of tbe quick metropolitan life. At tbe same time it has 1 VOL. I. a character of its own ; a gay, holiday air, that seems partly due to tbe fresh breeze which comes across tbe wide surrounding country, partly to tbe picturesque building of tbe town, and partly to tbe transient stay of many of its visitors.

Dr. Hetley's bouse is in tbe High-Street of Sandville, close to tbe railway station, and close to tbe post-office, in tbe midst of such life as the town contains. It retires a little from the actual street, screening itself with a few modest trees. Roses encircle tbe windows, and try to look as if they were pure country bred. They are not far from it, for tbe sweet Surrey ah enters tbe doc tor's dining-room window, with scarcely any adulteration in its flavour. Dr. Hetley stands this morning by that same window, inhaling tbe fresh breeze. He is a man scarcely at tbe prime of life ; The Doctor ac Home. 3 with a quick brain, as you could see by bis eyes, with plenty of hard work to steady him, as tbe lines on bis forehead sbow plainly ; and, yet, a certain expression that lingers about tbe rather humorous mouth suggests a subdued rebelliousness against that process of being steadied.

He did not need to be out very early this morning, so he had come down late to breakfast. This be did partly because he really felt lazy, and partly because it always put bis aunt Pauncefort, who managed his house, and tried to manage him, out of temper. He was adding to the offence by looking leisurely out of tbe window, instead of rushing to table with a penitent face ; but he had still enough of the boy left in him to make tbe consciousness of this fact rather add to the pleasantness of the morn ing air than otherwise. 1—2 He finds it charming to look out and watch tbe progress of tbe paper-boy down tbe street ; charming to lean on his window-sill and wait some five minutes, until the boy comes into tbe garden and hands him The Times ; charming to lazily open tbe paper out, while the sun makes him blink so that he scarcely can see the words.

Dr. Hetley really does enjoy all this, because the greater part of his days are spent in active, incessant work, mental and physical. He seldom has time to lounge ; and as, like most really hard-working men, he has a vast capacity for idleness, he thoroughly delights in being lazy now and then. But Mrs. Pauncefort cannot appreciate any of this, because she never has enough to do. She is always working herself up into a passion in order to occupy her mind ; and Dr. Hetley is well aware that her marvellous morning-cap is now quivering with its wearer's indignation. Presently comes the decisive tap of a napkin-ring on the table, tbe quick scrape of a chair, and Aunt Pauncefort rises and speaks, " I cannot remain any longer, Leonard, to look after your breakfast, as I have household matters to attend to.

I have had everything kept hot, but it will soon all be cold again." And Mrs. Pauncefort, a thin, upright old lady with a grim face and a military walk which earned her the nickname of " tbe General," left the room. Dr. Hetley listened to the tap-tap of her high-heeled shoes, as she went off to visit her ill humour on tbe servants, and then, going to the table, began his breakfast with perfect Shiner. equanimity. He found everything hot, and very good ; for the old lady was a grand housekeeper, and very proud of her capa bilities in that truly feminine direction. He wanted to read the paper through during breakfast, so as to turn bis mind to other matters immediately afterwards ; but presently he heard the tap-tap through tbe hall again, and he laid it down to see what might be coming. " The General " came in, and paused opposite him, like a soldier at attention.

" Have you all you want, Leonard ? " she asked, making a visible effort to sweeten her sourness. " All, my dear aunt ! and everything is perfection, as it always is under your excellent management," said the doctor, with a wave of his hand over the breakfast table, and a look at the old lady through his spectacles. Those spectacles might have been alive ; so kindly did they lend themselves to the doctor, and help to make his expression unintelligible to a spectator who could not understand mixed emotions. " That's right," said she ; and after lingering a moment, walked off again, apparently because she did not see what else to do. "I wonder what my aunt wants?" the irreverent nephew reflected. " The dear old girl's little plots are always so very palpable. I am sure she wants to ask something before I go out, or she would not try so hard to be sweet."

As be expected, in she marched again, before long. She came and sat down in an easy-chair ; and then went straight to the point, as was her usual fashion. Sinner. 8 " Are you going to the rose-show this afternoon?" Dr. Hetley laid down his knife and fork, and emitted a groan. " I wished to go," she said, stiffly, on receiving this unpromising rejoinder, " but you are so peculiar and so very unsociable that I might have expected you to grunt like a bear when I mention the subject, instead of making a proper answer. I wish James could have come to-day instead of to-morrow. He is not so wanting in proper respect for his elders as some people are." The old lady was up in arms. Dr. Hetley had learned to regard this as rather amusing ; the only drawback was that his aunt became so much less good-looking when ill-temper got the mastery ; and then, be was sure it had a very bad effect on her health.

He would be dead in a month, he often thought, if he got into as many passions as his venerable aunt. " I am sorry, too, that James is not here," he answered, quietly, " because he likes ordinary society, and I don't. It will put me out for a week, if I have to go, and be bored for a couple of hours among all the dressed-up fools of Sandville." The line down his forehead grew rather deeper as he spoke. You see, these people came of the same stock, aDd the good doctor might have yielded to small ill-humours oftener than he did, if God had not gifted him with a kindly soul and a deeply tender heart, which enabled him, as a rule, to stand aside from these temptations of the nerves. " Oh ! of course," began the old lady, Shiner. 10 as she rose from her chair, with a dry chippiness of voice, and a poker-like rigidity of manner, which a dull pen can give no idea of.

She fancied that this was dignity. " "Well, I don't mind one hour of it," interrupted the doctor, as he glanced over his notes of professional engagements, " but I can't quite say what time I will call for you." "Oh! indeed," said she. "No, thank you. I would not go with you now, if you went down on your knees to me." Dr. Hetley raised his hands and eyebrows with a deprecating gesture peculiar to him. He took up his paper again. This was maddening to Mrs. Pauncefort ; she meant to beat a dignified retreat after her last words, — terminating the interview herself; but not to be answered was a thing she never could endure. So she began again, with a bitter and aggrieved manner, and discussed the whole matter from the begin ing, regretting again and again that James, the proper, the reverent James, was not present, to give an example of well conductedness to this reprobate nephew.

Any one who happens to have a relation or friend gifted with this lady's talent will know how the affair was magnified ; how it was made to lead into a dozen other such little bygone affairs, which had to be re discussed; and will also know that before Dr. Hetley's little brougham and pair of pretty bay horses stood before his door, aunt Pauncefort had gained her point, and it was settled that they were to go in the afternoon to the rose-show. Dr. Hetley carried his papers and his books, and various little mysterious cases, Sinner. 12 and stowed them away in the brougham, and then — well-brushed, well-dressed, respectable to a degree, — be drove off for his morning's work. He passed out of Mrs. Pauncefort's atmosphere, to enter that of suffering humanity. For this man, though nothing but a rising young doctor in a country town, carried about with him a true gift of healing.

The suffering were his natural prey ; he wanted to heal them. Rich and poor were alike to him ; except that in his heart he rather preferred the poor, because they were not quite so con sistently ungrateful. He was a fine man, of what may perhaps be fairly now called the English type , j-ou saw no special sign of the Norse-King or the Saxon about him, except perhaps iu a tall, athletic form. Dark haired, dark bearded, with grey, short-sighted, yet quickly observant eyes ; a clear skin, abundant health, a great deal of natural animal life and spirits, and altogether a fine physique. Such was Dr. Hetley. Sick people liked to hold his hand, and hear his voice ; they always liked him, though their friends often did not. For he was straight forward and brusque, to people be despised or laughed at.

And he had a bad habit of despising and laughing at people — when they were well. During his rounds he passed through a village which was some distance from Sandville. It was hardly big enough to be called a village ; but there was a rail way station for the convenience of the many large country houses which lay all around, hidden by the trees. Not far from the station a pretty bouse had stood empty some little time ; Dr. Hetley noticed Shiner. 14 as he passed it, that it was no longer empty. When they met at their midday meal, Mrs. Pauncefort told him all that was yet known in Sandville about tbe new arrivals at Laham Court, this same pretty house. Mrs. Pauncefort was the most inveterate gossip in Sandville ; although probably she would have died of horror and amazement could the fact have been revealed to her, by some supernatural opening of her mind.

At all events, Dr. Hetley was never allowed to go ignorant of the important affairs of the town, though most of such information passed in at one ear and out of the other. He forgot things ; Mrs. Paunce fort did not, and could not understand any one who did. Tbe newcomers were people of wealth and position ; Mr. and Mrs. Hamerton and their two daughters. Dr. Hetley did not take in anything more about them, for his mind was full of a paper he was writing for a medical journal ; and a case he had just visited bore upon its subject, so be was provokingly abstracted.

CHAPTER II. EYES THAT BEWITCH.

" . . . . And thou Didst glide away. Only thine eyes remained. They would not go — they never yet have gone." Edgar Allan Poe. " Dear me ! "We are grand ! " remarked Dr. Hetley as bis aunt came into the room where he was waiting, ready to start. "What's the matter?" asked tbe lady, with a sudden setting of her lips, for she thought she had made a supreme toilette. And so perhaps she had ; sober and dignified to a degree was Mrs. Pauncefort's society attire ; and one can only suppose that it was that very fact which provoked her graceless relation to invariably make ob servations like the above whenever he saw her dressed. How innocently do people make butts of themselves ! Tou may generally do anything without being laughed at, if you do not mind being laughed at. The rose-show was like all other roseshows; there were too many flowers and too many people ; and the latter fact was dreadful to the martyred doctor, for he knew nearly everybody.

He had grown of late very weary of these rich frivolous people who frequented Sandville as visitors ; and even more weary of the rich respectable people who drove into the town from their country houses, and looked about them at the small fry that dwelt in the town, with a patronising air. He disliked the 2 vol. 1. Sinner. greater part of them ; for he knew him self to be intellectually their superior, yet he had been patronised in most of their houses ; he had received mean letters from the richest of them, complaining of his fees ; when he, poor man, instead of merely supplying them with a few drugs, and a little time, for which the fee might pay, had given to them out of bis very self — his physical and mental health. But they did not know this ; and so he criti cised them and held himself their superior.

A dangerous thing for a young man of ordinary self-pride, to believe himself better than his neighbours ! It was a matter of business to appear as little bored as possible, and so Dr. Hetley did his best. He moved among their friends with Mrs. Pauncefort, whose august lead he humbly followed. He did not care to leave her ; there were too many young ladies around him ; and although the doctor did not imagine himself a lady-killer, yet he had a wholesome fear of certain palpably designing mammas. Mrs. Pauncefort presently whispered to him that the Hamertons' carriage had come ; and she was evidently much vexed not to have witnessed the arrival. Dr. Hetley was not equally disappointed, however ; and thought no more about them. The Hamertons had no friends in the neighbourhood, and there bad been no time as yet for them to be called upon.

So they walked through the tents looking at the roses, and not noticing the people around them much. There was Mr. Hamerton, a soldierly looking man with a faded kind of fire in his eyes, and his two daughters : one, a 2—2 Shiner. 20 fair creature of smiles and dimples, and the other a delicate-looking girl, of a dark intense beauty, whose large eyes were full of the same fire that once had burned in her father's. They were a remarkable and distinguished-looking group ; and the town dwellers, who knew all about them, were much interested. They had not reached the tent in which Mrs. Pauncefort stood, and had yet to suffer the inspection of her inquisitorial gaze. Nevertheless, the dark one said to her laughing sister, " These people seem to me to stare rather, Jessie. I suppose they know we are strangers ; but I should not have thought Sandville people would have noticed that."

They did not know that their carriage had distinguished them from passing visitors in the town; so quick are the eyes of gossips. "Are you tired?" said Jessie to her sister, who leaned a little on her arm. " We will not go through all the tents if you are." Mr. Hamerton, who was in front, looked round at his beautiful dark-eyed daughter with a slightly anxious expression, as Jessie spoke ; but he was reassured by a smile, and they went on in the same fashion, Mr. Hamerton leading the way, and tbe girls arm-in-arm behind. Presently they entered the tent where Dr. Hetley and his aunt stood in the midst of a crowd of talking people. It was very full, and the Hamertons when they got inside had to crawl at the pace of the stream. Jessie was looking about her with much amusement (for she was one of those happy natures who are always amused), when Sinner. 22 she felt her sister's band close tight upon her arm.

She looked hastily round, and saw her sister's attention fixed upon some thing far down the tent. Her eyes were wide open and her face pale. " Stella ! " exclaimed Jessie, in a low tone that those around might not hear her. " Stella, what do you see ? "What is the matter ? Are you ill ? " Stella answered her in a thrilling whisper without moving her eyes. " Child,'' she said, " look at that man. My God ! what have I met with ? "What can it be that tears at my heart, and bewilders my brain like this ? Do you see him ? " Jessie looked ; and her sister's eyes ap peared to be fixed upon Dr. Hetley, who was standing silent, wearing an abstracted expression. She turned back to her sister in alarm, for Stella's passionate soul and frail body made any emotion a terror to her friends. " I see," said Jessie, " but I don't know him.

What is it, dear Stella ? you must feel ill?" "Jessie," was all Stella's answer, "there is something strange about that man ! I would give worlds to speak to him, but I dare not — it would kill me ! No matter, I shall see him again : I shall speak to him. Ah ! " Dr. Hetley had raised his head, turned, and looked straight across the crowd into Stella's eyes. Jessie was exceedingly startled by this, and was growing much alarmed by Stella's intensely white face and extraordinary words. She did not know how to act, and had just put out her band to arrest her father when she felt that Shiner. 24 Stella's whole weight was thrown against her. She clutched her father, and he, turning, saw at once that Stella had fainted. Their carriage had been kept close by the gates, and a servant stood outside the tents.

Mr. Hamerton was a man of quick action ; he summoned the servant at once, and in a moment they were carrying Stella to the carriage, while Jessie, who was incarnate April, folluwed in tears. No one had time to offer to help them ; and by the time Dr. Hetley had recovered from his surprise at the incident, and had made his way hurriedly through the crowd, the carriage had driven off. " How very sudden," remarked Mrs. Pauncefort, brimming over with interest, "the unfortunate girl must be subject to such attacks, as her friends appeared to be quite prepared for it. Dear me, what a misfortune ! For she is very nice-looking ; really a pretty face ; quite remarkable ! " They had to leave now, and Mrs. Paunce fort talked on about the Hamertons, as they drove home. But Dr. Hetley leaned back in tbe brougham, and heard not a word she said.

CHAPTER III. IS IT LOVE

? IS IT DEATH ? " Her, who knew that love can vanquish death." Tennyson. James Pauncefort arrived on the afternoon of the next day. Mrs. Pauncefort's face relaxed into a grim graciousness. James was her only son, and the pride of her heart. He was in an office in the city, where he worked steadily, and got on fairly well. He generally spent the greater part of his holidays with his mother and Dr. Hetley. Dr. Hetley was always delighted to see ? Is it Death ? 27 him, for he was agreeably relieved of Mrs. Pauncefort's gossip and general attentions while he was there. It may be a matter of perplexity why an independent young man should put up continually with a Gorgon for his companion. There were several reasons. One was business-like. Aunt Pauncefort entered society for him, and played hostess.

More over she was so eminently respectable that it did away with some of the need for tbe young doctor getting married. People thought of Mrs. Pauncefort, and felt sure that no relation of hers would do anything he shouldn't. Besides all this, Dr. Hetley was gregarious, and was a man of family affections ; and he and Mrs. Pauncefort being lonely members of the family, it seemed to both only natural that they should live together. Though Mrs. Pauncefort An Innocent Sinner. 28 was venomous and narrow-minded, she was as strong a partisan as she was an enemy. He came home in the evening to find James and his mother as happy as possible. Like two old women, they sat drinking tea and talking gossip, Dr. Hetley welcomed James, drank his tea and retired into bis study with alacrity. He was still at the article he was burning to write for a medical quarterly, and possibly he meant to mix that with a little quiet laziness.

" My dear James," remarked Mrs. Pauncefort shaking her cap solemnly, "your cousin is really most unsociable." Dr. Hetley was emancipated now from kettledrums, dances, dinner parties. James was as restless as his mother, and willing to take her everywhere. And as he was a fine young man, with erect bearing, a band- ? Is it Death ? 29 some face, and pleasant manners, he was much in request. Dr. Hetley shut himself into his study evening after evening with a sense of exqui site luxury. Nowhere else had he ever found so much pleasure yet, as in his study arm-chair. Here he would rest, after a day's work done, and reflect over what he had achieved ; making the most of the good and the least of the ill, for he had long since found that life needs a little self-deceit to make it pleasant. Then he would turn to his books.

But to-night, a vision came between him and the page. He saw again those intense eyes through which a woman's soul had spoken to him. And he wondered what it meant, and why the remembrance clung so to his mind. By degrees he grew to linger more again A71 Innocent Sinner. 30 in the drawing-room, for he found that a new name frequently appeared in the con versations. The Paunceforts often spoke of Jessie Hamerton. He discovered that they met her at certain houses; and by quietly keeping bis attention to what was said around him, he heard enough to arouse in his mind a strange romantic curiosity. Mrs. Pauncefort was an unscrupulous questioner. Finding that Jessie continually appeared in society without her sister Stella, she made it her business to find out, direct from tbe fountain-head, if it were possible in no other way, the reason of this, So she made friends with Mrs. Hamerton, who, a pretty kindly woman that once had been just like her daughter Jessie, was pleased with apparent sympathy, and glad to chat a little about her pi-ivate concerns.

He heard that Stella was very ill. Al- ? Is it Death ? 31 ways delicate and an anxiety to them, yet before now she had been quite accustomed to go about with her sister ; for her mental life was so quick and her sympathies so earnest and vivid, that a secluded life was insufficient for her. If compelled to remain in her room for any time, her mind fastened itself upon some purpose with a zeal so intense, that she would pursue it in spite of all obstacles ; and they became terrified to see how recklessly the spirit controlled the trembling and inefficient body. They were compelled to take her about whenever possible, and feed her mind with change of ideas ; to interrupt her studies and her aims, and check, without letting her suspect it, her resolute pursuit of any object which she had in view.

" She must be dreadfully persistent and obstinate," remarked Mrs. Pauncefort. Dr. Hetley did bis best to digest what he heard, and separate the facts from the remarks upon them. This much was fact. Since that day at the flower-show, Stella had been unable to leave the house. Dr. Hetley dwelt on this. What did it mean ? Why did they not send for him ? He anxiously inquired whether they had sent for either of the other doctors of the place. No : their physician from London had been down once, and bad thought there was no cause for alarm. Rest, quiet, and unexciting amusement was his prescrip tion. One day Dr. Hetley, in the course of bis visits, called at a house where a croquet-party was going on. He went out on to the lawn for a few moments and ? Is it Death ? 33 mixed with the others. His aunt and James were there ; and he observed that the latter was talking to a pretty, smiling blonde, whom he guessed at once to be Jessie Hamerton.

He had no remembrance of her ; her sister's face had eclipsed hers entirely when he saw them together. He heard a lady ask her of her sister ; Jessie's face sobered directly, and her eyes were full of tears. She said Stella was too weak to leave her room, except for a very short time. A moment afterwards, she was laughing gaily with James Pauncefort. Dr. Hetley went up to them, and James introduced him. After a little conversation with them, he bad to go away ; but he had seen quite enough for once. He saw that James vol. i. Pauncefort was paying a very marked attention to Jessie Hamerton. He frowned a little over it at first. Would they suit each other ? He believed James to be exactly like his mother ; and what we can just endure in a woman, becomes detestable in a man : and vice versa. If so, would James's nature be kindly enough for the fair April morning he had chosen ?

He had no right to say anything against James ; he was an emi nently eligible young man. He could not go to Mr. Hamerton and say that he did not see the germs of nobility in James's character; and so he decided to think no more about it. But he could not help speculating as to whether this would not bring him nearer to Stella. He began to watch James's romance with some amusement. One day he found his ? Is it Death ? 35 cousin looking melancholy ; and after awhile elicited the reason. Jessie had given up visiting for the present, in con sequence of her sister's illness. The physician had been down twice again, and said nothing more could be done. He expected her to recover slowly. But Jessie, who worshipped her sister, took the alarm and would not leave her side. Poor James is in consternation.