A Conspiracy of Silence

Book II. Chap

PAGE I. A NEW LIFE ..... 3 II. IMPRESSIONS . . . . .18 III. A BROKEN SILENCE . . . .25 IV. HOME COMING . . . . -34 V. ON THE CLIFF . . . . .42 VI. A LONELY STRUGGLE . . . -54 VII. THE PRIDE OF LIFE . . . .66 VIII. TO THE LAST OF THE LINE. . . 76 IX. THE TRUTH 86 X. A REALITY OF DREAD . . . -94 XI. A CRY FOR HELP. . . . . IO4 b CONTENTS. V 1 CHAI*. PACE XII. HOPELESS . . . . . -119 XIII. A GLIMPSE OF SUNSHINE . . .128 XIV. THE DREAD DEEPENS . . . -135 XV. AT LAST . . . . . -143

Book III

I. SEVEN YEARS AFTER . . . -157 II. COMMONPLACES . . . . . 1 66 III. A MESSAGE FROM THE PAST . .174 IV. REVELATION . . . . . 1 82 V. JUSTICE . . . . . . 1 88 VI. A SUMMONS. ..... 197 VII. FACE TO FACE ..... 207 VIII. SALVAGE . . . . . .2

BOOK II.

"Infinite pity, yet also infinite rigourt of law; it is so N.iture is made.'1 CARLYLE 1 VOL.

Chapter I

A NEW LIFE. On a still evening towards the end of March two figures were standing in the grounds of the Monastery of San Miniato. The figures were those of a man and a woman : the man was unusually tall, with a vivacious, almost restless expression ; the woman was slight and fair, and her face was pensive as she looked at the calm sunset, and the city of Florence growing dimmer and dimmer in the shrouding twilight. The man broke the silence. " Come," he said, " come, Charlotte, it will soon be dark. By Jove!" he added, "how low down the valley is ! " " Of course," said Charlotte, " or you should rather say how high up we are ; we are on a hill." " Height or depth, it doesn't much matter ; the top is the same distance from the bottom, however you put it," said Eustace Sotheran. " Fancy, Charlotte —stop for a minute and imagine it — supposing the depth went sheer down, without any of those slopes and grada tions, sheer down from here where we are standing to the bottom of the Arno, what a fall it would be !

" Charlotte made a little movement, half a shudder, half a shrug of the shoulders. "How horrid!" she said. "I don't want to imagine it. You make me quite giddy, Eustace." "Oh, but it's splendid," said Eustace; "think of the distance; and you would be dead, Charlotte— dead as a door-nail, by the time you got to the bottom." " Long before, I should say," said Charlotte, " and I don't see any advantage in it. Come along ; I'm getting hungry." She walked away, and Eustace presently followed her, and seated himself beside her in the carriage waiting outside the gate. They drove down the sloping road, the driver making strange gutteral noises in his throat to encourage or frighten on a drowsy, imper turbable horse, till they reached the level of the plain that lies around the city, and stretches in rich cultivation for miles along the Arno valley ; then through the narrow Florence streets where the people stood and talked and gesticulated, and the children played ; and so across the river, growing silvery in the twilight, and past the Duomo to the Piazza Santa Maria Novella.

Here, in a corner of the square, at right angles to the church which gives the Piazza its name, was the hotel in which Eustace and Charlotte Sotheran were lodged. Charlotte was glad to get out of the carriage — for the air was becoming chill — to run upstairs to her bedroom, and disencumber herself of her wraps, and to hurry down again to the long, crooked room in which dinner was going on. The table d'hote was nearly over when Eustace and Charlotte took their places, and only a few late comers like themselves lingered on at the table. Not far from them a lady was sitting ; she had finished her dinner, but still sat on, eating now and again some of the dried fruit which formed the dessert. When Eustace and Charlotte rose she rose also, and came towards them. "Am I right in thinking that you are Mr. and Mrs. Sotheran?" she said.

"I did not want to disturb you till you had finished your dinner — it is so boring to talk when one is hungry ; but I was looking in the visitors' book this afternoon and saw the name, and I thought, somehow, it must belong to you." She spoke smilingly, and continued to smile after she had finished speaking ; she was a rather handsome woman, with dark hair and eyes, and an air of perfect ease and selfpossession. "Yes," said Charlotte, "it is our name; but "Oh, you are wondering what in the world your name can have to do with me," said the lady with a little laugh. " But I live in Devon shire, not very far from Dornington Court, and we shall be neighbours. I could not miss such a charming opportunity of making ac quaintance." " I am afraid I do not know my neighbours so well as I ought to," said Eustace.

" I have played truant terribly with regard to Dorn ington." "Yes," said the lady, "you have behaved shamefully. Nobody has a right to shut up their house in such a desolate country as Devonshire. But Mrs. Sotheran will alter all that." "And when it is altered," said Eustace, " and we come to Dornington, we shall be neighbours of ? I know a good many names in the neighbourhood, but I could not fit them to the owners." " Oh, Ackland is my name," said the lady, " Mrs. Charles Ackland. But why should we stand here in this uncomfortable room ? My horrid husband has deserted me, and gone to dine with some friends at a cafe, and I am all alone. I hate being alone ; will you come up to my room ? and we will have some coffee." In Mrs. Ackland's sittino--room candles were O lighted, and a fire was burning ; the room looked comfortable but slightly untidy, owing, perhaps, to a number of half-opened parcels which were scattered about.

"My purchases," she explained. "We are going away in a day or two, and I am so fond of buying things— though there is not much to be had in Florence ; it is not like Paris." She touched an electric bell, and a maid came in from an adjoining room. " We want some coffee, Fearon," Mrs. Ackland said. "Will you see about it?" Then she drew forward a chair. " Now sit down," she went on. " Come near the fire, won't you ? I always find it cold here in the evenings." "You live at the Grange, then?" said Eustace Sotheran. " As far as I remember it was a Colonel Ackland who used to live there when I was a boy. He would be your ? " " My brother-in-law," said Mrs. Ackland. " He died, of course, before we were married ; Charley was only a younger son till then. He used to drive beautiful horses ; do you remember them ?

" " No," said Eustace, " hardly ; I remember nothing but the name. The only people I knew at all well as a child were the Fords ; the son was afterwards up at Oxford with me. An awfully absent-minded fellow he was, too ; I always expected to see him standing on his head, and scratching his heels to stimulate his brains." Mrs. Ackland laughed " I should like to be introduced to him," she said ; " absent-minded people amuse me ; but the Fords left the neighbourhood before my day. Do you still know him, Mr. Sotheran?" " No," said Eustace ; " I have quite lost sight of him. He went off after his mind one day, I fancy, and has never been able to find his way back." He got up from his chair. " I generally have a cigar after dinner," he said, " so, if you will excuse me, I will go for a stroll." " Oh, I don't mind smoke at all," said Mrs. Ackland, " if you like to light up here."

" Ah, but my wife would never forgive me," said Eustace ; " she is one of the people who can't stand smoke in a room." Charlotte half rose too ; it was her custom to accompany her husband in his evening walk ; but Mrs. Ackland would not let her go. "No, Mrs. Sotheran, you are not to desert me too," she said. " I want you to st4.y and talk to me." Charlotte sat down again unwillingly ; she would rather have gone with Eustace out into the evening streets. " And how long have you been married ? " said Mrs. Ackland, when Eustace had closed the door behind him " Three months," said Charlotte ; " it was shortly before Christmas." " Oh yes, of course," said Mrs. Ackland. " I remember seeing an account of the wedding in one of the papers. It was a big wedding, I suppose ? " " There were a good many people, I think," said Charlotte, " but I knew very few of them ; they were chiefly friends and relations of my husband's whom I had never seen before."

"You do not know many of your husband's people, then ? " asked Mrs. Ackland. " No," answered Charlotte ; " I have been introduced to one or two, but I don't really know any of them." " You have had a long honeymoon," said Mrs. Ackland after a short pause, during which she regarded Charlotte attentively. " I daresay you will not be sorry to get back." "Oh no," said Charlotte eagerly. "That is," she added, as Mrs. Ackland laughed, " I am looking forward to seeing my mother again ; I have never been away from her before." " I see," said Mrs. Ackland with another little laugh. " And I suppose you will not be coming down to our dull Devonshire for ever so long ? You will be enjoying yourself in London." " Yes," said Charlotte, " my husband has taken a house in Park Lane, which is being furnished and made ready for us while we are away, and I suppose we shall be there till the end of June, at any rate."

"Lucky girl!" exclaimed Mrs. Ackland. " A London house is the height of my am- A CONSPLRACY OF SILENCE. 14 bition ; but we can't afford it. A sew weeks in rooms in the season is all I get. I have nearly two months at the Grange to get through after I go back." "You don't like the country, then?" said Charlotte. " I hate it," said Mrs. Ackland, with energy, " except, perhaps, just in the shooting season. Don't you ?" " No," said Charlotte, " I like it ; and I am looking forward to being at Dornington." "Well," said Mrs. Ackland, with a shrug of her shoulders, " chacun a son gout! But if I were you " and then she stopped abruptly. " Do you know the Paynes ? " she said presently. " No," said Charlotte, " I know hardly any body in London ; we lived very quietly, mother and I. Who are they?" " Oh, nobody in particular," said Mrs. Ackland ; " but I thought perhaps you might have met Angela Payne — such a pretty girl ; she married last season — Lord Yeovil ; a very good match in a way, for he has no end of oughts to the tail of his income, and of course there's the title.

Still, it was rather horrid, I thought." "Why?" said Charlotte. "Oh, he's half an idiot, you know," said Mrs. Ackland ; " and he drinks, too —or so they say." Charlotte shuddered. "Oh, how could she?" she said, in a low voice. Mrs. Ackland looked at her curiously. "Well, she had a first-rate settlement," she answered ; " but still I rather agree with you. One is prepared to run a certain risk, of course, but this was a dead certainty. There's no chance, I should say, of the wretched man improving, — nor even of him getting worse, A CONSPIRACY OF SILENCE. 16 so that she could dispose of him comfortably in a lunatic asylum. I suppose, however, she counted on him not living long." "Oh, don't," said Charlotte. "It's dreadful. I call it wicked, downright wicked of any woman to marry a man like that."

Again Mrs. Ackland gave her little laugh. "Of course," she said; "that's the correct, moral point of view. But if you go in for risks it's rather difficult to draw the line. And for you Once more she stopped herself, and the colour rushed over her face. " And for me ? " repeated Charlotte. " I suppose you mean that I am not capable of judging, that I have no experience. Perhaps not ; but there are some things one can make up one's mind about without any experience ; and, for my part, a risk of that kind is one I should never run." A NEW LLFE. 17 Mrs. Ackland looked at her with a somewhat puzzled expression, and then she changed the conversation. When, later on, Charlotte rose to go, she held the girl's hand in both her own for a minute, and looked her kindly in the face. " My dear," she said, " I must not let you go without congratulating you.

I hope with all my heart that your married life will be a very happy one." Charlotte went back to her room in a thoughtful mood. Mrs. Ackland' s eyes and voice had been full of kindness as she said good-night, but some of her speeches, and her manner, from time to time, had left an uncom fortable impression ; and long after Charlotte had gone to bed, and the room was dark, and only the buzz of mosquitoes stirred the silence, she lay awake, and tried to define what it was in the evening's conversation that had pained and disturbed her. vol. 11.

Chapter II. Impressions

The next morning was spent by Charlotte in the Uffizzi Gallery. Eustace said he would follow her there, but it was late when he came ; and for two hours Charlotte wandered about alone with her guide book, trying to admire the pictures selected by Mr. Bædeker as being worthy of admiration, and wondering, often, wherein lay the charm and the beauty of which she had heard so much, and which she found it difficult always to perceive. They looked so stiff and awkward, those century-old Madonnas ; and there were many famous pictures which IMPRESSIONS. 19 seemed to her merely uninteresting or positively ugly. And yet, as she wandered to and fro through the rooms, she saw much that gave her a sense of quiet satisfaction, or a thrill of genuine plea sure ; she became from time to time sensible of a certain dignity or power or pathos in the strange Madonna faces ; and sometimes, when she had passed a picture by, she was attracted to turn to it again, and found in it a subtle, unexpected charm.

The picture before which she lingered the longest, and returned to the oftenest, was the Fortitude of Botticelli. It did not please her so much as many others, but it puzzled her ; she did not understand the painter's concep tion ; she did not see why the seated figure should have a slightly languid air, why the face should be worn and a little weary, why Fortitude should appear almost to shrink from, rather than to defy, suffering. She came back to it again and again, and pondered over its meaning ; and when Eustace came to fetch her he found her standing before it. " Are you taking a lesson in endurance ? " he asked. " I don't understand the picture," said Charlotte. " I think Fortitude should look bolder and stronger ; the figure there does not give me the impression of any great courage in meeting trouble."

"Ah, you don't know much about it, you see," said Eustace. " Wait till you have been married to me for a time ; you'll have some knowledge of adversity then to help you. " Well, I must wait and see," said Charlotte with a laugh, " for I certainly don't understand it now. But, perhaps, as you say, I shall be wiser after some experience of married life ; IMPRESSIONS. 21 the picture may show its meaning to me in a few years' time." " Perhaps," said Eustace ; " but it's half-past twelve, and I have had nothing but bread and coffee this morning. My internal fortitude is exhausted, and I move that we adjourn the debate, and go into committee of supply." In the afternoon Charlotte drove with her husband to Fiesole. The day was such a day as is suggested by the words, Italian weather; the sky was of a deep, bright, unclouded blue, the sunshine was constant, and the air was warm as the air of an English June.

As the carriage wound along the white, hilly road, clouds of dust rose up behind it ; on either side were walls covered with vivid green or large pink cabbage roses ; and the leaves and roses showed clear and bright against the sky beyond, in gorgeous combination of pink and green and blue. Here was no melting haziness of outline as in a northern atmosphere, no neutral tints, no soft, undefined meeting of point with point : the outlines were sharp and clear, the colouring distinct and brilliant. Charlotte felt as though she passed through an enchanted land ; and her enjoyment would have been perfect, had it not been for the beggars stationed in relays the whole length of the road. To each relay a certain portion of the way was appointed, and formed a regular beat, which the proprietors duly trod from beginning to end, imploring alms and pointing out their deformities — persistent, clamorous, unless money made answer to their prayers, or a piece of level road enabled the sluggish horse to outstrip them in speed.

"I can't bear those beggars!" Charlotte exclaimed more than once. "They spoil my pleasure ; even the roses look the paler for their cries." IMPRESSIONS. 23 But Eustace refused to agree with her. " They are charming," he said, " amusing beyond all things. Look at that old fellow there with the wooden leg ; and that deformity of a girl, — it is all she can do to keep up with us. " Oh, Eustace, how can you ?" said Charlotte. " Give them some money, and let us have peace for at least a little bit." But Eustace only laughed. He was pro vided with a large supply of copper money, and he amused himself in distributing it as he went along, holding it up, and inviting the beggars to persevere in following the carriage ; sometimes throwing a coin of minimum value to be scrambled for by two or three, some times making an old or crippled man follow from beginning to end of his beat before he would award the coveted alms ; and he would not listen to Charlotte's remonstrances.

After a time Charlotte paid little heed to him ; she vvas becoming, bit by bit and un consciously, accustomed to leave him in some of his moods to follow out his own fancies ; and she gave herself up, as far as was possible, to the enjoyment of the beauty around her. The time in Florence was drawing to a close, and this drive to Fiesole was her last one in the smiling Lombard country ; which was the reason, perhaps, why she remembered it so well ; why the look of the sky, the roses, and the green never wholly faded from her memory ; and why a picture of Eustace throwing money to the beggars on the road was amongst the most vivid of the many mental pictures which she carried back with her to England.

CHAPTER I

I I. A BROKEN SILENCE. On the evening before leaving Florence, Char lotte and Eustace Sotheran went for a last walk about the town. They strolled down to the Ponte Vecchio, then along the Lung 'Arno in the direction of the Cascine Gardens, and wandered back towards their hotel through narrow, ill-lighted streets. The night was dark and very still ; the air was warm ; the few stars showing in sparse, unclouded spaces looked doubly bright, seen from the added gloom caused by tall houses rising high on either side. The footsteps of Charlotte and Eustace rang out clear and A COXSPIRACY OF SILENCE. distinct ; they walked on side by side, arm in arm, without speaking, hushed by the sense of solemn quiet that floats in darkness. Suddenly Eustace stopped. " Hark!" he said. Charlotte, too, stood still and listened ; and as she stood, she heard a peculiar, unfamiliar sound, a kind of murmuring hum that rose and swelled, and came nearer and nearer.

"What is it, Eustace?" she asked. Eustace did not answer her question directly. " Come on," he said. " We shall see them perhaps." He walked on quickly, and Charlotte hurried along by his side ; while, moment by moment, the sound became more clear and full. Charlotte's heart was throbbing, and a strong excite ment thrilled her ; this mysterious breaking of the evening silence impressed her curiously. Now they were close to a turn in the narrow, winding street ; the sound had resolved itself into a kind of monotonous chant ; and mingled with it was the beat of footsteps treading in even march. Suddenly Charlotte started, and clung to her husband in quick alarm. Round the corner of the street came a weird procession, a company of strange figures, robed from head to foot in white : white cowls were on their heads ; white hid their faces ; only bright living eyes looked forth from a covering like that of the dead.

They carried torches in their hands, or swing ing lamps that cast uncertain lights and shadows as they passed. "What is it?" whispered Charlotte. "Who are they ? " " The Misericordia," answered Eustace. " See, they are taking a coffin to the grave." His eyes were gleaming, and his face was flushed ; he drew Charlotte back within the shelter of a doorway ; and so they stood, and watched the strange company go by. With measured tread, chanting their monotonous chant, their torches flaring in great quivering, backward flames, their lamps slow swinging with an even motion, their white-clad figures ghostly against the tall, dark houses rising close in the narrow street, two by two the Brethren of the Misericordia passed by ; and six of them bore upon their shoulders a burden heavy and dark, a coffin covered with a pall.

Charlotte stood spell-bound in the doorway with quick-heaving, pausing breath, with startled, gazing eyes, her consciousness absorbed, and her imagination excited by the strange, unexpected sight. Then, all at once, a new, incongruous sound broke in upon the severe monotony of the chant ; and Charlotte started as a peal of laughter arose, close to her, by her side, jarring upon the awed emotion that held her, and upon the hushed impressive ness of the scene. The Brethren of the Misericordia passed unheeding by ; the few loiterers who followed the procession glanced wondering or indignant at the shadowed doorway ; Charlotte looked up with a shock of hurt, revolted seeling at the tall figure of her husband, tremulous with merriment. For a moment dismay enchained her ; then she touched his arm.

" Eustace," she said, hurriedly, " what is it ? Why do you ? Oh, Eustace, think - — don't " Eustace turned to her. " Did you see the coffin ? " he said, " and all the row of chattering madmen doing honour to one poor rotting body ? It was a gay sight ; didn't you like it, Charlotte ? " "Oh, Eustace," said Charlotte, " come away. :See, the people are wondering at you." She put her arm through his, and he made no resistance as she led him down the street. The night was still, and there were houses all about her ; there was nothing to recall the thought of swaying trees ; there was nothing to suggest the rush and turbulence of a storm. And yet in Charlotte's mind the memory rose up of the night when she had stood by the window at Seven Thorns Farm, and seen the trees do battle with the wind, and had fancied, as she stood there, chill with a sense of evil, that something human mingled in the strife, and something human shouted in the air.

The scene rose up before her in unaccountable but vivid clearness, wrought itself into the peace fulness of the Florence evening, and twined about the quiet streets ; and ever afterwards in Charlotte's memory the two scenes — the wild storm and the silent southern night — were bound inextricably together. By-and-bye, as they walked along, Eustace became as quiet as she ; a certain jauntiness which had displayed itself in his air and bearing forsook him, and a new mood shadowed his face. As they neared the Piazza Santa Maria Novella a little gasping noise caused him to look down at Charlotte's face. The tears were rolling down her cheeks, and she held her nether lip tightly between her teeth. Eustace stopped. ' Charlotte," he said, "what is the matter ?" "Oh, Eustace," said Charlotte, "you fright ened and shocked me so.

Why did you speak and act so strangely ? How could you laugh when ? " " Did I hurt you so ? " said Eustace, gloomily. " I did not mean to ; I would not hurt you, Charlotte, for the world." Then his voice sank low. " How did I shock you ? " he asked. " What was it I said or did ? " "You spoke so strangely," Charlotte an swered. " And the procession — it seemed to me so awful — and — you laughed — and -" Eustace turned away, and stood for a little while without moving or speaking. When he again faced Charlotte he had regained some thing of his usual manner. " My dear child," he said, " don't you think you are making a mountain out of a molehill ? You were excited and impressed by the Miseri cordia — as was natural ; most people would be, coming upon them suddenly for the first time — and anything that didn't quite chime in with your mood seemed to you offensive and shocking.

But I have seen them often, and am not so impressed by them, and I — in fact, I had rather an amusing adventure once in connection vvith them, which always returns to me when I meet one of their processions. I forgot you had never seen anything of the kind before, and —and I suppose I didn't keep my feelings to myself as I ought to have done." Charlotte looked up vvith a feeble smile " I daresay I exaggerated it," she said. " But it was so silent, you see, and the laugh jarred upon me." " Of course it would," said Eustace. " I ought to have thought of that. But it is all right now, isn't it ?" he added. " You are not vexed with me any more ? " " No," said Charlotte; and then Eustace stooped down and kissed her. 3 VOL.

Chapter IV. Home Coming

The day that Charlotte Sotheran came back to London seemed to her to be the happiest day in her life. She was delighted with the luxurious carriage waiting at the station, with the fur rug within it, with the rapid drive through muddy, familiar streets ; and her delight vvas crowned by the anticipation of something better that was still to come. " Do you think she will be there, ready to receive us?" she asked at intervals as the carriage sped along; and Eustace answered, always in the same words, with the same look of amusement on his face, " Yes, I think she will be there." And Mrs. March was there, indeed, watching at the window as the carriage drove up, standing just within the open door of the dining-room as Charlotte entered the hall. Charlotte took no note of the servants waiting to receive her, had no thought of the magnificence of her new home, no glance of curiosity to spare.

She went straight across the hall to where Mrs. March was standing, drew her into the dining-room, shut to the door, and folded the little agitated figure in her arms. For Mrs. March vvas wonderfully agitated. She clung to her daughter with tears and kisses ; she asked her over and over again if she were quite well, quite happy ; she would not rest till Charlotte had taken off her hat and veil, and she could see for herself that she was not changed in any way. Eustace left the mother and daughter alone for a while ; but at last the door vvas slightly opened, and his face peeped into the room. " May I come in ? he said, " or am I to be entirely supplanted by my mother-in-law ? " " Come in, come in," said Mrs. March. " Dear Eustace ! I should not be able to supplant you long. " Perhaps," said Eustace to Charlotte, "per haps when you have finished devouring your mother you would like some tea ; and after wards your curiosity may possibly be excited to the pitch of caring to go through the house."