Chapter 37

AN UNEXPECTED RENCONTRE.

Into a ward of the white-washed walls, Where the dead and the dying lay, Wounded by bayonets, shells, and balls, Somebody's darling was borne one day. --Song.

Mrs. Rolleston completely sank under this dreadful blow. Bertie had been her darling and pride from his infancy, and her own misery was redoubled, in anticipation of the even greater anguish of Cecil.

Strange to say, though, _she_ experienced no new shock. That Du Meresq was dead, she had never doubted, or that his spirit, in the moment of departure, had hovered for an instant near the one who loved him best. It seemed to connect her with that other world whither he had gone. It did not appear so far away, now Bertie was there, and her thoughts were ever in communion with her spirit love.

The hour in which he had, as she believed, appeared to her, she regularly passed alone in the same room, and even prayed for another sign of his presence.

But if such prayers were answered, what mourners would remain unvisited by their dead?

This room became her "temple and her shrine," in which Bertie, all his sins forgotten, was canonized. How incessantly she regretted having parted with those letters, so impulsively affectionate and so entirely confidential! To be sure, they were chiefly about himself; but what subject could be so interesting to Cecil? His normal condition of picturesque insolvency was only a proof of generosity of disposition and absence of meanness. Now she had nothing but a letter not her own, and that one last message, "Give my dearest love to Cecil."

Whether or no the vision was really but a dream, we leave to the decision of our readers. It was not unnatural that the dominant idea should impress that unreasoning moment between sleeping and waking; but Cecil's fervent faith knew no doubts, and thus it was that Du Meresq dead influenced her as much as when living.

They soon heard from Colonel Rolleston. Part of his regiment had been sent to seek and bring in the wounded; his brother-in-law's body had been found and brought back by Vavasour, and he sent his wife Bertie's watch. The newspapers were full of the disastrous but glorious charge of the cavalry, and of their immense loss.

In Du Meresq's regiment all the senior had been cut off. Had he lived, he would have been Colonel of it, a position which Lascelles survived to fill.

There appeared no respite from anxiety for those who had relatives in the East. Within two months the battles of the Alma, Balaklava, and Inkermann had been fought. Colonel Rolleston seemed to bear a charmed life; for, though repeatedly under fire, he had come out unscathed. Many of his officers were killed, Fane slightly wounded, and Jack Vavasour had lost an arm.

In the ensuing spring Cecil roused herself. Though all her hopes were dead, the native energy of her character asserted itself, and rebelled against utter stagnation. Some letters she had received from the nurses in the Crimea rekindled her former enthusiasm, and she determined to execute her original project, and go out to the aid of her suffering countrymen.

Mrs. Rolleston was now more hopeful, and, far from opposing Cecil's wishes, cheerfully forwarded them. She looked upon hers as so cruelly exceptional a lot, that any absorbing occupation capable of distracting her mind was only too welcome. And so when

Spring Came forth, her work of gladness to contrive, With all her reckless birds upon the wing,

Cecil, turning "from all she brought," was far on her way to the East, and wishing, as she assumed the black serge hospital dress, that she could as easily transform her internal consciousness as her outward identity.

Hers was not a nature to do anything by halves, and every faculty of mind and body became absorbed in these new duties. The patient who fell into Cecil's hands had little to complain of. She struggled for his life when even the shadow of death had fallen on him, and sometimes, by arduous exertions and devoted nursing, saved one in whom the vital flame had wasted almost to the socket. And then a nearly divine content came to her as she imagined she might have spared some distant heart the pangs that had almost broken her own.

But to follow her through the daily routine of duties, often painful, often touching, would be too long for the present history, so we pass abruptly to one event, a necessary link in it.

Cecil was attending a fever case, and looking anxiously for the doctor, as she fancied her patient was sinking. He was a young man, and had been more or less unconscious ever since he was brought in.

The surgeon came, and shook his head as he felt the feeble pulse.

"Is there no hope?" asked Cecil, sorrowfully.

"Scarcely any. Give him this stimulant whenever you can get him to swallow it; but there seems no reserve of strength." And he passed on to others.

She lost no time in attending to his directions, and a large pair of melancholy brown eyes opened on her. They watched her about persistently, and seeing their gaze, though languid, was rational, she asked "if there was anything she could do for him."

His voice was so inaudible she could but just catch the sentence, "So he gives me over!"

"I don't think he would if he could see you now. Indeed, you seem better."

"I don't think I shall die; but, in case of accidents, will you write something for me?"

Cecil nodded, while holding rapid communion with herself. Ought she to let him exhaust his little strength in dictating probably an agitating letter?

"Will you wait till you are a little stronger?" she said doubtfully.

"If I ever am, it will not be necessary to write; if otherwise I cannot do it too soon."

Cecil, judging by her own feelings that opposition to any strong wish would be more injurious than even imprudent indulgence, glided from the room, and soon returned with writing materials.

She sat down by the bed, and casually felt the attenuated wrist as she did so. The sick man gazed gratefully at her, but waited some minutes for breath to commence. His first words made her almost bound from her chair, and, as he continued in low feeble tones, with long pauses between, Cecil was wrought into an agony of suspense and interest.

The communication was to be addressed to an uncle, and began abruptly:--

"I was married to Theodora Leigh at a register office at Liverpool in November, 1853, and I make it a dying request to you to acknowledge my widow, who will otherwise be destitute both of money and friends. Forgive, if you can, my deception, and the poor return made for all the benefits lavished on your, notwithstanding, grateful nephew,

"HARRY DUTTON.

"P.S.--My wife is a governess in the family of Mr. Markham, Heatherbrae, Wimbledon."

It was sealed, directed, and the patient had sunk into a heavy stupor; but Cecil felt her heart stirred as she had never expected to do again.

Here, if she had required it, was complete exoneration of any subsequent intercourse having taken place between Du Meresq and Bluebell. The latter evidently had been far otherwise engaged, and, for the first time, she felt her long-cherished resentment melting away.

She gazed with some curiosity at the man who could so soon supplant Bertie, and smiled with irrepressible bitterness at the singular coincidence that she should be striving to preserve a husband to Bluebell, who had deprived her of her own early love.

But where could she have met this man, whom she had married almost immediately on landing in England? Cecil looked again at the address--"Right Honourable Lord Bromley." She had heard that name somewhere, but could not recall any connecting associations.

Harry lingered some time, his life frequently despaired of; and he would probably have succumbed had it not been for the untiring energy and care of the hospital nurse. Her anxiety could not have been exceeded by Bluebell herself, for Cecil's disposition was generous, and she never more truly forgave her _ci-devant_ enemy than when thus labouring to return good for evil.

At last the turning-point was reached and Dutton lifted from the very gates of the grave. A wound in his leg was now the chief retarding circumstance; and as it seemed incapable of healing at Scutari, he was ordered on sick leave to England.

In the mean time, a lively friendship had arisen between him and Cecil. Directly she admitted her name and former intimacy with Bluebell, Harry took her entirely into his confidence, and, encouraged by the evident interest with which she listened, related how he had first met and fallen in love with Bluebell on the steamer, and subsequently persuaded her to elope with him.

He did not deny the interested motives which had afterwards induced him to conceal the marriage; but Cecil's upright mind recoiled at the unworthy deception, and the strong view she took of it made short work of the extenuating circumstances advanced by Harry.

The dying appeal to Lord Bromley had, of course, been burnt since its writer's recovery; but Dutton, now thoroughly ashamed of his shabby policy, vowed to Cecil that he would abandon all thoughts of inheritance, and boldly acknowledge his marriage to Lord Bromley as soon as he should set foot in England.

This was their last interview; for, as he had now approached convalescence, she had no further excuse for ministering to Harry.

It was some time since he had received tidings from his wife, having purposely kept her in ignorance when he volunteered into Peel's brigade. Then he was wounded and laid up at Scutari, so whatever letters she might have written would be on board the "Druid."

Now he must apprise her of his approaching return and explain his long silence. As it happened, a homeward-bound steamer sailed within a few days of the one which carried this letter, and Dutton, obtaining a passage in the former, which happened to the faster of the two, arrived in England almost simultaneously.

Without further notice, he rushed down to Wimbledon, and, had she been there, would speedily have solved the mystery that had so exercised Mrs. Markham. But, lo! on reaching Heatherbrae, he beheld with a sinking heart a conspicuous board on the garden-gate, with the words, "To be let, furnished," legibly inscribed thereon.

Weak from his illness and the disappointment, Harry leant against the railings to consider and recover. He had been so secure of finding Bluebell there, and during the whole hurried journey was picturing the meeting. How would she look? He knew so well the fluttering colour that changed in any emotion, pleasurable or otherwise: but would he see a true loving welcome in those transparent eyes? He had considered every probability or improbability of this sort, but not how he should act in such a dead lock as the present.

Repeated rings at the bell at last brought out the woman in charge, her arms covered with soap-suds, and gown drawn through a placket-hole.

"The family had gone abroad," she said. "No, she did not know where. The agent might, perhaps. She was only there to show visitors the house."

Harry turned away in listless perplexity; it was quite evident this person could tell him nothing. Doubtless their change of plans had been communicated to him by post, but he had not waited to send for letters. There was nothing for it but to obtain from the woman the address of the house-agent, get Mr. Markham's from him, and send another letter to Bluebell.