CHAPTER XLII.

FROM FRANCES TO HER HUSBAND, BRYAN CAREY.

I address you from the grave, and I pray that what I write may never reach your hands. If, unhappily, you are fated to read these words, they will bring their own punishment with them.

Do I hope, then, that you may be dead on the day that this letter shall be opened or destroyed, unread? No. But rather than you should receive it, it would be better that the earth covered you, as it has covered me these many years. You will understand my meaning before you have finished reading. I write in no vindictive spirit. All bitter feeling has left me; although even yourself may acknowledge that I have good cause for feeling bitterly towards you. But I am resolved that you shall not blight another life as you blighted mine. Another life so dear to me! that should be so dear to you! Another life that has been some comfort to me in the midst of my sorrow and affliction; and that I hope may be long spared for happiness.

It is not a giddy girl who is writing to you. It is a woman who has learned to look upon things with fair judgment, notwithstanding that she has suffered deeply from a cruel wrong inflicted upon her.

When you first came to me I was a child almost in years. I had had no opportunity of knowing the world, or of gaining that experience which is necessary to those who move in its busy quarters. I had never known trouble or sorrow, and, until my father fell into misfortune, I had lived very happily with him. He had his faults, I do not doubt, as we all have; but he was a good father to the last, and I loved him to the last. You judged him harshly, I know, and made no excuses for him--but it is in your nature to judge harshly. Weak as he was to some extent, I do not believe that he would have wronged his wife--doubly wronged her--and then have deserted her: as you wronged and deserted me. I have some remembrance of my mother, who died when I was very young, and I know that he was indulgent and good to her.

I fancy I can see a hard look on your face at the word indulgent. But some natures require indulgence, and are the better and the happier for it. You were for a time indulgent to me, and it was for this, as well as for other qualities in you upon which I placed higher value than you deserved, that I loved you.

Yes, I loved you. I scarcely know whether you ever believed I did; for, thinking over matters since our separation, I have arrived--whether rightly or wrongly--at what I believe to be a correct estimate of your character, at what assuredly is a correct estimate if you are destined to read it. I see you, hard and intolerant; doubtful of goodness in others; prone to place the most uncharitable construction on the actions of others. Lightness of heart is in your eyes a sign of levity. Surely the moods which were familiar to me in the first days of our acquaintanceship, and in the first few months of our wedded life, must have been foreign to your nature.

I see something more in you. I see you false to your wife and to your marriage vows. I see you, who prided yourself upon your sense of justice, most unjust and ungenerous to me. Let your heart answer if I am wrong.

Recall the evening on which we met for the first time, and certain words which passed between us. You were at my father's house, advising him upon his business affairs, which had become complicated. You said that my voice reminded you of a friend--a lady friend, very dear to you--and that she was dead. The words did not make much impression upon me at the time; but I had occasion afterwards to remember them. I liked you that evening. Your grave face, your sensible ways, were agreeable to me, frivolous girl as you supposed me to be. We kept but little society; the only regular visitor at my father's house was my cousin Ralph. I loved him; but not in the way you suspected. We had been intimate from early childhood, and I had a sincere affection for him. When I became better acquainted with you, I saw faults in him which I had not hitherto discerned; there was a want of stability in his character; he was indolent and deficient in manliness. Even if you had not entered into my life, and marred it, I think I should never have had any but a cousinly love for him. So far as I was concerned, there were no grounds for jealousy on your part, and no grounds for your base suspicions of me. I do not speak for him; I speak for myself. And when you wrote to me on the day you deserted me, and accused me of loving him as a woman should love the man she wishes to marry, you lied. But you had another purpose to serve, and it suited you to write the lie.

Of our married life I need say but few words. I was very happy for a time. You had behaved nobly and generously to my father; you were most kind and indulgent to me. If, as I afterwards learnt, we were living beyond our means, I had no suspicion of it. You never gave me the slightest hint to that effect, and you encouraged what I now know were extravagances in me. But--believe it or not as you will--I could have been contented and happy without them. You told me you were rich, and you could not fail to know that I had no idea of the value of money. Why could you not have confided in me? Was it honest to keep me, of your own free will, in such absolute ignorance, and then to blame me for not having known? I think, if you had trusted me, that you might have found some good in me--judged even by the light of your own hard judgment; but it is in your nature to accuse and judge in the same breath, and to do both unmercifully.

I remember well the last day you were kind to me. You left me in the morning with smiles; you returned home long after midnight a changed man. I, also, was changed when you returned. I have other cause to remember the day; for in the evening my cousin Ralph came to see me, and stayed with me until nearly eleven o'clock. You had sent me a note saying that you were detained at your office by important business. I read the note to my cousin, and he laughed at it, and said that you had good cause for your absence. His words conveyed a strange meaning to my ears, and I asked for an explanation. He gave it to me; and I learnt, to my horror, that you were in the habit of visiting another woman--a stranger in the town. Before I had recovered from the shock, I received another. My cousin Ralph, in a mad moment, proved himself to be what I had not hitherto suspected--a vile bad man. He told me, in passionate terms, that he loved me, and that he had loved me from boyhood; that it had been the dream of his life that we should be married, and that, but for you and your money, his life might have been a life of happiness. I listened in dismay and astonishment; I knew that he had an affection for me, but I thought it was such an affection as one cousin might innocently have entertained for another. I was so overwhelmed by this discovery, and by his accusations against you, that I had no power to stay his words. He misinterpreted my silence, and proceeded in wilder terms to propose flight to me. I tried to answer him, but my grief, and my terror lest you should return while he was in the house--for he was at my feet and refused to stir--made me weak. I implored him for my sake and for his own to leave me; and presently, when I grew stronger, I addressed him in words which it was impossible for him to misunderstand. It flashed upon me then that he had invented the story he had told me about you, and I taunted him with it. He answered me to the effect that he would prove it true before many days were over, and that then I might possibly listen to him more favourably. He left me; and your own conduct towards me from that day, during the short time we were together, was almost a sufficient proof. You would have judged upon that evidence; I was not content with it. I soon tasted the bitterness that lay in knowledge. A clerk in your office, who had for a purpose of his own made himself acquainted with the history of this woman--probably to use against you in some way--and whom you had employed to convey money and letters to her at different times, told me more than I wanted to know. On the day that you had the public quarrel with my cousin Ralph--I heard of it soon afterwards, for it became matter of common talk--I discovered that this woman came from a town in which you had formerly resided--that you knew her then--and that her history was a shameful one. Then there came to me the words that had passed between us upon your first visit to my father's house, when you said that my voice reminded you of a woman who was dear to you, and who was dead. It was easy to supply the blank spaces in the story to make it complete--shamefully, miserably complete. Your clerk told me that the life you had lived in that town was not a respectable one: I did not ask him how he had gained his knowledge, but I was sure of its truth. You left that town, and came to this place, a complete stranger, knowing no one, known by none. You refused to speak of your past life; not a word had ever passed your lips with reference to it. What other confirmation was needed of the truth of your clerk's statements? You tried to blot out your past career, knowing that it would not bear the light, and that the good name and position you had gained would be sullied and lost if the particulars were made public. You deserted the woman who had been your companion, and when you were inadvertently betrayed into remembrance of her by the sound of my voice, you told me she was dead. You never mentioned her again, nor did I, for I had forgotten her. But see how hard it is to lead a life of hypocrisy, as you have done! Shame never dies, nor can it ever be completely wiped away. After years of sojourn here, when you had gained money, position and a good name--when you had position, a simple, ignorant, and innocently-vain girl to your heart, and had sworn to cherish and protect her--this woman tracks you, finds you, and appeals to you by the remembrance of old times, and perhaps by other arguments more powerful, of which I am ignorant. On the very evening she meets you, you take her to a house in the town, and provide lodgings for her, and from that time your visits are frequent. Is this part of your story complete, and need I add to it by saying that you mentioned not a word concerning the woman to the wife you professed to love? If there was no shame in the relations that existed between you and her, why should you have taken such pains to conceal them? On the day you deserted me, you told me you were ruined, and you adopted the miserable subterfuge of saying that you had discovered all, and that you could no longer live with me. Your meaning was plain enough. You implied that I was false to you and to the vows I had taken on the day we were married. A more wicked lie never poisoned the heart of man or woman. I had brought shame and disgrace upon you, you said, and that it was useless my sending after you. I have read this letter often--it is destroyed now; I burnt it lest one who is dearer to me than my heart's blood should see it--and I have wondered at my folly and credulity in ever, for one moment, believing you to be a good and just man. For I did believe you to be this. There was a time in my life when I set you up as a model of honour and integrity and truth. The last words of your letter are burnt into my heart. Do you remember them? 'If I could make you a free woman, so that you might marry the man you love, I would willingly lay down my life; but it cannot be done. The only and best reparation I can offer is to promise, as I do now most faithfully, to wipe you out of my heart, so that you may be free from me for ever.' How fair those words sound--how self-sacrificing--how manly! What a noble nature do they display! Would it be believed that while this letter was on its way to the wife whom he was about to desert--to the wife whom he had most cruelly wronged, and most shamefully betrayed--the man who wrote it was entering the house where the woman lived who had been his companion in former years? The next morning you left. Two days afterwards, the woman followed you to London.

Is anything more wanted to complete the shameful story? Had I brought disgrace upon you, or had you brought it upon me? A noble reparation, indeed, did you make to me!

You may ask how it was that I discovered your visit to the woman. My father and my cousin saw you coming from the house, where doubtless you had completed all your arrangements, and left your final instructions. My cousin it was who told me. 'Now,' he said, 'do you believe that he is false?' 'Yes,' I answered; 'I am convinced of it' What followed? Remember it is your dead wife who is speaking to you, and do not dare, for your soul's sake, to add to your cruelty by doubting what she says. My cousin Ralph then began to speak again of his own selfish passion, and I bade him never to presume to address me again. From that day I never saw him; some little while afterwards my father told me he had gone abroad, but we never heard from him.

We remained--my father and I--for a few weeks after your departure, and then my father's health suddenly broke down. In one thing you had most completely succeeded; you had blackened my name as well as your own. Innocent as I was, wronged as I was, I think no one in my native place pitied me. Persons who had once respected me avoided me, or slighted me. Day by day the torture of living in this atmosphere of injustice grew until it was unbearable; and when my father broke down, I took him with me into a strange place, where neither of us was known, and where I hoped by carefully husbanding our small means, and by employing some hours of the day in needlework, to be enabled to live quietly, if not in peace. There was another reason why I was anxious to leave--a reason which you will now learn for a certainty for the first time. I was about to become a mother.

I kept this secret from you. Often and often had I listened to the expression of your wishes--the dearest wish of your heart, you said--that our union might be blessed with children. Your wish was that our first child might be a girl, and I used to hang with delight upon your words--believing in them in my credulous faith--when you described how you would educate and rear her into a good woman. I kept the secret, intending to joyfully surprise you later on; but it was fated that you should never learn it from my lips. When my time drew near, I was among strangers. I prayed that I might be blessed with a boy, who would be able to fight against the world's cruelties--with a boy who might one day--if you lived--be able to tell you to your face that you had slandered his mother. I had those thoughts at that time, and I set them down so that you may know exactly the state of my mind towards you. I prayed most fervently that the child might not be a girl, whose fate it might be to be treated by a man as her unhappy mother was treated by you. But my prayers were not heard. The child I clasped to my breast--your child--was a girl.

I hardly dared to look into her face at first, for I feared that it might resemble you, and that I should be compelled to hate her. I thanked God when I saw that there was but little resemblance to you. Think when you read this what my feelings towards you must have been.

My darling's was the sweetest, most beautiful face that I had ever gazed upon. I had never conceived it possible that a human heart could throb with such ineffable delight as mine did even in the midst of my bitter sorrow and shame, when I looked into my darling's face and eyes. I offered up grateful prayers that I lived and was a mother, and I offered up prayers of thankfulness also that it was out of your power to rob me of my treasure. That you would have done it had you known, I entertained no doubt.

The first few months of my child's life I was as happy as it was possible for a wronged and betrayed woman to be. Intending in these lines to hide nothing, I will not disguise from you that I shed many bitter tears because she was deprived of a father's love; but she did not lack love and attention. She was my one comfort and joy; I soon had no one else to love but her.

My father died. The doctor who had attended him in his illness warned me that, unless I was careful of myself, my life might be short. The thought that my darling might be left, helpless and dependent, among strangers, frightened me, and I did not know which way to turn for counsel and advice. I had not a friend in the world capable of helping me by a kindly, sensible word. To this condition you had brought me.

But my cup of sorrow was not yet full. The doctor I have mentioned was an unmarried man. He believed me to be a widow, as I had given out. I had no other resource than to speak this untruth. It was impossible for me to say that I was a helpless, unhappy woman, who had been deserted by her husband. To such a creature strangers show no mercy; they put their own construction on the story and judge accordingly--as you would judge, harshly, unfeelingly. I think I should not have cared so much for myself, but I had my darling to look to.

The doctor flattered me by saying that he saw I was a lady, and, in most respectful terms, he invited my confidence. He was most delicate and considerate, but I could not confide in him or any one; my cruel story and my cruel wrongs must be for ever locked in my breast. He did not press me when he saw that I was pained by his inquiries, but he paid me great attention, and by his kindness lightened my load. I did not place any serious construction upon his intentions, nor indeed did I think of them, for I was entirely wrapt up in my love for my darling child, who was growing every day more beautiful and more engaging. But when he asked me to be his wife, my eyes were opened. If I had been a free woman I would have accepted him, if only for the sake of providing a comfortable home for my child. As I was in chains, I refused him. He said he was a patient man, that he loved me very sincerely, and that he would wait. In the heavy catalogue of my sins that you have against me, place this new one--that this good man loved me. He continued his attentions, and they brought me into fresh disgrace. In the place I was living there were single ladies, and mothers who had daughters to marry, who entertained a hope that the doctor would choose from among them, and they were angry when they saw that I stood in their way. I do not know whom I have to thank for what followed, but gradually rumours got about to my discredit. I was not a widow; I was not a married woman; the name I went by was not my own. Women shrugged their shoulders when they met me; men stared at me insolently and familiarly. What had occurred in my native town when you deserted me was repeated here. I had no alternative but to fly from the place.

At that time my darling was nearly three years old, and the unkind creatures had attempted to drop poison even into her young and innocent mind. One day she asked me, in her pretty way, where her father was. 'You have none, my darling,' I said; 'he is dead.'

In the new place I found refuge in I made friends with a kind family, who grew very fond of my child--as none indeed could help doing. Her bright ways, her innocence, her artlessness, would win any heart not dead to human affection. If anything should happen to me, these friends will take care of my darling as long as they are able. I think it is likely that I shall not live long, and I have thought anxiously over the future of my darling until she arrives at an age when she may be able to protect and provide for herself. I have consulted with my new friends, and I have arranged everything to the best of my ability and judgment. I shall place in their hands a small box, which, in the event of my death and of their being unable to maintain my child (for they are poor people), is to be given to her with plain instructions. These instructions it will be necessary for me here to explain, first saying, however, that should these good friends be able to look after my child until she arrives at womanhood, there will be no necessity to give them to her. In that event, also, the box and its contents will be burnt. They have promised me faithfully, and I know they will keep their word.

If I am gone, and they are too poor to help my child, she will be, as I have been, without a friend. These good people have some idea of emigrating, if they can save sufficient money, and then my darling will be indeed helpless. They might take her with them, it may be said; but they may not have sufficient means. And then, again, it inflicts the most bitter pain upon me to think that my darling child should be taken thousands of miles from the spot where her mother's ashes are laid. She will be helpless, as I have said; but there is one upon whom she has a just claim--yourself. I wished her never to see you; I wished that you might never look upon her beautiful face, nor feel the charm of her presence. But I see no other way to secure a home for her. Should she be left without friends, she will come to you, a stranger, with a letter from me, who will even then be dead, asking you to give a home to a friendless child. She will bear a strange name, and will know you only as a stranger. Neither will you know her; it may be that you will see in her face some slight resemblance to the wife whose happiness you have destroyed, and it may be that you may place that resemblance to your dead wife's discredit. Do so, and bring another shame upon your soul.

How do I know where you live in London? It has been discovered for me, by means of a clue which my father obtained soon after your flight. When a mother is working for her child, she can do much. I have never seen London, but I know your address; and on the day that the friends I have made for my child find they can no longer provide for her, she will present herself at your door. Hard and unfeeling, cruel and unjust, as you are, I think you will not turn her from it.

In the small box which my friends will give to my darling child are three letters, numbered first, second, third. On the first letter is written, 'To be opened first, on your eighteenth birthday, before the other letters are touched. This is the sacred wish of your dead mother.' I copy this letter in this place, so that you may clearly understand what I have done:

'My darling Child,--I wish you to regard these written words as though they are spoken to you with my dying breath, and to obey them. If Mr. Bryan Carey has made your life happy, and if you are in the enjoyment of a happy home, destroy the second letter by fire, and hand him the third. If it is otherwise with you, and your life with him has been in any way unhappy, destroy the third letter by fire, as you would have done the second. Then seek some quiet place and read the second letter, and when you have read it, send it to Mr. Carey, and act as you think best for your welfare and happiness. That God will for ever bless and protect my darling is the prayer of your mother,

'Frances.'

The third letter contains a short account of my life since you left me, and the statement that Jessie is your daughter. It leaves it to your judgment to make the relationship known to her, or to let it remain a secret.

The second letter you are now reading.

If it fall into your hands, Jessie will have read it first, and will know how basely you behaved to me. She will know that your conduct towards me was such that a woman never can forgive, and she will understand that a man had better kill his wife than inflict upon her such shame and misery and humiliation as you inflicted upon me, a guiltless woman, as God is my Judge. She will know that you deserted me for another woman, and left me, a simple inexperienced girl, to battle alone with the pitiless world. Ah, how pitiless it is, how uncharitable, how cruel! How many nights have I passed shedding what might have been tears of blood, for they were wrung from a bruised and bleeding heart! She, who has lived with me many happy years in her childhood's life, will, when she reads this, be able to look back with the eyes of a woman upon the life I led while we were together, and she will know whether it was without stain and without reproach. She will have had experience both of you and myself, and of both our natures and minds, and she will have sense and intelligence enough to judge fairly between us. I repeat here, with all the strength of my soul, what I have declared before--that when you accused me of loving my cousin Ralph and of being false to you, you lied most foully.

I believe that I decided rightly when I decided to write these things. As you have acted towards your daughter, so shall be your reward. Whether it be for good or ill, you have earned it.

Your unhappy wife,

Frances.

After the last sheet of this letter, there were a few words in uncle Bryan's handwriting, evidently intended for my mother: 'If you see her whom I scarcely dare call my daughter for the shame which overwhelms me, tell her but one thing from me--that her mother's suspicions concerning the woman I befriended are unfounded. She will believe this, perhaps; it is the truth.'