CHAPTER V.

The discovery of Minnie Bodkin's note in Algernon's secretaire at the office had incited Castalia to make some other attempts to pry into that depository of her husband's papers. She made excuses to step into the post-office whenever she had any reason for thinking Algernon was absent. Sometimes it was with the pretence of wishing to see him, sometimes on the plea of wanting to rest. She had learned that her husband frequently went into the "Blue Bell," to have luncheon, in the middle of the day; and that, from one cause or another, the Whitford Post-office was not really honoured with so much of his personal superintendence as she had been led to suppose. And this again was a fertile source of self-tormenting. Where was he, when he was not at the office?

It whetted her suspicious curiosity to find the secretaire always carefully locked, ever since her discovery of Miss Bodkin's note there. She now wished that she had searched it thoroughly when she had the opportunity, instead of hastening off to Dr. Bodkin's house, after having read the first letter she came upon. But her feelings at that time had been very different from what they now were. She had been nettled, truly, and jealous of any private consultation between Minnie Bodkin and her husband; hating to think that he could trust, and be confidential with, another woman than herself, but not distinctly suspecting either Minnie or Algernon of any intent to wrong her. Miss Bodkin loved power, and influence, and admiration, and Castalia wished no woman to influence Algernon, or to be admired by him for any qualities whatsoever, except herself; but all her little envious resentments against Minnie had been mere pinpricks compared with the cruel pangs of jealousy that now pierced her heart when she thought of Rhoda Maxfield.

That secretaire! It seemed to have an irresistible attraction for her thoughts. She even dreamt sometimes of trying to open it, and finding fresh fastenings arise more and more complicated, as she succeeded in undoing one lock after the other. It was not Algernon's habit to lock up anything belonging to him. There must be some special reason for his doing so in this case! And to Castalia's jaundiced mind it seemed that the special reason could only be a desire to keep his letters secret from her. She grew day by day more restless. The servants at Ivy Lodge remarked with wonder their mistress's frequent absences from home. She, who had so dreaded and disliked walking, was now constantly to be seen on the road to the town, or on the meadow-path by the river. This kind of exercise, however, merely fatigued without refreshing her, and she became so lean and haggard, and her eyes had such a feverish glitter, that her looks might have alarmed anyone who loved her, and witnessed the change in her.

"There she goes again!" exclaimed Lydia to her fellow servant, as she watched her mistress down the garden-path, behind the house, one afternoon. "She can't bide at home for an hour together now!"

"She wears herself to the bone," said Polly, shaking her head.

"She wears other folks to the bone, and that's worse," returned the pitiless Lydia.

Meanwhile Castalia had passed out of the little wicket-gate of her garden into the fields, and so along the meadow-path towards Whitford. She made her way along the path resolutely, though with a languid step. The ground was hardened by recent frost, and the usually muddy track was dry. At the corner of the Grammar School playground she turned up the lane towards the High Street, keeping close to the wall of the Grammar School, so as to be out of view of any from the side windows. Before she quite reached the High Street she caught sight of Mr. Diamond, walking briskly along in the direction of his lodgings. He did not see Castalia, or did not choose to see her; for, although she had once or twice saluted him in the street, she had on another occasion regarded him with her most unrecognising stare, and Matthew Diamond was not a man to risk enduring that a second time. But Castalia quickened her step so as to intercept him before he crossed the end of Grammar School Lane.

"Mr. Diamond!" she said almost out of breath.

"Madam!"

Diamond raised his hat and stood still, in some surprise.

"Would you be kind enough—do you happen to know whether Mr. Errington has left the post-office? You must have passed the door. You might have seen him coming out."

"I am sorry, madam, that I cannot inform you."

"You—you haven't seen him anywhere in the town?"

"No; I have only just left the Grammar School. Have you any further commands?"

He asked the question after a slight pause, because Castalia remained standing exactly across his path, glancing anxiously up and down the High Street, and apparently oblivious of Diamond's existence.

"Oh no! I beg your pardon," she answered, moving aside. As she did so young Ingleby came up, and was about to pass them when Diamond touched him on the shoulder and said, "Ingleby, have you chanced to see Mr. Errington?"

"Yes, sir; I saw him going down the High Street not two minutes ago, close to old Maxfield's shop. Do you want him, Mrs. Errington? I can easily catch him if I run."

"No, no, no! Don't go! You must not go after him."

She walked away without any word or sign of farewell, leaving Diamond and the boy looking after her in surprise.

"That is the most disagreeable woman I ever came across!" exclaimed Ingleby, with school-boy frankness. "I hate her stuck-up airs. But Errington is such a capital fellow——! I'd do anything for him."

Diamond did not choose to discuss either the husband or the wife with young Ingleby, but he said to himself, as he pursued his homeward way, that Mrs. Errington's manner had been not only disagreeable but very strange.

Castalia reached the office and walked in. She entered the inner part that was screened off from the public, and passed Mr. Gibbs, behind his desk, without any recognition. She was about to enter Algernon's private room at the back, when Gibbs, rising and bowing, said "Did you want anything, ma'am? Mr. Errington is not there."

"Oh! I'll go in and sit down."

Gibbs looked uneasy and doubtful, and presently made an excuse to follow her into the room. Her frequent visits to the office of late by no means pleased Mr. Obadiah Gibbs.

"I didn't know how the fire was," said he, poking at the hot coals, and looking furtively at Mrs. Errington.

She was seated in her husband's chair in front of his desk. The little secretaire stood on a table at one side of it.

"I'm afraid Mr. Errington may not be back very soon," said Gibbs.

"Do you know where he's gone?"

"Not I, ma'am."

"Does he often go away during business hours?"

"Why—I don't know what you would call 'often,' ma'am—I crave pardon. I must attend to the office now; there is some one there." And Mr. Gibbs withdrew, leaving the door half open.

Castalia shut it, and fastened it inside. Then she pulled out a bunch of keys from her pocket, and tried them, one after the other, on the lock of the secretaire. This time it was safely secured, and not one of her keys fitted it. Then she opened the drawer of the table, and examined its contents. They consisted of papers, some printed, some written, a pair of driving gloves, and the cover of a letter directed to Algernon Errington, Esq., in a woman's hand. Castalia pounced on the cover, and thrust it into her pocket. After that, she looked behind the almanac on the chimney-piece, and rummaged amongst a litter of newspapers, and torn scraps of writing that lay in a basket. She was thus engaged when Mr. Gibbs's hand was laid on the handle of the door, and Mr. Gibbs's voice was heard demanding admission.

Castalia opened the door at once, and Mr. Gibbs came in with a look of unconcealed annoyance on his face. He looked round the room sharply.

"What do you want?" asked Castalia.

"I want to see that all's right here, ma'am. I'm responsible."

"What should be wrong? What do you mean?" she demanded with so coldly-haughty an air, that Gibbs was abashed. He felt he had gone too far, and muttered an apology. "I wanted to see to the fire. I'm afraid the coal-box is nearly empty. That old woman is so careless. I beg your pardon, but Mr. Errington is very particular about the room being kept warm."

Castalia deigned not to notice him or his speech. She drew her shawl round her shoulders, and began to move away.

"Can I give any message for you to Mr. Errington, ma'am?"

"No——you need not mention that I came. I shall tell him myself this evening."

As she walked down the High Street, she reflected on Mr. Gibbs's unwonted rudeness of look and manner.

"He is told to watch me; to drive me away if possible; to prevent me making any discoveries. I daresay they are all in a league together. I am the poor dupe of a wife—the stranger who knows nothing, and is to know nothing. We shall see; we shall see. I wonder where Ancram can have gone! That boy spoke of seeing him near Maxfield's house."

At that moment she found herself close to it, and with a sudden impulse she entered the shop, and, walking up to a man who stood behind the counter, said, "Is Mr. Errington here?"

The man was James Maxfield, and he answered sulkily, "I don't know whether he's gone or not. You'd better inquire at the private door."

Castalia's heart gave a great throb. "He has been here, then?" she said.

"You'd better inquire at the private door," was all James's response, delivered still more surlily than before.

Castalia left the shop, and knocked at the door indicated to her by James's thumb jerked over his shoulder. "Is Mr. Errington gone?" she asked of the girl who opened the door.

"Yes, ma'am."

"Did he—did he stay long?"

"About half an hour, I think."

"Is Mr. Maxfield at home?"

"No, ma'am; master is at Duckwell, and has been since Saturday."

"Who is it, Sally?" cried Betty Grimshaw's voice from the parlour, and upon hearing it Castalia walked hastily away.

When she reached her own home again, between fatigue and excitement she could scarcely stand. She threw herself on the sofa in her little drawing-room, unable to mount the stairs.

"Deary me, missus," cried Polly, who happened to admit her, "why you're a'most dead! Where-ever have you been?"

"I've been walking in the fields. I came round by the road. I'm very tired."

"Tired? Nay, and well you may be if you took all that round! I thought you'd happen been into Whitford. Lawk, how you're squashing your bonnet! Let me take it off for you."

"I don't care; leave it alone."

But Polly would not endure to see "good clothes ruinated," as she said, so she removed her mistress's shawl and bonnet—folding, and smoothing, and straightening them as well as she could. "Now you'd better take a drop o' wine," she said. "You're a'most green. I never saw such a colour."

Despite her rustic bluntness, Polly was kind in her way. She made her mistress swallow some wine, and put her slippers on her feet for her, and brought a pillow to place beneath her head. "You see you han't got no strength to spare. You're very weak, missus," she said. Then she muttered as she walked away, "Lord, I wouldn't care to be a lady myself! I think they're mostly poor creeturs."

Left alone, Castalia closed her eyes and tried to review the situation, but at first her brain would do nothing but represent to her over and over again certain scenes and circumstances, with a great gap here and there, like a broken kaleidoscope.

Ancram had been to Maxfield's house, and it could not have been to see the old man, who had been absent for some days. Perhaps Ancram was in the habit of going thither! He had never said a word to her about it. How sly he had been! How sly Rhoda had been! All his pretended unwillingness to have Rhoda invited to Ivy Lodge had been a blind. There was nothing clear or definite in her mind except a bitter, burning, jealous hatred of Rhoda.

"We shall see if Ancram confesses to having been to that house to-day," said Castalia to herself. Then she went upstairs wearily. She was physically tired, being weak and utterly unused to much walking, and called Lydia to dress her and brush her hair. And when her toilet was completed, she sat quite still in the drawing-room, neither playing, reading, nor working—quite still, with her hands folded before her, and awaited her husband.

She would first try to lead him to confess his visit to the Maxfields, and, if that failed, would boldly tax him with it. She even went over the very words she would say to her husband when he should descend from his dressing-room before dinner.

But she could not foresee a circumstance which disturbed the plan she had arranged in her mind. When Algernon returned to Ivy Lodge he did not go into his dressing-room as usual, but marched straight into the drawing-room, where Castalia was sitting.

"That's an agreeable sort of letter!" he said, flinging one down on the table.

He was not in a passion—he had never been known to be in a passion—but he was evidently much vexed. His mouth was curved into a satirical smile; he drew his breath between his teeth with a hissing sound, and nodded his head twice or thrice, after repeating ironically, "That's an uncommonly agreeable sort of letter!" Then he thrust his hands deep into his pockets, threw himself into an easy-chair, stretched his legs straight out before him, and looked at his wife.

Castalia was surprised, and curious, and a little anxious, but she made an effort to carry out her programme despite this unexpected beginning. She remained motionless on the sofa, and said, with elaborate indifference of manner, "Do you wish me to read the letter? I wonder at your allowing me to know anything of your affairs."

"Read it? Of course! Why else did I give it to you? Don't be absurd, Castalia. Pshaw!" And he impatiently changed the position of his feet with a sharp, sudden movement.

Castalia's sympathy with his evident annoyance overcame her resentment for the moment. She could not bear to see him troubled. She opened the letter.

"Why it's from Uncle Val!" she exclaimed.

It was from her uncle, addressed to her husband, and was written in a tone of considerable severity. To Castalia it appeared barbarously cruel. Lord Seely curtly refused any money assistance; and stated that he wrote to Algernon instead of to Castalia, because he perceived that, although the application for money had been written by Castalia's hand, it had not been dictated by her head. Lord Seely further advised his niece's husband, in the strongest and plainest terms, to use every method of economy, to retrench his expenditure, to refrain from superfluous luxuries, and to live on his salary.

"The little allowance I give Castalia for her dress will be continued to her," wrote his lordship. "Beyond that, I am unable to give either her or you one farthing. Understand this, and act on it. And, moreover, I had better tell you at once, as an additional inducement to be prudent, that I see no prospect of procuring advancement for you in any other department of his Majesty's service than the one you are in at present. My advice to you is to endeavour to merit advancement by diligence in the performance of your duties. You have abilities which are sure to serve you if honestly applied. You are so young, that even after ten or fifteen years' work you would be in the prime of all your faculties and powers. And ten or fifteen years' good work might give you an excellent position. As to Castalia, I cannot help feeling a conviction that her discontent is chiefly reflected, and that if she saw you cheerful and active in your daily business, she would not repine at her lot."

Castalia put the letter down on the table in silence. She was astonished, indignant; but yet a little gleam of satisfaction pierced through those feelings—a hope that she and her husband might be drawn closer together by this common trouble. She would show him how well able she was to endure this, and worse, if he would only love her and trust her entirely. Even her jealousy for Rhoda Maxfield was mitigated for the moment. All that fair-weather prettiness and philandering would be put out of sight at the first growl of a storm. The wife would be the nearest to him if troubles came. No pink-and-white coquetry could usurp her right to suffer with him and for him, at all events.

"That's a pleasant sort of thing, isn't it?" said Algernon, who had been watching her face as she read.

"It is too bad of Uncle Val, Ancram."

"Too bad! Yes; to put it mildly, it is too bad, I think. Too bad? By George, I never heard of anything so outrageous!"

"Do you know, I think that my lady is at the bottom of it."

"I wish she was at the bottom of the Thames!"

"Ancram, I do feel sorry for you. It is such a shame to bury your talents, and all that. But still, you know, it is true what he says about your having plenty of time before you. And as to being poor—of course it is horrid to be poor, but we can bear it, I daresay. And, really, I don't think I should mind it so much if once we were acknowledged to be quite, quite poor; because then it wouldn't matter what one wore, and nobody would expect one to have things like other people of one's rank."

Poor Castalia was not eloquent, but had she possessed the most fluent and persuasive tongue in the world, it would not have availed to make Algernon acquiesce in her view of the situation. She was for indignantly breaking off all connection with relatives who could behave as Uncle Val had behaved. It was not his refusing to advance more money (in her conscience Castalia did not believe he could afford much assistance of that kind), but his writing with such cruel coldness to Ancram—his declaring that Ancram's case was not a hard one—his lecturing about duties, and cheerful activity, and so on, just as if Ancram had been an ordinary plodding young man instead of a being exceptionally gifted with all sorts of shining qualities—these were offences not to be forgiven. Castalia, for her part, would have endured any privation, rather than beg more favours of Uncle Val and my lady.

But Algernon's feeling in the matter was by no means the same as Castalia's. He dismissed all her attempts to express her willingness to share his lot for good or ill as matters of no importance. She might find it easy enough. Yes; the chief burthen would not fall on her! And, besides, she did not at all realise what it would be to have to live on the salary of the postmaster of Whitford, and to practise "rigid economy," as my lord phrased it. It was really provoking to see the cool way in which she took it for granted that matters would be mended by their being "acknowledged to be quite, quite poor." "My dear Castalia," he said, with an air of superior tolerance, "you have about as much comprehension of the actual state of the case as a canary-bird."

She paused, silently looking at him for a moment. Then she drew nearer to him, and laid her arm round his shoulder. She wore a dinner-dress with loose hanging sleeves, which were not becoming to her wasted frame. But the poor thin arm clung with a loving touch to her husband, as she said, "I know I am not so clever as you, Ancram, but I can see and understand that if we haven't money enough to pay for things we must do without them." (Castalia advanced this in the tone of one stating a self-evident proposition.) "And I shan't care, Ancram, if you trust me, and—and—don't put any one else before me. I never put any one before you. I was fond of Uncle Val. I think he was the only person I really loved in the world before I saw you. But if he treats you badly I shall give him up."

Algernon shook off the clinging arm from his shoulder, not roughly, but slightingly.

"What on earth are you talking about, Cassy? What do you suppose we are to do? I tell you I must have some money, and you must write to your uncle again without delay."

She drew back with a hurt sense of having been unappreciated. The tears sprang to her eyes, and she put her hand into her pocket to take her handkerchief. The hand fell on something that rustled, and was stiff. It was the letter cover she had found in her husband's office that morning. The touch of the crisp paper recalled not only the events of the afternoon, but her own sensations during them. "Where were you this afternoon?" she asked, suddenly checking her tears, as the dry, burning, jealous feeling awoke again in her heart.

"Where was I? Where must I be? Where am I every afternoon? At the office—confound it!"

"You were not there all the afternoon. I—happened to look in there, and you were gone."

"I suppose you came just at the moment I happened to be absent, then. I had to see one or two men on business. Not pleasant business. I was not amusing myself, I assure you," he added with a short hard laugh.

"What men had you to see?"

"Oh, no one whom you know anything about. Isn't dinner ready? I shan't dress. I have to go out again this evening."

"This evening!"

"Yes; it is a frightful bore, but I have a business appointment. Do ring and tell the cook to make haste."

"You are not going out again this evening, Ancram?"

"I tell you I must. How can you be so childish, Castalia? Whilst I am gone you can employ yourself in making out the draught of a letter to your uncle."

"I will not write to my uncle! I will not. You don't care for me. You—you deceive me," burst out Castalia. And then a storm of sobs choked her voice, and she hurried away, filling the little house with a torrent of incoherent sounds.

Algy looked after her, with his head bent down and his eyebrows raised. Castalia was really very trying to live with. As to her refusal to write to her uncle, she would not of course persist in it. It was out of the question that she should persist in opposing any wish of his. But she was really very trying.

When dinner was announced, Castalia sent word that she had a headache and could not eat. She was lying down in her own room. Her husband murmured a few words of sympathy, but ate his dinner with no sensible diminution of appetite, and, as soon as it was despatched, he lit a cigar, wrapped himself in his great-coat, and went out.

Castalia heard the street-door shut. She rose swiftly from the bed on which she had thrown herself, put on a bonnet and cloak, muffled her face in a veil, and followed her husband.