Chapter XIV: No Mercy

It was with a throbbing brain and a heavy heart that Mabin, dismissed by Mrs. Dale with a warm pressure of the hand and a little pathetic smile, went through the hall and out of the house.

What was the meaning of old Lady Mallyan’s coming? Why had Mrs. Dale sent for her? Surely, the girl felt, there could be but one answer to this question; and in that answer lay the key to the mystery about “Mr. Banks.”

Mabin remembered the likeness she had seen in his face, in one of his sterner moments, to the visitor whom she now knew as Lady Mallyan. And she could have little doubt, on putting together the facts of the story she had just heard and the details she knew concerning her father’s tenant, that it was indeed Sir Geoffrey Mallyan’s brother Willie, one of the causes, if not the sole cause, of the tragedy which had wrecked Mrs. Dale’s life, who had settled down, unknown to the lady herself, as her nearest neighbor.

A hot blush came into Mabin’s face, alone though she was, as this conclusion forced itself upon her. For even she, young and innocent as she was, could not help seeing that his behavior, since he had lived at Stone House, was inconsistent with Mrs. Dale’s account of the blameless relations which had existed between them.

Mrs. Dale had represented this “Willie” as a light-hearted young fellow, who had felt only the comradeship of a younger brother toward his brother’s beautiful wife. But “Mr. Banks” had behaved, not only like a lover, but like a lover, once favored, whom despair had driven to the verge of madness.

On the other hand, Mabin, in her loyalty toward her friend, was ready to believe that, even if the feelings these two unhappy creatures had had for each other had been less innocent than Mrs. Dale had represented, they had been themselves less to blame than either of the two other persons concerned in the terrible history.

Mrs. Dale, naturally enough constrained by her own remorse to speak well of her dead husband, had yet been able to give no very attractive picture of the man who had misunderstood his young wife, frightened away her confidence, and allowed himself to be alienated from her by the interference of his mother. And of that mother herself Mabin had seen enough to be more than ready to give her her fair share of the blame.

The young girl’s heart went out, more than it had ever done before, to the little woman, whom nature had made so frivolous, and circumstances so miserable, and around whom misfortune seemed to be closing once more.

It was the one gleam of comfort she had to know how sincerely Mrs. Dale was trying to do what was right in the matter. Instead of attempting to see “Mr. Banks,” which would have been easy enough for her to do, she had sent for his mother, repugnant though such a course must always be to her; so that, whatever indiscretion she might have shown in the past, it was clear that she meant to keep herself free from all suspicion now.

And this was the more creditable on her part, so Mabin felt, since the strange elation she had shown by fits and starts since the day before, when she heard the voice of “Mr. Banks” for the first time, proved clearly that she was not so indifferent, not so unimpressionable, as she had professed to be.

And here Mabin felt her heart grow very tender; she pictured to herself what she would feel, if circumstances were to put Rudolph and herself in the same position toward each other, as were “Mr. Banks” and “Mrs. Dale.”

If she were to have to live within a stone’s throw of him, not only always loving, always longing, but conscious that the same feelings which drew her heart toward him were forever drawing him toward her.

Mabin began to cry softly. And then the application of the story to her own case caused her thoughts to take another turn; and she asked herself, with the generous Quixotism of her youth and her loyal nature, whether she ought not to wish for, to encourage, the process by which Rudolph’s love was being diverted from herself, the uninteresting, awkward girl without any history, to the unhappy lady around whom there clung the romance of a tragedy.

These questions, which had indeed risen in her mind before, but which had now acquired a new force with her extended knowledge, were entirely consistent with the bent of Mabin’s mind. Accustomed from her childhood to consider others rather than herself, and inclined by her own modesty to underrate her deserts as well as her attractions, she found it easy, not indeed to stifle her own feelings, but to control them. She told herself that she would show Rudolph no more petulance, no more “childish” jealousy or curiosity; and if, as seemed inevitable, he found that he had made a mistake in thinking he cared for herself, she would be the first to wish him happiness with a more attractive bride.

Perhaps it showed rather a touching sense of her own devotion to her lover, that Mabin never once doubted his power to console Mrs. Dale for all her troubles, nor that lady’s readiness to be comforted by him.

And it was while these thoughts were fresh in her mind that Mabin, turning the angle in the path toward the kitchen-garden, came face to face with Rudolph.

Meeting him at such a moment, it was not surprising that she stopped short, turned first red, then white, and presented to his view a countenance so deeply impressed with a sort of shy alarm, that the young man was rather puzzled as to the kind of greeting he might expect.

Recovering herself quickly, Mabin wisely put off explanations by dashing straight into an exciting subject:

“Oh, do you know,” she asked in a hurried, constrained voice, “that I have had to leave poor Mrs. Dale to that dragon? Oh yes, I know who she is now; I know who they both are. Mrs. Dale herself has told me that, told me everything;” added Mabin, in answer to an interrogative and puzzled look which she detected on his face.

Rudolph looked dubious.

“Everything?” he repeated doubtfully.

“And,” went on Mabin with calm triumph, “old Lady Mallyan has told me something too. And as I had a long talk with Mr. Banks yesterday, I think perhaps the tables are turned, and I know more than you do now.”

Mabin seated herself, as she spoke, on the garden seat which was placed, most charmingly as far as picturesque effect was concerned, but most inconveniently, if one considered earwigs and green flies, under a tall lime-tree and against a dark hedge of yew. Rudolph was intensely relieved to find that her jealous and angry mood of the evening before had passed away; and although he was puzzled by her new manner, which was easy, friendly, but not affectionate, he thought it better to fall in with her mood and not to risk the pleasure of the moment, by asking for explanations just yet. Mabin, on her side, felt a curiously pleasant sense of present enjoyment and irresponsibility. It was happiness to be with Rudolph, without any dispute to trouble their intercourse. And she found that by turning his attention and her own away from themselves to the subject of Mrs. Dale and her troubles, she got not only the full delight of Rudolph’s attention, but the satisfaction that she was stifling, if not conquering, her own weakness.

Rudolph was charmed by the new and undefinable change to greater frankness, to less shyness, in her manner.

“Well,” said he, pulling down the bough of a guelder rose-tree and beginning with great precision to strip off the leaves, “I couldn’t help myself, could I? I couldn’t tell you somebody else’s secrets without permission. And you see you haven’t had to wait very long to know all about it.”

“Oh, I’m not thinking about that,” said Mabin superbly. “It was annoying at the time not to know what you were all talking about; but I soon got over that. What I am thinking about now is the best thing to be done for Mrs. Dale. You know who this Mr. Banks is, I suppose?”

Her assumption of a lofty standpoint of deep knowledge combined with great indifference amused Rudolph.

“Do you?” retorted he.

“I suppose,” she answered almost in a whisper, and looking down on the ground as she spoke, “that he is Lady Mallyan’s son Willie.”

Rudolph looked astonished.

“You do know something then!” said he at last. “Yes, I suppose he is.”

“And Mrs. Dale knows it?--knew it yesterday, I suppose?--when she heard his voice?”

“Yes, I think so, I suppose so. But I must tell you that she was so much upset that I didn’t attempt to ask her any questions about it. I only tried to quiet her, and offer, when she said she must see Lady Mallyan, to send off the telegram.”

Mabin, too much excited to sit still, sprang to her feet on the gravel path beside him.

“Isn’t it hard? Oh, isn’t it hard for her? She does exactly what is right, what is best. She ought not to be persecuted by either of them, by mother or son!”

But instead of answering her fervent outbreak in the same tone, or at least with sympathy, she saw, to her indignation, that Rudolph had difficulty in suppressing a smile.

“The persecution won’t last long,” said he. Then noting the revulsion of feeling expressed in Mabin’s face, he added quickly: “When Lady Mallyan and Mr. Banks meet, they will have to come to an understanding; and I can answer for it that after that Mrs. Dale will be left in peace.”

“That’s what Mr. Banks himself seems to think,” said Mabin ingenuously. “But Lady Mallyan was shocked when she heard he lived so near, and she doesn’t want to meet him.”

Rudolph was in an instant on fire with excitement.

“Oh, doesn’t she, though? Then I’ll take jolly good care that she shall!” He took three or four rapid steps away from her and came back again. His face was glowing with excitement. “Look here, Mabin, I want you to mount guard over the house, and see that the old lady doesn’t get away before I get back with Mr. Banks. Mind, it is very important. You must do anything rather than let her go. It’s just possible she may get an idea of something of the kind, and may try to get away.”

“All right,” said Mabin very quietly, but none the less showing in the firm set of her lips and the steadiness of her eyes that she would prove a firm ally. “But don’t be long gone; for I am afraid of what may be going on between that hard woman and poor little Mrs. Dale!”

“I’ll be as quick as I can. You may trust me.”

And then, taking her entirely by surprise, he flung his arms round her, pressed upon her startled lips a long kiss, and ran off before she had breath to utter a word.

She had just sense enough left to remember her promise, to stagger round to the front of the house, and to take her place as sentinel under the dining-room wall. There was no window on this side, the space where one had originally been having been blocked up and filled with a painted imitation of one. It was impossible therefore for Mabin to tell, in this position, whether the interview between the two ladies was over or not.

So she went into the hall, where it was now so dark that she felt her way, stumbling, in the direction of the dining-room door. She was close to it before she was assured, so low was the voice speaking within the room, that the ladies were still there. But the piteous, subdued tones of Mrs. Dale, which met her ear as she came near, told her that the little lady in black was still pleading to her tyrant.

Withdrawing quickly, her heart throbbing in sympathy with the unfortunate woman, Mabin returned to the garden, and waited near the garden gate.

She now had leisure to dwell on that intoxicating kiss, which had for the moment thrown her back into the world of happiness into which Rudolph’s avowal of love had introduced her, and from which more recent events had seemed to combine to thrust her out. Could it be that he was still the same as ever, in spite of her jealous fears, of her Quixotic imaginings? Mabin’s brain seemed to be set on fire at the thought. She began to look out at the treeless fields which lay between “The Towers” and the sea, with eyes which saw nothing. Though mechanically from time to time she turned to glance at the front door of the house, she had forgotten for whom she was watching.

Suddenly she was startled by the sound of light footsteps on the gravel behind her, and looking round, she saw the parlormaid running toward the gate.

“The cab, miss, have you seen the cab? The lady wants to go now, and of course the stupid man is out of sight.”

“It is at the corner of the road,” answered Mabin, waking up to the realities of life with a start. “But don’t go for it yet. Mr. Bonnington wants to speak to Lady Mallyan first.”

The girl was evidently startled and impressed by the discovery that Mabin knew the visitor’s name. She hesitated.

“But she wants to catch a train, miss!” she protested at last.

As Mabin was about to answer, a figure in the road outside caught her eye. The maid saw it too.

“Who--who was that?” Mabin asked quickly.

The maid, who looked rather scared, hesitated, stammered.

“Was it--Mrs. Dale?” pursued Mabin almost in a whisper.

And as she spoke, her heart sickened with a vague fear. Quickly as the form had passed by, and disappeared from sight in the deep shadows of the trees at the bend of the road below, there had been something about its rapid and noiseless flight, in the very bend of the head and flutter of the dress, which alarmed the young girl.

Besides if it was Mrs. Dale, what was she doing, at this late hour of the evening, on the road which led down to the cliff, to the sea? She must have gone out by the door at the back of the house, too;--surely a strange thing to do!

But even as these thoughts crowded into her mind, there came another and less disquieting one. The road she had taken passed the front of “Stone House;” perhaps she had gone to seek herself an interview with “Mr. Banks.”

Even as she made this suggestion to herself, and while the voice of the maid still murmured that she must go and fetch the cab, Mabin heard men’s voices in the road below.

Recognizing that of Rudolph, she stepped outside the gates, and waited with anxiety for his appearance.

But he came slowly; perhaps, thought Mabin, he was talking to Mrs. Dale. She listened more intently; but as the voices came gradually nearer, she was able to assure herself that they were only those of Rudolph and of “Mr. Banks.” Scarcely able to control her anxiety, she stepped out through the gates into the road, at the very moment that Lady Mallyan’s harsh voice sounded behind her, speaking to the parlormaid:

“Where is my cab?”

Rudolph heard these words, and he hurried forward with his companion. It was now almost dark. Mabin saw who the man was beside him, but she could not distinguish his face.

“I beg your pardon, madam,” said Rudolph, raising his hat and walking quickly after the old lady, who had passed through the gate and was hurrying down the road: “Your son wishes to speak to you. He cannot walk so fast as you, but he has sent me with this message.”

She stopped short, appeared to hesitate, and then turned back without a word.

It was close to where Mabin stood, stupidly, not knowing exactly what was going to happen, or what she ought to do on behalf of Mrs. Dale, that mother and son met.

Dark as it was out there, with only a line of pale yellow light left in the horizon, shading off through sea-green into the blue above, Mabin saw enough to know that the meeting was one of deep import. Old Lady Mallyan seemed uneasy; the harshness which Mabin had hitherto believed to be her most salient quality had almost disappeared from her tones as she addressed her son:

“I am sorry,” she said, quite gently, as she put out her arms toward him, “to find you here. It can do no good. It might have done great harm. Why did you not let me know where you were? Why did you deceive me?”

But “Mr. Banks” did not accept the offered caress of the outstretched arms.

“I will tell you why, mother, presently. But now, where is Dorothy? I want to see her. I must see her. Surely,” he went on as she did not at first answer, “surely she will see me now you are here. Surely she will not refuse!”

There was again a silence of a few seconds, during which Mabin, who had only withdrawn a little way, and who was striving to attract the attention of Rudolph, who stood with his back to her, uttered a little cry of pain and distress.

Mr. Banks went on impatiently:

“Where is she? Is she in the house? I must go to her; I must see her!”

Then Lady Mallyan spoke, in a voice which was greatly changed. She seemed to be trying to control some real alarm.

“You cannot,” she said quickly. “She will not see you. She refuses--absolutely. As a gentleman you cannot persist. She is as hard and cold-hearted as ever. She will not see you again. She has gone away.”

At these words, which Mabin heard, the young girl uttered a sharp cry. But “Mr. Banks” did not heed her. He spoke again, in such piteous tones that Mabin and Rudolph, young and susceptible both, felt their hearts wrung.

“Mother, I must see her, I must. Once, once only, I won’t ask for more. Go after her; go after her. Tell her I love her, I love her always. She will not refuse to see me once--before--before I die!”

Mabin waited no longer. Rushing between the mother and son, she panted out:

“I will go. I will fetch her! I will bring her back. And she will come! Oh, she will come! She is not hard. Trust me, trust me, she will come--she _shall_ come.”

She gave him no time for more than a hoarse whisper of thanks, and a murmured blessing. She was off, down the hill, as if on the wings of the wind.

And as she drew into the black shadow of the trees on the hill, she heard footsteps and a voice behind her:

“Mabin! Mabin! Don’t be frightened. Where has she gone, dear? Where has she gone?”

Panting, breathless, not halting a moment as she ran, Mabin whispered, in a low voice which thrilled him:

“Down the hill--this way. Oh, Rudolph! You don’t think she’s gone to the sea, do you?”

“Don’t let us think about it, dear. If anything has happened to her, it is the fault of that old woman’s bitter tongue.”

“Oh, don’t let us talk. Let us hurry on. We may be in time yet.”

“We may.”

There was little hope in his tone. At the bottom of the road he, slightly in front, hesitated.

“To the left--to the high part of the cliff, by the sea-mark,” directed Mabin briefly. “Don’t wait for me. I am getting lame again. Run on alone.”

So Rudolph ran. And, behind the fir-plantation a little further on, he disappeared from her sight.

Mabin, her lame foot paining her a little, limped on after him with a sinking heart.