“I will do what you like, Talbot; I will do what you like.”
Mr. Mellish pressed his friend’s hand. Had he ever thought, when he had seen Talbot an accepted lover at Felden, and had hated him with a savage and wild Indian-like fury, that he would come to be thus humbly grateful to him; thus pitifully dependent upon his superior wisdom? He wrung the young politician’s hand, and promised to be as submissive as a child beneath his guidance.
In compliance, therefore, with Talbot’s commands, he ate a few morsels of fish, and drank a couple of glasses of sherry; and having thus gone through a show of dining, he went with Mr. Bulstrode to seek Aurora.
She was sitting with her cousin in the morning-room, looking terribly pale in the dim dusk of the August evening—pale and shadowy in her loose white muslin dress. She had only lately risen after a long feverish slumber, and had pretended to dine out of courtesy to her guest. Lucy had tried in vain to comfort her cousin. This passionate, impetuous, spoiled child of fortune and affection refused all consolation, crying out again and again that she had lost her husband’s love, and that there was nothing left for her upon earth.
But in the very midst of one of these despondent speeches, she sprang up from her seat, erect and trembling, with her parted lips quivering and her dark eyes dilated, startled by the sound of a familiar step, which within the last few days had been seldom heard in the corridor outside her room. She tried to speak, but her voice failed her; and in another moment the door had been dashed open by a strong hand, and her husband stood in the room, holding out his arms and calling to her.
“Aurora! Aurora! my own dear love, my own poor darling!”
She was folded to his breast before she knew that Talbot Bulstrode stood close behind him.
“My own darling,” John said, “my own dearest, you cannot tell how cruelly I have wronged you. But, oh, my love, the wrong has brought unendurable torture with it. My poor guiltless girl! how could I—how could I⸺But I was mad, and it was only when Talbot—”
Aurora lifted her head from her husband’s breast and looked wonderingly into his face, utterly unable to guess the meaning of these broken sentences.
Talbot laid his hand upon his friend’s shoulder. “You will frighten your wife if you go on in this manner, John,” he said quietly. “You mustn’t take any notice of his agitation, my dear Mrs. Mellish. There is no cause, believe me, for all this outcry. Will you sit down by Lucy and compose yourself? It is eight o’clock, and between this and nine we have some serious business to settle.”
“Serious business!” repeated Aurora vaguely. She was intoxicated by her sudden happiness. She had no wish to ask any explanation of the mystery of the past few days. It was all over, and her faithful husband loved her as devotedly and tenderly as ever. How could she wish to know more than this?
She seated herself at Lucy’s side, in obedience to Talbot; but she still held her husband’s hand, she still looked in his face, for the moment most supremely unconscious that the scheme of creation included anything beyond this stalwart Yorkshireman.
Talbot Bulstrode lighted the lamp upon Aurora’s writing-table—a shaded lamp, which only dimly illuminated the twilight room—and then, taking his seat near it, said gravely—
“My dear Mrs. Mellish, I shall be compelled to say something which I fear may inflict a terrible shock upon you. But this is no time for reservation; scarcely a time for ordinary delicacy. Will you trust in the love and friendship of those who are around you, and promise to bear this new trial bravely? I believe and hope that it will be a very brief one.”
Aurora looked wonderingly at her husband, not at Talbot.
“A new trial?” she said inquiringly.
“You know that the murderer of James Conyers has not yet been discovered?” said Mr. Bulstrode.
“Yes, yes; but what of that?”
“My dear Mrs. Mellish, my dear Aurora! the world is apt to take a morbid delight in horrible ideas. There are some people who think that you are guilty of this crime!”
“I!”
She rose suddenly from her low seat, and turned her face towards the lamplight, with a look of such blank amazement, such utter wonder and bewilderment, that had Talbot Bulstrode until that moment believed her guilty, he must thenceforth and forever have been firmly convinced of her innocence.
“I!” she repeated.
Then turning to her husband, with a sudden alteration in her face, that blank amazement changing to a look of sorrow, mingled with reproachful wonder, she said in a low voice—
“You thought this of me, John; you thought this!”
John Mellish bowed his head before her.
“I did, my dear,” he murmured—“God forgive me for my wicked folly—I did think this, Aurora. But I pitied you, and was sorry for you, my own dear love; and when I thought it most, I would have died to save you from shame or sorrow. My love has never changed, Aurora; my love has never changed.”
She gave him her hand, and once more resumed her seat. She sat for some moments in silence, as if trying to collect her thoughts, and to understand the meaning of this strange scene.
“Who suspects me of this crime?” she said presently. “Has anyone else suspected me? Anyone besides—my husband?”
“I can scarcely tell you, my dear Mrs. Mellish,” answered Talbot; “when an event of this kind takes place, it is very difficult to say who may or may not be suspected. Different persons set up different theories: one man writes to a newspaper to declare that, in his opinion, the crime was
