The Trial; Or, More Links of the Daisy Chain

'I think if you did talk it over with papa, you would feel the comfort, and know him better.'

'Well, well, I dare say, but I can't do it, Ethel. Either he shuts me up at first, with some joke, or—' and Tom stopped; but Ethel knew what he meant. There was on her father's side an involuntary absence of perfect trust in this son, and on Tom's there was a character so sensitive that her father's playfulness grated, and so reserved that his demonstrative feelings were a still greater trial to one who could not endure outward emotion. 'Besides,' added Tom, 'there is really nothing—nothing to tell. I'm not going to commit myself. I don't know whether I ever shall. I was mad that day, and I want to satisfy my mind whether I think the same now I am sane, and if I do, I shall have enough to do to make her forget the winter when I made myself such an ass. When I have done that, it may be time to speak to my father. I really am going out about the book. When did you hear last?'

'That is what makes me anxious. I have not heard for two months, and that is longer than she ever was before without writing, except when Minna was ill.'

'We shall know if Leonard has heard.'

'No, she always writes under cover to us.'

The course that the conversation then took did not look much like Tom's doubt whether his own views would be the same. All the long-repressed discussion of Averil's merits, her beautiful eyes, her sweet voice, her refinement, her real worth, the wonder that she and Leonard should be so superior to the rest of the family, were freely indulged at last, and Ethel could give far heartier sympathy than if this had come to her three years ago. Averil had been for two years her correspondent, and the patient sweetness and cheerfulness of those letters had given a far higher estimate of her nature than the passing intercourse of the town life had left. The terrible discipline of these years of exile and sorrow had, Ethel could well believe, worked out something very different from the well-intentioned wilful girl whose spirit of partisanship had been so fatal an element of discord. Distance had, in truth, made them acquainted, and won their love to one another.

Tom's last words, as he drew up under the lime-trees before the door, were, 'Mind, I am only going about the 'Diseases of Climate'.'

CHAPTER XXVI

     And Bishop Gawain as he rose,Said, 'Wilton, grieve not for thy woes,         Disgrace and trouble;For He who honour best bestows,         Can give thee double.'—Marmion

Dr. May had written to Portland, entreating that no communication might be made to Leonard Ward before his arrival; and the good physician's affection for the prisoner had been so much observed, that no one would have felt it fair to anticipate him. Indeed, he presented himself at the prison gates only two hours after the arrival of the documents, when no one but the governor was aware of their contents.

Leonard was as usual at his business in the schoolmaster's department; and thither a summons was sent for him, while Dr. May and the governor alone awaited his arrival. Tom's visit was still very recent; and Leonard entered with anxious eyes, brow drawn together, and compressed lips, as though braced to meet another blow; and the unusual room, the presence of the governor instead of the warder, and Dr. May's irrepressible emotion, so confirmed the impression, that his face at once assumed a resolute look of painful expectation.

'My boy,' said Dr. May, clasping both his hands in his own, 'you have borne much of ill. Can you bear to hear good news?'

'Am I to be sent out to Australia already?' said Leonard—for a shortening of the eight years before his ticket-of-leave was the sole hope that had presented itself.

'Sent out, yes; out to go wherever you please, Leonard. The right is come round. The truth is out. You are a free man! Do you know what that is? It is a pardon. Your pardon. All that can be done to right you, my boy—but it is as good as a reversal of the sentence.'

The Doctor had spoken this with pauses; going on, as Leonard, instead of answering, stood like one in a dream, and at last said with difficulty, 'Who did it then?'

'It was as you always believed.'

'Has he told?' said Leonard, drawing his brows together with the effort to understand.

'No, Leonard. The vengeance he had brought on himself did not give space for repentance; but the pocket-book, with your receipt, was upon him, and your innocence is established.'

'And let me congratulate you,' added the governor, shaking hands with him; 'and add, that all I have known of you has been as complete an exculpation as any discovery can be.'

Leonard's hand was passive, his cheek had become white, his forehead still knit. 'Axworthy!' he said, still as in a trance.

'Yes. Hurt in a brawl at Paris. He was brought to the Hotel Dieu; and my son Tom was called to see him.'

'Sam Axworthy! repeated Leonard, putting his hand over his eyes, as if one sensation overpowered everything else; and thus he stood for some seconds, to the perplexity of both.

They showed him the papers: he gazed, but without comprehension; and then putting the bag, provided by Tom, into his hand, they sent him, moving in a sort of mechanical obedience, into the room of one of the officials to change his dress.

Dr. May poured out to the governor and chaplain, who by this time had joined them, the history of Leonard's generous behaviour at the time of the trial, and listened in return to their account of the growing impression he had created—a belief, almost reluctant, that instead of being their prime specimen, he could only be in their hands by mistake. He was too sincere not to have confessed had he been really guilty; and in the long run, such behaviour as his would have been impossible in one unrepentant. He had been the more believed from the absence of complaint, demonstration, or assertion; and the constant endeavour to avoid notice, coupled with the quiet thorough execution of whatever was set before him with all his might.

This was a theme to occupy the Doctor for a long time; but at last he grew eager for Leonard's return, and went to hasten him. He started up, still in the convict garb, the bag untouched.

'I beg your pardon,' he said, when his friend's exclamation had reminded him of what had been desired of him; and in a few minutes he reappeared in the ordinary dress of a gentleman, but the change did not seem to have made him realize his freedom—there was the same submissive manner, the same conventional gesture of respect in reply to the chaplain's warm congratulation.

'Come, Leonard, I am always missing the boat, but I don't want to do so now. We must get home to-night. Have you anything to take with you?'

'My Bible and Prayer-Book. They are my own, sir;' as he turned to the governor. 'May I go to my cell for them?'

Again they tarried long for him, and became afraid that he had fallen into another reverie; but going to fetch him, found that the delay was caused by the farewells of all who had come in his way. The tidings of his full justification had spread, and each official was eager to wish him good speed, and thank him for the aid of his example and support. The schoolmaster, who had of late treated him as a friend, kept close to him, rejoicing in his liberation, but expecting to miss him sorely; and such of the convicts as were within reach, were not without their share in the general exultation. He had never galled them by his superiority; and though Brown, the clerk, had been his only friend, he had done many an act of kindness; and when writing letters for the unlearned, had spoken many a wholesome simple word that had gone home to the heart. His hand was as ready for a parting grasp from a fellow-prisoner as from a warder; and his thought and voice were recalled to leave messages for men out of reach; his eyes moistened at the kindly felicitations; but when he was past the oft-trodden precincts of the inner court and long galleries, the passiveness returned, and he received the last good-byes of the governor and superior officers, as if only half alive to their import. And thus, silent, calm, and grave, his composure like that of a man walking in his sleep, did Leonard Ward pass the arched gateway, enter on the outer world, and end his three and a half years of penal servitude.

'I'm less like an angel than he is like St. Peter,' thought Dr. May, as he watched the fixed dreamy gaze, 'but this is like "yet wist he not that it was true, but thought he saw a vision." When will he realize liberty, and enjoy it? I shall do him a greater kindness by leaving him to himself.'

And in spite of his impatience, Dr. May refrained from disturbing that open-eyed trance all the way down the long hill, trusting to the crowd in the steamer for rousing him to perceive that he was no longer among russet coats and blue shirts; but he stood motionless, gazing, or at least his face turned, towards the Dorset coast, uttering no word, making no movement, save when summoned by his guide—then obeying as implicitly as though it were his jailor.

So they came to the pier; and so they walked the length of Weymouth, paced the platform, and took their places in the train. Just as they had shot beyond the town, and come into the little wooded valleys beyond, Leonard turned round, and with the first sparkle in his eye, exclaimed, 'Trees! Oh, noble trees and hedges!' then turned again to look in enchantment at the passing groups—far from noble, though bright with autumn tints—that alternated with the chalk downs.

Dr. May was pleased at this revival, and entertained at the start and glance of inquiring alarm from an old gentleman in the other corner. Presently, in the darkness of a cutting, again Leonard spoke: 'Where are you taking me, Dr. May?'

'Home, of course.'

Whatever the word might imply to the poor lad, he was satisfied, and again became absorbed in the sight of fields, trees, and hedgerows; while Dr. May watched the tokens of secret dismay in their fellow-traveller, who had no doubt understood 'home' to mean his private asylum. Indeed, though the steady full dark eyes showed no aberration, there was a strange deep cave between the lid and the eyebrow, which gave a haggard look; the spare, worn, grave features had an expression—not indeed weak, nor wandering, but half bewildered, half absorbed, moreover, in spite of Tom's minute selection of apparel, it had been too hasty a toilette for the garments to look perfectly natural; and the cropped head was so suspicious, that it was no wonder that at the first station, the old gentleman gathered up his umbrella, with intense courtesy squeezed gingerly to the door, carefully avoiding any stumble over perilous toes, and made his escape—entering another carriage, whence he no doubt signed cautions against the lunatic and his keeper, since no one again invaded their privacy.

Perhaps this incident most fully revealed to the Doctor, how unlike other people his charge was, how much changed from the handsome spirited lad on whom the trouble had fallen; and he looked again and again at the profile turned to the window, as fixed and set as though it had been carved.

'Ah, patience is an exhausting virtue!' said he to himself. 'Verily it is bearing—bearing up under the full weight; and the long bent spring is the slower in rebounding in proportion to its inherent strength. Poor lad, what protracted endurance it has been! There is health and force in his face; no line of sin, nor sickness, nor worldly care, such as it makes one's heart ache to see aging young faces; yet how utterly unlike the face of one and-twenty! I had rather see it sadder than so strangely settled and sedate! Shall I speak to him again? Not yet: those green hill-sides, those fields and cattle, must refresh him better than my clavers, after his grim stony mount of purgatory. I wish it were a brighter day to greet him, instead of this gray damp fog.'

The said fog prevented any semblance of sunset; but through the gray moonlit haze, Leonard kept his face to the window, pertinaciously clearing openings in the bedewed glass, as though the varying outline of the horizon had a fascination for him. At last, after ten minutes of glaring gas at a junction had by contrast rendered the mist impenetrable, and reduced the view to brightened clouds of steam, and to white telegraphic posts, erecting themselves every moment, with their wires changing their perspective in incessant monotony, he ceased his gaze, and sat upright in his place, with the same strange rigid somnambulist air.

Dr. May resolved to rouse him.

'Well, Leonard,' he said, 'this has been a very long fever; but we are well through it at last—with the young doctor from Paris to our aid.'

Probably Leonard only heard the voice, not the words, for he passed his hand over his face, and looked up to the Doctor, saying dreamily, 'Let me see! Is it all true?' and then, with a grave wistful look, 'It was not I who did that thing, then?'

'My dear!' exclaimed the Doctor, starting forward, and catching hold of his hand, 'have they brought you to this?'

'I always meant to ask you, if I ever saw you alone again,' said Leonard.

'But you don't mean that you have imagined it!'

'Not constantly—not when any one was with me,' said Leonard, roused by Dr. May's evident dismay; and drawn on by his face of anxious inquiry. 'At Milbank, I generally thought I remembered it just as they described it in court, and that it was some miserable ruinous delusion that hindered my confessing; but the odd thing was, that the moment any one opened my door, I forgot all about it, resolutions and all, and was myself again.'

'Then surely—surely you left that horror with the solitude?'

'Yes, till lately; but when it did come back, I could not be sure what was recollection of fact, and what of my own fancy;' and he drew his brows together in painful effort. 'Did I know who did it, or did I only guess?'

'You came to a right conclusion, and would not let me act on it.'

'And I really did write the receipt, and not dream it?'

'That receipt has been in my hand. It was what has brought you here.' And now to hearing ears, Dr. May went over the narrative; and Leonard stood up under the little lamp in the roof of the carriage to read the papers.

'I recollect—I understand,' he said, presently, and sat down, grave and meditative—no longer dreamy, but going over events, which had at last acquired assurance to his memory from external circumstances. Presently his fingers were clasped together over his face, his head bent, and then he looked up, and said, 'Do they know it—my sister and brother?'

'No. We would not write till you were free. You must date the first letter from Stoneborough.'

The thought had brought a bitter pang. 'One half year sooner—' and he leant back in his seat, with fingers tightly pressed together, and trembling with emotion.

'Nay, Leonard; may not the dear child be the first to rejoice in the fulfilment of her own sweet note of comfort? They could not harm the innocent.'

'Not innocent,' he said, 'not innocent of causing all the discord that has ended in their exile, and the dear child's death.'

'Then this is what has preyed on you, and changed you so much more of late,' said Dr. May.

'When I knew that I was indeed guilty of her death,' said Leonard, in a calm full conviction of too long standing to be accompanied with agitation, though permanently bowing him down.

'And you never spoke of this: not to the chaplain?'

'I never could. It would have implied all the rest that he could not believe. And it would not have changed the fact.'

'The aspect of it may change, Leonard. You know yourself how many immediate causes combined, of which you cannot accuse yourself—your brother's wrongheadedness, and all the rest. And,' added the Doctor, recovering himself, 'you do see it in other aspects, I know. Think of the spirit set free to be near you—free from the world that has gone so hard with you!'

'I can't keep that thought long; I'm not worthy of it.'

Again he was silent; but presently said, as with a sudden thought, 'You would have told me if there were any news of Ave.'

'No, there has been no letter since her last inclosure for you,' and then Dr. May gave the details from the papers on the doings of Henry's division of the army.

'Will Henry let me be with them?' said Leonard, musingly.

'They will come home, depend upon it. You must wait till you hear.'

Leonard thought a little while, then said, 'Where did you say I was to go, Dr. May?'

'Where, indeed? Home, Leonard—home. Ethel is waiting for us. To the High Street.'

Leonard looked up again with his bewildered face, then said, 'I know what you do with me will be right, but—'

'Had you rather not?' said the Doctor, startled.

'Rather!' and the Doctor, to his exceeding joy, saw the fingers over his eyes moist with the tears they tried to hide; 'I only meant—' he added, with an effort, 'you must think and judge—I can't think—whether I ought.'

'If you ask me that,' said Dr. May, earnestly, 'all I have to say is, that I don't know what palace is worthy of you.'

There was not much said after that; and the Doctor fell asleep, waking only at the halts at stations to ask where he was.

At last came 'Blewer!' and as the light shone on the clock, Leonard said, 'A quarter past twelve! It is the very train I went by! Is it a dream?'

Ten minutes more, and 'Stoneborough' was the cry. Hastily springing out, shuffling the tickets into the porter's hand, and grappling Leonard's arm as if he feared an escape, Dr. May hurried him into the empty streets, and strode on in silence.

The pull at the door-bell was answered instantly by Ethel herself. She held out her hand, and grasped that which Leonard had almost withheld, shrinking as from too sudden a vision; and then she ardently exchanged kisses with her father.

'Where's Tom? Gone to bed?' said Dr. May, stepping into the bright drawing-room.

'No,' said Ethel, demurely; 'he is gone—he is gone to America.'

The Doctor gave a prodigious start, and looked at her again.

'He went this afternoon.' she said. 'There is some matter about the 'Diseases of Climate' that he must settle before the book is published; and he thought he could best be spared now. He has left messages that I will give you by and by; but you must both be famished.'

Her looks indicated that all was right, and both turned to welcome the guest, who stood where the first impulse had left him, in the hall, not moving forward, till he was invited in to the fire, and the meal already spread. He then obeyed, and took the place pointed out; while the Doctor nervously expatiated on the cold, damp, and changes of train; and Ethel, in the active bashfulness of hidden agitation, made tea, cut bread, carved chicken, and waited on them with double assiduity, as Leonard, though eating as a man who had fasted since early morning, was passive as a little child, merely accepting what was offered to him, and not even passing his cup till she held out her hand for it.

She did not even dare to look at him; she could not bear that he should see her do so; it was enough to know that he was free—that he was there—that it was over. She did not want to see how it had changed him; and, half to set him at ease, half to work off her own excitement, she talked to her father, and told him of the little events of his absence till the meal was over; and, at half-past one, good nights were exchanged with Leonard, and the Doctor saw him to his room, then returned to his daughter on her own threshold.

'That's a thing to have lived for,' he said.

Ethel locked her hands together, and looked up.

'And now, how about this other denouement? I might have guessed that the wind sat in that quarter.'

'But you're not to guess it, papa. It is really and truly about the 'Diseases of Climate'.'

'Swamp fevers, eh! and agues!'

The 'if you can help it,' was a great comfort now; Ethel could venture on saying, 'Of course that has something to do with it; but he really does make the book his object; and please—please don't give any hint that you suspect anything else.'

'I suppose you are in his confidence; and I must ask no questions.'

'I hated not telling you, and letting you tease him; but he trusted me just enough not to make me dare to say a word; though I never was sure there was a word to say. Now do just once own, papa, that Tom is the romantic one after all, to have done as he did in the height of the trouble.'

'Well in his place so should I,' said the Doctor, with the perverseness of not satisfying expectations of amazement.

'You would,' said Ethel; 'but Tom! would you have thought it of Tom?'

'Tom has more in him than shows through his spectacles,' answered Dr. May. 'So! That's the key to his restless fit. Poor fellow! How did it go with him? They have not been carrying it on all this time, surely!'

'Oh, no, no, papa! She cut him to the heart, poor boy! thought he was laughing at her—told him it had all been irony. He has no notion whether she will ever forgive him.'

'A very good lesson, Master Doctor Thomas,' said Dr. May, with a twinkle in his eye; 'and turn out as it will, it has done him good—tided him over a dangerous time of life. Well, you must tell me all about it to-morrow; I'm too sleepy to know what I'm talking of.'

The sleepiness that always finished off the Doctor's senses at the right moment, was a great preservative of his freshness and vigour; but Ethel was far from sharing it, and was very glad when the clock sounded a legitimate hour for getting up, and dressing by candle-light, briefly answering Gertrude's eager questions on the arrival. It was a pouring wet morning, and she forbade Daisy to go to church—indeed, it would have been too bad for herself on any morning but this—any but this, as she repeated, smiling at her own spring of thankfulness, as she fortified herself with a weight of waterproof, and came forth in the darkness of 7.45, on a grim November day.

A few steps before her, pacing on, umbrellaless, was a figure which made her hurry to overtake him.

'O, Leonard! after your journey, and in this rain!'

He made a gesture of courtesy, but moved as if to follow, not join her. Did he not know whether he were within the pale of humanity?

'Here is half an umbrella. Won't you hold it for me?' she said; and as he followed his instinct of obedience, she put it into his hand, and took his arm, thinking that this familiarity would best restore him to a sense of his regained position; and, moreover, feeling glad and triumphant to be thus leaning, and to have that strong arm to contend with the driving blast that came howling round the corner of Minster Street, and fighting for their shelter. They were both out of breath when they paused to recover in the deep porch of the Minster.

'Is Dr. May come home?'

'Yes—and—'

Ethel signed, and Mr. Wilmot held out an earnest hand, with, 'This is well. I am glad to see you.'

'Thank you, sir,' said Leonard, heartily; 'and for all—'

'This is your new beginning of life, Leonard. God bless you in it.'

As Mr. Wilmot passed on, Ethel for the first time ventured to look up into the eyes—and saw their hollow setting, their loss of sparkle, but their added steadfastness and resolution. She could not help repeating the long-treasured lines: 'And, Leonard,

         "—grieve not for thy woes,Disgrace and trouble;For He who honour best bestows,       Shall give thee double."'

'I've never ceased to be glad you read Marmion with me,' he hastily said, as they turned into church on hearing a clattering of choristers behind them.

Clara might have had such sensations when she bound the spurs on her knight's heels, yet even she could hardly have had so pure, unselfish, and exquisite a joy as Ethel's, in receiving the pupil who had been in a far different school from hers.

The gray dawn through the gloom, the depths of shadow in the twilight church, softening and rendering all more solemn and mysterious, were more in accordance than bright and beamy sunshine with her subdued grave thankfulness; and there was something suitable in the fewness of the congregation that had gathered in the Lady Chapel—so few, that there was no room for shyness, either in, or for, him who was again taking his place there, with steady composed demeanour, its stillness concealing so much.