A DABBLER IN IMMORTALITY. ALL THEIR LIVES! WILL PHOEBE KNOW ME? STAY TO TELL HER THIS IS ME. THAT POOR OLD PERSON. HOW GWEN MET GRANNY MARRABLE ON HER WAY HOME. HER DREAD OF MORE DISCLOSINGS, AND A GREAT RELIEF. MACTE VIRTUTE, DR. NASH! GRANNY MARRABLE'S FORTITUDE. HOW GWEN NOTICED THE LIKENESS TOO, FOR THE FIRST TIME! A SHORT CHAT THE COUNTESS HAD HAD WITH SIR HAMILTON. HOW SHE WAS UNFEELING ABOUT THE OLD TWINS. WHY NOT SETTLE DOWN AND TALK IT OVER? NO AUTHENTICATED GHOST APPEARS TO A PERFECT STRANGER. A DANIEL COME TO JUDGMENT. SIR SPENCER DERRICK AND THE OPENSHAWS. GWEN'S LETTER TO HER FATHER. HOW SHE DID NOT GO TO PENSHAM, BUT BACK TO STRIDES COTTAGE

When Gwen's task came to an end, she had to think of herself. The day had been more trying even than her worst anticipations of it. But now at last she had stormed that citadel of Impossible Belief in the mind of both mother and daughter, and nothing she could do could bring them, strained and distracted by the incredible revelation, nearer to a haven of repose. She had spoken the word: the rest lay with the powers of Nature. Probably she felt what far different circumstances have caused many of us to feel, on whom the unwelcome task has devolved of bringing the news of a death. How consciously helpless we were—was it not so?—when the tale was told, and we had to leave the heart of our hearer to its lonely struggle in the dark!

This that Gwen had told was not news of death, but news of life; nevertheless, it might kill. She had little fear for the daughter or the sister; much for this new-found object of her affection who had survived so many troubles. For Gwen had to acknowledge that "old Mrs. Picture" had acquired a mysteriously strong hold upon her—its strangeness lying in its sudden development. She could, however, do nothing now to help the old tempest-tossed bark into smooth water, that would not be done as well or better by her equally storm-beaten consort, whose rigging and spars had been in such much better trim than hers when the gale struck both alike. Gwen felt, too, a great faith that the daughter's love would be, as it were, the beacon of the mother's salvation; the pilot to a sheltered haven where the seas would be at rest. She herself could do no more.

After the old lady's consciousness returned, it was long before she spoke, and Gwen had felt half afraid her speech might be gone. But then—could she herself speak? Scarcely! And Ruth Thrale, the daughter, seemed in like plight, sitting beside her mother on the bed, her usually rosy cheeks gone ashy white, her eyes fixed on the old face before her with a look that seemed to Gwen one of wonder even more than love. The stress of the hour, surely! For all the tenderness of her heart was in the hand that wandered caressingly about the mass of silver hair on the pillow, and smoothed it away from the eyes that turned from the one to the other half questioningly, but content without reply. The mother seemed physically overwhelmed by the shock, and ready to accept absolute collapse, if not indeed incapable of movement. She made no attempt to speak till later.

During the hour or half-hour that followed, Gwen and Ruth Thrale spoke but once or twice, beneath their breath. Neither could have said why. Who can say why the dwellers in a house where Death is pending speak in undertones? Not from fear of disturbance to the dying man, whose sight and hearing are waning fast. This was a silence of a like sort, though it was rather resurrection than death that imposed it.

The great clock in the kitchen, which had struck twelve when Gwen was showing the forged letter to Widow Thrale, had followed on to one and two, unnoticed. And now, when it struck three, she doubted it, and looked at her watch. "Yes," said she, bewildered. "It's right! It's actually three o'clock. I must go. I wish I could stay." She stooped over the old face on the pillow, and kissed it lovingly. "You know, dear, what has happened. Phoebe is coming—your sister Phoebe." She had a strange feeling, as she said this, of dabbling in immortality—of tampering with the grave.

Then old Maisie spoke for the first time; slowly, but clearly enough, though softly. "I think—I know—what has happened.... All our lives?... But Phoebe will come. My Ruth will fetch her. Will you not, dear?"

"Mother will come, very soon."

"That is it. She is mother—my Ruth's mother!... But I am your mother, too, dear!"

"Indeed yes—my mother—my mother—my mother!"

"I kissed you in your crib, asleep, and was not ashamed to go and leave you. I went away in the moonlight, with the little red bag that was my mother's—Phoebe's and mine! I was not ashamed to go, for the love of your father, on the cruel sea! Fifty years agone, my darling!" Gwen saw that she was speaking of her husband, and her heart stirred with anger that such undying love should still be his, the miscreant's, the cause of all. She afterwards thought that old Maisie's mind had somehow refused to receive the story of the forgery. Could she, else, have spoken thus, and gone on, as she did, to say to Gwen:—"Come here, my dear! God bless you!"? She held her hand, pressing it close to her. "I want to say to you what it is that is fretting me. Will Phoebe know me, for the girl that went away? Oh, see how I am changed!"

The last thing Gwen had expected was that the old woman should master the facts. It made her hesitate to accept this seeming ability to look them in the face as genuine. It would break down, she was convinced, and the coming of a working recognition of them would be a slow affair. But she could not say so. She could only make believe. "Why should she not know you?" she said. "She has changed, herself."

"When will she come?" said old Maisie restlessly. "She will come when you are gone. Oh, how I wish you could stay, to tell her that this is me!"

"Do you think she will doubt it? She will not, when she hears you talk of the—of your old time. I am sorry I must go, but I must." And indeed she thought so, for she did not know that her own mother had gone away from the Towers, and fancied that that good lady would resent her desertion. This affair had lasted longer than her anticipation of it.

Then old Maisie showed how partial the illumination of her mind had been. "Oh yes, my dear," she said, "I know. You have to go, of course, because of that poor old person. The old person you told me of—whom you have to tell—to tell of her sister she thought dead—what was it?" She had recovered consciousness so far as to know that Phoebe was somehow to reappear risen from the dead; and that this Ruth whom she had taken so much to heart was somehow entitled to call her mother; but what that how was, and why, was becoming a mystery as her vigour fell away and an inevitable reaction began to tell upon her.

Gwen heard it in the dazed sound of her voice; and, to her thought, assent was best to whatever the dumfoundered mind dwelt upon most readily. "Yes," said she, "I must go and tell her. She must know." Then she beckoned Widow Thrale away from the bedside. "It was her own sister I told her of," said she in an undertone. "I thought she would see quickest that way.... Do you quite understand?" A quick nod showed that her hearer had quite understood. Gwen thanked Heaven that at least she had no lack of faculties to deal with there. "Listen!" said she. "You must get her food now. You must make her eat, whether she likes it or no." She saw that for Ruth herself the kindest thing was the immediate imposition of duties, and was glad to find her so alive to the needs of the case.

Two voices of women in the kitchen without. One, Elizabeth-next-door; the other, surely, Keziah Solmes from the Towers. So much the better! "I may tell it them, my lady?" said Widow Thrale. Gwen had to think a moment, before saying:—"Yes—but they must not talk of it in the village—not yet! Go out and tell them. I will remain with your mother." It was the first time Ruth Thrale had had the fact she had succeeded in knowing in theory forced roughly upon her in practice. She started, but recovered herself to do her ladyship's bidding.

The utter amazement of Keziah and Elizabeth-next-door, as Gwen heard it, was a thing to be remembered. But she paid little attention to it. She was bidding farewell to old Mrs. Picture. The last speech she heard from her seemed to be:—"Tell my little boy and Dolly. Say I will come back to them." Then she appeared to fall asleep.

"You must get some food down her throat, somehow, Mrs. Thrale, or we shall have her sinking from exhaustion. You will stop to help, Keziah? Stop till to-morrow. I will look in at the Lodge to tell your husband. I must go now. Is Tom Kettering there?" Gwen felt she would like an affectionate farewell of Ruth Thrale, but a slight recrudescence of the Norman Conquest came in the way, due to the presence of Keziah and Elizabeth-next-door; so she had to give it up.

Tom Kettering was not there, but was reproducible at pleasure by whistles, evolved from some agent close at hand and willing to assist. Tom and the mare appeared unchanged by their long vigil, and showed neither joy nor sorrow at its coming to an end. A violent shake the latter indulged in was a mere report of progress, and Tom only touched his hat as a convention from time immemorial. There was not a trace of irony in his "Home, my lady?" though a sarcastic Jehu might have seemed to be expressing a doubt whether her ladyship meant ever to go home at all.

The road to Costrell's turned off Gwen's line of route, the main road to the Towers. A cart was just coming in sight, at the corner. Farmer Costrell's cart, driven by himself. An old woman, by his side—Granny Marrable, surely?

Gwen was simply frightened. She felt absolutely unfit for another high-tension interview. Her head might give way and she might do something foolish. But it was impossible to turn and run. It was, however, easy enough to go quickly by, with ordinary salutations. Still, it was repugnant to her to do so. But, then, what else could she do? It was settled for her.

Said Granny Marrable to her grandson-in-law:—"'Tis Gwen o' th' Towers, John, in Tom Kettering's gig. Bide here till they come up, that I may get speech of her ladyship."

"Will she stand still on th' high roo-ad, to talk to we?"

"She'll never pass me by if she sees me wishful to speak with her. Her ladyship has too good a heart."

"Vairy well, Gra-anny." John Costrell reined in his horse, and the cart and gig came abreast.

Granny Marrable spoke at once. Her voice was firm, but her face was pale and hard set. "I have been told strange news, my lady, but it must be true. It cannot be else."

"It is true. Dr. Nash told you."

"That is so. Our Dr. Nash."

"But how much? Has he told you all?"

"I will tell your ladyship." The old woman's firmness and strength were marvellous to Gwen. "He has told me that my sister that was dead is risen from the grave...."

"God's my life, Granny, what will ye be for saying next to her ladyship?" John Costrell had heard none of the story.

"It's all quite right, Mr. Costrell," said Gwen. "Granny Marrable doesn't mean really dead. She thought her dead—her sister.... Go on, Granny! That is quite right. And has Dr. Nash told you where your sister is now?"

"At my own home at Chorlton, my lady. And I am on my way there now, and will see her once more, God willing, before we die."

"Go to her—go to her! The sooner the better!... I must tell you one thing, though. She is not strong—not like you and your daughter Ruth. But you will see." The old lady began with something about her gratitude to Gwen and to her father, but Gwen cut her short. What did that matter, now? Then she assured her that old Maisie had been told everything, and was only uneasy lest her sister should not know her again, and would even doubt her identity. "But that is impossible," said Gwen. "Because she is your sister, and remembers all your childhood together."

After they had parted company, and Gwen was on her way again, relieved beyond measure to find that Dr. Nash had contrived to carry out his mission so well—though how he had done it was a mystery to her as yet—she had a misgiving that she ought to have produced the forged letter to show to Granny Marrable. Perhaps, however, she had done no harm by keeping it; as if the conviction of the two sisters of each other's identity was to turn on what is called "evidence," what would be its value to either? They would either know each other, or not; and if they did not, enough "evidence" to hang a dozen men would not stand against the deep-rooted belief in each other's death through those long years.

Besides, like Dr. Nash, she had just been quite taken aback to see—now that she came to look for it, mind you!—the amazing likeness between the old twin sisters. How came it that she had not seen it before?—for instance, when they were face to face in her presence at the door of Strides Cottage, but two or three weeks since. She dismissed the forged letter, to dwell on the enormous relief of not having another disclosure problem before her; and also on the satisfaction she would have in telling her father what a successful outcome had followed his venial transgression of opening and reading it. Altogether, her feelings were those of triumph, trampling underfoot the recollection that she had had nothing to eat since breakfast, and making a good stand against brain-whirl caused by the almost unbearable strangeness of the story.

On arriving at the Towers, she was disconcerted to find that all her solicitude about her mother's loneliness in her absence had been thrown away. She whispered to herself that it served her right for fidgeting about other people. Adrian had been perfectly justified when he said that interest in one's relations was the worst investment possible for opulent Altruism.

Well—she was better off now than she had been in the early morning, when there was all that terrible disclosure ahead. It was done—ended; for better, for worse! She might indulge now in a cowardice that shrank from seeing the two old sisters again until they were familiarised with the position. If only she might find them, on her next visit, habituated to a new modus vivendi, with the possibility of peaceful years together, to live down the long separation into nothingness! If only that might be! But was it possible? Was it conceivable even?

Anyhow, she deserved a well-earned rest from tension. And presently she would tell the whole strange story to Adrian, and show him that clever forgery.... No!—thought stopped with a cruel jerk, and her heart said:—"Shall I ever show him anything! Never! Never!"

"You went to Pensham, mamma?" said Gwen to her mother, the next day, as soon as an opportunity came for quiet talk.

"On my way to Poynders," said the Countess yawnfully. "But it was unlucky. Lady Torrens was keeping her room. Some sort of nervous attack. I didn't get any particulars."

Gwen suspected reticence. "You didn't see her, then?"

"Oh dear no! How should I? She was in bed, I believe."

"You saw somebody?"

"Only Sir Hamilton, for a few minutes. He doesn't seem uneasy. I don't suppose it's anything serious."

"Did you see 'Re?"

"Miss Torrens and her brother were out. Didn't come back." Her ladyship here perceived that reticence, overdone, would excite suspicion, and provoke exhaustive inquiry. "I had a short chat with Sir Hamilton. Who gave me a very good cup of tea." The excellence of the tea was, so to speak, a red herring.

Gwen refused to be thrown off the scent. "He's an old friend of yours, isn't he?" said she suggestively.

"Oh dear yes! Ages ago. He told me about some people I haven't heard of for years. I must try and call on that Mrs. What's-her-name. Do you know where Tavistock Square is?"

"Of course I do. Everybody does. Who is it lives there?"

The Countess had consulted the undersized tablets, and was repocketing them. "Mrs. Enniscorthy Hopkins," said she, in the most collateral way possible to humanity. "You wouldn't know anything about her."

"This tea has been standing," said Gwen. She refused to rise to Mrs. Enniscorthy Hopkins, whom she suspected of red-herringhood.

The Countess was compelled to be less collateral. "She was Kathleen Tyrawley," said she. "But I quite lost sight of her. One does."

"Was she interesting?"

"Ye-es.... N-no ... not very. Pretty—of that sort!"

"What sort?"

"Well—very fond of horses."

"So am I—the darlings!"

"Yes—but a girl may be very fond of horses, and yet not marry a ... Don't put milk in—only cream...."

"Marry a what?"

"Marry her riding-master." Her ladyship softened down Miss Tyrawley's groom to presentability. "But it was before you were born, child. However, no doubt it is the same, in principle."

"Hope so! Is that tea right?"

"The tea? Oh yes, the tea ... will do. No, I only saw Sir Hamilton. The son and daughter were away."

"Now, mamma, that is being unkind, and you know it. 'The son and daughter!' As if they were people!"

"Well—and what are they?"

"You know perfectly well what I mean."

As the Countess did, she averted discussion. "We won't rake the subject up, my dear Gwendolen," she said, in a manner which embodied moderation, while asserting dignity. "You know my feelings on the matter, which would, I am sure, be those of any parent—of any mother, certainly. And I may mention to you—only, please no discussion!—that Sir Hamilton entirely shares my views. He expressed himself quite clearly on the subject yesterday."

"You must have seen him for more than a few minutes to get as far as that." This was a shell in the enemy's powder-magazine.

The Countess had to adopt retrocessive strategy. "I think, my dear," she said, with dignity at a maximum, "that I have made it sufficiently clear that I do not wish to rediscuss your engagement, as your father persists in calling it. We must retain our opinions. If at the end of six months—if—it turns out that I am entirely mistaken, why, then you and your father must just settle it your own way. Now let us talk no more about it."

This conversation took place in the late afternoon of the day following Gwen's visit to Strides Cottage, and the Countess's to Pensham. All through the morning of that day her young ladyship had been feeling the effects of the strain of the previous one, followed by a night of despairing sleeplessness due to excitement. An afternoon nap, a most unusual thing with her, had rallied her to the point of sending a special invitation to her mother to join her at tea in her own private apartment; which was reasonable, as all the guests were away killing innocent birds, or hares. The Countess was aware of her daughter's fatigue and upset, but persisted in regarding its cause as over-estimated—a great deal too much made of a very simple matter. "Then that is satisfactorily settled, and there need be no further fuss." These were her words of comment on her daughter's detailed account of her day's adventures, which made themselves of use to keep hostilities in abeyance.

"I think you are unfeeling, mamma; that's flat!" was Gwen's unceremonious rejoinder.

The Countess repeated the last word impassively. It was rather as though she said to Space:—"Here is an expression. If you are by way of containing any Intelligences capable of supplying an explanation, I will hear them impartially." Receiving no reply from any Point of the Compass, she continued:—"I really cannot see what these two old ... persons have to complain of. They have every reason to be thankful that they have been spared so long. The death of either would have made all your exertions on their behalf useless. Why they cannot settle down on each side of that big fireplace at Strides Cottage, and talk it all over, I cannot imagine. It has been engraved in the Illustrated London News." This was marginal, not in the text. "They will have plenty to tell each other after such a long time."

"Mamma dear, you are hopeless!"

"Well, my dear, ask any sensible person. They have had the narrowest escape of finding it all out after each other's death, and then I suppose we should never have heard the end of it.... Yes, perhaps the way I put it was a little confused. But really the subject is so complex." Gwen complicated it still more by introducing its relations to Immortality; to which her mother took exception:—"If they were both ghosts, we should probably know nothing of them. No ghost appears to a perfect stranger—no authenticated ghost! Besides, one hopes they would be at peace in their graves."

"Oh, ah, yes, by-the-by!" said Gwen, "there wasn't to be anything till the Day of Judgment."

"I wish you wouldn't drag in Religion," said her mother. "You pick up these dreadful Freethinking ways of speech from....

"From Adrian? Of course I do. But you began it, by talking about Death and Ghosts."

"My dear, neither Death nor Ghosts are Religion, but the Day of Judgment is. Ask anybody!"

"Very well, then! Cut the Day of Judgment out, and go on with Death and Ghosts."

"We will talk," said the Countess coldly, "of something else. I do not like the tone of the conversation. What are your plans for to-morrow?"

"I don't think I shall go to Chorlton to-morrow. I shall leave the old ladies alone for a while. I think it's the best way. Don't you?"

"I don't think it can matter much, either way." The Countess was not going to come down from Olympus, for trifles. "But what are you going to do to-morrow? Go to church, I suppose?"

"Is it necessary to settle?"

"By no means. Perhaps I was wrong in taking it for granted. No doubt I should have done well—in your case—to ask for information. Are you going to church?"

"Possibly. I can settle when the time comes." Her mother made no reply, but she made it so ostentatiously that to skip off to another subject would have been to accept a wager of battle. Gwen was prepared to be conciliatory. "Is anything coming off?" she asked irreverently. "Any Bishop or anything?"

Her mother replied, with a Pacific Ocean of endurance in her voice:—"Dr. Tuxford Somers is preaching at the Abbey. If you come, pray do not be late. The carriage will be ready at a quarter to ten."

"Well—I shall have to go once or twice, so I suppose now will do for once. There's Christmas Day, of course—I don't mind that. I shall go to Chorlton, and look at the two old ladies in church. I hope Mrs. Picture will be well enough by then."

"I am sure I hope so. A whole week!" The Countess's parti pris, that the experience of the old twins was nothing to make such a fuss over, showed itself plainly in this. She passed on to a more important subject. "I understand," said she, "that you intend to go to Pensham on Monday—and stay!"

"I do," said Gwen uncompromisingly. But her mother's expression became so stony that Gwen anticipated her spoken protest, saying:—"Now, mamma dear, you know I've agreed, and we are to go abroad for six whole months. So don't look like a martyr!"

"When will you be back?" said the martyr. The fact is, she was well aware that this was a case of quid pro quo; and that Gwen was entitled, by treaty, to a perfect Saturnalia of sweet-hearting till after Christmas, in exchange for the six months of penal servitude to follow. But she preferred to indicate that the terms of the treaty had disappointed her.

"Quite uncertain," said Gwen. "I shall stop till Thursday, anyhow. And Adrian and Irene are to come here on Christmas Eve. I suppose they'll have to share the paternal plum-pudding on Christmas Day. That can't be helped. And I shall have to be here. That can't be helped either. I think it a pity the whole clan-jamfray shouldn't come here for Christmas."

"That is out of the question. Sir Hamilton has his own social obligations. Besides, it would look as if you and Mr. Torrens were definitely engaged. Which you are not."

"Suppose we talk of something else."

"Suppose we do." Her ladyship could only assent; for had she not, Shylockwise, taught her daughter that word?

The agreement that another topic should be resorted to was sufficiently complied with by a short pause before resuming the antecedent one. Gwen did this by saying:—"You will be all right without me for a few days, because Sir Spencer Derrick and his wife are due to-night, and the Openshaws, and the Pellews will be here on Monday."

"Gwendolen!" In a shocked tone of voice.

"Well—Aunt C. and Cousin Percy, then. If they are not the Pellews, they very soon will be. They are coming on Monday, anyhow."

"But not by the same train!"

"I should come by the same train, if I were they. And in the same carriage. And tip the guard to keep everybody else out. Much better do it candidly than pretend they've met by accident. I should."

The Countess thought she really had better change to another subject. She dropped this one as far off as possible. "When do you expect to see your two old interesting twins again?" said she conciliatorily. For she felt that reasoning with her beautiful but irregular daughter was hopeless. The young lady explained that her next visit to Chorlton would be by way of an expedition from Pensham. Adrian and Irene would drive her over. It was not morally much farther from Pensham than from the Towers, although some arithmetical appearances were against it. And she particularly wanted Adrian to see old Mrs. Picture. And then, like a sudden sad cadence in music, came the thought:—"But he cannot see old Mrs. Picture."

Keziah Solmes did not come back till quite late in the evening. Her report of the state of things at Strides Cottage was manifestly vitiated by an unrestrained optimism. If she was to be believed, the sudden revelation to each other of the old twin sisters had had no specially perturbing effect on either. Gwen spent much of the evening writing a long letter to her father at Bath, giving a full account of her day's work, and ending:—"I do hope the dear old soul will bear it. Mrs. Solmes has just given me a most promising report of her. I cannot suppose her constant references to the Benevolence of Providence to be altogether euphemisms in the interest of the Almighty. I am borrowing Adrian's language—you will see that. I think Keziah is convinced that Mrs. Prichard will rally, and that the twins may live to be nonagenarians together. I must confess to being very anxious about her myself. She looked to me as if a breath of air might blow her away. I shall not see her again for a day or two, but I know they will send for me if I am wanted. Dr. Nash is to see to that. What a serviceable man he is!" She went on to say, after a few more particulars of Keziah's report, that she was going to Pensham on Monday, and should not come back before the Earl's own return to the Towers. Mamma would do perfectly well without her, and it was only fair, considering her own concessions.

But Gwen did not go to church next day.

Dr. Nash had been sent for to Strides Cottage at a very early hour, having been prevented from fulfilling a promise to go overnight. He must have seen some new cause for uneasiness, although he disclaimed any grounds of alarm. For he wrote off at once to her young ladyship, after a careful examination of his patient:—"Mrs. Prichard certainly is very feeble. I think it only right that you should know this at once. But you need not be frightened. Probably it is no more than was to be expected." That was the wording of his letter, received by Gwen as she sat at breakfast with some new arrivals and the Colonel, and the dregs of the shooting-party. She was not at all sorry to get a complete change of ideas and associations, although the subjects of conversation were painful enough, turning on the reports of mixed disaster and success in the Crimea that were making the close of '54 lurid and memorable for future history. Gwen glanced at Dr. Nash's letter, gave hurried directions to the servant to tell Tom Kettering to be in readiness to drive her at once to Chorlton, and made short work of breakfast and her adieux to the assembled company.

If events would only pay attention to the convenience of storytellers, they would never happen at the same time. It would make consecutive narrative much more practicable. It would have been better—some may say—for this story to follow Granny Marrable to Strides Cottage, and to leave Gwen to come to Dr. Nash's summons next day. It might then have harked back to the foregoing chat between her and her mother, or omitted it altogether. Its author prefers the course it has taken.