ON HAMPSTEAD HEATH
IRIS had only to remember the manner in which she and Mountjoy had
disappointed her father, to perceive the serious necessity of
preventing Mountjoy's rival from paying a visit at Mr. Henley's house.
She wrote at once to Lord Harry, at the hotel which Mr. Vimpany had
mentioned, entreating him not to think of calling on her. Being well
aware that he would insist on a meeting, she engaged to write again and
propose an appointment. In making this concession, Iris might have
found it easier to persuade herself that she was yielding to sheer
necessity, if she had not been guiltily conscious of a feeling of
pleasure at the prospect of seeing Lord Harry again, returning to her
an innocent man. There was some influence, in this train of thought,
which led her mind back to Hugh. She regretted his absence--wondered
whether he would have proposed throwing her letter to the Irish lord
into the fire--sighed, closed the envelope, and sent the letter to the
post.
On the next day, she had arranged to drive to Muswell Hill, and to pay
the customary visit to Rhoda. Heavy rain obliged her to wait for a
fitter opportunity. It was only on the third day that the sky cleared,
and the weather was favourable again. On a sunshiny autumn morning,
with a fine keen air blowing, she ordered the open carriage. Noticing,
while Fanny Mere was helping her to dress, that the girl looked even
paler than usual, she said, with her customary kindness to persons
dependent on her, "You look as if a drive in the fresh air would do you
good--you shall go with me to the farm, and see Rhoda Bennet."
When they stopped at the house, the farmer's wife appeared, attending a
gentleman to the door. Iris at once recognised the local medical man.
"You're not in attendance, I hope, on Rhoda Bennet?" she said.
The doctor acknowledged that there had been some return of the nervous
derangement from which the girl suffered. He depended mainly (he said)
on the weather allowing her to be out as much as possible in the fresh
air, and on keeping her free from all agitation. Rhoda was so far on
the way to recovery, that she was now walking in the garden by his
advice. He had no fear of her, provided she was not too readily
encouraged, in her present state, to receive visitors. Her mistress
would be, of course, an exception to this rule. But even Miss Henley
would perhaps do well not to excite the girl by prolonging her visit.
There was one other suggestion which he would venture to make, while he
had the opportunity. Rhoda was not, as he thought, warmly enough
clothed for the time of year; and a bad cold might be easily caught by
a person in her condition.
Iris entered the farm-house; leaving Fanny Mere, after what the doctor
had said on the subject of visitors, to wait for her in the carriage.
After an absence of barely ten minutes Miss Henley returned; personally
changed, not at all to her own advantage, by the introduction of a
novelty in her dress. She had gone into the farmhouse, wearing a
handsome mantle of sealskin. When she came out again, the mantle had
vanished, and there appeared in its place a common cloak of
drab-coloured cloth. Noticing the expression of blank amazement in the
maid's face, Iris burst out laughing.
"How do you think I look in my new cloak?" she asked.
Fanny saw nothing to laugh at in the sacrifice of a sealskin mantle. "I
must not presume, Miss, to give an opinion," she said gravely.
"At any rate," Iris continued, "you must be more than mortal if my
change of costume doesn't excite your curiosity. I found Rhoda Bennet
in the garden, exposed to the cold wind in this ugly flimsy thing.
After what the doctor had told me, it was high time to assert my
authority. I insisted on changing cloaks with Rhoda. She made an
attempt, poor dear, to resist; but she knows me of old--and I had my
way. I am sorry you have been prevented from seeing her; you shall not
miss the opportunity when she is well again. Do you admire a fine view?
Very well; we will vary the drive on our return. Go back," she said to
the coachman, "by Highgate and Hampstead."
Fanny's eyes rested on the shabby cloak with a well-founded distrust of
it as a protection against the autumn weather. She ventured to suggest
that her mistress might feel the loss (in an open carriage) of the warm
mantle which she had left on Rhoda's shoulders.
Iris made light of the doubt expressed by her maid. But by the time
they had passed Highgate, and had approached the beginning of the
straight road which crosses the high ridge of Hampstead Heath, she was
obliged to acknowledge that she did indeed feel the cold. "You ought to
be a good walker," she said, looking at her maid's firm well-knit
figure. "Exercise is all I want to warm me. What do you say to going
home on foot?" Fanny was ready and willing to accompany her mistress.
The carriage was dismissed, and they set forth on their walk.
As they passed the inn called "The Spaniards," two women who were
standing at the garden gate stared at Iris, and smiled. A few paces
further on, they were met by an errand-boy. He too looked at the young
lady, and put his hand derisively to his head, with a shrill whistle
expressive of malicious enjoyment. "I appear to amuse these people,"
Iris said. "What do they see in me?"
Fanny answered with an effort to preserve her gravity, which was not
quite successfully disguised: "I beg your pardon, Miss; I think they
notice the curious contrast between your beautiful bonnet and your
shabby cloak."
Persons of excitable temperament have a sense of ridicule, and a dread
of it, unintelligible to their fellow-creatures who are made of coarser
material. For the moment, Iris was angry. "Why didn't you tell me of
it," she asked sharply, "before I sent away the carriage? How can I
walk back, with everybody laughing at me?"
She paused--reflected a little--and led the way off the high road, on
the right, to the fine clump of fir-trees which commands the famous
view in that part of the Heath.
"There's but one thing to be done," she said, recovering her good
temper; "we must make my grand bonnet suit itself to my miserable
cloak. You will pull out the feather and rip off the lace (and keep
them for yourself, if you like), and then I ought to look shabby enough
from head to foot, I am sure! No; not here; they may notice us from the
road--and what may the fools not do when they see you tearing the
ornaments off my bonnet! Come down below the trees, where the ground
will hide us."
They had nearly descended the steep slope which leads to the valley,
below the clump of firs, when they were stopped by a terrible
discovery.
Close at their feet, in a hollow of the ground, was stretched the
insensible body of a man. He lay on his side, with his face turned away
from them. An open razor had dropped close by him. Iris stooped over
the prostate man, to examine his face. Blood flowing from a frightful
wound in his throat, was the first thing that she saw. Her eyes closed
instinctively, recoiling from that ghastly sight. The next instant she
opened them again, and saw his face.
Dying or dead, it was the face of Lord Harry.
The shriek that burst from her, on making that horrible discovery, was
heard by two men who were crossing the lower heath at some distance.
They saw the women, and ran to them. One of the men was a labourer; the
other, better dressed, looked like a foreman of works. He was the first
who arrived on the spot.
"Enough to frighten you out of your senses, ladies," he said civilly.
"It's a case of suicide, I should say, by the look of it."
"For God's sake, let us do something to help him!" Iris burst out. "I
know him! I know him!"
Fanny, equal to the emergency, asked Miss Henley for her handkerchief,
joined her own handkerchief to it, and began to bandage the wound. "Try
if his pulse is beating," she said quietly to her mistress. The foreman
made himself useful by examining the suicide's pockets. Iris thought
she could detect a faint fluttering in the pulse. "Is there no doctor
living near?" she cried. "Is there no carriage to be found in this
horrible place?"
The foreman had discovered two letters. Iris read her own name on one
of them. The other was addressed "To the person who may find my body."
She tore the envelope open. It contained one of Mr. Vimpany's cards,
with these desperate words written on it in pencil: "Take me to the
doctor's address, and let him bury me, or dissect me, whichever he
pleases." Iris showed the card to the foreman. "Is it near here?" she
asked. "Yes, Miss; we might get him to that place in no time, if there
was a conveyance of any kind to be found." Still preserving her
presence of mind, Fanny pointed in the direction of "The Spaniards"
inn. "We might get what we want there," she said. "Shall I go?"
Iris signed to her to attend to the wounded man, and ascended the
sloping ground. She ran on towards the road. The men, directed by
Fanny, raised the body and slowly followed her, diverging to an easier
ascent. As Iris reached the road, a four-wheel cab passed her. Without
an instant's hesitation, she called to the driver to stop. He pulled up
his horse. She confronted a solitary gentleman, staring out of the
window of the cab, and looking as if he thought that a lady had taken a
liberty with him. Iris allowed the outraged stranger no opportunity of
expressing his sentiments. Breathless as she was, she spoke first.
"Pray forgive me--you are alone in the cab--there is room for a
gentleman, dangerously wounded--he will bleed to death if we don't find
help for him--the place is close by--oh, don't refuse me!" She looked
back, holding fast by the cab door, and saw Fanny and the men slowly
approaching. "Bring him here!" she cried.
"Do nothing of the sort!" shouted the gentleman in possession of the
cab.
But Fanny obeyed her mistress; and the men obeyed Fanny. Iris turned
indignantly to the merciless stranger. "I ask you to do an act of
Christian kindness," she said. "How can you, how dare you, hesitate?"
"Drive on!" cried the stranger.
"Drive on, at your peril," Iris added, on her side.
The cabman sat, silent and stolid, on the box, waiting for events.
Slowly the men came in view, bearing Lord Harry, still insensible. The
handkerchiefs on his throat were saturated with blood. At that sight,
the cowardly instincts of the stranger completely mastered him. "Let me
out!" he clamoured; "let me out!"
Finding the cab left at her disposal, Iris actually thanked him! He
looked at her with an evil eye. "I have my suspicions, I can tell you,"
he muttered. "If this comes to a trial in a court of law, I'm not going
to be mixed up with it. Innocent people have been hanged before now,
when appearances were against them."
He walked off; and, by way of completing the revelation of his own
meanness, forgot to pay his fare.
On the point of starting the horse to pursue him, the cabman was
effectually stopped. Iris showed him a sovereign. Upon this hint (like
Othello) he spoke.
"All right, Miss. I see your poor gentleman is a-bleeding. You'll take
care--won't you?--that he doesn't spoil my cushions." The driver was
not a ill-conditioned man; he put the case of his property indulgently,
with a persuasive smile. Iris turned to the two worthy fellows, who had
so readily given her their help, and bade them good-bye, with a solid
expression of her gratitude which they both remembered for many a long
day to come. Fanny was already in the cab supporting Lord Harry's body.
Iris joined her. The cabman drove carefully to Mr. Vimpany's new house.