Run to Earth by M. E. Braddon

M >> M. E. Braddon >> Run to Earth

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It was already nearly four o'clock in the afternoon; but at that hour
Paulina had rarely left her own apartments.

Victor Carrington knew this quite as well as the woman at the lodge,
but he had business to do with another person as well as Paulina
Durski. That other person was the widow's humble companion.

The door was opened by Carlo Toas, Paulina's confidential courier and
butler. This man looked very suspiciously at the visitor.

"My mistress receives no one at this hour," he said.

"I am aware that she does not usually see visitors so early," replied
Carrington; "but as I come on particular business, and as I come a long
way to see her, she will perhaps make an exception in my favour."

He produced his card-case as he spoke, and handed the man a card, on
which he had written the following words in pencil:

"_Pray see me, dear madame. I come on really important business, which
will bear no delay. If you cannot see me till your dinner-hour, I will
wait._"

The Spaniard ushered Victor into one of the reception-rooms, which
looked cold and chill in the winter daylight. Except the grand piano,
there was no trace of feminine occupation in the room. It looked like
an apartment kept only for the reception of visitors--an apartment
which lacked all the warmth and comfort of home.

Victor waited for some time, and began to think his message had not
been taken to the mistress of the house, when the door was opened, and
Miss Brewer appeared.

She looked at the visitor with an inquisitive glance as she entered the
room, and approached him softly, with her light, greenish-grey eyes
fixed upon his face.

"Madame Durski has been suffering from nervous headache all day," she
said, "and has not yet risen. Her dinner-hour is half-past six. If your
business is really of importance, and if you care to wait, she will be
happy to see you then."

"My business is of real importance; and I shall be very glad to wait,"
answered Victor. "Since Madame Durski is, unhappily, unable to receive
me for some time, I shall gladly avail myself of the opportunity, in
order to enjoy a little conversation with you, Miss Brewer," he said,
courteously, "always supposing that you are not otherwise engaged."

"I have no other engagement whatever," answered the lady, in a cold,
measured voice.

"I wish to speak to you upon very serious business," continued Victor,
"and I believe that I can venture to address you with perfect candour.
The business to which I allude concerns the interests of Madame Durski,
and I have every reason to suppose that you are thoroughly devoted to
her interests."

"For whom else should I care?" returned Miss Brewer, with a bitter
laugh. "Madame Durski is the only friend I can count in this world. I
have known her from her childhood--and if I can believe anything good
of my species, which is not very easy for me to do, I can believe that
she cares for me--a little--as she might care for some piece of
furniture which she had been accustomed to see about her from her
infancy, and which she would miss if it were removed."

"You wrong your friend," said Victor. "She has every reason to be
sincerely attached to you, and I have little doubt that she is so."

"What right have you to have little doubt or much doubt about it?"
exclaimed Miss Brewer, contemptuously; "and why do you try to palm off
upon me the idle nonsense which senseless people consider it incumbent
on them to utter? You do not know Paulina Durski--I do. She is a woman
who never in her life cared for more than two things."

"And these two things are--"

"The excitement of the gaming-table, and the love of your worthless
friend, Sir Reginald Eversleigh."

"Does she really love my friend?"

"She does. She loves him as few men deserve to be loved--and least of
all that man. She loves him, although she knows that her affection is
unreturned, unappreciated. For his sake she would sacrifice her own
happiness, her own prosperity. Women are foolish creatures, Mr.
Carrington, and you men do wisely when you despise them."

"I will not enter into the question of my friend's merits," said
Victor; "but I know that Madame Durski has won the love of a man who is
worthy of any woman's affection--a man who is rich, and can elevate her
from her present--doubtful--position."

The Frenchman uttered these last words with a great appearance of
restraint and hesitation.

"Say, miserable position," exclaimed Miss Brewer; "for Paulina Durski's
position is the most degraded that a woman--whose life has been
comparatively sinless--ever occupied."

"And every day its degradation will become more profound," said Victor.
"Unless Madame Durski follows my advice, she cannot long remain in
England. In her native city she has little to hope for. In Paris, her
name has acquired an evil odour. What, then, lies before her?"

"Ruin!" exclaimed Miss Brewer, abruptly; "starvation it may be. I know
that our race is nearly run, Mr. Carrington. You need not trouble
yourself to remind me of our misery."

"If I do remind you of it, I only do so in the hope that I may be able
to serve you," answered Victor. "I have tasted all the bitterness of
poverty, Miss Brewer. Forgive me, if I ask whether you, too, have been
acquainted with its sting?"

"Have I felt its sting?" cried the poor faded creature. "Who has felt
the tooth of the serpent, Poverty, more cruelly than I? It has pierced
my very heart. From my childhood I have known nothing but poverty.
Shall I tell you my story, Mr. Carrington? I am not apt to speak of
myself, or of my youth; but you have evoked the demon, Memory, and I
feel a kind of relief in speaking of that long-departed time."

"I am deeply interested in all you say, Miss Brewer. Stranger though I
am, believe me that my interest is sincere."

As Victor Carrington said this, Charlotte Brewer looked at him with a
sharp, penetrating glance. She was not a woman to be fooled by shallow
hypocrisies. The light of the winter's day was fading; but even in the
fading light Victor saw the look of sharp suspicion in her pinched
face.

"Why should you be interested in me?" she asked, abruptly.

"Because I believe you may be useful to me," answered Victor, boldly.
"I do not want to deceive you, Miss Brewer. Great triumphs have been
achieved by the union of two powerful minds."

I know you to possess a powerful mind; I know you to be a woman above
ordinary prejudices; and I want you to help me, as I am ready to help
you. But you were about to tell me the story of your youth.

"It shall be told briefly," said Miss Brewer, speaking in a rapid,
energetic manner that was the very reverse of the measured tones she
was wont to use. "I am the daughter of a disgraced man, who was a
gentleman once; but I have forgotten that time, as he forgot it long
before he died.

"My father passed the last ten years of his life in a prison. He died
in that prison, and within those dingy smoke-blackened walls my
childhood was spent--a joyless childhood, without a hope, without a
dream, haunted perpetually by the dark phantom, Poverty. I emerged from
that prison to enter a new one, in the shape of a West-end boarding-
school, where I became the drudge and scape-goat of rich citizens'
daughters, heiresses presumptive to the scrapings of tallow-chandlers
and coal-merchants, linen-drapers and cheesemongers. For six years I
endured my fate patiently, uncomplainingly. Not one creature amongst
that large household loved me, or cared for me, or thought whether I
was happy or miserable.

"I worked like a slave. I rose early, and went to bed late, giving my
youth, my health, my beauty--you will smile, perhaps, Mr. Carrington,
but in those days I was accounted a handsome woman--in exchange for
what? My daily bread, and the education which was to enable me to earn
a livelihood hereafter. Some distant relations undertook to clothe me;
and I was dressed in those days about as shabbily as I have been
dressed ever since. In all my life, I never knew the innocent pleasure
which every woman feels in the possession of handsome clothes.

"At eighteen, I left the boarding-school to go on the Continent, where
I was to fill a situation which had been procured for me. That
situation was in the household of Paulina Durski's father. Paulina was
ten years of age, and I was appointed as her governess and companion.
From that day to this, I have never left her. As much as I am capable
of loving any one, I love her. But my mind has been embittered by the
miseries of my girlhood, and I do not pretend to be capable of much
womanly feeling."

"I thank you for your candour," said Victor. "It is of importance for
me to understand your position, for, by so doing, I shall be the better
able to assist you. I may believe, then, that there is only one person
in the world for whom you care, and that person is Paulina Durski?"

"You may believe that."

"And I may also believe that you, who have drained to the dregs the
bitter cup of poverty, would do much, and risk much, in order to be
rich?"

"You may."

"Then, Miss Brewer, let me speak to you openly, as one sincerely
interested in you, and desirous of serving you and your charming but
infatuated friend. May I hope that we shall be uninterrupted for some
time longer, for I am anxious to explain myself at once, and fully, now
that the opportunity has arisen?"

"No one is likely to enter this room, unless summoned by me," said Miss
Brewer. "You may speak freely, and at any length you please, Mr.
Carrington; but I warn you, you are speaking to a person who has no
faith in any profession of disinterested regard."

As she spoke, Miss Brewer leaned back in her chair, folded her hands
before her, and assumed an utterly impassible expression of
countenance. No less promising recipient of a confidential scheme could
have been seen: but Victor Carrington was not in the least discouraged.
He replied, in a cheerful, deferential, and yet business-like tone:

"I am quite aware of that, Miss Brewer; and for my part, I should not
feel the respect I do feel for you if I believed you so deficient in
sense and experience as to take any other view. I don't offer myself to
you in the absurd disguise of a _preux chevalier_, anxious to espouse
the unprofitable cause of two unprotected women in an equivocal
position, and in circumstances rapidly tending to desperation."

Here Victor Carrington glanced at his companion; he wanted to see if
the shot had told. But Miss Brewer cared no more for the almost open
insult, than she had cared for the implied interest conveyed in the
exordium of his discourse. She sat silent and motionless. He continued:

"I have an object to gain, which I am resolved to achieve. Two ways to
the attainment of this object are open to me; the one injurious, in
fact destructive, to you and Madame Durski, the other eminently
beneficial. I am interested in you. I particularly like Madame Durski,
though I am not one of the legion of her professed admirers."

Miss Brewer shook her head sadly. That legion was much reduced in its
numbers of late.

"Therefore," continued Carrington, without seeming to observe the
gesture, "I prefer to adopt the latter course, and further your
interests in securing my own. I suppose you can at least understand and
credit such very plain motives, so very plainly expressed, Miss
Brewer?"

"Yes," she said, "that may be true; it does not seem unlikely; we shall
see."

"You certainly shall. My explanation will not, I hope, be unduly
tedious, but it is indispensable that it should be full. You know, Miss
Brewer, that Sir Reginald Eversleigh and I are intimate friends?"

Miss Brewer smiled--a pale, prolonged, unpleasant smile, and then
replied, speaking very deliberately:

"I know nothing of the kind, Mr. Carrington. I know you are much
together, and have an air of familiar acquaintance, which is the true
interpretation of friendship, I take it, between men of the world--of
_your_ world in particular."

The hard and determined expression of her manner would have discouraged
and deterred most men. It did not discourage or deter Victor
Carrington.

"Put what interpretation you please upon my words," he said, "but
recognize the facts. There is a strict alliance, if you prefer that
phrase, between me and Sir Reginald Eversleigh, and his present
intimacy, with his seeming devotion to Madame Durski, prevents him from
carrying out the terms of that alliance to my satisfaction. I am
therefore resolved to break off that intimacy. Do you comprehend me so
far?"

"Yes, I comprehend you so far," answered Miss Brewer, "perfectly."

"Considering Madame Durski's feelings for Sir Reginald--feelings of
which, I assure you, I consider him, even according to my own
unpretending standard, entirely unworthy--this intimacy cannot be
broken off without pain to her, but it might be destroyed without any
profit, nay, with ruinous loss. Now, I cannot spare her the pain; that
is necessary, indispensable, both for her good, and--which I don't
pretend not to regard more urgently--my own. But I can make the pain
eminently profitable to her, with your assistance--in fact, so
profitable as to secure the peace and prosperity of her whole future
life."

He paused, and Miss Brewer looked steadily at him, but she did not
speak.

"Reginald Eversleigh owes me money, Miss Brewer, and I cannot afford to
allow him to remain in my debt. I don't mean that he has borrowed money
from me, for I never had any to lend, and, having any, should never
have lent it." He saw how the tone he was taking suited the woman's
perverted mind, and pursued it. "But I have done him certain services
for which he undertook to pay me money, and I want money. He has none,
and the only means by which he can procure it is a rich marriage. Such
a marriage is within his reach; one of the richest heiresses in London
would have him for the asking--she is an ironmonger's daughter, and
pines to be My Lady--but he hesitates, and loses his time in visits to
Madame Durski, which are only doing them both harm. Doing her harm,
because they are deceiving her, encouraging a delusion; and doing him
harm, because they are wasting his time, and incurring the risk of his
being 'blown upon' to the ironmonger. Vulgar people of the kind, you
know, my dear Miss Brewer, give ugly names, and attach undue importance
to intimacies of this kind, and--and--in short, it is on the cards that
Madame Durski may spoil Sir Reginald's game. Well, as that game is also
mine, you will find no difficulty in understanding that I do not intend
Madame Durski shall spoil it."

"Yes, I understand that," said Miss Brewer, as plainly as before; "but
I don't understand how Paulina is to be served in the affair, and I
don't understand what my part is to be in it."

"I am coming to that," he said. "You cannot be unaware of the
impression which Madame Durski has made upon Sir Reginald's cousin,
Douglas Dale."

"I know he did admire her," said Miss Brewer, "but he has not been here
since his brother's death. He is a rich man now."

"Yes, he is--but that will make no change in him in certain respects.
Douglas Dale is a fool, and will always remain so. Madame Durski has
completely captivated him, and I am perfectly certain he would marry
her to-morrow, if she could be brought to consent."

"A striking proof that Mr. Douglas Dale deserves the character you have
given him, you would say, Mr. Carrington?"

"Madam, I am at the mercy of your perspicuity," said Victor, with a
mock bow; "however, a truce to badinage--Douglas Dale is a rich man,
and very much in love with Madame Durski; but he is the last man in the
world to interfere with his cousin, by trying to win her affections, if
he believes her attached to Sir Reginald. He is a fool in some things,
as I have said before, and he is much more likely, if he thinks it a
case of mutual desperation, to contribute a thousand a year or so to
set the couple up in a modest competence, like a princely proprietor in
a play, than to advance his own claims. Now, this modest competence
business would not suit Sir Reginald, or Madame Durski, or me, but the
other arrangement would be a capital thing for us all."

"H--m, you see she really loves your friend, Sir Reginald," said Miss
Brewer.

"Tush," ejaculated Victor Carrington, contemptuously; "of course I know
she does, but what does it matter? She would be the most wretched of
women if Reginald married her, and _he won't_,--after all, that's the
great point, he won't. Now Dale will, and will give her unlimited
control of his money--a very nice position, _not_ so elevated as to
ensure an undesirable raking-up of her antecedents, and the means of
proving her gratitude to you, by providing for you comfortably for
life."

"That is all possible," replied Miss Brewer, as calmly as before; "but
what am I to do towards bringing about so desirable a state of
affairs."

"You have to use the influence which your position _aupres de_ Madame
Durski gives you. You can keep her situation constantly before her, you
can perpetually harp upon its exigencies--they are pressing, are they
not? Yes--then make them more pressing. Expose her to the constant
worry and annoyance of poverty, make no effort to hide the
inconvenience of ruin. She is a bad manager, of course--all women of
her sort are bad managers. Don't help her--make the very worst of
everything. Then, you can take every opportunity of pointing out
Reginald's neglect, all his defalcations, the cruelty of his conduct to
her, the evidence of his never intending to marry her, the selfishness
which makes him indifferent to her troubles, and unwilling to help her.
Work on pride, on pique, on jealousy, on the love of comfort and
luxury, and the horror of poverty and privation, which are always
powerful in the minds of women like Madame Durski. Don't talk much to
her at first about Douglas Dale, especially until he has come to town
and has resumed his visiting here; but take care that her difficulties
press heavily upon her, and that she is kept in mind that help or hope
from Reginald there is none. I have no doubt whatever that Dale will
propose to her, if he does not see her infatuation for Reginald."

"But suppose Mr. Dale does not come here at all?" asked Miss Brewer;
"he has broken through the habit now, and he may have thought it over,
and determined to keep away."

"Suppose a moth flies away from a candle, Miss Brewer," returned
Carrington, "and makes a refreshing excursion out of window into the
cool evening air! May we not calculate with tolerable certainty on his
return, and his incremation? The last thing in all this matter I should
think of doubting would be the readiness of Douglas Dale to tumble
head-foremost into any net we please to spread for him."

A short pause ensued--interrupted by Miss Brewer, who said, "I suppose
this must all be done quickly--on account of that wealthy Philistine,
the ironmonger?"

"On account of my happening to want money very badly, Miss Brewer, and
Madame Durski finding herself in the same position. The more quickly
the better for all parties. And now, I have spoken very plainly to you
so far, let me speak still more plainly. It is manifestly for your
advantage that Madame Durski should be rich and respectable, rather
than that she should be poor and--under a cloud. It is no less
manifestly, though not so largely, for your advantage, that I should
get my money from Reginald Eversleigh, because, when I do, get it, I
will hand you five hundred pounds by way of bonus."

"If there were any means by which you could be legally bound to the
fulfilment of that promise, Mr. Carrington," said Miss Brewer, "I
should request you to put it in writing. But I am quite aware that no
such means exist. I accept it, therefore, with moderate confidence, and
will adopt the course you have sketched, not because I look for the
punctual payment of the money, but because Paulina's good fortune, if
secured, will secure mine. But I must add," and here Miss Brewer sat
upright in her chair, and a faint colour came into her sallow cheek, "I
should not have anything to do with your plots and plans, if I did not
believe, and see, that this one is for Paulina's real good."

Victor Carrington smiled, as he thought, "Here is a rare sample of
human nature. Here is this woman, quite pleased with herself, and
positively looking almost dignified, because she has succeeded in
persuading herself that she is actuated by a good motive."

The conversation between Miss Brewer and Victor Carrington lasted for
some time longer, and then he was left alone, while Miss Brewer went to
attend the _levee_ of Madame Durski. As he paced the room, Carrington
smiled again, and muttered, "If Dale were only here, and she could be
persuaded to borrow money of him, all would be right. So far, all is
going well, and I have taken the right course. My motto is the motto of
Danton--'_De l'audace, de l'audace, et toujours de l'audace_.'"

* * * * *

Victor Carrington dined with Madame Durski and her companion. The meal
was served with elegance, but the stamp of poverty was too plainly
impressed upon all things at Hilton House. The dinner served with such
ceremony was but a scanty banquet--the wines were poor--and Victor
perceived that, in place of the old silver which he had seen on a
previous occasion, Madame Durski's table was furnished with the most
worthless plated ware.

Paulina herself looked pale and haggard. She had the weary air of a
woman who finds life a burden almost too heavy for endurance.

"I have consented to see you this evening, Mr. Carrington, in
accordance with your very pressing message," she said, when she found
herself alone in the drawing-room with Victor Carrington after dinner,
Miss Brewer having discreetly retired; "but I cannot imagine what
business you can have with me."

"Do not question my motives too closely, Madame Durski," said Victor;
"there are some secrets lying deep at the root of every man's
existence. Believe me, when I assure you that I take a real interest in
your welfare, and that I came here to-night in the hope of serving you.
Will you permit me to speak as a friend?"

"I have so few friends that I should be the last to reject any honest
offer of friendship," answered Paulina, with a sigh. "And you are the
friend of Reginald Eversleigh. That fact alone gives you some claim to
my regard."

The widow had admitted Victor Carrington to a more intimate
acquaintance than the rest of her visitors; and it was fully understood
between them that he knew of the attachment between herself and Sir
Reginald.

"Sir Reginald Eversleigh is my friend," replied Victor; "but do not
think me treacherous, Madame Durski, when I tell you he is not worthy
of your regard. Were he here at this moment, I would say the same. He
is utterly selfish--it is of his own interest alone that he thinks; and
were the chance of a wealthy marriage to offer itself, I firmly believe
that he would seize it--ay! even if by doing so he knew that he was to
break your heart. I think you know that I am speaking the truth, Madame
Durski?"

"I do," answered Paulina, in a dull, half despairing tone. "Heaven help
me! I know that it is the truth. I have long known as much. We women
are capable of supreme folly. My folly is my regard for your friend
Reginald Eversleigh."

"Let your pride work the cure of that wasted devotion, madame," said
Victor, earnestly. "Do not submit any longer to be the dupe, the tool,
of this man. Do you know how dearly your self-sacrifice has cost you? I
am sure you do not. You do not know that this house is beginning to be
talked about as a place to be shunned. You have observed, perhaps, that
you have had few visitors of late. Day by day your visitors will grow
fewer. This house is marked. It is talked of at the clubs; and Reginald
Eversleigh will no longer be able to live upon the spoils won from his
dupes and victims. The game is up, Madame Durski; and now that you can
no longer be useful to Reginald Eversleigh, you will see how much his
love is worth."

"I believe he loves me," murmured Paulina, "after his own fashion."

"Yes, madame, after his own fashion, which is, at the best, a strange
one. May I ask how you spent your Christmas?"

"I was very lonely; this house seemed horribly cold and desolate. No
one came near me. There were no congratulations; no Christmas gifts.
Ah! Mr. Carrington, it is a sad thing to be quite alone in the world."

"And Reginald Eversleigh--the man whom you love--he who should have
been at your side, was at Hallgrove Rectory, among a circle of
visitors, flirting with the most notorious of coquettes--Miss Graham,
an old friend of his boyish days."

Victor looked at Paulina's face, and saw the random shot had gone home.
She grew even paler than she had been before, and there was a nervous
working of the lips that betrayed her agitation.

"Were there ladies amongst the guests at Hallgrove?" he asked.

"Yes, Madame Durski, there were ladies. Did you not know that it was to
be so?"