The Heavenly Twins by Madame Sarah Grand

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"And was she cured?" Evadne asked.

"Oh, yes," I answered. "There was no fear for her after she confessed.
When the moral consciousness returns in such cases, and there is nothing
but relief of mind to be gained by confession, the cure is generally
complete."

"But what could have been the motive of such a fraud?" somebody asked.

"It is difficult to imagine," I answered. "Had it been more extensive the
explanation would have been easier; but as myself and the young lady's
parents were her only audience, I have never been able to account for it
satisfactorily."

I noticed, while I was speaking, that Evadne was thinking the problem out
for herself.

"She would not have given herself so much trouble without a very strong
motive," she now suggested, "and human passions are the strongest motives
for human actions, are they not?"

"Of course," I said, "but the question is, what passion prompted her. It
could not have been either anger, ambition, revenge, or jealousy."

"No," she answered, in the matter-of-fact tone of one who merely arrives
at a logical conclusion, "and it must therefore have been love. She was in
love with you, and tried in that way to excite your sympathy and attract
your attention."

"It is quite evident that view of the case never occurred to you,
Galbraith," Dr. Lauder observed, laughing.

And I own that I _was_ taken aback by it, considerably--not of course
as it affected myself, but because it gave me a glimpse of an order of
mind totally different from that with which I should have credited Evadne
earlier in the evening.

"But how do you treat these cases?" she proceeded. "Is there any cure for
such depravity?"

"Oh, yes," I answered confidently. "They are being cured every day. So
long as there is no organic disease, I am quite sure that wholesome
surroundings, patience and kind care, and steady moral influence will do
all that is necessary. The great thing is to awaken the conscience.
Patients who once feel sincerely that such courses are depraved may cure
themselves--if they are not robbed of their self-respect. The most
hopeless causes I have, come from that class of people who give each other
bits of their mind--very objectionable bits, consisting of vulgar abuse
for the most part, and the calling of names that rankle. The operators
seem to derive a solemn kind of self-satisfaction from the treatment
themselves, but it does for the patient almost invariably."

This led to a discussion on bad manners, during which Evadne relapsed. I
saw the light go out of her eyes, and she showed no genuine interest in
anything for the rest of the evening; and when I had wrapped her up, and
seen her drive away, I somehow felt that the entertainment had been a
failure so far as she was concerned, and I wondered why she should so soon
be bored. At her age she should have had vitality enough in herself to
carry her through an evening.

"Colonel Colquhoun will regret that he has not been able to come," she
said as she wished me good-bye.

And I noticed afterward that she was always most punctilious about such
little formalities. She never omitted any trifle of etiquette, and I doubt
if she could have dined without "dressing" for dinner.

CHAPTER V.

Colonel Colquohoun called next day himself to explain his absence on the
previous evening. I forget what excuse he made, but it sufficed.

I saw Evadne, too, that same afternoon. She had been to make a call in the
neighbourhood, and was waiting at a little country station to return by
train. Something peculiar in her attitude attracted my attention before I
recognized her. She was standing alone at the extreme end of the platform,
her slender figure silhouetted with dark distinctness against the sloping
evening sky. She might have been waiting anxiously for someone to come
that way, or she might have been waiting for a train with tragic purpose.
She wore a long dark green dress, the train of which she was holding up in
her left hand. She showed no surprise when I spoke to her, although she
had not heard me approach.

"What do the people here think of me?" she asked abruptly. "What do they
say?"

"They have yet to discover your faults," I answered.

She compressed her lips, and looked down the line again.

"That is my train, I think," she said presently.

When I had put her into a carriage, she shook hands with me, thanking me
gravely, then threw herself back in her seat, and was borne away.

That was literally all that passed between us, yet she left me standing
there, staring after her stupidly, and curiously impressed. There was
always a suggestion of something unusual about her which piqued my
interest and kept it alive.

During the summer and autumn I met her at various places, and saw her also
in her own house, and she seemed, so far as an outsider could judge, as
happily situated as most women of her station, and not at all likely to
require any special service at the hands of a friend. Her husband was a
good deal older than herself, but the disparity made no apparent
difference to their comfort. When he was absent she never talked about
him, but when he was present she treated him with unvarying consideration,
and they appeared together everywhere. Mindful of my promise to Lady
Adeline, I showed them both every attention in my power. I called
regularly, and Colonel Colquhoun as regularly returned my calls, sometimes
bringing Evadne with him.

The winter that year came upon us suddenly and sharply, and until it set
in I had only seen her under the most ordinary circumstances; but at the
beginning of the cold weather, she had an illness which was the means of
my learning to know more of her true character and surroundings in a few
days than I should probably have done in years of mere social intercourse.
I stopped for a moment one morning as I drove past As-You-Like-It to leave
her some flowers, and her own maid, who opened the door, showed me
upstairs to a small sitting room, the ante-chamber to another room beyond,
at the door of which she knocked.

I heard no answer, but the girl entered and announced me. I followed her
in, and found myself face to face with Evadne. She was in bed. The maid
withdrew, closing the door after her.

"What nonsense is this--I am exceedingly sorry, doctor!" Evadne exclaimed
feebly. "That stupid girl must have thought that you were coming to see me
professionally. But, oh! _do_ let me look at the flowers!" and she
stretched out her left hand for them, offering me her right at the same
time to shake, and burying her face and her embarrassment together. Her
hand was hot and dry.

"I don't require you in the least, doctor," she assured me, looking up
brightly from the flowers, "but I am very glad to see you."

"Why are you in bed?" I asked, responding cheerfully to this cheerful
greeting.

"Oh, I have a little cold," she answered.

I drew a chair to the bedside, laid my hand on her wrist, and watched her
closely as I questioned her--cough incessant; respiration rapid;
temperature high, I judged; pulse 120.

"How long have you had this cold?" I asked.

"About a week," she said. "It makes me ache all over, you know, and that
is why I am in bed to-day."

I saw at once that she was seriously ill, and I also saw that she was
bearing up bravely, and making as little of it as possible.

"Why isn't your fire lit?" I asked.

"Oh, I never thought of having one," she answered.

"And what is that you are drinking?"

"Cold water."

"Well, you mustn't drink any more cold water, or anything else cold until
I give you leave," I ordered. "And don't try to talk. I will come and see
you again by and by."

I went downstairs to look for Colonel Colquhoun, and found him just about
to start for barracks.

"I am sorry to say your wife is very ill," I said. "She has an attack of
acute bronchitis, and it may mean pneumonia as well; I have not examined
her chest. She must have fires in her room, and a bronchitis kettle at
once. Don't let the temperature get below 70 deg. till I see her again. Her
maid can manage for a few hours, I suppose? But you had better telegraph
for a nurse. One should be here before night."

"What a damned nuisance these women are," Colquhoun answered cheerfully.
"There's always something the matter with them!"

I returned between five and six in the evening, walked in, and not seeing
anybody about, went up to Evadne's sitting room. The door leading into the
bedroom was open, and I entered. She was alone, and had propped herself up
in bed with pillows. The difficulty of breathing had become greater, and
she found relief in that attitude. She looked at me with eyes unnaturally
large and solemn as I entered, and it was a full moment before she
recognised me. The fires had not been lighted in either of the rooms, and
she was evidently much worse.

"Why haven't these fires been lighted?" I demanded.

"This is only October," she answered, jesting, "and we don't begin fires
till November."

I rang the bell emphatically.

"Do not trouble yourself, doctor," she remonstrated gently. "What does it
matter?"

I went out into the sitting room to meet the maid as she entered.

"Why haven't these fires been lighted?" I asked again.

"I don't know, sir," she answered. "I received no orders about them."

"Where is Colonel Colquhoun?"

"He went out after breakfast, sir, and has not come back yet."

"Has the nurse arrived?"

"No, sir."

"Well, light these fires at once."

"I don't light fires, sir," she said, drawing herself up. "It isn't my
work."

"Whose work is it?" I demanded.

"Either of the housemaids', sir, but they're both out," she answered,
ogling me pertly.

I own that I was exasperated, and I showed it in such a way that she fled
precipitately. I followed her downstairs to find the butler. I happened to
know the man. His wife had been in my service, and I had attended her
through a severe illness since her marriage.

"Do you know if there's such a thing as a sensible woman in this
establishment, Williamson?" I demanded.

"Well, sir, the cook's sensible when she's sober," he answered, pinching
his chin dubiously.

"Does she happen to be sober now?"

He glanced at the clock. "I'll just see, sir," he said.

When he returned he announced, with perfect gravity, that she was
'passable sober, but busy with the dinner."

"Then look here," I exclaimed, out of all patience, "we must do it
ourselves."

"Yes, sir," he said. "Anything I _can_ do."

When I explained the difficulty, he suggested sending for his wife, who
could manage, he thought, until the trained nurse arrived, and help her
afterward. It was a good idea, and my man was despatched to bring her
immediately.

"They're a bad lot o' servants, the women in this 'ouse at present,"
Williamson informed me. "The missus didn't choose 'em 'erself"--and he
shook his head significantly, "But she knows what's what, and they're
going. That's why they're takin' advantage."

I returned to Evadne. Her eyes were closed and her forehead contracted.
Every breath of cold air was cutting her lungs like a knife, but she
looked up at me when I took her hand, and smiled. I never knew anybody so
patient and uncomplaining. She was lying on a little iron bedstead, hard
and narrow as a camp bed. The room was bare-looking, the floor being
polished and with only two small rugs, one at the fireplace and one beside
the bed, upon it. It looked like a nun's cell, and there was a certain
suggestion of purity in the sweetness and order of it quite consistent
with the idea; but it was a north room and very cold, Evadne had
unconsciously clasped my hand, and dozed off for a few minutes, holding it
tight, but the cough re-aroused her. When she looked at me again her mind
was wandering. She knew me, but she did not know what she was saying.

"I am so thankful!" she exclaimed. "The peace of mind--the peace of
mind--I cannot tell you what a relief it is!"

Williamson came in on tiptoe and lit the fire, and Evadne's maid followed
him in and stood looking on, half sheepishly and half in defiance. I
noticed now that she was a hard-faced, bold-looking girl, not at all the
sort of person to have about my delicate little lady, and when Mrs.
Williamson arrived, I ordered her out of the room, and never allowed her
to enter it again. During the week she left altogether, and I was
fortunately able to procure a suitable woman to wait upon Mrs. Colquhoun.
She has been with her ever since, by the way.

I felt pretty sure by this time that no nurse had been sent for, and I
therefore despatched one of Colonel Colquhoun's men in a dogcart to
Morningquest to telegraph for one. But she could not arrive before
daylight even by special train, and it had now become a matter of life and
death, and as Mrs. Williamson had no knowledge of nursing to help her good
will, I determined to spend the night beside my patient.

When Colonel Colquhoun came in and found me making myself at home in his
house he expressed himself greatly pleased.

"When I returned this afternoon to see how Mrs. Colquhoun was progressing,
I found that none of my orders had been carried out, and now she is
dangerously ill," I said severely.

"Faith," he replied, changing countenance, "I'm very sorry to hear it, and
I'm afraid I'm to blame, for I was in the deuce of a hurry when I saw you
this morning, and never thought of a word you said from that moment to
this. Now I'm genuinely sorry," he repeated. "Is there nothing I can do?
Mrs. Orton Beg--"

"She's gone abroad for the winter."

"Ah, to be sure!"

"And everybody else is away who would be of any use," I added, "and I
therefore propose, if you have no objection, to stay here to-night
myself."

"You'd oblige me greatly by doing so," he answered earnestly. "I don't
know what there is for dinner, but I shall enjoy it all the more myself
for the pleasure of your company."

He made no special inquiries about his wife's condition, and never went
near her; but as he was in a tolerably advanced state of intoxication
before he retired for the night, it was quite as well, perhaps.

Mrs. Williamson had probably done her day's work before I sent for her,
and, with all the will in the world to wake and watch, she fell fast
asleep before midnight, and I let her sleep. There were only the fires to
be attended to--at least that was all that I could have trusted her to do.
Watching the case, generally, and seizing opportune moments to administer
remedies would not have been in her line at all.

Evadne knew me always, but she lost all count of time.

"You seem to come every day now, doctor," she said once during the night,
"and I _am_ glad to see you!"

For two hours toward dawn, when the temperature is sensibly lower, I gave
my little lady up; but she was better by the time the trained nurse
arrived, and eventually she pulled through--greatly owing, I am sure, to
her own perfect patience. She was always the same all through her illness,
gentle, uncomplaining, grateful for every trifle that was done for her,
and tranquillity herself. My impression was that she enjoyed being ill. I
never saw a symptom of depression the whole time; but when she had quite
recovered, and although, as often happens after a severe illness, when
so-called "trifles" are discovered and checked which would otherwise have
been allowed to run on until they grew serious--although for this reason
she was certainly stronger than she had ever been since I became
acquainted with her, no sooner did she resume her accustomed habits than
that old unsatisfactory something in her, which it was so easy to perceive
but so difficult to define, returned in full force.

I had ceased to be critical, however. Colonel Colquhoun's careless neglect
of her had continued throughout her illness, and I thought I understood.

CHAPTER VI.

I had necessarily seen much of Evadne during her illness, and the intimacy
never again lapsed.

Jealousy was not one of Colonel Colquhoun's vices. He always encouraged
any man to come to the house for whom she showed the slightest preference,
and I have heard him complain of her indifference to admiration.

"She'll dress herself up carefully in the evening to sit at home alone
with me, and go out to a big dinner party in the dowdiest gown she's got,"
he told me once. "She doesn't care a hang whether she's admired or
not--rather objects, if anything, perhaps."

Colonel Colquhoun rubbed his hands here with a certain enjoyment of such
perversity. But I could see that Evadne did not relish the subject. It was
one afternoon at As-You-Like-It. I was tired after a long day and had
dropped in to ask for some tea. Colonel Colquhoun came up to entertain me,
and Evadne went on with her work while we chatted familiarly.

"You were never so civil to any of your admirers, Evadne, as you were to
that great boy in the regiment," Colonel Colquhoun continued, quite blind
to her obvious and natural though silent objection to being made the
subject of conversation--"a young subaltern of ours," he explained to me,
"a big broad-shouldered lad, six feet high, who just worshipped Evadne!"

"Poor boy!" said Evadne, sighing. "He was cruelly butchered in a horribly
fruitless skirmish with his fellow creatures during that last small war. I
was glad I was able to be kind to him. He was always very nice to me."

"Well, there's a reason for everything!" Colonel Colquhoun observed
gallantly.

"Don't you like boys?" Evadne asked, looking up at me. "The ones we have
here at the depot, when they first come, fresh from the public schools,
are delightful, with their high spirits, and their love affairs; their
pranks, and the something beyond which will make men of them eventually. I
can never see enough of _our_ boys. But Colonel Colquhoun very kindly
lets me have as many of them here as I like."

"Faith, I can't keep them out, for they're all in love with you," said
Colonel Colquhoun.

"And I am in love with them all!" she answered brightly, leaning back in
her chair, and holding up her work to look at it. As she did so, the lower
half of her face was concealed from me, and her eyes were cast down. I
only glanced at her, but, in the act of doing so, I suddenly became aware,
by one of those curious flashes of imperfect recollection which come to us
all at times to torment us, that I had seen her somewhere, before I knew
who she was, in that attitude exactly; but where, or under what
circumstance, I failed to recollect. The impression, however, was
indelible, and haunted me ever afterward.

"Now, there's Diavolo," Colonel Colquhoun continued--the exchange I had
suggested had been effected by this time, and Diavolo was quartered at the
depot--not exactly to Colonel Colquhoun's delight, perhaps, but he was
very good about it. "Now, there's Diavolo. He tells me to my face that he
was the first to propose to Mrs. Colquhoun, and always meant to marry her,
and means it still. He said to me coaxingly, only last Friday, when I was
coming out of barracks: 'Take me home with you to-day, sir.' And I
answered, pretending to be severe, but pulling his sleeve, you know:
'Indeed I won't. You'll be making love to Mrs. Colquhoun.' And he got very
red, and said quite huffily; 'Well, I think you might let a fellow look at
her.' And of course I had to bring him back with me, and he sat down on
the floor at her feet there, and got on with the most ridiculous nonsense.
You couldn't help laughing! 'I should like to kill you, and carry her
off,' he said, for all the world as if he meant it. And no more harm in
the boy, either, than there is in Evadne herself," Colonel Colquhoun added
good-humouredly.

This is a specimen of the man at his best. Latterly I had seldom seen him
in such a genial mood at home--abroad he brightened up. But in his own
house _now_--for a process of deterioration had been going on ever
since his arrival in Morningquest--his mind was apt to resemble a dark
cave which is transformed diurnally by a single shaft of sunshine which
streams in for a brief space at a certain hour. The happy moment with him
occurred about the time of the tenth brandy-and-soda, as nearly as I could
calculate, and it lasted till the eleventh, when he usually relapsed into
gloom again, and became overcast until the next recurrence of the
phenomena. But whatever his mood was, Evadne humoured it. She responded
always--or tried to--when he was genial; and when he was morose, she was
dumb. I thought her a model wife.

CHAPTER VII.

After her illness Evadne spent much of her time in the west window of the
drawing room at As-You-Like-It with her little work-table beside her,
embroidering. I never saw her reading, and there were no books about the
room; but the work she did was beautiful. She used to have a stand before
her with flowers arranged upon it, and copy them on to some material in
coloured silks direct from nature. She could not draw either with pen or
pencil, or paint with a brush, but she could copy with her needle quite
accurately, and would do a spray of lilies to the life, or in the most
approved conventional manner, if it pleased her. Her not being able to
draw struck me as a curious limitation, and I asked her once if she could
account for it in any way.

"I believe I am an example of how much we owe to early influences," she
answered, laughing; "and probably I have the talent both for drawing and
painting in me, but it remains latent for want of cultivation. My mother
drew and painted beautifully as a girl, but she had given both up before I
was old enough to imitate her, and only copied flowers as I do with her
needle, and I used to watch her at her work until I felt impelled to do
the same. If she had gone on with her drawing I am sure I should have
drawn too; but as it was, I never thought of trying."

"Moral for mothers," I observed: "Keep up your own accomplishments if you
would have your daughters shine."

Evadne was not enough in the fresh air at this time, and she was too much
alone. I ventured once, in my professional capacity, to say that she
should have friends to stay with her occasionally, but she passed the
suggestion off without either accepting or declining it, and then I spoke
to Colonel Colquhoun. He, however, pooh-poohed the idea altogether.

"She's all right," he said. "You don't know her. She always lives like
that; it's her way."

I also counselled regular exercise, and to that she replied: "I _do_
go out. Why, you passed me yourself on the road only the other day."

I certainly had seen her more than once, alone, miles away from home,
walking at the top of her speed, as if impelled by some strong emotion or
inexorable necessity, and I did not like the sign. "One or two hours' walk
regularly every day is what you should take," I told her. "The virtue of
it is in the regularity. If you make a habit of taking a short walk daily
you will have got more sunshine and fresh air, which is what you specially
require, in one year than you will in two if you continue to go out in a
jerky, irregular way. And you must give up covering impossible distances
in feverish haste, as you do now. Walk gently, and make yourself feel that
you have full leisure to walk as long as you like. You will find the
effect tranquillizing. It is a common mistake to make a business of taking
exercise. I am constantly lecturing my patients about it. If you want
exercise to raise your spirits, brace your nerves, and do you good
generally, it must be all pure pleasure without conscious exertion.
Pleasurable moments prolong life."

"Thank you," Evadne answered gently. "I know, of course, that you are
right, and I will do my best to profit by your advice, if it be only to
show you how much I appreciate your kindness. But I must have a scamper
occasionally, a regular _burst_, you know. Please don't stop that!
The indulgence, when I am in the mood, is my pet vice at present."

The great drawing room at As-You-Like-It, which I had mentioned in my
letter to Lady Adeline as containing the one bright spot in that gloomy
abode, was an addition tacked on to the end of the house, and evidently an
afterthought. It was entered by a flight of shallow steps from the hall,
and was above the level of the public road, which ran close past that end
of the house, the grounds and approach being on the other side. It was
lighted by three high narrow windows looking toward the north, and three
more close together looking west, and forming a bay so deep as to be quite
a small room in itself. It almost overhung the high-road, only a tall
holly-hedge being between them, but so near that the topmost twigs of the
holly grew up to the window-sill. It was a quiet road, however, too far
from the town for much traffic, and Evadne could sit there with the
windows open undisturbed, and enjoy the long level prospect of fertile
land, field and fallow, wood and water, that lay before her. She sat in
the centre window, and I think it was from thence that she learnt to
appreciate the charms of a level landscape as you look down upon it, about
which I heard her discourse so eloquently in after days. It was her chosen
corner, and there she sat silent many and many an hour, with busy fingers
and thoughts we could not follow, communing at times with nature, I doubt
not, or with her own heart, and thankful to be still.