“She didn’t suffer at all?” said Griselda, with a wild look at the bed.
“No, no, my darling. No,” said Godfrey. “Look at her peaceful face.”
Griselda threw herself into her father’s arms, and he caressed her as if unconsciously.
“We can’t all stay here for ever,” said Matthew.
“Dufferin will be here very soon,” said Jermyn.
“Yes, yes, Dufferin will be here. Then we shall know,” said Godfrey, as if this gave a touch of hope.
“We had better go down to breakfast,” said Matthew.
“I don’t know about that, my boy.”
“We shall do no good by starving,” said Matthew.
“No, that is true,” said Godfrey, and turned and led the way from the room. “If we could, how willingly we would do it!”
“To save Mother,” said Gregory, with an unnatural note of mirth.
“You know the truth, Buttermere?” said Jermyn.
“Yes, sir. You will have to keep up your strength,” said Buttermere, as though the approach to the table needed some justification.
“We have a great deal before us,” said Godfrey. “You will share our sorrow in a measure, Buttermere.”
Buttermere gave his master a rapid glance, seeming new to the idea that he shared the family fortunes.
“We dare not face what is before us.”
“You will have to accommodate yourselves again, Sir Godfrey.”
“It passes me how it could have happened,” said Matthew.
“‘In the midst of life we are in death,’” said his father.
“But we are not,” said Matthew. “That is not true. There must be some cause.”
“Well, we shall know in a few minutes,” said Jermyn.
“Could she have done what she tried to do before?” said Griselda.
“Oh, no, no, my dear,” said Godfrey, and was silent.
Jermyn and Gregory looked at Matthew.
“Of course it crossed my mind,” said Matthew. “How could it not?”
“But how could she have come by what was needed?” said Gregory.
“We don’t know that she did come by it. There may be some other explanation. It is idle to speculate,” said Matthew.
“She hasn’t been near Dufferin’s house since she came home,” said Jermyn.
“She was there yesterday,” said Matthew. “Dufferin told me himself. She waited for him in his own room, and had a talk with him afterwards. You remember she came home late from her drive. She didn’t say a word of anything of the kind. But she was alone in his room for an hour.”
“Would anything of that sort be about? Wouldn’t it be put away?” said Gregory.
“Oh yes, I daresay it would; no doubt it would,” said Matthew. “Dufferin might have such things in his room, but under lock and key. I daresay she did not get it; of course she did not. There wasn’t any there that I know of. But this makes one think of any solution, and it is hard to see another. But there must be one. There is Dufferin’s bell.”
Godfrey rose and went into the hall, signing to his children to remain. He and Dufferin exchanged a word, and their steps were heard on the stairs.
“Well, I am not going to be kept here,” said Matthew. “I have as much right there as either of them. I will come and tell you as soon as there is anything to be told.”
“We somehow feel there is still hope,” said Jermyn.
“We are still before the verdict,” said Gregory.
“Nothing can make any difference,” said Griselda.
“No, but Mother may not have felt as wretched as that,” said Gregory.
“She couldn’t have. She would have shown it. She is in her way a transparent person,” said Jermyn, revealing his unchanged image of his mother.
Gregory went into the hall and looked upstairs. Godfrey and Matthew were standing on the landing, silent, and Harriet’s door was closed. Presently Matthew came to them.
“Yes, Griselda was right,” he said. “Dufferin thinks that is what it was. He is all but sure. It will be found out for certain later. She must have got it when she went to see him. She evidently knew his room better than he thought. She waited there for some time. We shall never know if she went with that purpose, or if the thought came to her while she was there.”
“But how did she feel before she did it? What made her do it?” said Griselda.
“She could not have been herself,” said Matthew’. “Her searching for it points to that. It was not like her in a natural mood. That sort of secretive skill is sometimes symptomatic.”
“It would be simply necessary. Open blundering would never work,” said Jermyn.
“Oh well, whatever it is,” said Matthew in a weary tone. He turned to the window, and his sister took his arm. He did not repulse her, but stood as if sunk in his thoughts.
Godfrey and Dufferin came on to the silence.
“I must go back to see if there are any of certain tablets gone,” said Dufferin. “Don’t be more troubled than you must. She suffered nothing; it was the same as dying in her sleep. Matthew can come with me, and be a witness about the amount that is missing. It is better than doing nothing here, though the rest of you must do your best with it. I am afraid it is clear how it was, though the bottle with the tablets will be a proof. In some manner or another she must have known my ways. The cupboard was locked, and the keys were in a drawer across the room. But after all it was possible enough for a reasoning and observing person. The thing that will be said, that she was temporarily insane, ought often to be the opposite.”
“Will it all have to come out?” said Jermyn.
“Yes, it will; we can’t help that,” said Dufferin. “It is all but out now. But it will do no harm to anyone. It won’t be different from other things of its kind. It isn’t anything to dwell upon. You have none of you done anything wrong. Keep that in mind, and have an eye on your sister. Matthew and I will be back when we can. You must remain in the house, and answer any questions with the simple truth. The next few days will soon pass.”
“Can’t anything be done to keep it secret?” asked Griselda.
“No, my darling. I asked that,” said her father. “It seems it has to be faced. We have that before us. It is a cruel thing that your mother cannot even pass from us in peace. I for one shall never feel ashamed of anything she has done. I shall feel to her simply as my beloved and loving wife, and my children’s devoted mother.”
“She didn’t seem so unlike herself yesterday,” said Griselda.
“I suppose she saw her life suddenly before her again, and felt she could not face it,” said Gregory.
“She must have felt that, my boy,” said Godfrey miserably. “But I didn’t guess it. I didn’t know what my wife went through on the last day she lived, the last of our thousands together. She didn’t tell me, though she always knew of anything that I suffered. She didn’t tell even Gregory. She went through it by herself.”
“Matthew looks very ill,” said Gregory. “I did not know people showed signs of shock so suddenly. From his eyes he might have known the truth all night. He is very like Mother.”
“Ah, he is very like her, I fear,” said his father. “I fear it for his own sake, because of what he may suffer. For myself I feel I have her left to me in one of her children. It is only in them that I can have her now.”
Matthew returned very soon. Dufferin had seen his need to relax, and undertaken himself what had to be done. The young man entered with a lifeless step, and answered questions in an empty tone.
“Yes, there was a tablet missing out of a bottle with three. The things on the shelf were a little out of place. The keys were not returned to quite the same position. It is clear enough.”
He sat down and put his hands on his knees, leaning forward over them.
“My dear boy!” cried Godfrey, hastening towards him. “It has been too much for you, having it all piled on you like this. You have had to face the most. You are your mother’s son. Your extra knowledge does not arm you against that. You shall get it off your mind, if you have to burden mine in doing it. Ah, what is it, Buttermere? Matthew, here is a better doctor that I can be to you!”