Chapter 5 The Unveiling Shadows

"No! no! I do not think so," said Margaret, with a bewildered air, "we had chairs close to the side. And Miss Brandt was telling me of her life in Jamaica, when such an extraordinary sensation came over me! I can't describe it! it was just as if I had been scooped hollow!"

At this description, Harriet Brandt burst into a loud laugh, but Elinor frowned her down.

"It may seem a laughing matter to you, Miss Brandt," she said, in the same cold tone, "but it is none to me. Mrs. Pullen is far from strong, and her health is not to be trifled with. However, I shall not let her out of my sight again."

"Don't make a fuss about it, Elinor," pleaded her friend, "it was my own fault, if anyone's. I think there must be a thunderstorm in the air, I have felt so oppressed all the evening. Or is the smell from the dunes worse than usual? Perhaps I ate something at dinner that disagreed with me!"

"I cannot understand it at all," replied Miss Leyton, "you are not used to fainting, or being suddenly attacked in any way. However, if you feel able to walk, let us go back to the Hotel. Miss Brandt will doubtless find someone to finish the evening with!"

Harriet was just about to reply that she knew no one but

themselves, and to offer to take Mrs. Pullen's arm on the other side, when Elinor Leyton cut her short.

"No! thank you, Miss Brandt! Mrs. Pullen would, I am sure, prefer to return to the Hotel alone with me! You can easily join the Vieuxtemps or any other of the visitors to the Lion d'Or. There is not much ceremony observed amongst the English at these foreign places. It would be better perhaps if there were a little more! Come, Margaret, take my arm, and we will walk as slowly as you like! But I shall not be comfortable until I see you safe in your own room!"

So the two ladies moved off together, leaving Harriet Brandt standing disconsolately on the Digue, watching their departure. Mrs. Pullen had uttered a faint Good-night to her, but had made no suggestion that she should walk back with them, and it seemed to the girl as if they both, in some measure, blamed her for the illness of her companion. What had she done, she asked herself, as she reviewed what had passed between them, that could in any way account for Mrs. Pullen's illness? She liked her so much-so very much-she had so hoped she was going to be her friend-she would have done anything and given anything sooner than put her to inconvenience in any way. As the two ladies moved slowly out of sight, Harriet turned sadly and walked the other way. She felt lonely and disappointed. She knew no one to speak to, and there was a cold empty feeling in her breast, as though, in losing her hold on Margaret Pullen, she had lost something on which she had depended. Something of her feeling must have communicated itself to Margaret Pullen, for after a minute or two she stopped and said,

"I don't half like leaving Miss Brandt by herself, Elinor! She is very young to be wandering about a town by night and alone!"

"Nonsense!" returned Miss Leyton, shortly, "a young lady who can make the voyage from Jamaica to Heyst on her own account, knocking about in London for a week on the way, is surely competent to walk back to the Hotel without your assistance. I should say that Miss Brandt was a very independent young woman!"

"Perhaps, by nature, but she has been shut up in a convent for the best part of her life, and that is not considered to be a good preparation for fighting one's way through the world!"

"She'll be able to fight her own battles, never fear!" was Elinor's reply.

Just then they encountered Bobby Bates, who lifted his cap as he hurried past them.

"Where are you going so fast, Mr. Bates?" said Elinor Leyton.

"I am going back to the Hotel to fetch Mamma's fur boa!" he answered.

They were passing a lighted lamp at the time, and she noticed that the lad's eyes were red, and his features bore traces of distress.

"Are you ill?" she enquired quickly, "or in any trouble?" He halted for a minute in his stride.

"No! no! not exactly," he said in a low voice, and then, as if the words came from him against his will, he went on, "But O! I do wish someone would speak to Mamma about the way she treats me. It's cruel-to strike me with her stick before all those people, as if I were a baby, and to call me such names! Even the servant William laughs at me! Do all mothers do the same, Miss Leyton? Ought a man to stand it quietly?"

"Decidedly not!" cried Elinor, without hesitation.

"O! Elinor! remember, she is his mother," remonstrated Margaret, "don't say anything to set him against her!"

"But I was nineteen last birthday," continued the lad, "and sometimes she treats me in such a manner, that I can't bear it! The Baron dare not say a word to her! She swears at him so. Sometimes, I think I will run away and go to sea!"

"No! no! you mustn't do that!" called Miss Leyton after him, as he quickened his footsteps in the direction of the Lion d'Or.

"What an awful woman!" sighed Mrs. Pullen. "Fancy! striking her own son in public, and with that thick stick too. I believe he had been crying!"

"I am sure he had," replied her friend, "you can see the poor fellow is half-witted, and very weakly into the bargain. I suppose she has beaten his brains to a pap. What a terrible misfortune to have such a mother! You should hear some of the stories Madame Lamont has to tell of her!"

"But how does she hear them?"

"Through the Baron's servant William, I suppose. He says the Baroness has often taken her stick to him and the other servants, and thinks no more of swearing at them than a trooper! They all hate her. One day, she took up a kitchen cleaver and advanced upon her coachman with it, but he seized her by both arms and sat her down upon the fire, whence she was only rescued after being somewhat severely burned!"

"It served her right!" exclaimed Margaret, laughing at the ludicrous idea, "but what a picture she must have presented, seated on the kitchen range! Where can the woman have been raised? What sort of a person can she be?"

"Not what she pretends, Margaret, you may be sure of that! All her fine talk of lords and ladies is so much bunkum. But I pity the poor little Baron, who is, at all events, inoffensive. How can he put up with such a wife! He must feel very much ashamed of her sometimes!"

"And yet he seems devoted to her! He never leaves her side for a moment. He is her walking stick, her fetcher and carrier, and her scribe. I don't believe she can write a letter!"

"And yet she was talking at the table d'hôte yesterday of the Duke of This and the Earl of That, and hinting at her having stayed at Osborne and Windsor. Of course they are falsehoods! She has never seen the inside of a palace unless it was in the capacity of a char-woman! Have you observed her hair? It is as coarse as a horse-tail! And her hands! Bobby informed me the other day that his Mamma took nines in gloves! She's not a woman, my dear! She's a female elephant!"

Margaret was laughing still, when they reached the steps of the Lion d'Or.

"You are very naughty and very scandalous, Elinor," she said, "but you have done me a world of good. My unpleasant feelings have quite gone. I am quite capable of continuing our walk if you would like to do so."

"No such thing, Madam," replied Miss Leyton. "I am responsible for your well-doing in Arthur's absence. Upstairs and into bed you go, unless you would like a cup of coffee and a chasse first. That is the only indulgence I can grant you."

But Mrs. Pullen declined the proffered refreshment, and the two ladies sought their rooms in company.