The Gerrard Street Mystery and Other Weird Tales by John Charles Dent (i can read with my eyes shut TXT) 📖

her line of action on the instant. Her love for the father of her child died away as she gazed on his picture. It was borne in upon her that he was a heartless scoundrel, unworthy of any woman's regard. Before she withdrew her glance from the daguerreotype, her love for him was dead and buried beyond all possibility of revivification. What would it avail her to still further lacerate the heart of the unhappy woman in whose presence she stood? Why kill her outright by revealing the truth? There was but a step--and evidently the step was a short one--between her and the grave. The distance should not be abridged by any act of the lawful wife.
She closed the case and quietly handed it back to the woman, whom it will still be convenient to call Mrs. Randall. "I see there has been some misunderstanding," she said. "This is not the Mr. Randall I knew in Canada."
In her kind consideration for the invalid, she deliberately conveyed a false impression, though she spoke nothing more than the simple truth. There had indeed been "some misunderstanding," and Savareen's likeness was certainly not the likeness of Mr. Randall. As matter of fact, Mrs. Savareen had really known a Mr. Randall in Millbrook, who bore no resemblance whatever to her husband. Thus, she spoke the literal truth, while she at the same time deceived her hostess for the latter's own good. Affliction had laid its blighting hand there heavily enough already. Her main object now was to get away from the house before the return of the man who had so villainously wrecked two innocent lives. But a warm sympathy for the betrayed and friendless woman had sprung up in her heart, and she longed to leave behind some practical token of her sympathy. While she was indulging in these reflections the infant on the bed awoke and set up a startled little cry. Its mother advanced to where it lay, took it up in her arms, sat down on the edge of the bed, and stilled its forlorn little wails by the means known to mothers from time immemorial. When it became quiet she again deposited it on the bed and resumed her seat by the table.
Mrs. Savareen continued standing.
"I am sorry to have disturbed you unnecessarily," she remarked "and will now take my leave. Is there anything I can do for you? I should be glad if I could be of any use. I am afraid you are not very comfortably off, and you are far from well in health. It is not kind of Mr. Randall to leave you alone like this. You need rest and medical advice."
These were probably the first sympathetic words Mrs. Randall had heard from one of her own sex for many a long day. The tears started to her tired eyes, as she replied:
"I guess there ain't no rest for me this side o' the grave. I haven't any money to git medical advice, and I don't suppose a doctor could do me any good. I'm pretty well run down and so is baby. I'm told it can't live long, and if it was only laid to rest I wouldn't care how soon my time came. You're right about our being awful hard up. But don't you be too hard on my husband. He has his own troubles as well as me. He hain't had no cash lately, and don't seem to be able to git none."
"But he could surely stay at home and keep you company at nights, when you are so ill. It must be very lonely for you."
"Well, you see, I ain't much company for him. He's ben brought up different to what I hev, an's ben used to hevin' things comfortable. I ain't strong enough to do much of anything myself, with a sick baby. I'm sure I don't know what's to be the end of it all. Es a gineral thing he don't mean to be unkind, but----"
Here the long-suffering woman utterly broke down, and was convulsed by a succession of sobs, which seemed to exhaust the small stock of vitality left to her. The visitor approached the chair where she sat, knelt by her side, and took the poor wasted form in her arms.
They mingled their tears together. For some time neither of them was able to speak a word, but the sympathy of the stronger of the two acted like a cordial upon her weaker sister, who gradually became calm and composed. The sobs died away, and the shattered frame ceased to tremble. Then they began to talk. Mrs. Savareen's share in the conversation was chiefly confined to a series of sympathetic questions, whereby she extracted such particulars as furnished a key to the present situation. It appeared that the _soi-disant_ Jack Randall had made the acquaintance of his second victim within a short time after his departure from Canada. He had then been engaged in business on his own account as a dealer in horses in Lexington, Kentucky, where the father of the woman whose life he had afterwards blighted kept a tavern. He had made soft speeches to her, and had won her heart, although, even then, she had not been blind to his main defect--a fondness for old Bourbon. After a somewhat protracted courtship she had married him, but the sun of prosperity had never shone upon them after their marriage, for his drinking habit had grown upon him, and he had soon got to the end of what little money he had. He had been compelled to give up business, and to take service with anyone who would employ him. Then matters had gone from bad to worse. He had been compelled to move about from one town to another, for his habits would not admit of his continuing long in any situation. She had accompanied him wherever he went with true wifely devotion, but had been constrained to drink deeply of the cup of privation, and had never been free from anxiety. About six months ago they had come to New York, where he had at first found fairly remunerative employment in Hitchcock's sale stable. But there, as elsewhere, he had wrecked his prospects by drink and neglect of business, and for some time past the unhappy pair had been entirely destitute. The baby had been born soon after they had taken up their quarters in New York. The mother's health, which had been far from strong before this event, completely broke down, and she had never fully recovered. The seeds of consumption, which had probably been implanted in her before her birth, had rapidly developed themselves under the unpromising regimen to which she had been subjected, and it was apparent that she had not long to live. She was unable to afford proper nourishment to her child, which languished from day to day, and the only strong desire left to her was that she might survive long enough to see it fairly out of the world.
Such was the sad tale poured into the sympathetic ears of Mrs. Savareen, as she knelt there with the poor creature's head against her boson. She, for the time, lost sight of her own share in the misery brought about by the man who, in the eye of the law, was still her husband. She spoke such words of comfort and consolation as suggested themselves to her, but the case was a hopeless one, and it was evident that no permanent consolation could ever again find a lodgment in the breast of the woman who supposed herself to be Mrs. Randall. The best that was left to her in this world was to hear the sad rites pronounced over her babe, and then to drop gently away into that long, last sleep, wherein, it was to be hoped, she would find that calm repose which a cruel fate had denied her so long as she remained on earth.
Mrs. Savareen, it will be remembered, was a pious woman. In such a situation as that in which she found herself, we may feel sure that she did not omit all reference to the consolations of religion. She poured into the ear of this sore-tried soul a few of those words at which thinkers of the modern school are wont to sneer, but which for eighteen centuries have brought balm to the suffering and the afflicted of every clime. Moreover, she did not neglect to administer consolation of a material kind. She emptied her purse into the invalid's lap. It contained something like thirty dollars--more money, probably, than Mrs. Randall had ever called her own before. "Keep this for your own use," she said--"it will buy many little comforts for you and baby. No, I will not take any of it back. I am comfortably off and shall not want it." Then, with a final embrace, and a few hurried words of farewell, she stepped to the bedside and imprinted a kiss on the little waif lying there, all unconscious of the world of sin and sorrow in which it held so precarious a dwelling place. Her mission was at an end. She silently passed from the room, closing the door behind her.


CHAPTER XII.
STILL A MYSTERY.
At the head of the stairway she paused for a moment to collect herself before passing down and out into the street. What she had left behind her was of a nature well fitted to excite emotion, and her bosom rose and fell with a gentle tenderness and pity. But she had learned self control in the school of experience, and her delay was a brief one. Mastering her emotions, she walked steadily down the two flights of stairs, opened the front door for herself, and was just about to cross the threshold when a man entered. The light of the street lamp fell full upon his face. It was the face of the man whose mysterious disappearance five years before had created such a profound sensation throughout Western Canada. There was no possibility of mistaking it, though it was greatly changed for the worse. Five years had wrought terrible havoc upon it. The scar on the left cheek was more conspicuous than of yore, and the features seemed to have settled into a perpetual frown. But, worst of all, the countenance was bloated and besotted. The nose had become bulbous and spongy, the eyes watery and weak. The man's clothes were patched and seedy, and presented a general aspect of being desperately out at elbows. His unsteady step indicated that he was at least half drunk at that moment. He did not see; or at any rate did not take any notice of the woman who gazed into his face so intently. As he staggered on his way upstairs he stumbled and narrowly escaped falling. Could it be possible that this disreputable object was the man whom she had once loved as her husband? She shuddered as she passed out on to the pavement. Truly, his sin had found him out.
She had no difficulty in finding her way back to the hotel, without asking questions of anybody. Upon reaching it she conferred for a moment with the office clerk, and then passed up to a small general sitting-room where she found her father. The old gentleman was beginning to be anxious at her long absence.
"Well, father, I find there is an express for Suspension Bridge at midnight. I think we had better take it. It is now half-past ten. I have learned all I wanted to know, and there is no use for us to stay here on expense. But perhaps you are tired, and would like a night's rest."
"Found out all you wanted to know? Do you mean to say you have seen him?"
"Yes, and I never wish to see or hear