Lady Audley’s Secret M. E. Braddon (best historical fiction books of all time TXT) 📖

had not come home; she had looked in as early as six o’clock that morning, and found the chambers empty.

“Had anything happened to the poor, dear gentleman?” she asked, seeing Robert Audley’s pale face.

He turned around upon her quite savagely at this question.

Happened to him! What should happen to him? They had only parted at two o’clock the day before.

Mrs. Maloney would have related to him the history of a poor dear young engine-driver, who had once lodged with her, and who went out, after eating a hearty dinner, in the best of spirits, to meet with his death from the concussion of an express and a luggage train; but Robert put on his hat again, and walked straight out of the house before the honest Irishwoman could begin her pitiful story.

It was growing dusk when he reached Southampton. He knew his way to the poor little terrace of houses, in a full street leading down to the water, where George’s father-in-law lived. Little Georgey was playing at the open parlor window as the young man walked down the street.

Perhaps it was this fact, and the dull and silent aspect of the house, which filled Robert Audley’s mind with a vague conviction that the man he came to look for was not there. The old man himself opened the door, and the child peeped out of the parlor to see the strange gentleman.

He was a handsome boy, with his father’s brown eyes and dark waving hair, and with some latent expression which was not his father’s and which pervaded his whole face, so that although each feature of the child resembled the same feature in George Talboys, the boy was not actually like him.

Mr. Maldon was delighted to see Robert Audley; he remembered having had the pleasure of meeting him at Ventnor, on the melancholy occasion of⁠—He wiped his watery old eyes by way of conclusion to the sentence. Would Mr. Audley walk in? Robert strode into the parlor. The furniture was shabby and dingy, and the place reeked with the smell of stale tobacco and brandy-and-water. The boy’s broken playthings, and the old man’s broken clay pipes and torn, brandy-and-water-stained newspapers were scattered upon the dirty carpet. Little Georgey crept toward the visitor, watching him furtively out of his big, brown eyes. Robert took the boy on his knee, and gave him his watch-chain to play with while he talked to the old man.

“I need scarcely ask the question that I come to ask,” he said; “I was in hopes I should have found your son-in-law here.”

“What! you knew that he was coming to Southampton?”

“Knew that he was coming?” cried Robert, brightening up. “He is here, then?”

“No, he is not here now; but he has been here.”

“When?”

“Late last night; he came by the mail.”

“And left again immediately?”

“He stayed little better than an hour.”

“Good Heaven!” said Robert, “what useless anxiety that man has given me! What can be the meaning of all this?”

“You knew nothing of his intention, then?”

“Of what intention?”

“I mean of his determination to go to Australia.”

“I know that it was always in his mind more or less, but not more just now than usual.”

“He sails tonight from Liverpool. He came here at one o’clock this morning to have a look at the boy, he said, before he left England, perhaps never to return. He told me he was sick of the world, and that the rough life out there was the only thing to suit him. He stayed an hour, kissed the boy without awaking him, and left Southampton by the mail that starts at a quarter-past two.”

“What can be the meaning of all this?” said Robert. “What could be his motive for leaving England in this manner, without a word to me, his most intimate friend⁠—without even a change of clothes; for he has left everything at my chambers? It is the most extraordinary proceeding!”

The old man looked very grave. “Do you know, Mr. Audley,” he said, tapping his forehead significantly, “I sometimes fancy that Helen’s death had a strange effect upon poor George.”

“Pshaw!” cried Robert, contemptuously; “he felt the blow most cruelly, but his brain was as sound as yours or mine.”

“Perhaps he will write to you from Liverpool,” said George’s father-in-law. He seemed anxious to smooth over any indignation that Robert might feel at his friend’s conduct.

“He ought,” said Robert, gravely, “for we’ve been good friends from the days when we were together at Eton. It isn’t kind of George Talboys to treat me like this.”

But even at the moment that he uttered the reproach a strange thrill of remorse shot through his heart.

“It isn’t like him,” he said, “it isn’t like George Talboys.”

Little Georgey caught at the sound. “That’s my name,” he said, “and my papa’s name⁠—the big gentleman’s name.”

“Yes, little Georgey, and your papa came last night and kissed you in your sleep. Do you remember?”

“No,” said the boy, shaking his curly little head.

“You must have been very fast asleep, little Georgey, not to see poor papa.”

The child did not answer, but presently, fixing his eyes upon Robert’s face, he said abruptly:

“Where’s the pretty lady?”

“What pretty lady?”

“The pretty lady that used to come a long while ago.”

“He means his poor mamma,” said the old man.

“No,” cried the boy resolutely, “not mamma. Mamma was always crying. I didn’t like mamma⁠—”

“Hush, little Georgey!”

“But I didn’t, and she didn’t like me. She was always crying. I mean the pretty lady; the lady that was dressed so fine, and that gave me my gold watch.”

“He means the wife of my old captain⁠—an excellent creature, who took a great fancy to Georgey, and gave him some handsome presents.”

“Where’s my gold watch? Let me show the gentleman my gold watch,” cried Georgey.

“It’s gone to be cleaned, Georgey,” answered his grandfather.

“It’s always going to be cleaned,” said the boy.

“The watch is perfectly safe, I assure you, Mr. Audley,” murmured the old man, apologetically; and taking out a pawnbroker’s duplicate, he handed it to Robert.

It was made out in the name of Captain Mortimer: “Watch,