The Haunted Hotel A Mystery of Modern Venice

THE HAUNTED HOTEL: A MYSTERY OF MODERN VENICE

the hotel – inconceivably transformed into a timid, shrinking woman! Lady Montbarry had not once ventured to look at Agnes, since she had made her way into the room. Advancing to take the chair that had been pointed out to her, she hesitated, put her hand on the rail to support herself, and still remained standing. ‘Please give me a moment to compose myself,’ she said faintly. Her head sank on her bosom: she stood before Agnes like a conscious culprit before a merciless judge.

The silence that followed was, literally, the silence of fear on both sides. In the midst of it, the door was opened once more – and Henry Westwick appeared.

He looked at Lady Montbarry with a moment’s steady attention – bowed to her with formal politeness – and passed on in silence. At the sight of her husband’s brother, the sinking spirit of the woman sprang to life again. Her drooping figure became erect. Her eyes met Westwick’s look, brightly defiant. She returned his bow with an icy smile of contempt.

Henry crossed the room to Agnes.

‘Is Lady Montbarry here by your invitation?’ he asked quietly.

‘No.’

‘Do you wish to see her?’

‘It is very painful to me to see her.’

He turned and looked at his sister-in-law. ‘Do you hear that?’ he asked coldly.

‘I hear it,’ she answered, more coldly still. ‘Your visit is, to say the least of it, ill-timed.’

‘Your interference is, to say the least of it, out of place.’

91

WILKIE COLLINS

With that retort, Lady Montbarry approached Agnes. The presence of Henry Westwick seemed at once to relieve and embolden her. ‘Permit me to ask my question, Miss Lockwood,’ she said, with graceful courtesy. ‘It is nothing to embarrass you. When the courier Ferrari applied to my late husband for employment, did you – ‘ Her resolution failed her, before she could say more. She sank trembling into the nearest chair, and, after a moment’s struggle, composed herself again. ‘Did you permit Ferrari,’ she resumed, ‘to make sure of being chosen for our courier by using your name?’

Agnes did not reply with her customary directness. Trifling as it was, the reference to Montbarry, proceeding from that woman of all others, confused and agitated her.

‘I have known Ferrari’s wife for many years,’ she began. ‘And I take an interest – ‘

Lady Montbarry abruptly lifted her hands with a gesture of entreaty. ‘Ah, Miss Lockwood, don’t waste time by talking of his wife! Answer my plain question, plainly!’

‘Let me answer her,’ Henry whispered. ‘I will undertake to speak plainly enough.’

Agnes refused by a gesture. Lady Montbarry’s interruption had roused her sense of what was due to herself. She resumed her reply in plainer terms.

‘When Ferrari wrote to the late Lord Montbarry,’ she said, ‘he did certainly mention my name.’

Even now, she had innocently failed to see the object which her visitor had in view. Lady Montbarry’s impatience became ungovernable. She started to her feet, and advanced to Agnes.

92

THE HAUNTED HOTEL: A MYSTERY OF MODERN VENICE

‘Was it with your knowledge and permission that Ferrari used your name?’ she asked. ‘The whole soul of my question is in that. For God’s sake answer me – Yes, or No!’

‘Yes.’

That one word struck Lady Montbarry as a blow might have struck her. The fierce life that had animated her face the instant before, faded out of it suddenly, and left her like a woman turned to stone. She stood, mechanically confronting Agnes, with a stillness so wrapt and perfect that not even the breath she drew was perceptible to the two persons who were looking at her.

Henry spoke to her roughly. ‘Rouse yourself,’ he said. ‘You have received your answer.’

She looked round at him. ‘I have received my Sentence,’ she rejoined – and turned slowly to leave the room.

To Henry’s astonishment, Agnes stopped her. ‘Wait a moment, Lady Montbarry. I have something to ask on my side. You have spoken of Ferrari. I wish to speak of him too.’

Lady Montbarry bent her head in silence. Her hand trembled as she took out her handkerchief, and passed it over her forehead. Agnes detected the trembling, and shrank back a step. ‘Is the subject painful to you?’ she asked timidly.

Still silent, Lady Montbarry invited her by a wave of the hand to go on. Henry approached, attentively watching his sister-in-law. Agnes went on.

‘No trace of Ferrari has been discovered in England,’ she said. ‘Have you any news of him? And will you tell me (if you have heard anything), in mercy to his wife?’

93

WILKIE COLLINS

Lady Montbarry’s thin lips suddenly relaxed into their sad and cruel smile.

‘Why do you ask me about the lost courier?’ she said. ‘You will know what has become of him, Miss Lockwood, when the time is ripe for it.’

Agnes started. ‘I don’t understand you,’ she said. ‘How shall I know? Will some one tell me?’

‘Some one will tell you.’

Henry could keep silence no longer. ‘Perhaps, your ladyship may be the person?’ he interrupted with ironical politeness.

She answered him with contemptuous ease. ‘You may be right, Mr. Westwick. One day or another, I may be the person who tells Miss Lockwood what has become of Ferrari, if – ‘ She stopped; with her eyes fixed on Agnes.

‘If what?’ Henry asked.

‘If Miss Lockwood forces me to it.’

Agnes listened in astonishment. ‘Force you to it?’ she repeated. ‘How can I do that? Do you mean to say my will is stronger than yours?’

‘Do you mean to say that the candle doesn’t burn the moth, when the moth flies into it?’ Lady Montbarry rejoined. ‘Have you ever heard of such a thing as the fascination of terror? I am drawn to you by a fascination of terror. I have no right to visit you, I have no wish to visit you: you are my enemy. For the first time in my life, against my own will, I submit to my enemy. See! I am waiting because you told me to wait – and the fear of you (I swear it!) creeps through me while I stand here. Oh, don’t let me excite your curiosity or your pity! Follow the example of

94

THE HAUNTED HOTEL: A MYSTERY OF MODERN VENICE

Mr. Westwick. Be hard and brutal and unforgiving, like him. Grant me my release. Tell me to go.’

The frank and simple nature of Agnes could discover but one intelligible meaning in this strange outbreak.

‘You are mistaken in thinking me your enemy,’ she said. ‘The wrong you did me when you gave your hand to Lord Montbarry was not intentionally done. I forgave you my sufferings in his lifetime. I forgive you even more freely now that he has gone.’

Henry heard her with mingled emotions of admiration and distress. ‘Say no more!’ he exclaimed. ‘You are too good to her; she is not worthy of it.’

The interruption passed unheeded by Lady Montbarry. The simple words in which Agnes had replied seemed to have absorbed the whole attention of this strangely-changeable woman. As she listened, her face settled slowly into an expression of hard and tearless sorrow. There was a marked change in her voice when she spoke next. It expressed that last worst resignation which has done with hope.

‘You good innocent creature,’ she said, ‘what does your amiable forgiveness matter? What are your poor little wrongs, in the reckoning for greater wrongs which is demanded of me? I am not trying to frighten you, I am only miserable about myself. Do you know what it is to have a firm presentiment of calamity that is coming to you – and yet to hope that your own positive conviction will not prove true? When I first met you, before my marriage, and first felt your influence over me, I had that hope. It was a starveling sort of hope that lived a lingering

95

WILKIE COLLINS

life in me until to-day. You struck it dead, when you answered my question about Ferrari.’

‘How have I destroyed your hopes?’ Agnes asked. ‘What connection is there between my permitting Ferrari to use my name to Lord Montbarry, and the strange and dreadful things you are saying to me now?’

‘The time is near, Miss Lockwood, when you will discover that for yourself. In the mean while, you shall know what my fear of you is, in the plainest words I can find. On the day when I took your hero from you and blighted your life – I am firmly persuaded of it! – you were made the instrument of the retribution that my sins of many years had deserved. Oh, such things have happened before to-day! One person has, before now, been the means of innocently ripening the growth of evil in another. You have done that already – and you have more to do yet. You have still to bring me to the day of discovery, and to the punishment that is my doom. We shall meet again – here in England, or there in Venice where my husband died – and meet for the last time.’

In spite of her better sense, in spite of her natural superiority to superstitions of all kinds, Agnes was impressed by the terrible earnestness with which those words were spoken. She turned pale as she looked at Henry. ‘Do you understand her?’ she asked.

‘Nothing is easier than to understand her,’ he replied contemptuously. ‘She knows what has become of Ferrari; and she is confusing you in a cloud of nonsense, because she daren’t own the truth. Let her go!’

96

THE HAUNTED HOTEL: A MYSTERY OF MODERN VENICE

If a dog had been under one of the chairs, and had barked, Lady Montbarry could not have proceeded more impenetrably with the last words she had to say to Agnes.

‘Advise your interesting Mrs. Ferrari to wait a little longer,’ she said. ‘You will know what has become of her husband, and you will tell her. There will be nothing to alarm you. Some trifling event will bring us together the next time – as trifling, I dare say, as the engagement of Ferrari. Sad nonsense, Mr. Westwick, is it not? But you make allowances for women; we all talk nonsense. Good morning, Miss Lockwood.’

She opened the door – suddenly, as if she was afraid of being called back for the second time – and left them.

97

CHAPTER XII

‘Do you think she is mad?’ Agnes asked.

‘I think she is simply wicked. False, superstitious, inveterately cruel – but not mad. I believe her main motive in coming here was to enjoy the luxury of frightening you.’

‘She has frightened me. I am ashamed to own it – but so it is.’

Henry looked at her, hesitated for a moment, and seated himself on the sofa by her side.

‘I am very anxious about you, Agnes,’ he said. ‘But for the fortunate chance which led me to call here to-day – who knows what that vile woman might not have said or done, if she had found you alone? My dear, you are leading a sadly unprotected solitary life. I don’t like to think of it; I want to see it changed – especially after what has happened to-day. No! no! it is useless to tell me that you have your old nurse. She is too old; she is not in your rank of life – there is no sufficient protection in the companionship of such a person for a lady in your position. Don’t mistake me, Agnes! what I say, I say in the sincerity of my devotion to you.’ He paused, and took her hand. She made a feeble effort to withdraw it – and yielded. ‘Will the day never come,’ he pleaded, ‘when the privilege of protecting you may be mine? when you will be the pride and joy of my

98

THE HAUNTED HOTEL: A MYSTERY OF MODERN VENICE

life, as long as my life lasts?’ He pressed her hand gently. She made no reply. The colour came and went on her face; her eyes were turned away from him. ‘Have I been so unhappy as to offend you?’ he asked.

She answered that – she said, almost in a whisper, ‘No.’ ‘Have I distressed you?’

‘You have made me think of the sad days that are gone.’ She said no more; she only tried to withdraw her hand from his for the second time. He still held it; he lifted it to his lips.

‘Can I never make you think of other days than those – of the happier days to come? Or, if you must think of the time that is passed, can you not look back to the time when I first loved you?’

She sighed as he put the question. ‘Spare me, Henry,’ she answered sadly. ‘Say no more!’

The colour again rose in her cheeks; her hand trembled in his. She looked lovely, with her eyes cast down and her bosom heaving gently. At that moment he would have given everything he had in the world to take her in his arms and kiss her. Some mysterious sympathy, passing from his hand to hers, seemed to tell her what was in his mind. She snatched her hand away, and suddenly looked up at him. The tears were in her eyes. She said nothing; she let her eyes speak for her. They warned him – without anger, without unkindness – but still they warned him to press her no further that day.

‘Only tell me that I am forgiven,’ he said, as he rose from the sofa.

99

WILKIE COLLINS

‘Yes,’ she answered quietly, ‘you are forgiven.’

‘I have not lowered myself in your estimation, Agnes?’ ‘Oh, no!’

‘Do you wish me to leave you?’

She rose, in her turn, from the sofa, and walked to her writing-table before she replied. The unfinished letter which she had been writing when Lady Montbarry interrupted her, lay open on the blotting-book. As she looked at the letter, and then looked at Henry, the smile that charmed everybody showed itself in her face.

‘You must not go just yet,’ she said: ‘I have something to tell you. I hardly know how to express it. The shortest way perhaps will be to let you find it out for yourself. You have been speaking of my lonely unprotected life here. It is not a very happy life, Henry – I own that.’ She paused, observing the growing anxiety of his expression as he looked at her, with a shy satisfaction that perplexed him. ‘Do you know that I have anticipated your idea?’ she went on. ‘I am going to make a great change in my life – if your brother Stephen and his wife will only consent to it.’ She opened the desk of the writing-table while she spoke, took a letter out, and handed it to Henry.

He received it from her mechanically. Vague doubts, which he hardly understood himself, kept him silent. It was impossible that the ‘change in her life’ of which she had spoken could mean that she was about to be married – and yet he was conscious of a perfectly unreasonable reluctance to open the letter. Their eyes met; she smiled again. ‘Look at the address,’ she said. ‘You ought to know the handwriting – but I dare say you don’t.’

100