with her. Her husband was quite at his ease, except that he was complaining of the cold. When she was anxious to get him out into the carriage, he still stood there leisurely, arranging shawl after shawl around his throat. “You can do that quite as well in an omnibus,” she had just said to him very crossly, when there appeared upon the scene through a side door that very night-porter whom she dreaded, with a soiled pockethandkerchief in his hand.
Even before the sound of her own name met her ears Mrs. Brown knew it all. She understood the full horror of her position from that man’s hostile face, and from the little article which he held in his hand. If during the watches of the night she had had money in her pocket, if she had made a friend of this greedy fellow by well-timed liberality, all might have been so different! But she reflected that she had allowed him to go unfee’d after all his trouble, and she knew that he was her enemy. It was the handkerchief that she feared. She thought that she might have brazened out anything but that. No one had seen her enter or leave that strange man’s room. No one had seen her dip her hands in that jar. She had, no doubt, been found wandering about the house while the slumberer had been made to suffer so strangely, and there might have been suspicion, and perhaps accusation. But she would have been ready with frequent protestations to deny all charges made against her, and, though no one might have believed her, no one could have convicted her. Here, however, was evidence against which she would be unable to stand for a moment. At the first glance she acknowledged the potency of that damning morsel of linen.
During all the horrors of the night she had never given a thought to the handkerchief, and yet she ought to have known that the evidence it would bring against her was palpable and certain. Her name, “ H. Brown,” was plainly written on. the corner. What a fool she had been not to have thought of this! Had she but remembered the plain marking which she, as a careful, well-conducted British matron, had put upon all her clothes, she would at an hazard have recovered the article. Oh that she had waked the man, or bribed the porter, or even told her husband! But now she was, as it were, friendless, without support, without a word that she could say in her own defence, convicted of having committed this assault upon a strange man in his own bedroom, and then of having left him T The thing must be explained by the truth; but how to explain such truth, how to tell such story in a way to satisfy injured folk, and she with only barely time 1 sufficient to catch the train! Then it occurred to her that they could have no legal right to stop her because the pockethandkerchief had been found in a strange gentleman’s bedroom. “ Yes, it is mine,” she said, turning to her husband, as the porter, with a loud voice, asked if she were not Madame Brown. “ Take it, Charles, and come on.” Mr. Brown naturally stood still in astonishment. He did put out his hand, but the porter would not allow the evidence to pass so readily out of his custody.
“What does it all mean?” asked Mr. Brown.
“A gentleman has been—eh—eh—. Something has been done to a gentleman in his bedroom,” said the clerk.
“Something done to ‘a gentleman! “ repeated Mr. Brown.
“Something very bad indeed,” said the porter. “ Look here,” and he showed the condition of the handkerchief.
“Charles, we shall lose the train,” said the affrighted wife.
“What the mischief does it all mean? “ demanded the husband.
“Did Madame go into the gentleman’s room?” asked the clerk. Then there was an awful silence, and all eyes were fixed upon the lady.
“What does it all mean? “ demanded the husband. “ Did you go into anybody’s room?”
“I did,” said Mrs. Brown with much dignity, looking round upon her enemies as a stag at bay will look upon the hounds which are attacking him. “ Give me the handkerchief.” But the night-porter quickly put it behind his back. “ Charles, we cannot allow ourselves to be delayed. You shall write a letter to the keeper of the hotel, explaining it all.” Then she essayed to swim out, through the front door, into the courtyard in which the vehicle was waiting for them. But three or four men and women interposed themselves, and even her husband did not seem quite ready to continue his journey. “Tonight is Christmas Eve,” said Mrs. Brown, “and we shall not be at Thompson Hall! Think of my sister!”
“Why did you go into the man’s bedroom, my dear?” whispered Mr. Brown in English.
But the porter heard the whisper, and understood the language;—the porter who had not been “tipped.” “ Ye’es;—vy? “ asked the porter.
“It was a mistake, Charles; there is not a moment to lose. I can explain it all to you in the carriage.” Then the clerk suggested that Madame had better postpone her journey a little. The gentleman upstairs had certainly been very badly treated, and had demanded to know why so great an outrage had been perpetrated. The clerk said that he did not wish to send for the police—here Mrs. Brown gasped terribly and threw herself on her husband’s shoulder,—but he did not think he could allow the party to go till the gentleman upstairs had received some satisfaction. It had now become clearly impossible that the journey could be made by the early train. Even Mrs. Brown gave it up herself, and demanded of her husband that she should be taken back to her own bedroom.
“But what is to be said to the gentleman? “ asked the porter.
Of course it was impossible that Mrs. Brown should be made to tell her story there in the presence of them all. The clerk, when he found he had succeeded in preventing her from leaving the house, was satisfied with a promise from Mr. Brown that he would inquire from his wife what were these mysterious circumstances, and would then come down to the office and give some explanation. If it were necessary, he would see the strange gentleman,—whom he now ascertained to be a certain Mr. Jones returning from the east of Europe. He learned also that this Mr. Jones had been most anxious to travel by that very morning train which he and his wife had intended to use,—that Mr. Jones had been most particular in giving his orders accordingly, but that at the last moment he had declared himself to be unable even to dress himself, because of the injury which had been done him during the night. When Mr. Brown heard this from the clerk just before he was allowed to take his wife upstairs, while she was sitting on a sofa in a corner with her face hidden, a look of awful gloom came over his own countenance. What could it be that his wife had done to the man of so terrible a nature? “ You had better come up with me,” he said to her with marital severity, and the poor cowed woman went with him tamely as might have done some patient Grizel. Not a word was spoken till they were in the room and the door was locked. “ Now,” said he, “ what does it all mean?”
It was not till nearly two hours had passed that Mr. Brown came down the stairs very slowly,—turning it all over in his mind. He had now gradually heard the absolute and exact truth, and had very gradually learned to believe it. It was first necessary that he should understand that his wife had told him many fibs during the night; but as she constantly alleged to him when he complained of her conduct in this respect, they had all been told on his behalf. Had she not struggled to get the mustard for his comfort, and when she had secured the prize had she not hurried to put it on,— as she had fondly thought,—his throat? And though she had fibbed to him afterwards, had she not done so in order that he might not be troubled? “You are not angry with me because I was in that man’s room?” she asked, looking full into his eyes, but not quite without a sob. He paused a moment and then declared, with something of a true husband’s confidence in his tone, that he was not inethe least angry with her on that account. Then she kissed him, and bade him remember that after all no one could really injure them. “ What harm has been done, Charles? The gentleman won’t die because he has had a mustard plaster on his throat. The worst is about Uncle John and dear Jane. They do think so much of Christmas Eve at Thompson Hall?”
Mr. Brown, when he again found himself in the clerk’s office, requested that his card might be
