The Disappearance XI - An Interview By Candlelight

The apartment in which the "bold discoverer in an unknown sea" found herself presented an appearance far from cheerful or attractive. It was of small dimensions, but too large for the meagre supply of furniture it contained. The unpapered walls displayed a monotonous surface of bare whitewash in urgent need of renewal. In one corner was an impoverished looking bed, on which reposed an infant of a few months old. At the foot of the bed was a cheap toilet stand, with its accessories. In the adjacent corner was a door apparently opening into a closet or inner receptacle of some kind, against which was placed a battered leather trunk with a broken hasp. A small table of stained pine, without any covering, stood near the middle of the room, and two or three common wooden chairs were distributed here and there against the walls. The faint light of expiring day found admission by means of a window looking out upon the roofs to the rear of the house. The only artificial light consisted of a solitary candle placed on the table, at the far end of which sat a woman engaged in sewing.

The light, dim and ineffectual as it was, served to show that this woman was in a state of health which her friends, if she had any, must have deemed to be anything but satisfactory. It was easy to perceive that she had once possessed an attractive and rather pretty face. Some portion of her attractiveness still remained, but the beauty had been washed away by privation and misery, leaving behind nothing but a faint simulacrum of its former self. She was thin and fragile to the point of emaciation, insomuch that her print dress hung upon her as loosely as a morning wrapper. Her cheeks were sunken and hollow, and two dark patches beneath a pair of large blue eyes plainly indicated serious nervous waste. In addition to these manifest signs of a low state of bodily health, her pinched features had a worn, weary expression which told a sad tale of long and continuous suffering. Most of these things her visitor, with feminine quickness of perception, took in at the first momentary glance, and any pre-conceived feeling of hostility which may have had a place in her heart gave way to a sentiment of womanly sympathy. Clearly enough, any display of jealous anger would be wholly out of place in such a presence and situation.

Mrs. Savareen had not given much pre-consideration as to her line of action during the impending interview. She had merely resolved to be guided by circumstances, and what she saw before her made her errand one of some difficulty. Her main object, of course, was to ascertain, beyond the possibility of doubt, whether the man calling himself Jack Randall was the man known to her as Reginald Bourchier Savareen.

The tenant of the room rose as her visitor entered, and even that slight exertion brought on a hollow cough which was pitiful to hear.

"I am sorry to see," gently remarked the visitor, "that you are far from well."

"Yes," was the reply; "I've got a cold, and ain't very smart. Take a chair." And so saying, she placed a chair in position, and made a not ungraceful motion towards it with her hand.

Mrs. Savareen sat down, and began to think what she would say next. Her hostess saved her from much thought on the matter by enquiring whether she had called to see Mr. Randall.

"Yes," replied Mrs. Savareen, "I would like to see him for a few moments, if convenient."

"Well, I am sorry he's out, and I don't suppose he'll be in for some time. He's generally out in the fore part of the evening; but he's most always home in the morning. Is it anything I can tell him?"

Here was a nice complication. Had Mrs. Savareen been a student of Moliere, the fitting reply to such a question under such circumstances would doubtless have risen to her lips. But I shrewdly suspect that she had never heard of the famous Frenchman, whose works were probably an unknown quantity in Millbrook in those days. After a momentary hesitation she fenced with the question, and put one in her turn.

"Do you know if he has heard from his friends in Hertfordshire lately?"

"Hertfordshire? O, that is the place he comes from in the Old Country. No, he never hears from there. I have often wanted him to write to his friends in England, but he says it is so long since he left that they have forgotten all about him." Here the speaker was interrupted by another fit of coughing.

"No," she resumed, "he never even wrote to England to tell his friends when we were married. He was only a boy when he left home, and he was a good many years in Canady before he came over to the States."

Just at this point it seemed to occur to Mrs. Randall that she was talking rather freely about her husband to a person whom she did not know, and she pulled herself up with a rather short turn. She looked intently into her visitor's face for a moment, as though with an inward monition that something was wrong.

"But," she resumed, after a brief pause, "do you know my husband? I can't remember as I ever seen you before. You don't live in New York: I can see that. I guess you come from the West."

Then Mrs. Savareen felt that some explanation was necessary. She fairly took the animal by the extreme tip of his horns.

"Yes," she responded, "I live in the West, and I have only been in New York a very short time. I accidentally heard that Mr. Randall lived here, and I wish to ascertain if he is the same gentleman I once knew in Canada. If he is, there is something of importance I should like to tell him. Would you be so kind as to describe his personal appearance for me?"

The woman again inspected her very carefully, with eyes not altogether free from suspicion.

"I don't exactly understand," she exclaimed. "You don't want to do him any harm, do you? You haven't got anything agin him? We are in deep enough trouble as it is."

The last words were uttered in a tone very much resembling a wail of despair. By this time the visitor's sympathies were thoroughly aroused on behalf of the poor broken creature before her.

She felt that she had not the heart to add to the burden of grief which had been imposed upon the frail woman who sat there eyeing her with anxiety depicted upon her weary, anxious face.

"I can assure you," responded Mrs. Savareen, "that I have no intention of doing any harm either to him or to you. I would much rather do you a kindness, if I could. I can see for myself that you stand in great need of kindness."

The last words were spoken in a tone which disarmed suspicion, and which at the same time stimulated curiosity. The shadow on Mrs. Randall's face passed away.

"Well," said she, "I beg your pardon for mistrusting you, but my husband has never told me much about his past life, and I was afraid you might be an enemy. But I am sure, now I look at you, that you wouldn't do harm to anybody. I'll tell you whatever you want to know, if I can."

"Thank you for your good opinion. Will you be good enough, then, to describe Mr. Randall's personal appearance? I have no other object than to find out if he is the person I used to know in Canada."

"How long ago did you know him in Canady?"

"I saw him last in the summer of 1854—about five years ago."

"Well, at that rate I've known him pretty near as long as you hev. It's more'n four years since I first got acquainted with him down, in Ole Virginny, where I was raised. Why, come to think of it, I've got his likeness, took just before we was married. That'll show you whether he's the man you knew."

As she spoke, she rose and opened the leather trunk in the corner by the closet door. After rummaging among its contents, she presently returned with a small oval daguerreotype in her hand. Opening the case she handed it to Mrs. Savareen. "There he is," she remarked, "an' it's considered an awful good likeness."

Mrs. Savareen took the daguerreotype and approached the candle. The first glance was amply sufficient. It was the likeness of her husband.

She made up her mind as to 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.