The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 256: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

mg ee eT ee ea - a a ene - — ee THE MYSTERIES OF THE COURT. terest he had previously felt being immensely en- hanced in a moment. “Ah, it is all gone out of my memory again!” she said, shaking her head dolefully: “you made me start—you drove it away! It is of no use:”— and with these words she plunged abruptly into the copse, thus disappearing from the view of the amazed Captain and his equally astonished groom. “There is something extraordinary in this,” : said Stanley to the domestic: “that womam evi- | dently knows something—but the impression of if is upon her mind like that of an unusual object upon the mind of a child—too dim and uncertain to be properly explained. to the Hall and tell my father what has taken place. Mr, Redcliffe, too, said he should be: back by luncheon-time; and this: is: intelligence. which he will be deeply interested to. receive,” Captain Stanley accordingly took the nearest route to the Hall, which he reached: just as Mr. Redcliffe was‘alighting from the Baxonet’s. carriage, which had taken him into Liverpool. Sin William: Stanley, his som, and their guest were speedily closeted together; and the interview between. the young gentleman and Crazy Jane was the subject | of deliberatiion,, “This is Indeed: most important,” observed Mr. Redcliffe: “fox it is evidently the same subject to. which the woman alluded when we met her at the.| fence, and when she said that she had somethang.|' grew upon her mind.” “Let us go and see her,” exclaimed the Bas ronet, “without delay. But no!-—Redeliffe, you shall go alone—I have more faith in your power |} to lead her into lucid: conversation tham inmy own, I have already so-often failed. Besides, it is, fre- quently to a stranger that these poor demented creatures will prove more rational than to those whom they have known for along time, and who have always) been accustomed to talk to them in a particular way.” “Yes,” said Mr. Redcliffe, “I will lose no time in seeing her. I think you stated that her hut is about four miles distant? If you indicate the particular direction, I will set out and walk thither.” “Take the carriage—-or go om horseback,” ex- claimed the Baronet. “No,” rejoined Mr. Redeliffe.:, * I will, walk— because in that case [ may stand! a better chance | of falling in with her if she be rambling about. And I will go alone too, as she, may be the less embarrassed and bewildered im, conversing with one than in talking in the presence of two or more.” Sir William Stanley gave Mr. Redcliffe sufficient explanations to guide him towards Crazy Jane’s hut; and that gentleman accordingly set out, He had proceeded for a distance of about three miles across the fields, when on emerging into a lane bordered by high thick hedges, he perceived Crazy Jane sitting on the green bank under one of these hedges, rocking herself to and fro and speaking aloud. An idea suddenly entered Mr. Redcliffe’s mind. He remembered that Captain Stanley had stated how Crazy Jane had spoken of having “said it all to herself,’ and how by an incautious ejaculation he had driven the poor woman’s thoughts out of her head; and it therefore .oc- We will return at onee. curred to Mr. Redcliffe that when she was alone {% she was better able to keep her ideas collected. She had not as yet seen him as he emerged into the lane: he got at the back of the hedge —and stealthily creeping along, halted close behind the spot where Crazy Jane was still seated. She was continuing to muse in an audible tone, but in ‘strangely disjointed and broken sentences,—the ‘tenour of which. was however as follows: — “Tit must be many and many a year since then but I canmot recollect how many! I was very different at that time Ah, so different! People did not call me Crazy Fane, No, it was '* Jane my good girl, do this or do that.’—Ah, that ‘was the way my poor dear mistress used to speak! ‘Oh, how I loved her! Alas, alas, that it should shave all ended as it did shocking! shocking! ‘E know not why I should always and always be thinking of it. And yet I can’t help it. Till that other thing came into my mind, I never could think of anything else. How piteously she wept! | it really seems as if I saw her now standing before me. Yes, when the mist is deepest around ‘me; Ef see, that one image as plain as ever. She Was: not guilty no, no, she was not! I am ‘sure she was not! She was too good—too kind for ‘that Oh, what became of you, my dear, dear ‘mistress 2” Crazy Jane ceased: but her sobs were audible ‘to Mr. Redcliffe as he listened behind the hedge. ‘Who. was more beautiful,” at length continued the mad: woman in her audible musings, “than the ‘Duchess of Marchmont?P They should have mar- ried) her to, Bertram Vivian—and not to his uncle. , Alas; alas! to have thrown that divine creature away ig ia that old man it was shocking! ‘shocking ! Often and often have I thought of going to Oaklands. to see the old place ; and I have dragged myself for miles and miles I wonder how. many along the roads and through the fields, until I had not the courage to go further— and then I have: come back to my hut. No, no— . I could not look again upon that house where [ last saw the good Duchess Eliza. I could not tread those gravel-walks where I once saw her move in all the glory of her beauty! Oh, it was a dreadful day! But those tears which she shed then seem to, fall) upon my heart even now like scalding drops. My poor dear mistress, I could have laid down, my life for you !” Here there was another pause in the poor mad woman’s musings; and again did her convulsive sobs reach the ears of Clement Redcliffe. “What darkness and confusion have been in my brain ever since!” she once more mused audibly. “And yet there are times that I see it all before me, so plain—so plain—that I think it is taking plade all over and over anew! But this other thing that is now in my mind Let me reflect! When did it happen? Oh, poor creature that I am—I cannot remember anything about dates; and yet I am sure it was not near so far back as those dreadful scenes at Oaklands no, not near so far back! I was a young woman; and they used to say I was pretty at the time the dear Duchess and Bertram Vivian But what could have become of them both ?” she ejaculated, thus suddenly interrupting herself: ‘“ what could have become of them? I wander again !— there is that other thing I wish to get back to my ~eenwent S (e©) 0)(0\0) AMUCe (C()