I Say No by Wilkie Collins

  CHAPTER XV. EMILY.

  "May I say a word?" Mrs. Mosey inquired. She entered the room--paleand trembling. Seeing that ominous change, Emily dropped back into herchair.

  "Dead?" she said faintly.

  Mrs. Mosey looked at her in vacant surprise.

  "I wish to say, miss, that your aunt has frightened me."

  Even that vague allusion was enough for Emily.

  "You need say no more," she replied. "I know but too well how my aunt'smind is affected by the fever."

  Confused and frightened as she was, Mrs. Mosey still found relief in hercustomary flow of words.

  "Many and many a person have I nursed in fever," she announced. "Manyand many a person have I heard say strange things. Never yet, miss, inall my experience--!"

  "Don't tell me of it!" Emily interposed.

  "Oh, but I _must_ tell you! In your own interests, Miss Emily--in yourown interests. I won't be inhuman enough to leave you alone in the houseto-night; but if this delirium goes on, I must ask you to get anothernurse. Shocking suspicions are lying in wait for me in that bedroom, asit were. I can't resist them as I ought, if I go back again, and hearyour aunt saying what she has been saying for the last half hour andmore. Mrs. Ellmother has expected impossibilities of me; and Mrs.Ellmother must take the consequences. I don't say she didn't warnme--speaking, you will please to understand, in the strictestconfidence. 'Elizabeth,' she says, 'you know how wildly people talk inMiss Letitia's present condition. Pay no heed to it,' she says. 'Let itgo in at one ear and out at the other,' she says. 'If Miss Emily asksquestions--you know nothing about it. If she's frightened--you knownothing about it. If she bursts into fits of crying that are dreadfulto see, pity her, poor thing, but take no notice.' All very well,and sounds like speaking out, doesn't it? Nothing of the sort! Mrs.Ellmother warns me to expect this, that, and the other. But there is onehorrid thing (which I heard, mind, over and over again at your aunt'sbedside) that she does _not_ prepare me for; and that horrid thingis--Murder!"

  At that last word, Mrs. Mosey dropped her voice to a whisper--and waitedto see what effect she had produced.

  Sorely tried already by the cruel perplexities of her position, Emily'scourage failed to resist the first sensation of horror, aroused in herby the climax of the nurse's hysterical narrative. Encouraged byher silence, Mrs. Mosey went on. She lifted one hand with theatricalsolemnity--and luxuriously terrified herself with her own horrors.

  "An inn, Miss Emily; a lonely inn, somewhere in the country; and acomfortless room at the inn, with a makeshift bed at one end of it, anda makeshift bed at the other--I give you my word of honor, that washow your aunt put it. She spoke of two men next; two men asleep (youunderstand) in the two beds. I think she called them 'gentlemen'; but Ican't be sure, and I wouldn't deceive you--you know I wouldn't deceiveyou, for the world. Miss Letitia muttered and mumbled, poor soul. I ownI was getting tired of listening--when she burst out plain again, inthat one horrid word--Oh, miss, don't be impatient! don't interrupt me!"

  Emily did interrupt, nevertheless. In some degree at least she hadrecovered herself. "No more of it!" she said--"I won't hear a wordmore."

  But Mrs. Mosey was too resolutely bent on asserting her own importance,by making the most of the alarm that she had suffered, to be repressedby any ordinary method of remonstrance. Without paying the slightestattention to what Emily had said, she went on again more loudly and moreexcitably than ever.

  "Listen, miss--listen! The dreadful part of it is to come; you haven'theard about the two gentlemen yet. One of them was murdered--what doyou think of that!--and the other (I heard your aunt say it, in so manywords) committed the crime. Did Miss Letitia fancy she was addressing alot of people when _you_ were nursing her? She called out, like a personmaking public proclamation, when I was in her room. 'Whoever you are,good people' (she says), 'a hundred pounds reward, if you find therunaway murderer. Search everywhere for a poor weak womanish creature,with rings on his little white hands. There's nothing about him likea man, except his voice--a fine round voice. You'll know him, myfriends--the wretch, the monster--you'll know him by his voice.' Thatwas how she put it; I tell you again, that was how she put it. Did youhear her scream? Ah, my dear young lady, so much the better for you!'O the horrid murder' (she says)--'hush it up!' I'll take my Bible oathbefore the magistrate," cried Mrs. Mosey, starting out of her chair,"your aunt said, 'Hush it up!'"

  Emily crossed the room. The energy of her character was roused at last.She seized the foolish woman by the shoulders, forced her back in thechair, and looked her straight in the face without uttering a word.

  For the moment, Mrs. Mosey was petrified. She had fully expected--havingreached the end of her terrible story--to find Emily at her feet,entreating her not to carry out her intention of leaving the cottagethe next morning; and she had determined, after her sense of her ownimportance had been sufficiently flattered, to grant the prayer of thehelpless young lady. Those were her anticipations--and how had they beenfulfilled? She had been treated like a mad woman in a state of revolt!

  "How dare you assault me?" she asked piteously. "You ought to be ashamedof yourself. God knows I meant well."

  "You are not the first person," Emily answered, quietly releasing her,"who has done wrong with the best intentions."

  "I did my duty, miss, when I told you what your aunt said."

  "You forgot your duty when you listened to what my aunt said."

  "Allow me to explain myself."

  "No: not a word more on _that_ subject shall pass between us. Remainhere, if you please; I have something to suggest in your own interests.Wait, and compose yourself."

  The purpose which had taken a foremost place in Emily's mind rested onthe firm foundation of her love and pity for her aunt.

  Now that she had regained the power to think, she felt a hateful doubtpressed on her by Mrs. Mosey's disclosures. Having taken for grantedthat there was a foundation in truth for what she herself had heard inher aunt's room, could she reasonably resist the conclusion that theremust be a foundation in truth for what Mrs. Mosey had heard, undersimilar circumstances?

  There was but one way of escaping from this dilemma--and Emilydeliberately took it. She turned her back on her own convictions; andpersuaded herself that she had been in the wrong, when she had attachedimportance to anything that her aunt had said, under the influenceof delirium. Having adopted this conclusion, she resolved to face theprospect of a night's solitude by the death-bed--rather than permit Mrs.Mosey to have a second opportunity of drawing her own inferences fromwhat she might hear in Miss Letitia's room.

  "Do you mean to keep me waiting much longer, miss?"

  "Not a moment longer, now you are composed again," Emily answered. "Ihave been thinking of what has happened; and I fail to see any necessityfor putting off your departure until the doctor comes to-morrow morning.There is really no objection to your leaving me to-night."

  "I beg your pardon, miss; there _is_ an objection. I have already toldyou I can't reconcile it to my conscience to leave you here by yourself.I am not an inhuman woman," said Mrs. Mosey, putting her handkerchief toher eyes--smitten with pity for herself.

  Emily tried the effect of a conciliatory reply. "I am grateful for yourkindness in offering to stay with me," she said.

  "Very good of you, I'm sure," Mrs. Mosey answered ironically. "But forall that, you persist in sending me away."

  "I persist in thinking that there is no necessity for my keeping youhere until to-morrow."

  "Oh, have it your own way! I am not reduced to forcing my company onanybody."

  Mrs. Mosey put her handkerchief in her pocket, and asserted her dignity.With head erect and slowly-marching steps she walked out of the room.Emily was left in the cottage, alone with her dying aunt.