The Dead Letter · Part II · Chapter 2 3 (1/2)

III

The Confession

In the afternoon we paid Miss Sullivan a visit. It was the first time I had met her since that strange night of watching at Moreland villa; and I confess that I could not meet her without an inward shudder of abhorrence. Unbounded as was my respect and confidence for Mr. Burton, I did think that he had erred in his conclusions as to the character of this woman; or else that he concealed from me his real opinions, for some purpose to be explained at the proper time. If he still had suspicions, it was evident that he had kept them from their object as skillfully as from me, for I saw, by her manner of receiving him, that she regarded him as a friend.

Notwithstanding I had been informed of her rapidly-failing health, I was shocked at the change in Miss Sullivan since I had seen her. It was with an effort that she rose from her easy-chair at our approach; the fullness had all wasted from her naturally queenly figure; her cheeks were hollow, and aflame with the fire of fever; while those black eyes, which had ever seemed to smolder above unfathomable depths of volcanic passion, now almost blazed with light. Something like a smile flitted across her face when she saw my companion, but smiles were too strange there to feel at home, and it vanished as soon as seen. I do not think she liked me any better than I did her; each recoiled from the other instinctively; she would not have spoken to me had I come alone; but out of concession to the presence of her friend, she bowed to me and asked me to be seated. A little child in the room ran to Mr. Burton, as if expecting the package of bonbons which he took from his pocket; but, as he became engaged in conversation with Leesy, I coaxed her over to me, where she was soon sitting on my knee. She was a pretty little girl, about three years old, in whose chubby little features I could no longer trace any resemblance to her “aunt.” She prattled after the fashion of children, and in listening to her, I lost a remark or two of Mr. Barton’s; but soon had my attention aroused by hearing Miss Sullivan exclaim,

“Going away! For how long?”

“Three months, at least.”

Her hands sunk in her lap, and she became pale and agitated.

“It is presumptuous in me to dare to be sorry; I am nothing to you; but you are much to me. I don’t know how we shall get along without you.”

“Don’t be uneasy about that, my child. I shall make arrangements with this same person who boards you now to keep you until my return, and, if you should fall sick, to take good care of you.”

“You are far too good,” she responded, tremulously. “You will have the blessing of the friendless. I only wish it had the power to bring you good luck on your journey.”

“Perhaps it will,” he said, with a smile. “I have a great deal of faith in such blessings. But, Leesy, I think you can assist my journey in even a more tangible way than that.”

She looked at him inquiringly.

“I want you to tell me all and everything you know about the father of little Nora.”

“Why, sir?” she quickly asked. “I hope you have not heard from him,” looking over toward the child, as if afraid it might be snatched from her.

“Your health is very far gone, Leesy; I suppose you hardly hope ever to recover it. Would you not be glad to see Nora under her father’s protection before you were taken away?”

She stretched out her arms for the child, who slid off my knee, ran and climbed into her lap, where she held the curly head close to her bosom for a moment; her attitude was as if she sheltered the little one from threatened danger.

“I know, much more surely than anyone else, that my days are numbered. I believe I shall never see your face again, Mr. Burton; and that was what grieved me when you spoke of going away⁠—it was not that I thought of my comfort so much. The winter snow will hide me before you come back from your journey; and my darling will be left friendless. I know it⁠—it is my only care. But I would rather, far rather, leave her to the cold charity of an orphan asylum⁠—yes, I would rather turn her upon the street, with her innocent face only for a protector⁠—than that her father should have aught to do with Nora.”

“Why?”

“Because he is a bad man.”

“I understand that he is in California; and as I am going to San Francisco, and perhaps shall visit the mining regions before my return, I thought you might wish to send him a message, telling him the child’s condition. He may have laid up money by this time, and be able to send you a sum sufficient to provide for little Nora until she is old enough to take care of herself.”

She only shook her head, drawing the child closer, with a shudder.

“I have forgotten his name,” said Mr. Burton.

“I will not tell you,” answered Miss Sullivan, with a return of the old fierceness, like that of a hunted panther. “Why can I never, never, never be let alone?”

“Do you think I would do anything for your injury or disadvantage?” asked the detective in that gentle yet penetrating voice which had such power to move people to his will.

“I do not know,” she cried; “you have seemed to be my friend. But how do I know that it is not all simply to compass my destruction at last? You have brought into my house that person,” looking at me, “who has persecuted me. You promised me that I should be free from him. And now you want to set a bloodhound on my track⁠—as if I must be driven into my grave, and not allowed to go in peace.”

“I assure you, Leesy, I had no idea that you regarded Nora’s father with so much dislike. I have no object in the world in troubling you with him. I promise you that no word of mine shall give him the clue to your present circumstances, nor to the fact that he has a child living, if he is ignorant of it. You shall be protected⁠—you shall have peace and comfort. What I would like is, that you shall give me a history of his life, his habits, character, where he lived, what was his business, etc.; and I will give you my reasons for wishing the information. A circumstance has come to light which connects him with an affair which I am investigating⁠—that is, if he is the person I think he is⁠—a sort of a doctor, I believe?”

Miss Sullivan did not answer the question so skillfully put; she still watched us with shining, half-sullen eyes, as if ready to put forth a claw from the velvet, if we approached too near.

“Come, Leesy, you must tell me what I want to hear.” Mr. Burton’s air was now that of a master. “Time is precious. I can not wait upon a woman’s whim. I have promised you⁠—and repeat it, upon my honor⁠—that no annoyance or injury shall come to you through what you may tell me. If you prefer to answer me quietly to being compelled to answer before a court, all is right. I must know what I desire about this man.”

“Man, Mr. Burton! Call him creature.”

“Very well, creature, Leesy. You know him better than I do, and if you say he is a creature, I suppose I may take it for granted. His name is⁠—”

“Or was, George Thorley.”

When the name was spoken, I gave a start which attracted the attention of both my companions.

“You probably know something about him, Mr. Redfield,” remarked the girl.

“George Thorley, of Blankville, who used to have an apothecary shop in the lower part of the village, and who left the place some three years ago, to escape the talk occasioned by a suspicious case of malpractice, in which he was reported to be concerned?”

“The same person, sir. Did you know him?”

“I can not say that I was acquainted with him. I do not remember that I ever spoke a word with him. But I knew him, by sight, very well. He had a face which made people look twice at him. I think I bought some trifles in his shop once. And the gossip there was about him at the time he ran away, fixed his name in my memory. I was almost a stranger then in Blankville⁠—had lived there only about a year.”

“How did he come to have any connection with your family, Leesy?”

Miss Sullivan had grown pale during the agitation of our talk, but she flushed again at the question, hesitated, and finally, looking the detective full in the eyes, answered:

“Since you have promised, upon your honor, not to disturb me any further about this matter, and since I am under obligations to you, sir, which I can not forget, I will tell you the rest of the story, a part of which I told you that morning at Moreland villa. I confessed to you, there, the secret of my own heart, as I never confessed it to any but God, and I told you something of my cousin’s history to satisfy you about the child. I will now tell you all I know of George Thorley, which is more than I wish I knew. The first time I ever saw him was over four years ago, a short time after he set up his little shop, which, you recollect, was not far from my aunt’s in Blankville. My aunt sent me, one evening, for something to relieve the toothache, and I went into the nearest place, which was the new one. There was no one in but the owner. I was surprised by the great politeness with which he treated me, and the interest he seemed to take in the case of my aunt. He was a long time putting up the medicine, pasting the label on, and making change, so that I thought my aunt would surely be out of temper before I could bring her the drops. He asked our name, and where we lived, which was all, I thought, but a bit of his blarney, to get the good will of his customers.” (Miss Sullivan usually spoke with great propriety, but occasionally a touch of her mother’s country, in accent or expression, betrayed her Irish origin.) “That was the beginning of our acquaintance, but not the end of it. It was but a few days before he made an excuse to call at our house. I was a young girl, then, gay and healthy; and the plain truth of it is that George Thorley fell in love with me. My aunt was very much flattered, telling me I would be a fool not to encourage him⁠—that he was a doctor and a gentleman⁠—and would keep his wife like a lady⁠—that there would be no more going out to sew and slave for others, if I were once married to him; it was only what she expected of me, that I would at least be a doctor’s wife, after the schooling she had given me, and with the good looks I had. It is no vanity in me, now, to say of this clay, so soon to be mingled with the dust of the earth, that it was beautiful⁠—too much so, alas, for my own peace of mind⁠—for it made me despise the humble and honest suitors who might have secured me a lowly, happy life. Yet it was not that, either, and I’ll not demean myself to say so⁠—it was not because I was handsome that I held myself aloof from those in my own station; it was because I felt that I had thoughts and tastes they could not understand⁠—that my life was above theirs in hope, in aspiration. I was ambitious, but only to develop the best that was in me. If I could only be a needlewoman all my days, then I would be so skillful and so fanciful with my work, as almost to paint pictures with my needle and thread. But this isn’t telling you about George Thorley. From the first I took a dislike to him. I’m not good at reading character, but I understood his pretty thoroughly, and I was afraid of him. I was very cold to him, for I saw that he was of a quick temper, and I did not mean he should say that I had ever encouraged him. I told my aunt I did not think he was a gentleman⁠—I had seen plenty of real gentlemen in the houses where I sewed, and they were not like him. I told her, too, that he had a violent temper, and a jealous disposition, and could not make any woman happy. But she would not think of him in that light; her heart was set on the apothecary’s shop, which, she said, would grow into a fine drugstore with the doctor’s name in gilt letters on the door of his office.

“George soon offered himself, and was terribly angry when I refused him. I believe he loved me, in his selfish way, better than he loved any other human creature. He would not give me up, nor allow me any peace from his persecutions. He dogged my steps whenever I went out, and if I spoke to any other man, it put him in a rage. I got to feeling that I was watched all the time; for sometimes he would laugh in his hateful way, and tell me of things he had seen when I thought him miles away.

“Twice, in particular, I remember of his being in a savage passion, and threatening me. It was after”⁠—here the speaker’s voice, despite of her efforts to keep it steady, trembled and sunk⁠—“he had seen me riding out in the carriage with Mrs. Moreland. He said those people were making a fool of me⁠—that I was so set up, by their attentions, as to despise him. I told him that if I despised him, it was not for any such reason. It was because he behaved so ungentlemanly toward me, spying around me, when he had no business whatever with my affairs. That made him madder than ever, and he muttered words which I did not like. I told him I was not afraid of any mortal thing, and I didn’t think he would frighten me into marrying him. He said he would scare me yet, so that I would never get over it. I think he liked the spirit I showed; it seemed the more I tried to make him hate me, the more determined he was to pursue me. I don’t know how it was that I understood him so well, for in those days there had been nothing whispered against his character. Indeed, people didn’t know much about him; and he got himself into the good graces of some of the leading citizens of Blankville. He had told me something of his history; that is, that his family were English; that he, like myself, was an orphan; that, by dint of good luck, he had got a place in a doctor’s office in one of the towns in this State⁠—one of those humble situations where he was expected to take care of the physician’s horse, drive the carriage, put up medicines, attend upon orders, and anything and everything. He was smart and quick; he had many hours of leisure when waiting behind the little counter, and these hours he spent in studying the doctor’s books, which he managed to get hold of one at a time. By these means, and by observing keenly the physician’s methods, his advice to patients who called at the office, and by reading and putting up prescriptions constantly, he picked up a really surprising smattering of science. Making up his mind to be a doctor, and to keep a drugstore (a profitable business, he knew) he had the energy to carry out his plans. How he finally obtained the capital to set up the little business in Blankville, I never understood, but I knew that he attended lectures on surgery, one winter, in New York, and was in a hospital there a short time. All this was fair enough, and proved him ambitious and energetic; but I did not like or trust him. There was something dark and hidden in the workings of his mind, from which I shrunk. I knew him, too, to be cruel. I could see it in his manner of treating children and animals; there was nothing he liked so well as to practice his half-learned art of surgery upon some unfortunate sufferer. The more he insisted on my liking him, the more I grew to dread him.

“Affairs were at this crisis when my cousin came from New York to pay my aunt a visit. Coming to our rooms almost every evening, of course he made her acquaintance immediately. For the purpose of making me jealous, he began to pay the most devoted attention to her. Nora was a pretty girl, with blue eyes and fair hair; an innocent-minded thing, not very sharp, apprenticed to a milliner in the city; she believed all that Doctor Thorley told her, and fell in love with him, of course. When she went away, after her little holiday, George found that, instead of provoking me to jealousy, he had only roused my temper at the way he had fooled Nora. I scolded him well for it, and ended by telling him that I never would speak to him again.