The Woman in White (31 page)

So much, then, for the main building. Two wings are added at
either end of it. The half-ruined wing on the left (as you
approach the house) was once a place of residence standing by
itself, and was built in the fourteenth century. One of Sir
Percival's maternal ancestors—I don't remember, and don't care
which—tacked on the main building, at right angles to it, in the
aforesaid Queen Elizabeth's time. The housekeeper told me that
the architecture of "the old wing," both outside and inside, was
considered remarkably fine by good judges. On further
investigation I discovered that good judges could only exercise
their abilities on Sir Percival's piece of antiquity by previously
dismissing from their minds all fear of damp, darkness, and rats.
Under these circumstances, I unhesitatingly acknowledged myself to
be no judge at all, and suggested that we should treat "the old
wing" precisely as we had previously treated the Elizabethan
bedrooms. Once more the housekeeper said, "I am quite of your
opinion, miss," and once more she looked at me with undisguised
admiration of my extraordinary common-sense.

We went next to the wing on the right, which was built, by way of
completing the wonderful architectural jumble at Blackwater Park,
in the time of George the Second.

This is the habitable part of the house, which has been repaired
and redecorated inside on Laura's account. My two rooms, and all
the good bedrooms besides, are on the first floor, and the
basement contains a drawing-room, a dining-room, a morning-room, a
library, and a pretty little boudoir for Laura, all very nicely
ornamented in the bright modern way, and all very elegantly
furnished with the delightful modern luxuries. None of the rooms
are anything like so large and airy as our rooms at Limmeridge,
but they all look pleasant to live in. I was terribly afraid,
from what I had heard of Blackwater Park, of fatiguing antique
chairs, and dismal stained glass, and musty, frouzy hangings, and
all the barbarous lumber which people born without a sense of
comfort accumulate about them, in defiance of the consideration
due to the convenience of their friends. It is an inexpressible
relief to find that the nineteenth century has invaded this
strange future home of mine, and has swept the dirty "good old
times" out of the way of our daily life.

I dawdled away the morning—part of the time in the rooms
downstairs, and part out of doors in the great square which is
formed by the three sides of the house, and by the lofty iron
railings and gates which protect it in front. A large circular
fishpond with stone sides, and an allegorical leaden monster in
the middle, occupies the centre of the square. The pond itself is
full of gold and silver fish, and is encircled by a broad belt of
the softest turf I ever walked on. I loitered here on the shady
side pleasantly enough till luncheon-time, and after that took my
broad straw hat and wandered out alone in the warm lovely sunlight
to explore the grounds.

Daylight confirmed the impression which I had felt the night
before, of there being too many trees at Blackwater. The house is
stifled by them. They are, for the most part, young, and planted
far too thickly. I suspect there must have been a ruinous cutting
down of timber all over the estate before Sir Percival's time, and
an angry anxiety on the part of the next possessor to fill up all
the gaps as thickly and rapidly as possible. After looking about
me in front of the house, I observed a flower-garden on my left
hand, and walked towards it to see what I could discover in that
direction.

On a nearer view the garden proved to be small and poor and ill
kept. I left it behind me, opened a little gate in a ring fence,
and found myself in a plantation of fir-trees.

A pretty winding path, artificially made, led me on among the
trees, and my north-country experience soon informed me that I was
approaching sandy, heathy ground. After a walk of more than half
a mile, I should think, among the firs, the path took a sharp
turn—the trees abruptly ceased to appear on either side of me,
and I found myself standing suddenly on the margin of a vast open
space, and looking down at the Blackwater lake from which the
house takes its name.

The ground, shelving away below me, was all sand, with a few
little heathy hillocks to break the monotony of it in certain
places. The lake itself had evidently once flowed to the spot on
which I stood, and had been gradually wasted and dried up to less
than a third of its former size. I saw its still, stagnant
waters, a quarter of a mile away from me in the hollow, separated
into pools and ponds by twining reeds and rushes, and little
knolls of earth. On the farther bank from me the trees rose
thickly again, and shut out the view, and cast their black shadows
on the sluggish, shallow water. As I walked down to the lake, I
saw that the ground on its farther side was damp and marshy,
overgrown with rank grass and dismal willows. The water, which
was clear enough on the open sandy side, where the sun shone,
looked black and poisonous opposite to me, where it lay deeper
under the shade of the spongy banks, and the rank overhanging
thickets and tangled trees. The frogs were croaking, and the rats
were slipping in and out of the shadowy water, like live shadows
themselves, as I got nearer to the marshy side of the lake. I saw
here, lying half in and half out of the water, the rotten wreck of
an old overturned boat, with a sickly spot of sunlight glimmering
through a gap in the trees on its dry surface, and a snake basking
in the midst of the spot, fantastically coiled and treacherously
still. Far and near the view suggested the same dreary
impressions of solitude and decay, and the glorious brightness of
the summer sky overhead seemed only to deepen and harden the gloom
and barrenness of the wilderness on which it shone. I turned and
retraced my steps to the high heathy ground, directing them a
little aside from my former path towards a shabby old wooden shed,
which stood on the outer skirt of the fir plantation, and which
had hitherto been too unimportant to share my notice with the
wide, wild prospect of the lake.

On approaching the shed I found that it had once been a boat-
house, and that an attempt had apparently been made to convert it
afterwards into a sort of rude arbour, by placing inside it a
firwood seat, a few stools, and a table. I entered the place, and
sat down for a little while to rest and get my breath again.

I had not been in the boat-house more than a minute when it struck
me that the sound of my own quick breathing was very strangely
echoed by something beneath me. I listened intently for a moment,
and heard a low, thick, sobbing breath that seemed to come from
the ground under the seat which I was occupying. My nerves are
not easily shaken by trifles, but on this occasion I started to my
feet in a fright—called out—received no answer—summoned back my
recreant courage, and looked under the seat.

There, crouched up in the farthest corner, lay the forlorn cause
of my terror, in the shape of a poor little dog—a black and white
spaniel. The creature moaned feebly when I looked at it and
called to it, but never stirred. I moved away the seat and looked
closer. The poor little dog's eyes were glazing fast, and there
were spots of blood on its glossy white side. The misery of a
weak, helpless, dumb creature is surely one of the saddest of all
the mournful sights which this world can show. I lifted the poor
dog in my arms as gently as I could, and contrived a sort of make-
shift hammock for him to lie in, by gathering up the front of my
dress all round him. In this way I took the creature, as
painlessly as possible, and as fast as possible, back to the
house.

Finding no one in the hall I went up at once to my own sitting-
room, made a bed for the dog with one of my old shawls, and rang
the bell. The largest and fattest of all possible house-maids
answered it, in a state of cheerful stupidity which would have
provoked the patience of a saint. The girl's fat, shapeless face
actually stretched into a broad grin at the sight of the wounded
creature on the floor.

"What do you see there to laugh at?" I asked, as angrily as if she
had been a servant of my own. "Do you know whose dog it is?"

"No, miss, that I certainly don't." She stooped, and looked down
at the spaniel's injured side—brightened suddenly with the
irradiation of a new idea—and pointing to the wound with a
chuckle of satisfaction, said, "That's Baxter's doings, that is."

I was so exasperated that I could have boxed her ears. "Baxter?"
I said. "Who is the brute you call Baxter?"

The girl grinned again more cheerfully than ever. "Bless you,
miss! Baxter's the keeper, and when he finds strange dogs hunting
about, he takes and shoots 'em. It's keeper's dooty miss, I think
that dog will die. Here's where he's been shot, ain't it? That's
Baxter's doings, that is. Baxter's doings, miss, and Baxter's
dooty."

I was almost wicked enough to wish that Baxter had shot the
housemaid instead of the dog. Seeing that it was quite useless to
expect this densely impenetrable personage to give me any help in
relieving the suffering creature at our feet, I told her to
request the housekeeper's attendance with my compliments. She
went out exactly as she had come in, grinning from ear to ear. As
the door closed on her she said to herself softly, "It's Baxter's
doings and Baxter's dooty—that's what it is."

The housekeeper, a person of some education and intelligence,
thoughtfully brought upstairs with her some milk and some warm
water. The instant she saw the dog on the floor she started and
changed colour.

"Why, Lord bless me," cried the housekeeper, "that must be Mrs.
Catherick's dog!"

"Whose?" I asked, in the utmost astonishment.

"Mrs. Catherick's. You seem to know Mrs. Catherick, Miss
Halcombe?"

"Not personally, but I have heard of her. Does she live here? Has
she had any news of her daughter?"

"No, Miss Halcombe, she came here to ask for news."

"When?"

"Only yesterday. She said some one had reported that a stranger
answering to the description of her daughter had been seen in our
neighbourhood. No such report has reached us here, and no such
report was known in the village, when I sent to make inquiries
there on Mrs. Catherick's account. She certainly brought this
poor little dog with her when she came, and I saw it trot out
after her when she went away. I suppose the creature strayed into
the plantations, and got shot. Where did you find it, Miss
Halcombe?"

"In the old shed that looks out on the lake."

"Ah, yes, that is the plantation side, and the poor thing dragged
itself, I suppose, to the nearest shelter, as dogs will, to die.
If you can moisten its lips with the milk, Miss Halcombe, I will
wash the clotted hair from the wound. I am very much afraid it is
too late to do any good. However, we can but try."

Mrs. Catherick! The name still rang in my ears, as if the
housekeeper had only that moment surprised me by uttering it.
While we were attending to the dog, the words of Walter
Hartright's caution to me returned to my memory: "If ever Anne
Catherick crosses your path, make better use of the opportunity,
Miss Halcombe, than I made of it." The finding of the wounded
spaniel had led me already to the discovery of Mrs. Catherick's
visit to Blackwater Park, and that event might lead in its turn,
to something more. I determined to make the most of the chance
which was now offered to me, and to gain as much information as I
could.

"Did you say that Mrs. Catherick lived anywhere in this
neighbourhood?" I asked.

"Oh dear, no," said the housekeeper. "She lives at Welmingham,
quite at the other end of the county—five-and-twenty miles off,
at least."

"I suppose you have known Mrs. Catherick for some years?"

"On the contrary, Miss Halcombe, I never saw her before she came
here yesterday. I had heard of her, of course, because I had
heard of Sir Percival's kindness in putting her daughter under
medical care. Mrs. Catherick is rather a strange person in her
manners, but extremely respectable-looking. She seemed sorely put
out when she found that there was no foundation—none, at least,
that any of us could discover—for the report of her daughter
having been seen in this neighbourhood."

"I am rather interested about Mrs. Catherick," I went on,
continuing the conversation as long as possible. "I wish I had
arrived here soon enough to see her yesterday. Did she stay for
any length of time?"

"Yes," said the housekeeper, "she stayed for some time; and I
think she would have remained longer, if I had not been called
away to speak to a strange gentleman—a gentleman who came to ask
when Sir Percival was expected back. Mrs. Catherick got up and
left at once, when she heard the maid tell me what the visitor's
errand was. She said to me, at parting, that there was no need to
tell Sir Percival of her coming here. I thought that rather an
odd remark to make, especially to a person in my responsible
situation."

I thought it an odd remark too. Sir Percival had certainly led me
to believe, at Limmeridge, that the most perfect confidence
existed between himself and Mrs. Catherick. If that was the case,
why should she be anxious to have her visit at Blackwater Park
kept a secret from him?

"Probably," I said, seeing that the housekeeper expected me to
give my opinion on Mrs. Catherick's parting words, "probably she
thought the announcement of her visit might vex Sir Percival to no
purpose, by reminding him that her lost daughter was not found
yet. Did she talk much on that subject?"

"Very little," replied the housekeeper. "She talked principally
of Sir Percival, and asked a great many questions about where he
had been travelling, and what sort of lady his new wife was. She
seemed to be more soured and put out than distressed, by failing
to find any traces of her daughter in these parts. 'I give her
up,' were the last words she said that I can remember; 'I give her
up, ma'am, for lost.' And from that she passed at once to her
questions about Lady Glyde, wanting to know if she was a handsome,
amiable lady, comely and healthy and young—-Ah, dear! I thought
how it would end. Look, Miss Halcombe, the poor thing is out of
its misery at last!"