L. Meade - A Ring of Rubies

“It is worth a good deal more than that,” she said. “I know the centre ruby has been priced at a very high figure by more than one connoisseur. Nevertheless, you are not going to sell the ring, are you, Rosamund?”

“It would pay my expenses at the Slade,” I said somewhat mischievously.

My mother was about to reply when we were both startled by hearing the sound of a latch-key in the hall-door lock. I opened the door of the little drawing-room and peeped out.

“Jack!” I exclaimed. “What has brought you back at this hour?”

“My headache is worse,” he replied, “I could not stay in town, so I came home.”

“Oh, I am sorry,” I said. “Mother, Jack has come home with a bad headache.”

My mother stepped into the hall.

“You are looking very ill indeed,” she exclaimed.

Jack growled in that peculiarly ungracious way which always drove me wild when it was addressed to our mother.

“I am not ill,” he said. “What a fuss women make! I have just got a beastly headache.”

“Come into the drawing-room, and have a cup of tea, my dear boy.”

“I could not sit up, thank you, mother. I’ll go to my room, and see what a stretch on the bed and a nap will do for me. If Rosamund likes to be good-natured, she can bring me up some tea in half an hour.”

I did not particularly wish to be good-natured; nevertheless, at the time specified I took the tea to Jack. He sat up when I entered the room; there were feverish spots on his cheeks.

“Bother that tea!” he exclaimed. “Put it down, and shut the door, Rosamund. Now come over, and sit near me. If I don’t tell you what is the matter, I shall go mad.”

I sat down at once by Jack’s bedside.

“What are you going to tell me?” I asked.

“How prosaic you are, Rose.”

“Well, you never like me to make a fuss.”

“That is true, and no doubt you will act sensibly in the present emergency. It is nice to be pitied, and affection is of value, but sense, oh yes, unquestionably common sense comes first of all.” I could not help gazing at Jack with wide-open round eyes while he was speaking.

“You never in your whole life asked me to show feeling or affection,” I managed to gasp out. “What do you mean by regretting it now? Your head must be wandering.”

“Well, well, Rose, perhaps it is. It certainly aches badly enough to account for any vagaries in my speech. But now to business – or rather to the kernel of the matter. Rose, I am going to be very ill, very dangerously ill – do you understand?”

“I hope I don’t, Jack. You have a bad headache, which will soon get better.”

“I repeat, I am going to be dangerously ill. I have taken fever. I know the symptoms, for I have watched them in another.”

“In another? Whom do you mean? When have you been with a fever-stricken patient?”

“You will start when you hear my next words. I have been nursing my wife through fever.”

“Jack – your wife! Are you married? Oh, Jack!”

“Well, go on, Rosamund. Get over your astonishment. Say, ‘Oh Jack!’ as often as you like, only believe in the fact without my having to repeat it to you. I am married. My wife has scarlet fever; I have nursed her till I could hold up no longer, and now I have taken it myself.”

I looked full into my brother’s face. It was flushed now, and his brown eyes were bright. He was a big fellow, and he looked absolutely handsome as he sat up in bed with the fever gleam shining through his eyes, and a certain sad droop about his still boyish mouth. I own that I never found Jack so interesting before. He had behaved very badly, of course, in marrying any one secretly, but he was the hero of a romance. He had feeling and affection. I quite loved him. I bent forward and kissed him on his cheek.

“Go on,” I said. “You want me to help you. Tell me all the story as quickly as you can.”

“But you will shrink from me when you know all.”

“No, I promise that I won’t. Now do go on.”

“I believe I must tell you quickly, for this pain rages and rages, and I can scarcely collect my thoughts. Now then, Rosamund, these are the bare facts. Six months ago I fell in love with Hetty. Her other name doesn’t matter, and who she was doesn’t matter. I used to meet her in the mornings when she walked to a school where she was teaching. We were married and I took her to some lodgings in Putney.”

“But you had no money.”

“Well, I had scarcely any. I used to make an odd pound now and then by bringing home work to copy, and Hetty did not lose her situation as teacher. She still went to the school, and she told no one of her marriage. I meant to break it to you all when I began to get my salary, for you know my time of apprenticeship will expire at Christmas. Things wouldn’t have turned out so badly, for Hetty has the simplest tastes, poor little darling, if she had not somehow or other got this horrible scarlet fever. She was so afraid I’d take her to the hospital; but not I! – the landlady and I nursed her between us.”

“But, Jack, where did you get the money?” The heavy flush got deeper on my brother’s brow. He turned his head away, and his manner became almost gruff.

“That’s the awkward part,” he growled. “I – I borrowed the money.”

“From whom?”

“Chillingfleet.”

“Mr Chillingfleet? He’s the head of your firm, isn’t he?”

“Yes, yes. I went into his room one day. His private drawer was open; I took four five-pound notes. That was last Monday. He won’t miss them until next Monday – the day he makes up his accounts. I thought Hetty was dying, and the notes stared me in the face, and I – I borrowed them. He has tens of thousands of pounds, and I – I borrowed twenty.”

“Jack – Jack – you stole them!”

I covered my face with my hands; I trembled all over.

“Oh, don’t, Rose! call me by every ugly name you like – there, I know I’m a brute.”

“No, you’re not,” I said. I had recovered myself by this time. I looked at his poor flushed face, at his trembling hands. He was a thief, he had brought disgrace upon our poor but honest name, but at this moment I loved him fifty times better than George.

“Listen to me, Jack,” I said. “I won’t say one other word to abuse you at present. What’s more, I will do what I can to help you.”

“God bless you, Rosamund. You don’t really mean that? Really and truly?”

“I really and truly mean it. Now lie down and let me put these sheets straight. This is Friday. Something can be done between now and Monday. Are you quite sure that Mr Chillingfleet will not find out the loss of the notes before Monday?”

“Yes, he always banks on Monday, and he makes up his accounts then. Rose, you have got no money; you cannot save me.”

“I have certainly got no money, Jack, but I have got woman’s wit. Have you spent all the twenty pounds?”

“Every farthing. I owed a lot to Mrs Ashton, Hetty’s landlady.”

“Now you must give me Hetty’s address.”

“Oh, I say, Rose, you are a brick! Are you going to see her?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Are you going to-day?”

“I’ll go, if I possibly can.”

“You must be very gentle with her, remember.”

“I’ll do my best.”

“And for goodness’ sake don’t frighten her about me.”

“No.”

“You must make up some kind of excuse about me. You must on no account let out that I have caught this horrible thing. Do you understand, Rosamund, if Hetty finds this out it will kill her at once.”

“I’ll do my very best for you, Jack. I won’t do anything to injure Hetty. I don’t know her, but I think I can promise that. Now, please, give me her address.”