Recalled to Life

Chapter 16

MY PLANS ALTER

The rest of that day we spent chatting very amicably in our Pullman

arm-chairs. I couldn't understand it myself--when I had a moment to

think, I was shocked and horrified at it. I was so terribly at home

with them. These were friends of Dr. Ivor's--friends of my father's

murderer! I had come out to Canada to track him, to deliver him

over, if I could, to the strong hand of Justice. And yet, there I

was talking away with his neighbours and friends as if I had known

them all my life, and loved them dearly. Nay, what was more, I

couldn't in my heart of hearts help liking them. They were really

sweet people--so kind and sympathetic, so perceptive of my

sensitiveness. They asked no questions that could hurt me in any

way. They showed no curiosity about the object of my visit or my

relation to Dr. Ivor. They were kindness and courtesy itself. I

could see Mr. Cheriton was a gentleman in fibre, and Elsie was as

sweet as any woman on earth could be.

By-and-by, the time came for the Pullman saloon to be transformed

for the night into a regular sleeping-car. All this was new to me,

and I watched it with interest. As soon as the beds were made up, I

crept into my berth, and my new friend Elsie took her place on the

sofa below me. I lay awake long and thought over the situation. The

more I thought of it, the stranger it all seemed. I tried hard to

persuade myself I was running some great danger in accepting the

Cheritons' invitation. Certainly, I had behaved with consummate

imprudence. Canada is a country, I said to myself, where they kidnap

and murder well-to-do young Englishmen. How much easier, then, to

kidnap and murder a poor weak stray English girl! I was entirely at

the mercy of the Cheritons, that was clear: and the Cheritons were

Dr. Ivor's friends. As I thought all the circumstances over, the

full folly of my own conduct came home to me more and more. I had

let these people suppose I was travelling under an assumed name. I

had let them know my ticket was not for Palmyra but for Kingston,

where I didn't mean to go. I had told them I meant to change it at

Sharbot Lake. So they were aware that no one on earth but themselves

had any idea where I had gone. And I had further divulged to them

the important fact that I had plenty of ready money in Bank of

England notes! I stood aghast at my own silliness. But still, I did

NOT distrust them.

No, I did NOT distrust them. I felt I ought to be distrustful. I

felt it might be expected of me. But they were so gentle-mannered

and so sweet-natured, that I couldn't distrust them. I tried very

hard, but distrust wouldn't come to me. That kind fellow Jack--I

thought of him, just so, as Jack already--couldn't hurt a fly, much

less kill a woman. It grieved me to think I would have to hurt his

feelings.

For now that I came to look things squarely in the face in my berth

by myself, I began to see how utterly impossible it would be for me

after all to go and stop with the Cheritons. How I could ever have

dreamt it feasible I could hardly conceive. I ought to have refused

at once. I ought to have been braver. I ought to have said outright,

"I'll have nothing to do or say with anyone who is a friend or an

acquaintance of Courtenay Ivor's." And yet, to have said so would

have been to give up the game for lost. It would have been to

proclaim that I had come out to Canada as Courtenay Ivor's enemy.

I wasn't fit, that was the fact, for my self-imposed task of

private detective.

A good part of that night I lay awake in my berth, bitterly

reproaching myself for having come on this wild-goose chase without

the aid of a man--an experienced officer. Next morning, I rose and

breakfasted in the car. The Cheritons breakfasted with me, and, sad

to say, seemed more charming than ever. That good fellow Jack was so

attentive and kind, I almost felt ashamed to have to refuse his

hospitality; and as for Elsie, she couldn't have treated me more

nicely or cordially if she'd been my own sister. It wasn't what they

said that touched my heart: it was what they didn't say or do--their

sweet, generous reticence.

After breakfast, I steeled myself for the task, and broke it to them

gently that, thinking it over in the night, I'd come to the

conclusion I couldn't consistently accept their proffered welcome.

"I don't know how to say NO to you," I cried, "after you've been so

wonderfully kind and nice; but reasons which I can't fully explain

just now make me feel it would be wrong of me to think of stopping

with you. It would hamper my independence of action to be in anybody

else's house. I must shift for myself, and try if I can't find board

and lodging somewhere."

"Find it with us then!" Elsie put in eagerly. "If that's all that's

the matter, I'm sure we're not proud--are we, Jack?--not a bit.

Sooner than you should go elsewhere and be uncomfortable in your

rooms, I'd take you in myself, and board you and look after you. You

could pay what you like; and then you'd retain your independence,

you see, as much as ever you wanted."

But her brother interrupted her with a somewhat graver air:

"It goes deeper than that, I'm afraid, Elsie," he said, turning his

eye full upon her. "If Miss Callingham feels she couldn't be happy

in stopping with us, she'd better try elsewhere. Though where on

earth we can put her, I haven't just now the very slightest idea.

But we'll turn it over in our own minds before we reach Adolphus

Town."

There was a sweet reasonableness about Jack that attracted me

greatly. I could see he entered vaguely into the real nature of my

feelings. But he wouldn't cross-question me: he was too much of a

gentleman.

"Miss Callingham knows her own motives best," he said more than

once, when Elsie tried to return to the charge. "If she feels she

can't come to us, we must be content to do the best we can for her

with our neighbours. Perhaps Mrs. Walters would take her in: she's

our clergyman's wife, Miss Callingham, and you mightn't feel the

same awkwardness with her as with my sister."

"Does she know--Dr. Ivor?" I faltered out, unable to conceal my real

reasons entirely.

"Not so intimately as we do," Jack answered, with a quick glance at

his sister. "We might ask her at any rate. There are so few houses

in Palmyra or the neighbourhood where you could live as you're

accustomed, that we mustn't be particular. But at least you'll spend

one night with us, and then we can arrange all the other things

afterward."

My mind was made up.

"No, not even one night," I said. I couldn't accept hospitality from

Dr. Ivor's friends. Between his faction and mine there could be

nothing now but the bitterest enmity. How dare I even parley with

people who were friends of my father's murderer?

Yet I was sorry to disappoint that good fellow, Jack, all the same.

Did he want me to sleep one night at his house on purpose to rob me

and murder me? Girl as I was, and rendered timorous in some ways by

the terrible shocks I had received, I couldn't for one moment

believe it. I KNEW he was good: I KNEW he was honourable, gentle, a

gentleman.

So, journeying on all morning, we reached Sharbot Lake, still with

nothing decided. At the little junction station, Jack got me my

ticket. That was the turning point in my career. The die was cast.

There I lost my identity. A crowd lounged around the platform, and

surged about the Pullman car, calling to see "Una Callingham." But

no Una Callingham appeared on the scene. I went, on in the same

train, without a word to anyone, all unknown save to the two

Cheritons, and as an unrecognised unit of common humanity. I had

cast that horrid identity clean behind me.

The afternoon was pleasant. In spite of my uncertainty, it gave me a

sense of pleased confidence to be in the Cheritons' company. I had

taken to them at once: and the more I talked with them, the better I

liked them. Especially Jack, that nice brotherly Jack, who seemed

almost like an old friend to me. You get to know people so well on a

long railway journey. I was quite sorry to think that by five

o'clock that afternoon we should reach Adolphus Town, and so part

company.

About ten minutes to five, we were collecting our scattered things,

and putting our front-hair straight by the mirror in the ladies'

compartment.

"Well, Miss Cheriton," I said warmly, longing to kiss her as I

spoke, "I shall never forget how kind you two have been to me. I do

wish so much I hadn't to leave you like this. But it's quite

inevitable. I don't see really how I could ever endure--"

I said no more, for just at that moment, as the words trembled on my

lips, a terrible jar thrilled suddenly through the length and

breadth of the carriage. Something in front seemed to rush into us

with a deep thud. There was a crash, a fierce grating, a dull hiss,

a clatter. Broken glass was flying about. The very earth beneath the

wheels seemed to give way under us. Next instant, all was blank. I

just knew I was lying, bruised and stunned and bleeding, on a bare

dry bank, with my limbs aching painfully.

I guessed what it all meant. A collision, no doubt. But I lay faint

and ill, and knew nothing for the moment as to what had become of my

fellow-passengers.