Evidently the first thing to be done when I was turned out of the Torwood's house was to find a habitation for myself somewhere else; and the search for a suitable lodging occupied me till late in the evening. When at last I had succeeded, I told the landlady that my name was Charlotte Jackson; for I had learnt wisdom by experience, and, having now perceived the folly of continuing to call myself Caroline Jill, I substituted for it the first name that occurred to me whose initials would correspond to the C. J. with which my linen was marked.
By the time I had taken possession of my new quarters I felt quite ready for supper, and betook myself, therefore, to a neighbouring coffee-tavern, where, for the sum of twopence, I procured a satisfying and not extravagant meal, consisting of a large hunch of good bread and a basin of thick pea-soup, which—though perhaps somewhat coarsely flavoured—was undeniably savoury and nourishing. Then I returned to my lodging and composed another of the anonymous letters with which I was harassing my stepmother. I took especial pains to make it as unpleasant and likely to alarm her as I could, because it was the last that I intended sending her. I meant to let about a week more elapse, and then to put my threats into execution and proceed to the final act of vengeance, by making known to her husband and friends the whole history of her Scroggins connection.
Having written this letter and directed it all ready to post next day, I proceeded to consider my present situation, and what my next effort for a livelihood should be. But I suppose the pea-soup must have been indigestible, for I was out of sorts somehow, took a gloomy view of things in general, and was unwontedly dispirited about my prospects. My mind seemed to have no elasticity or variety, and would keep reverting to the difficulty of getting a place without a character, and the impossibility of getting a character without forging it. The pitcher that goes often to the well gets broken at last, thought I; and though, hitherto, the detection of my forgeries has brought no worse consequences than dismissal from my situations, yet I cannot reckon on always escaping so easily. If I do not mind what I am about, I may find myself in prison some fine day; and to that I should object most strongly. It would be too horribly disgraceful; I should never be able to hold up my head again afterwards!
I could arrive at no settled determination whatever, and finally went to bed in a very bad humour with myself for being so irresolute and inclined to be disheartened.
When I woke next morning I was more cheerfully disposed, and thought I would get a newspaper and give a look at the advertisements. There could be no reason why I should not do that, at all events, as reading them did not by any means necessarily involve answering them. Accordingly I procured a newspaper and proceeded to study it. Here a temptation to recklessness at once presented itself in the shape of a notice setting forth that excellent situations for courier-maids were to be heard of on application to Mrs. Asterisk's registry office. The idea of going abroad again made my mouth water; and, putting aside the character difficulty for future consideration, I proceeded immediately to Mrs. Asterisk's, paid the preliminary fee without which her lips were sealed, received in return the addresses of a couple of ladies in want of travelling-maids, and set off to call at one of these addresses.
The way to this place took me near the chief approach to a large railway station, whence a train was shortly about to start; and I had to pause before crossing the road in order to let a string of luggage-laden cabs and carriages go past. In the line of vehicles coming towards where I stood, there was a brougham which exhibited signs of wealth combined with perfect taste, which made me notice it particularly, and wonder who the fortunate owners could be. The colouring, liveries, etc., were as quiet as possible, and there was nothing showy about the turn-out except the splendid pair of high-stepping horses by which it was drawn. But, though not showy, none the less was every detail of its appointments faultless, and I lingered to see if the occupants were as well worth looking at as their equipage was. As the fiery horses came slowly abreast of me, tossing their heads, snorting, and champing their bits with impatience at being delayed, I saw that there was an earl's coronet on the harness, and that a lady and gentleman were in the carriage. In a moment more it was near enough for me to recognise who they were, and then I saw that they were Lord and Lady Clement.
I had not before set eyes on Kitty since I parted from her at Charing Cross; but I had often and often thought of her, and wondered whether her marriage had brought her happiness; and now I gazed at her eagerly, trying to guess this from her countenance. Impossible, however, to read the secrets of a face as impenetrable as hers! All I could tell was, that she looked handsomer than ever, and just a trifle more stern; and I had an idea, too, that the haughty immovable expression which had been always somewhat characteristic of her had become intensified. Her husband addressed some remark to her, and she answered him promptly with a gracious pleasant smile, that showed them to be on thoroughly good terms together. Yet I fancied it was a smile of conventionality rather than of affection; it seemed only to come from the lips—the eyes and rest of the face had nothing to do with it; and I hardly thought it was such a smile as a young wife would be likely to bestow upon a husband who possessed her heart. Yet after all, what did I know of the matter? It would be absurd for me to think I could form any opinion as to her happiness from a mere glimpse of her like this.
It was strange how the old charm which she had always had for me reasserted itself the instant I beheld her again. In her I seemed to recognise the sole human being in the world whose affection I would have taken trouble to obtain; and as I looked wistfully after her, thinking that I might possibly have had a chance of it, if it had not been for my stepmother and Perkins, I felt a fresh access of resentment towards them. My stepmother, by making home intolerable, had exiled me from the sphere of life where I could, perhaps, have made friends with Kitty as an equal; and Perkins, by spitefully driving me out of her service, had deprived me of the opportunities I might have had of winning her regard as an inferior. How curious it was that, notwithstanding what untoward circumstances had done to separate us, there yet existed between her and me the sort of half-bond which is involved in the possession of a mutual secret. For had not I discovered the love for Captain Norroy which she had striven zealously to conceal? and did not I know that about her which she believed herself to have kept secret from the whole world?
The carriage went on into the station, and I continued my course without dreaming that the trivial incident of waiting to see Kitty Clement drive by had affected my destiny materially. Such, however, was in truth the case; and the way in which it happened was this:
The sight of Kitty had, as I have just said, reminded me of my stepmother; and that made me think of the letter I had written on the previous night. I had put it in my pocket when I came out, and afterwards forgotten all about it till the present moment. Now, however, that I had remembered it, I thought I would post it at once so as to make sure of not forgetting it again, and accordingly looked about for a post-office. At the corner of a small side street was a pillar-box, which was only a few steps out of my way, so I walked up to it and posted the letter there.
Near by a groom was capering and careering about on an obstreperous horse; and just as I turned away from the box, the steed sprang on to the pavement in spite of all the rider's efforts to restrain him. There he set to plunging and kicking so close to me, that I was obliged to jump hastily into the road in order to get out of reach of his hoofs. Thinking only of the danger from the animal prancing on the pavement, I did not observe a hansom that was dashing up the side street. It came shaving round the corner at full speed, and in another instant I was knocked down, run over, and stunned.
Then comes a confused recollection of acute pain which made me groan; of being moved; of wishing to know what was happening to me, and feeling absolutely incapable of rousing myself sufficiently to find out. And then I must have lost consciousness altogether; for the next thing I remember is, becoming gradually aware that I was in bed. That one fact was as much as my mind was equal to take in at first; I was not altogether sure of my own identity, and recollected nothing whatever of the accident. After lying thus inert for a short time, I opened my eyes and looked at as much as was to be seen without moving my head, which I felt far too languid to do. The result of my observations was, that there were other beds near me, and that I was in a large airy room; I perceived also a prevailing odour of carbolic acid in the place. Had I been in my ordinary condition of energy, I should have been wild to know where I was, and how I came there; but, as it was, I was too limp both in body and mind to be curious or astonished at anything. Therefore I reclosed my eyes with a vague impression that there was something a little odd about my situation; but that as long as I could lie still and do nothing I had all that I desired.
This transient dream of consciousness was succeeded by an interval during which I can only recollect nightmarish visions and miseries. The next thing that my memory recalls definitely is a short conversation between two people whose voices sounded to me as though coming from some remote distance, though in reality, as I knew afterwards, they were close to my bedside.
"What is this case?" said the first voice.
"It's a woman who was run over by a cab," replied the second; "her leg is broken, and she has other injuries also. She was brought in yesterday morning, and hasn't recovered her senses properly yet."
"Indeed!" returned the former speaker. "How did you find out her name, then? I see you've got it stuck up over the bed."
"Oh, there was an envelope in her pocket addressed to Caroline Jill, No. — Chester Square," was the answer. "We sent to the address to ask if she was known there, and to say she had been brought to the hospital. It appeared that she had been lady's-maid at the house, and been dismissed the day before, and they knew nothing of who her belongings were, or where she lived, or anything about her."
As I heard no more, I conclude that here the speakers moved away from my bed. The few words they had said, however, had sufficed to enlighten my cloudy state of mind. At first I had listened without having an idea that I could be the person referred to; but when the name of Caroline Jill was spoken I remembered all about myself, knew clearly who I was, and realised what had occurred to me. Yes; I had gone to a pillar-box to post the letter to my stepmother, and there had been an unmanageable horse to be avoided. Then there had come suddenly a rattle, a violent concussion, confusion, pain, and utter blank; and I comprehended that I had been run over and brought to the accident ward of a hospital. I recollected, too, my prudent design of dropping the name of Jill; and as I realised that that intention was frustrated for the present, I felt a faint trace of amusement at the persistency with which the old childish name had stuck to me.
Was it true that my leg was broken, as those two people had just said? Very likely. Anyhow I would take their word for it, for I certainly did not feel inclined to stir hand or foot to verify the statement. And as my head ached, and I was quite exhausted with the effort of so much consecutive thought, I speedily relapsed into my former comatose condition.
When next I recovered my senses, my head was clear; I remembered directly how I came to be in a hospital, and looked around me. It was night, and by the dim light of a shaded lamp I could see the nurse in charge of the ward sitting in an upright-backed wooden chair, where she had fallen fast asleep notwithstanding the hardness and discomfort of her seat. I could see, too, a glass containing lemonade standing on a table near the head of my bed, and, as I was parching with thirst, I managed slowly, and with difficulty, to draw one hand out from under the bed-clothes, and stretch it out towards the tempting drink. Alas! the glass was out of my reach. The sight of the delicious liquid made my thirst grow worse and worse, till it seemed quite unendurable, and I was impelled to try and wake the nurse, to ask her to give it to me. Accordingly I called out to her as loudly as I could. But my utmost efforts produced only a wheezing feeble sound, which was powerless to produce any impression on her slumbers. The amount of fatigue which it cost me to uplift my voice was quite disproportionate to the insignificance of the result, and I was so tired with the attempt to make myself heard, and the exertion of getting my hand out of bed and reaching after the glass of lemonade, that I realised it was useless to think of waking the nurse, and that I must resign myself to bear the thirst as best I could, till she should wake of herself. Mortification at my helplessness, and profound pity for my poor dear self, caused tears to rise to my eyes and moisten my cheeks. I lay still and watched her so anxiously that one might almost have thought the mere ardour of my gaze ought to have disturbed her repose. Still she slumbered on blissfully. Oh, why would not she wake when I was so very very thirsty!
Suddenly I heard a door open at the other end of the room, and, on looking round, saw a woman enter whose dress showed her to belong to some Sisterhood. I had never thought well of Sisters in my life. They always had seemed to me to be useless, so eccentric as to be well-nigh mad, and—though otherwise harmless—yet objectionable on the ground that their mere existence conveyed a continual tacit reproach and assumption of superiority to more self-indulgent mortals, who shrank from the strictness and hardness which the Sisters imposed upon themselves voluntarily. Hence the fact of the new-comer's wearing a Sister's habit sufficed to prejudice me against her; and on an ordinary occasion I should not have spoken to—far less asked a favour of—her.
But the present was not an ordinary occasion. All I cared for was to have the thirst that tormented me relieved with the least possible delay; and no sooner did I see her than I made a frantic effort to call out loud enough for her to hear. The cry, feeble as it was, reached her ears; and as she was not sure from which bed it proceeded, she advanced slowly up the room, saying, in a low voice, "Who called me?"
I held up my hand to show it was I who had summoned her; she came straight to the bedside and asked what I wanted. "Drink!" I gasped, with some difficulty; for my throat was so dry that I could scarcely articulate the word intelligibly.
With one hand she took up the coveted draught, and, putting the other arm under my pillow, raised me to exactly the right height at which I could drink comfortably, and then held the glass to my lips. Never was nectar more delicious and refreshing than that lemonade tasted to me! When I had drained the last drop I begged eagerly for more, and she quickly replenished the tumbler from a jug on the table, and again gave me the liquid for which I craved. At last my burning thirst was quenched, and when she had gently restored me to my former position in the bed, I could not help feeling beholden to her, notwithstanding that it was a shock to my previous notions to think a Sister could be useful, and notwithstanding, also, that one never altogether relishes the upsetting of any of one's preconceived cherished ideas.
I could speak better now, so I said: "Thank you. I am sorry to have troubled you, but I was so dreadfully thirsty, and the glass was out of my reach."
"No trouble," she replied kindly; "the only object of my being here is to help people if I can. But why didn't you call to the nurse in charge of this ward? She would have attended to you at once."
"I did call to her more than half an hour ago by the clock," I replied, "but I couldn't call loud enough to wake her."
In consequence of my having drawn the Sister's attention to myself directly she entered the room, she had not yet noticed that the nurse was asleep. Now, however, she perceived it. A look of displeasure came over her face, and she at once proceeded to wake the sleeper, who was evidently much disconcerted at having been caught napping, and started up with a great pretence of liveliness when she saw the Sister standing by her.
"This is against all rules, Nurse Mary, as you know very well," said the Sister; "it is a serious offence for a nurse to sleep when on duty, and I shall have to report you."
"I knew it was very wrong, Sister, and I'm quite shocked that I should have been so careless," replied the culprit. "But indeed you mustn't think as there's any harm done. It was only five minutes back as I was going about, and seeing as every one was all right; and then I sat down and dropped off into a bit of a doze somehow. I wasn't reg'larly asleep—only dozing so light that I should have heard d'rectly if any one made a sound."
"Don't make your fault worse by falsehood," said the Sister severely; "I found the woman over there," pointing to me, "in great want of something to drink; and she told me she had been thirsty for a long time, and unable to wake you when she tried. You must attend to your duty better than this. If I find you asleep again when I visit your ward, you must expect to be dismissed."
The Sister continued her rounds through the hospital to see that everything was right; and as soon as she was gone the nurse came towards me. I regarded her approach with awe. I saw by her face that she did not feel particularly amiable towards the individual who had been the means—however innocent—of procuring her a wigging; and as a nurse has it in her power to make a patient very miserable if she chooses, I was naturally dismayed at having been so unlucky as to get into her black books. The desire which I felt at that moment to ingratiate myself with her, if possible, was quite degrading; and when she rebuked me sharply for having got part of one arm uncovered, and told me not to do so again, I promised obedience with the most servile meekness, though I was quite sure that there was no real harm whatever in what I had done. My bedclothes were as tidy as need be; but she pretended to think they wanted straightening, and twitched them about in a vigorous and jerky manner which was not comfortable, and kept me alarmed all the time lest I should be hurt. When she had completed this unnecessary process, she left me alone, to my great relief, and nothing short of the extremest necessity would have induced me to recall her to my bed. I felt frightened, helpless, and in the power of a person who had taken a dislike to me; and the only comfort I had was to think that the Sister's protecting influence would perhaps save me from anything more serious than petty annoyances. But even petty annoyances are bad enough in all conscience when one is as sick, weak, and miserable as I was then.