THE DARK HOUR OF MERVYN BENSON.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume VII, Issue 21, 23 May 1891, Page 16

THE DARK HOUR OF MERVYN BENSON.

A SKETCH.—BY WILFRED RATHBONE. is no hope?’ ‘ None !’ 1 * r * len W *H •’ L\ r I -‘ I 1 ma .V come any time now, and must X I within, eight hours. Be brave, my poor • Painless?* * Yes, you have that comfort. ’Tis pure exhaustion. She will pass off painlessly in a few hours at most. Goodbye. God help you!’ The man accustomed to such scenes held out his hand with some very real emotion. Mervyn Benson scarcely seemed to hear. His face was absolutely composed, but deathly white. * Good-bye !’ repeated the doctor. ‘ Stop, Jevons ! For God’s sake don’t go I You can surely do somethiug. She is so young. She was so well before —’ He stopped and controlled his rising excitement with an immense effort. After a second he sat down. * You must save her, doctor. We have only been married a year,’ he added, with a chocking sob. * My poor, dear lad, I know, I know, but it is absolutely impossible. All that medical science can do has been done. There is no life left. ’ Mervyn’s head fell lower and lower. Suddenly, however, a new mood seemed to seize him. He spoke vehemently. ‘ Nothing can be done by anyone, by no woman, by the nurse. You are sure of that, Jevons ?’ ‘ Nothing.’ ‘ She will want no more nursing—l mean can I do all that is necessary to the—to the end. Answer quickly 1 Oh, why don’t you answer ?’ He laid one hand on the doctor’s shoulder and almost shook him in his excitement. ‘You really must calm yourself, Benson,’ replied the young doctor, disengaging himself gently. * See ! I am calm.’ The unfortunate man folded his arms and stood quiet, but he trembled in all his limbs with impatience. ‘ My lad, it is even as you say. No one can do anything.’ * Then, take that woman away. I will be alone with my wife.’ ‘ But, my dear—’ ‘Take her away. She can do no good. I must be alone with my wife,’ he repeated, doggedly, but added in gentler tones as he saw the nurse’s scared face, ‘ Nay, do not think me ungrateful or mad. You have been very good, but your task is over. She—she must die. Go now, go at once, and thank you.’ ‘lt is better perhaps,’said the doctor. ‘ You can return in a few hours. Come !’ The woman retired for a moment, and presently returned with her hat. ‘ She will return at eight in the morning, or if you want her before, you can send the boy. I will take her to the township in my buggy. Once more good-bye.' A hearty handgrip followed. It was sunset. The whole of the western sky was a mass of crimson and golden glory. To the north the skies moderated their fervid splendours, but shone resplendent in a thousand ever-melting, ever-changing hues, while the whole vault of heaven, even to the furthest west, was embroidered with transparent fluffly cloudlets blushing rosiest red at the last kiss the sun had bestowed on them before sinking to sleep with such regal splendour. The gum trees and pines stood out black as ink against the brilliant glow, and the buggy seemed to disappear into a mist of auriferous roseate glory. Mervyn looked at all the beauty of the dying day with a wild bitterness at his heart. A wish to curse God and die. The last thought with its awful word made him drop the curtain and turn to the bed. There lay his wife, not a year married, and dying. As he first looked a fearful fear shot through him. Was she already dead—gone while he was watching the sunset? Thank God ! no. She still breathed. Moving quietly about, he pulled a big chair to the bedside so that he might rest his head on the pillow beside that of the dying wife he loved so passionately. How beautiful she looked. Her hair lay like strands of purest gold on the white of the pillow. One tiny hand so white, and scarcely shrunken, lay on the coverlet, on it gleaming the bright gold wedding ring, and above it the dainty toy of pearls and diamonds that had sealed their engagement. The soft cheeks were very white, but not shrunken, and the lips were still full, and, strange to say, red and moist. The dear, deep blue eyes were closed, and the long lashes slept restfully on the pale cheek. So Mervyn stood, and with a numb, senseless feeling, watched the gradual passing away of what he held most dear. .She seemed to sleep. With gentle hand he drew back the curtains, and let the light of the dead day fill the room. Then he sat down to wait for the end. His mind was in chasos, and thoughts innumerable in number and variety flitted through his mind. His eye fell on the picture over the bed. It was not quite straight. How annoying ! It must be put right, not to-night, of course, but to-morrow, when Hush ! but to-morrow, she will be dead. The frame of the picture, too, interested him. A corner had got damaged. He remembered the day it was done—the day he and Mildred, his young wife, had put them up, and now— With frantic endeavour he tries to realise the ‘ then ’ and the ‘ now,’ but with terrible persistency his thoughts return to the picture—the frame. The engraving was one of their wedding presents. She took it out of the case when it came back from the framer’s. Now, it looked at her dying. Curse the picture, would his thoughts never leave it ! There was some carved bead work on the frame. How was that done, he wondered ? He must inquire at the ordinary framers, in Queen-street. Had the man who did the work a wife, he wondered. Was she strong, or was she—curse the picture again ! His glance again rests on her face. Very calm and peaceful it looks. The lips are slightly parted, and the faint breath scarce seems to pass through them. The bedroom vanishes, and he sees the drawing-room of the • Cottage ’ at home. She lies asleep on the sofa. For a fortnight she has been laid up with some slight sprain, and now, worn out with novel reading, lies asleep in the prettiest of pink wrappers, her face flushed with slumlier. With what delight, with what tremulous hope and fear he watches, enter-

ing the open window and walking softly towards where she lies. It is glorious July. The air is heavy with mingled perfume of roses, and the hay lying newly mown in a hundred meadows. Gently he approaches and stands gazing, then very softly kneels and kisses the lips’ pouting invitation even in slumber. With a start she wakes. ‘Mr Benson! Ab, Mervyn, Mervyn, you love me after all.’ And, indeed, there is, he feels, no need to tell it. It is written plain in his eyes. She could not help but read the truth. hat a glorious hour passes. Very little is said. Her head is on his shoulder, ana the story is told lip to lip and hand to hand. Kiss answers kiss and pressure pressure till— A sigh of happiness escapes at the recollection, and with fiendish cruelty recallshim to the terrible present. She is dying—impossible ! the doctor mnst be wrong. She is only asleep as she was that other time. A kiss will awaken her. It must. Tlod cannot be so cruel. She, so happy, so fond, only twenty, and only his, a year. Surely the kiss will rouse her. Trembling with excitement, which he knows is only doomed to disappointed and terrible reaction, he stoops—oh, so gently— to give the caress he knows so well to be useless. Their lips meet. How chilly, passive hers seem. His heart is beating with great bumps like to burst itself. He scarcely breathes, for she is opening her eyes. ‘ Mervyn,’she murmurs, faintly, mutely, her lips begging for another kiss, ‘ have you come home at last, darling ? What a long night you have had.’ He is sub editor on a morning paper, and gets home only at three o’clock in the morning. ‘See, darling,’ she continues faintly, ‘it is nearly dawn. It has seemed so long, so lonely, and I have had such horrid dreams. Why is it so hard to talk, Mervyn ?’ He can keep them back no longer. Two big tears fall hotly on her cheek. For a moment or two there is silence, and Mildied Benson seems trying to understand something. The fair young face is all puckered up into what she used in the merry old days to call her thinking expression. Suddenly it clears, and into her eyes there creeps the light of infinite sorrow. . Love passing understanding was always brimming over in their depths, but now it so melted and merged with this sorrowful pity that Mervyn can no longer gaze. He buries his face in the clothes, vainly trying to tain command over himself. He will not let a sob escape, ut his whole body shakes convulsively responsive to the throes which wring his heart. With an effort she had managed to lift a hand and rest it on his head. She tries to stroke it, but has no strength. ‘ Mervyn, darling, don’t cry. lam dying, am I not ?’ A long silence. Softly is the question repeated. ‘ Answer !’ she commands. A choked ‘ yes ’ from the prostrate figure. ‘ How soon, sweetheart ? Nay, tell me love. I have no fear, only sorrow for my poor boy, and—’ She stopped as if exhausted. ‘ Dearest, will you do me one last favour ?’ ‘ Milly, how can you ask ?’ ‘ Hush, hush my poor boy. lam so silly. Tell me again of before we were married.’ It had been one of the fond follies of their early married days to recall and rehearse the scenes they two had acted in on the dear courting days. ‘ Come,' she whispered, ‘ let me put my arm round your neck, your dear cheek next mine. No, see, there is no weight on my arm ; it’s all on the pillow.’ So much talking had exhausted her, and she stopped with a shudder of weakness. Her lips conveyed the mute appeal, and he began to tell scraps of the’ oft-told tale. At first he remembered only the dreadful present, but looking always into her great violet blue eyes, all seemed to melt into the past, and with a vague agony at heart he half consciously lived the old time he talked of again. One hand beneath the bed clothes clasped hers, and one soft arm lay round his neck. ‘Do you remember the day we met? Oh, how beautiful you looked. The day I arrived home on my first visit after five years in Auckland. How shyly you looked at me, and how angrily I imagined you were laughing at colonialisms of manner and speech I had picked up. I remember your dress trimmed with the golden fur Herbert had sent from the Argentine. Then at dinner in your pink dress how completely you stole my heart away in that talk over the roses, and how I admired the one you wore. What a simple, joyous, love-making it was! How smoothly it ran ! You helped me to shop, and I told you all about the dear New Zealand home and friends, and always hinted at its loveliness. And do you remember the ball, the time I had nearly proposed, the clay before you left for your week in Ireland ? How you said I might write, and I said it was so good to have friends, of the flower you let drop—accidentally, and afterwards admitted it was with intention ? Do you remember how my voice quivered with the love that would not be suppressed as I asked for it, and how your hand trembled as you put it in my coat? Of how I kissed the hand, and was just beginning to tell, when in came Freda, and bouncingly carried you off.’ A half smile at the recollection awoke the present pain to exquisite pitch. He could not go on. Softly, gently, she turned her head (new life seemed given her) and kissed his lips again and again with long, lingering carresses. Tell me about the wedding, about our start. With mighty effort he conquered himself, and told of the ceremony, the delights, the fears, the beautiful presents, the absurd drive away, and then ot all the dear, delightful time on that honeymoon, when like children they wandered hand in hand, or he lay at her feet while lazily they talked. Then of the night when they left England. The awful scenes for others on the wharf as the great P. and O. steamship moved away, of their own feelings of all sufficiency in one another. Suddenly she stopped him. ‘ Darling,’ she whispered, ‘its coming. lam growing faint.’ She struggled for breath. The agony in his face was terrible to behold. The spasm left her. ‘I am going, darling. You won’t be very long, dearest, will you ?’ Then arose within him a terrible resolve that he would follow her at once. She must have seen an awful purpose in his face. With supreme effort she drew herself to him, and laid her lips against his. ‘ Promise, darling, you won’t do it. Promise yon won’t. Promise, promise,’ with Mid earnestness she prayed. With solemn face he promised,' then swore a terrible oath to keep it. She smiled. ‘I am happy now. You—won’t—be—long —Mervy—l know. ’

Very faintly came the words, and she sank back into unconsciousness. For the next two hours Mervyn Benson lay there, and every scene in Iris past life passed before him. Suddenly a deadly, sickened feeling came o’er him. A picture of a scene of vice and debauchey flashed into his mind with teirible, awful distinctness. Right through bis lips he bit in his agony, and clenched his fists till the nails entered the flesh. ‘My God ! My God !’ he murmured, in his supreme suffering, ‘ spare me, spare me !’ But still, with relentless persistence, the horrid vision pursued him, while a voice seemed to say, ‘ This is thy punishment.’ He disengaged himself from the circling arm, and lay on the floor writhing and straining as if his mind must go. ‘ Mercy !’ he moaned, ‘ mercy ! Any other punishment and other— ’ Then across his sense he felt that were he to die now by her side they would be judged together. He had not been worse than many of his fellows, but that she should hear him judged, that she should know. The pain was too great; he lost consciousness. He must have lain half an hour he found when he came too still and cold. He wondered why he was lying there, and speculated why for a few seconds, then as all the terrible truth rushed on him, he rushed to the bed in terror lest she should be gone. No, she was still alive, but the breath came feebler now. A feeling of calm, nay, of holy peace came over him as he watched her pitifully. She opened her eyes. ‘ Mervy, Mervy, how cold it is ! I am going away now. How—the—wind—blows. Must — my—noy —go—out tonight?’ ‘ Oh, hush, darling, hush !’ ‘ Don’t cry, darling. You wont be long, will you, Mervy ? It’s so lonely till you come. Why is it so dark ? Goodnight. The wind, how loud it’s blowing ! Good-night, Mervy. I think—come soon—l think I’ll go to sleep,’ so whispering faintly Mildred Benson sank to the long sleep from which she will waken -to greet life eternal. It was about dawn, full three hours after, when Mervyn regained consciousness. Three hours of blessed oblivion, but, oh, the terror of returning feeling. With her last breath and strength Mildred had drawn his face close to hers, and in the faint, panting struggle for life, had circled his neck with the arm across which he had replaced his head after that terrible guert-d'heur with conscience. Icyly now felt the cheek, and cold and heavy the arm. Slowly he remembered it all, and at last gained courage of a desperate sort and looked into her face. _He gazed into those glassy, gazing eyes, awful in their intensity and fixedity, with a growing rapture, alternating with sudden spasms of agony of terror. Loud noises boomed in his ears. Severer and severer grew the strain, louder and louder the noise. A great blood-red wave passed before his eyes. One more look at those dreadful eyes. God,-what pain ! and then darkness. Unconsciousness only lasts a few seconds. He opens his eyes again ; they are bright; his face is flushed; he smiles happily, and gazes with love and tenderest sympathy into the dear eyes. They are still terrible in their death frozenness, but to him they shine back love. The lips so chill and white look full red and pouting. With a passion of love he presses his to them, so chill and cold. The head of the dead girl slips with the force of his vehement caress. Ghastly it drops backward, and his hot kisses have parted the lips in what looks like a smile —a smile of infinite horror. A. shudder passes over him, and for half a second a shade passes over his face. ‘ See, she is smiling at me. My darling, my darling !’ Loudly he laughs. ‘ How happy we are, we two, my darling, how gloriously happy ! They told me you would die. Die, Milly, die ! not you. We know better, don’t we, darling. Ha, ha, ha.’ The horrid peals of the maniac’s laughter almost drowns the hammering at the door, where the doctor has returned. The sun is not yet up, but the glow of dawn fills the room. Loudly echoes the poor mad Mervyn’s laugh. ‘ Good heavens !’ says Dr. Jevons, ‘ the shock has driven him mad.’ Throwing all his force against the door windows of the sick room, which open on to the verandah, he staggers back at the sight that meets his eye. Half on her side lies the dead woman, her eyes wide, staring stonely into those of her husband, who alternately talks and presses his burning kisses to her lips. His arm is round her, and she is drawn close to him. He springs round with nndescribable fury on the doctor. His rage is fearful to behold. Flecks of foam are on his lips, and he is inarticulate. At last he gasps out: ‘ Ah, you are death, come to rob me of my dead. See, I will kill death, and all men shall live forever.’ With a face convulsed with fury he lifts the heavy mirror high above his head, and then with sickening crash lets it drop and falls senseless across the bed and body of his dead wife. **♦»**» , It is six months later. Mervyn Benson is recovered enough to sell his goods and chattels and return to England. He is driving down to the steamer. The only friend he ever sees, Dr. Jevons, is with him. At the top of Upper Queen-street they meet the steam roller. For a second the horse stops stalk still. A wild rear, a wilder plunge, and they are tearing down the street at racing speed. A terrible temptation enters Mervyn’s mind. He will not attempt to save themselves from the certain death. The seconds are filled with an infinity of thought. Suddenly he sees a fair face, and hears the well-loved voice, ‘ Your promise, Mervyn.’ With might and main he endeavours to curb the wild career. Grey-street crossing is safely passed, still they tear on to Wellesley-street, but it was a close thing with the tram. Ah, this can never be got over. Some improvements are being made. There is a scaffolding near Victoria-street. One more effort; ’tis in vain. Crash ! »*** * ’ • * * Stand back now ! give them air !’ ‘Put me close to Jevons,’ moans Mervyn. ‘Jevons,’he says, very faintly, ‘ you saw I did my best to save us. You are not much injured?’ ‘An arm broken, that’s all. Yon did your best.’ A great light comes into his eyes. ‘ Oh, Milly, I have kept my promise. lam coming, darling, coming, so quickly. I wasn't long, was I ?’ A long, deep sigh, and the happy spirit of Mervyn Benson fled to meet his wife.