Murder at Mansfield Park полностью

"I would stake my life on it, sir," said Mrs Baddeley, her pink face somewhat pinker than usual. "I have given the maids the most strict instructions."

Gilbert shook his head. "Only yesterday I was offering the family my felicitations on a recovery surpassing even my expectation, but now a recovery of any kind is most doubtful, most doubtful indeed. We will have to redouble our vigilance — and our prayers. Miss Crawford, can we prevail upon you to assist us yet further?"

Mary assured him of her complete willingness to watch the rest of the day, and the night if needed. It was a period of almost equal suffering to both. Hour after hour passed away in increasing pain and discomposure on Julia’s side, and in the most cruel anxiety on Mary’s, which could only be augmented by the new sense of unease that had arisen since her conversation with Evans.

She made a hasty dinner in the housekeeper’s room, and returned to relieve Mrs Baddeley. Julia was tossing to and fro, and uttering frequent but inarticulate sounds of complaint. Her face was flushed, and she seemed to be breathing with difficulty.

"I do so hate to see her in such a pitiable state, Miss Crawford," said Mrs Baddeley, with tears in her eyes. "I do believe she is worse even than when you went downstairs."

Mary put her hand on her arm, and offered words of reassurance that were very far from the forebodings in her own heart.

"Mr Gilbert has promised to call again in the course of the next three or four hours, Mrs Baddeley. Let us endeavour to support our hopes and spirits until then. We will be of more assistance to Miss Julia if we can remain calm."

At that moment Julia started up in the bed, and in a near frenzy, cried out, "No! No! It cannot be! It cannot be!"

Mary was at her side in an instant, and advising Mrs Baddeley to send for Mr Gilbert without delay, passed her hand over the girl’s brow.

"I am here, Julia. There is no cause for alarm. You are quite safe."

"No! No!" she moaned, "You must tell them — I can trust you — I did not mean — did not mean — an accident — an accident — "

"Hush, Julia, do not distress yourself so," Mary said imploringly, as she attempted to persuade her to lie down again, but when she clasped the girl’s shoulders, she felt her thin frame grow rigid against her.

"So much blood! — never knew — so much — her dress — her hands — never, never wished for that — let me be rid of it — let me forget it — never, oh never — no hope — no hope — "

She threw herself back on her pillows, as if exhausted, and lay for some moments neither moving nor stirring. Mary, too, was unmoving, half stupefied between horror and incredulity. Was this the explanation of the reprehensible conduct of Maddox and his associate? Was it indeed possible that Julia had been responsible, even if accidentally, for the death of her cousin? She knew the strength of her youthful passions, and the weak hold of more temperate counsels over the immoderation of youth and zeal; she knew, likewise, that Julia had been frantic to prevent the felling of the avenue, and in her high-wrought state, weakened by recent illness, the event had no doubt taken on a disproportionate enormity in her child-like mind.

As Mary sat retrospecting the whole of the affair, and the conversations she herself had witnessed, she began to perceive — all too late — that Julia might, indeed, have come to regard Fanny as wholly to blame for the disaster about to befall her beloved trees, believing her cousin could have prevented it, had she been prepared to intercede, and use her considerable influence to compel her uncle to alter his plans. Much as her heart revolted from the possibility, Mary’s imagination could easily conceive of a meeting between the two cousins in the park that ill-fated morning — the very morning that the work was due to commence. She could picture Fanny listening to her cousin’s pleas with contempt and ridicule, and Julia, provoked beyond endurance, striking out in desperation and fury, if only to put an end for ever to the scorn in that voice. She did not want to believe it, but her heart told her that it was possible, just as her mind acknowledged that it would explain many things that had puzzled her hitherto; it would render Julia’s despairing decision to chain herself to the trees more readily comprehensible; and it would account for her terror at the sight of her cousin’s coffin. Mary thought back to that dreadful scene, and recalled, with a cold shudder that carried irrefutable conviction, the actual words Julia had used. She saw her in imagination, standing in the door of her chamber, her hand to her mouth, crying out, "She is not dead, she cannot be dead." But how could she possibly have known whose coffin it was? The family had been careful to conceal the news of her cousin’s death from her.There was only one answer, only one explanation.