"Adam, my dear friend, you have had some hard trials in your life. You can bear sorrow manfully, as well as act manfully. God requires both tasks at our hands. And there is a heavier sorrow coming upon you than any you have yet known. But you are not guilty you have not the worst of all sorrows. God help him who has!"
The two pale faces looked at each other; in Adam's there was trembling suspense, in Mr. Irwine's hesitating, shrinking pity. But he went on.
"I have had news of Hetty this morning. She is not gone to him. She is in Stonyshire at Stoniton."
Adam started up from his chair, as if he thought he could have leaped to her that moment. But Mr. Irwine laid hold of his arm again and said, persuasively, "Wait, Adam, wait." So he sat down.
"She is in a very unhappy position one which will make it worse for you to find her, my poor friend, than to have lost her for ever."
Adam's lips moved tremulously, but no sound came. They moved again, and he whispered, "Tell me."
"She has been arrestedshe is in prison."
It was as if an insulting blow had brought back the spirit of resistance into Adam. The blood rushed to his face, and he said, loudly and sharply, "For what?"
"For a great crime the murder of her child."
"It CAN'T BE!" Adam almost shouted, starting up from his chair and making a stride towards the door; but he turned round again, setting his back against the bookcase, and looking fiercely at Mr. Irwine. "It isn't possible. She never had a child. She can't be guilty. WHO says it?"
"God grant she may be innocent, Adam. We can still hope she is."
"But who says she is guilty?" said Adam violently. "Tell me everything."
"Here is a letter from the magistrate before whom she was taken, and the constable who arrested her is in the dining-room. She will not confess her name or where she comes from; but I fear, I fear, there can be no doubt it is Hetty. The description of her person corresponds, only that she is said to look very pale and ill. She had a small red-leather pocket-book in her pocket with two names written in it one at the beginning, 'Hetty Sorrel, Hayslope,' and the other near the end, 'Dinah Morris, Snowfield.' She will not say which is her own name she denies everything, and will answer no questions, and application has been made to me, as a magistrate, that I may take measures for identifying her, for it was thought probable that the name which stands first is her own name."
"But what proof have they got against her, if it IS Hetty?" said Adam, still violently, with an effort that seemed to shake his whole frame. "I'll not believe it. It couldn't ha' been, and none of us know it."
"Terrible proof that she was under the temptation to commit the crime; but we have room to hope that she did not really commit it. Try and read that letter, Adam."
Adam took the letter between his shaking hands and tried to fix his eyes steadily on it. Mr. Irwine meanwhile went out to give some orders. When he came back, Adam's eyes were still on the first page he couldn't read he could not put the words together and make out what they meant. He threw it down at last and clenched his fist.
"It's HIS doing," he said; "if there's been any crime, it's at his door, not at hers. HE taught her to deceive HE deceived me first. Let 'em put HIM on his trial let him stand in court beside her, and I'll tell 'em how he got hold of her heart, and 'ticed her t' evil, and then lied to me. Is HE to go free, while they lay all the punishment on herso weak and young?"
The image called up by these last words gave a new direction to poor Adam's maddened feelings. He was silent, looking at the corner of the room as if he saw something there. Then he burst out again, in a tone of appealing anguish, "I can't bear itO God, it's too hard to lay upon me it's too hard to think she's wicked."
Mr. Irwine had sat down again in silence. He was too wise to utter soothing words at present, and indeed, the sight of Adam before him, with that look of sudden age which sometimes comes over a young face in moments of terrible emotion the hard bloodless look of the skin, the deep lines about the quivering mouth, the furrows in the brow the sight of this strong firm man shattered by the invisible stroke of sorrow, moved him so deeply that speech was not easy. Adam stood motionless, with his eyes vacantly fixed in this way for a minute or two; in that short space he was living through all his love again.
"She can't ha' done it," he said, still without moving his eyes, as if he were only talking to himself: "it was fear made her hide itI forgive her for deceiving meI forgive thee, Hettythee wast deceived tooit's gone hard wi' thee, my poor Hettybut they'll never make me believe it."
He was silent again for a few moments, and then he said, with fierce abruptness, "I'll go to him I'll bring him back I'll make him go and look at her in her misery he shall look at her till he can't forget it it shall follow him night and day as long as he lives it shall follow him he shan't escape wi' lies this time I'll fetch him, I'll drag him myself."