CHAPTER XXXVII.
FOILED.
“The marquis!” gasped Spenser Churchill, and he sank back, still staring at the haggard and wasted face, from which the piercing eyes glared down at him like ardent coals, with a fearful, horrified gaze.
Then he half-rose, and, with a grotesque attempt at a smile, wagged his head at Percy Levant, who stood erect and alert.
“This—this—is a very pretty little plot, my dear Percy,” he said; “but you don’t imagine that the dear marquis will take your word against mine? Marquis,” and he managed to raise his eyes to the fierce face with a ghastly attempt at a smile, “I am sorry that you should have been deceived by what was palpably an attempt on my part to lure this gentleman into a trap. He is—you don’t know him, but I do, and I must introduce him. This man is an adventurer, a scamp who would sell his soul for a ten-pound note. You won’t let his word weigh against mine—against Spenser Churchill’s!”
“It is quite true, my lord,” said Percy Levant. “As this man says—I am an adventurer. I have been willing to sell my soul for a ten-pound note; I am utterly unworthy of belief,” his voice grew hoarse and broken, “and it is only the influence of a woman’s pure and spotless nature that has, at the eleventh hour, induced meto stop short in the villainous work to which this man tempted me. I am as bad as he—up to this point. I ask for no mercy, no indulgence, no credit; from his own lips you shall judge him, and from the papers you have in your hand.”
The marquis just glanced at him—no more, then turned his fierce eyes upon Spenser Churchill again.
“Very good,” said Spenser Churchill, shrugging his shoulders, and stretching a trembling hand toward his hat. “I—I leave the whole business to you, my dear marquis. I will not condescend to—to answer the accusations which—which——” He shuffled nearer to the door, and his heart rose as he saw that neither Percy Levant nor the marquis made any attempt to stop him—“which my character will enable me to—to repel. I wish you success, Mr. Percy Levant, and—and good-morning.”
He made an ironical bow as he backed toward the door, and was turning to make a rush for it, when Lord Cecil stepped before him.
At sight of him Spenser Churchill’s face grew livid, and he put up his hand as if to ward off an expected blow; but Lord Cecil scarcely looked at him, and passed to the marquis’ side.
“Is—is this true, my lord?” he demanded, hoarsely.
The marquis dropped into a chair, and, still clutching the papers, gazed up at him with a wild despair which would have touched even Lord Cecil if he had not loved Doris too well to think of any one but her.
“It is true, my lord!” said Percy Levant, solemnly and sorrowfully. “Would to Heaven that both he and I had lied! It is true, every word of it! The separation between Miss Marlowe and yourself was worked by Spenser Churchill. He did, by word and deed, sell her to me.”
Lord Cecil made a movement as if to strike him, but Percy Levant stood patient and unresisting.
“And yet more, my lord! It was he who set the trap which caught you and handed you, fettered and bound, to his accomplice.”
“Grace! It is—it must be—a lie!” broke from Cecil’s white lips.
A hollow laugh rang out behind him, and Lady Grace glided from her dressing-room. All eyes were fixed upon her as she stood, her exquisitely-clad form posed in an attitude of contemptuous defiance. A hectic flush burned on her cheeks, and she swept the group with a disdainful glance, as she fanned herself.
“Permit me to bear my testimony to this gentleman’s veracity,” she said. Spenser’s face, which had cleared suddenly at her appearance, fell again, and he shrank back and leaned against the wall, where he stood, nervously passing his hands over each other. “What he states is quite correct. I don’t know how he discovered it, but he seems to have made a tool of ‘dear’ Mr. Churchill, while ‘dear’ Mr. Churchill was under the pleasing delusion that he had got a submissive and willing dupe in him. It is probable that he knows the whole scheme. For it was a scheme, Cecil, and,” with a disdainful smile, “a very good one. Any but the most trustful of men would have seen through it. I compliment you, my dear Cecil—I suppose I must say Lord Cecil now!—upon your credulity.”
Cecil looked at her; then hung his head with shame—for her, seeing her utter shamelessness.
“I am utterly at a loss to conceive why my dear Mr. Churchill should have exerted himself on my behalf. Of course, I knew it was from no love he bore me—but I understand it all now!”
Cecil turned his back upon her, and, leaning his elbow on the mantel-shelf, covered his eyes with his hand.
“Mr. Spenser Churchill is really and truly a remarkably clever man; but, like some other clever men, he has chosen his tools badly. I can’t understand why he should have confided in a person of Mr. Levant’s character!” and she shot a contemptuous glance from under her half-closed lids at his pale face. “But having done so, he has, of course, been betrayed. ‘Put not your trust in—adventurers’ will for the future be an excellent motto for him!” She laughed, and the fan moved a little more quickly. “And now, having borne my testimony to the truth of Mr. Levant’s assertions, I have only to express my sympathy for ‘dear’ Mr. Churchill’s discomfiture, and your disappointment, my dear Cecil”—her face grew red,and her delicately-molded nostrils expanded with a malignant enjoyment—“your terrible disappointment! If you had only known all this a few hours earlier, why, you would have thrown off your new love, and been on with the old! But as it is, Mr. Levant, with all his newly-born penitence, has been clever enough to secure Miss Marlowe, otherwise the marquis’ daughter, for his wife, and you are tricked. It is a vulgar word, Lord Cecil, but it is the only suitable one.” She laughed again, and her fan moved rapidly. “Won’t you see—or do you?—this penitent and remorse-stricken gentleman’s game? You don’t! Why, you observe that he has married the lady he wanted, and by his betrayal of his accomplice saved his ten thousand pounds. Mr. Levant, I congratulate you upon your dexterity,” and she made him a sweeping curtsey. “Mr. Spenser Churchill is clever, I admit. I, too, always had an idea that I possessed a turn for intrigue; but you—oh, you are a genius, and the honors remain in your deserving hands.”
Percy Levant remained as silent, as impressive, as a statue; but Spenser Churchill, whose face had reflected every word Lady Grace had uttered, began to draw himself upright, and a low, chuckling laugh broke from him.
“You are right,” he said, half-gloatingly, half-fearfully; “you and I are out of the game, dear Lady Grace; but I think—I really do think that dear Lord Cecil is in the same boat! Yes, Mr. Levant has been one too many for us all. All! My dear Cecil, you have my profound sympathy in the loss of the young lady you had set your heart on. My dear marquis, if I may be permitted to offer a word of humble advice, I should recommend you to forgive your newly found daughter, the ballet girl—no! pardon, the actress; and welcome as a son-in-law the gentleman upon whom she has bestowed her hand. It is true that he is an adventurer; that he sprang from the gutter; that he bought her and captured her by a plot; but he is her husband after all, and, really, he is no worse than the stock from which she sprang. He will be a worthy addition to the house of Stoyle! Forgive the young couple—the adventurer and the actress—and make them happy with your blessing. Do! my dear marquis.”
Lord Cecil’s hand closed spasmodically, but he kept it at his side; Percy Levant stood silent and impassive, and the marquis merely raised his eyes from the paper upon which they had been fixed.
“I—I really don’t think we need remain any longer, dear Lady Grace,” murmured Spenser Churchill. “I really don’t think we have any right to intrude upon this happy family party. We must leave them to settle their little differences, eh? Allow me to escort you to your hotel. I have to preside at a charitable meeting in London the day after to-morrow, alas! or I should like to remain and see the mutual reconciliation; but duty—duty.” He crept nearer the door and offered his arm, but Lady Grace, with a haughty gesture, waved him off.
“No? You would like to linger till the denouement? Yes? Then I must go alone——”
“Stop!” said Percy Levant, quietly.
Spenser Churchill pulled up and looked at him sideways. “I—I beg your pardon.”
“Move at your peril,” said Percy, sternly.
Spenser Churchill sidled toward the window, and with a quick movement threw it open.
“You mean to threaten me, detain me, offer me violence, my dear Percy,” he said, with a leer. “I think not. If any person—any person,” and he glanced at Lord Cecil, “presumes to prevent my departure, I shall call for assistance. There are police in the street, who will protect me, an English gentleman of unblemished character and honorable repute. There are police, I say.”
“There are,” said Percy Levant, quietly and incisively. “There is an English detective at the door ready to arrest you.”
Spenser Churchill shrank back from the window.
“Indeed! On what charge, pray?”
“Conspiracy, and robbery from the dead!” and he pointed to the papers which had been stolen from Jeffrey Flint’s body.
Spenser Churchill’s face grew white, but he forced a laugh.
“Conspiracy, eh? The other is nonsense, utter nonsense!Who’s to prove—ahem! But, conspiracy? With whom? With Mr. Percy Levant?”
“With Mr. Percy Levant,” repeated Percy, grimly. “Your fellow criminal! One step, one cry for assistance, and he arrests us both.”
Spenser Churchill clutched the curtain.
“You—you—traitor!” he gasped.
Percy Levant turned to Lord Cecil.
“I have simply stated the truth, my lord. A detective is waiting outside. It rests with you; it is for you to decide whether you will charge us. One thing remains for me to do.”
He went to the door of the anteroom, and taking Doris’ hand led her toward the group.
“Doris,” he said, in a low voice that trembled and broke for the first time. “Doris—your father!”
With pale face, wet with tears, Doris stood for a moment, irresolute. The old man, who had raised his head as her name smote upon his ear, made an effort to rise; then sank back with outstretched hands and piteously pleading face.
“My child, my child!” he cried, hoarsely.
It would have required a harder heart than Doris’ to resist such an appeal, an appeal for forgiveness, a cry of penitence and remorse. She hesitated a moment, while one could count twenty. Then she was at his knee, and his weak, quivering hands were upon her head.
Lady Grace, panting with the suppressed fury of jealousy, glanced at the picture which nearly moved two of the spectators to tears.
“How—how charming!” she said in a harsh voice. “Father and daughter. You have only to extend your blessing to the husband, my lord!” and she swept a contemptuous courtesy on Percy Levant.
“Yes, don’t forget the wily adventurer, the music teacher of Soho, your son-in-law, dear marquis!” pursued Spenser Churchill, sardonically.
The marquis started, and looked up at Percy Levant piteously.
“Are you—are you her husband?” he managed to articulate.
Percy Levant turned his haggard face toward him.“No, my lord,” he said, hoarsely, “we are not, and never shall be, married.”
The marquis drew a long breath. “No!”
“No,” said Percy Levant, almost inaudibly. “If I had loved her less——” he stopped. “My love for her has saved her, my lord. Miss Marlowe—Lady Mary—is free from any claims from me.”
Lady Grace’s fan came to a sudden stoppage.
“Not married!” she gasped.
“Not married!” echoed Spenser Churchill, in accents of malignant disappointment.
Percy Levant looked at them both with a steady gaze. “Not married,” he said. “You may go now, Spenser Churchill.”
“No!” cried a grave voice. It was Lord Cecil’s; and he sprang to the window. “Not till justice——”
Percy Levant folded his arms and stood resigned and patient.
“Not till justice has been satisfied. I charge you, Spenser Churchill, with conspiracy——”
“And—and—Levant, and Lady Grace!” said Spenser Churchill, with a leer.
“I am ready,” said Percy Levant, quietly.
But as he spoke Doris sprang to her feet, and, gently putting her father’s arm aside, stood in front of Percy Levant.
“No!” she cried, panting; “I say no!”
Percy Levant drew a long breath. “Let the law take its course, Lady Mary!” he said, in a low voice. But she still stood in front of him as if to shield and protect him.
The marquis held out his hand to her as if he could not bear her to leave his side.
“Come to me, come to me. Let them—let them go,” and he glanced in the direction of Lady Grace and Spenser Churchill.
The latter did not wait for the permission to be repeated. With an air of long-suffering patience and saintly resignation, he shook his head reproachfully at Percy Levant.
“Judas!” he murmured, “we shall have a day of reckoning, we two, Judas!”
Percy Levant scarcely glanced at him; and SpenserChurchill as he moved slowly to the door, smiled a ghastly smile at Lady Grace. “Let me escort you from this exclusively family party, dear Lady Grace,” he said, sardonically. But, like most conspirators when the plot has failed, she drew back and eyed him scornfully.
“Thanks, Mr. Churchill; but I have no further use for you.”
At this turning of the tables, at this repudiation by the woman he had regarded and used as a tool and dupe, Spenser Churchill was almost overcome, and his light eyes flashed viciously; then, with an effort that must have caused him a great deal of self-restraint, he checked himself, and stretching out his hand and casting up his eyes to the ceiling, said decorously, and proudly:
“I forgive you, Lady Grace. I pity you, and I shall not forget to remember you in my prayers. Poor woman!”
Now, Lady Grace ought to have turned her back upon him in silent contempt, but she had been sorely strained, and this, the hypocritical taunting of the worm who had a few moments ago been ready to crawl at the feet of his accusers, was the last straw which broke the back of her self-restraint, and as Mr. Spenser Churchill passed her, I regret to say that she closed her fan sharply and struck him across the face with it. Lady Grace possessed a magnificent arm; the fan was a large one, of carved ivory, with many sharp corners. Mr. Spenser Churchill uttered a howl of pain, and fled.
Lord Cecil approached her and offered her his arm. She had merely, if not quite, wrecked his life, she had caused pain and suffering to the girl he loved, she was unworthy of one moment’s pity, but he remembered that she was a woman, and that she would have been his wife, and he offered her his arm in silence. She looked up at his face with a quick, almost agonized, questioning, then turned from him, her face white, her lips quivering.
“No!” she said, almost inaudibly, “there can be no half way for us. Friend or foe, Cecil! Will you keep your promise to me?” She had no need to go further; his face, grave and grim, answered for him. With a swift compression of her lips she caught up a shawl that hungon a chair, and without lifting her eyes to his face, again slowly left the room.
Percy Levant took up his hat and went to Lady Despard, who was standing beside Doris.
“Will you—will you stay with her and—and help her? She was never more in need of your love than now,” and he glanced significantly at the white face of the old man at whose knees Doris knelt.
She nodded silently, and Percy Levant, as he passed Lord Cecil, said in a low voice:
“I hold myself at your disposal, my lord, completely, entirely, without any reservation.” Then he stopped and looked at Doris—a look impossible to describe, easy enough to imagine—and seemed about to speak, but with a sigh he turned and walked out, and Doris scarcely knew that he had gone.