'I am not going—cabin,' she faltered, when Lesbia remonstrated with her, 'only—going—saloon—sofa—lie down—little—Smithson take care—you,' not perceiving that Smithson had vanished, 'shall be—quite close.'
So Lesbia and Don Gomez were alone under the summer stars, murmuring little bits of Spanish.
'It is the only true way of learning a language,' he said; 'grammars are a delusion.'
It was a very delightful and easy way of learning, at any rate. Lesbia reclined in her bamboo chair, and fanned herself indolently, and watched the shadowy shores of the island, cliff and hill, down and wooded crest, flitting past her like dream-pictures, and her lips slowly shaped the words of that soft lisping language—so simple, so musical—a language made for lovers and for song, one would think. It was wonderful what rapid progress Lesbia made.
She heard a church clock on the island striking, and asked Don Gomez the hour.
'Ten,' he said.
'Ten! Surely it must be later. It was past eight before we began dinner, and we have been sailing for ever so long. Captain, kindly tell me the time,' she called to the skipper, who was lolling over the gunwale near the foremast smoking a meditative pipe.
'Twelve o'clock, my lady.'
'Heavens, can I possibly have been sitting here so long. I should like to stay on deck all night and watch the sailing; but I must really go and take care of poor Lady Kirkbank. I am afraid she is not very well.'
'She had a somewhat distracted air when she went below, but I daresay she will sleep off her troubles. If I were you I should leave her to herself.'
'Impossible! What can have become of Mr. Smithson?'
'I have a shrewd suspicion that it is with Smithson as with poor Lady Kirkbank.'
'Do you mean that he is ill?'
'Precisely.'
'What, on a calm summer night, sailing over a sea of glass. The owner of a yacht!'
'Rather ignominious for poor Smithson, isn't it? But men who own yachts are only mortal, and are sometimes wretched sailors. Smithson is feeble on that point, as I know of old.'
'Then wasn't it rather cruel of us to sail his yacht?'
'Yachts are meant for sailing, and again, sea-sickness is supposed to be a wholesome exercise.'
'Good-night.'
'Good-night,' both good nights in Spanish, and with a touch of tenderness which the words could hardly have expressed in English.
'Must you really go?' pleaded Montesma, holding her hand just a thought longer than he had ever held it before.
'Ah, the little more, and how much it is,' says the poet.
'Really and truly.'
'I am so sorry. I wish you could have stayed on deck all night.'
'So do I, with all my heart. This calm sea under the starlit sky is like a dream of heaven.'
'It is very nice, but if you stayed I think I could promise you considerable variety. We shall have a tempest before morning.'
'Of all things in the world I should love to see a thunderstorm at sea.'
'Be on the alert then, and Captain Parkes and I will try to oblige you.'
'At any rate you have made it impossible for me to sleep. I shall stay with Lady Kirkbank in the saloon. Good-night, again.'
'Good-night.'
Lesbia found Lady Kirkbank prostrate on a low divan in the saloon, sleepless, and very cross. The atmosphere reeked with red lavender, sal-volatile, eau de Cologne, and brandy, which latter remedy poor Georgie had taken freely in her agonies. Kibble, the faithful Grasmere girl, sat by the divan, fanning the sufferer with a large Japanese fan. Rilboche had naturally, as a Frenchwoman, succumbed utterly to her own feelings, and was moaning in her berth, wailing out every now and then that she would never have taken service with Miladi had she suspected her to be capable of such cruelty as to take her to live for weeks upon the sea.
If this was the state of affairs now while the ocean was only gently stirred, what would it be by-and-by if the tempest should really come?
'What can you be thinking of, staying on deck all night with those men?' exclaimed Lady Kirkbank, peevishly. 'It is hardly respectable.'
She would have been still more inclined to object had she known that Lesbia's companion had been 'that man' rather than 'those men.'
'What do you mean by all night?' Lesbia retorted, contemptuously; 'it is only just twelve.'
'Only twelve. I thought we were close upon daylight. I have suffered an eternity of agony.'
'I am very sorry you should be ill; but really the sea has been so deliciously calm.'
'I believe I should have suffered less if it had been diabolically rough. Oh, that monotonous flip-flap of the water, that slow heaving of the boat! Nothing could be worse.'
'I am glad to hear you say that, for Don Gomez says we are likely to have a tempest.'
'A tempest!' shrieked Georgie. 'Then let him stop the boat this instant and put me on shore. Tell him to land me anywhere—on the Needles even. I could stop at the lighthouse till morning. A storm at sea will be simply my death.'
'Dear Lady Kirkbank, I was only joking,' said Lesbia, who did not want to be worried by her chaperon's nervous apprehensions: 'so far the night is lovely.'
'Give me a spoonful more brandy, my good creature,'—to Kibble. 'Lesbia, you ought never to have brought me into this miserable state. I consented to staying on board the yacht; but I never consented to sailing on her.'
'You will soon be well, dear Lady Kirkbank; and you will have such an appetite for breakfast to-morrow morning.'
'Where shall we be at breakfast time?'
'Off St. Catherine's Point, I believe—just half way round the island.'
'If we are not at the bottom of the sea,' groaned Georgie.
They were now in the open Channel, and the boat dipped and rose to larger billows than had encountered her course before. Lady Kirkbank lay in a state of collapse, in which life seemed only sustainable by occasional teaspoonfuls of cognac gently tilted down her throat by the patient Kibble.
Lesbia went to her cabin, but with no intention of remaining there. She was firmly convinced that the storm would come, and she meant to be on deck while it was raging. What harm could thunder or lightning, hail or rain, do to her while he was by to protect her? He would be busy sailing the boat, perhaps, but still he would have a moment now and then in which to think of her and care for her.
Yes, the storm was coming. There was a livid look upon the waters, and the atmosphere was heavy with heat; the sky to windward black as a funeral pall. Lesbia was almost fearless, yet she felt a thrill of awe as she looked into that dense blackness. To leeward the stars were still visible; but that gigantic mass of cloud came creeping slowly, solemnly over the sky, while the shadow flitted fast across the water, swallowing up that ghastly electric glare.
Lesbia wrapped herself in a white cashmeresortie de baland stole up the companion. Montesma was working at the ropes with his own hands, calling directions to the sailors to shorten and take in the canvas, urging them to increased efforts by working at the ropes with his own hands, springing up the rigging and on deck, flashing backwards and forwards amidst the rigging like a being of supernatural power. He had taken off his jacket, and was clad from top to toe in white, save for that streak of scarlet which tightly girdled his waist. His tall flexible form, perfect in line as a Greek statue of Hermes, stood out against the background of black night. His voice, with its tones of brief imperious command, the proud carriage of his head, the easy grace of his rapid movements, all proclaimed the man born to rule over his fellow-men. And it is these master spirits, these born rulers, whom women instinctively recognise as their sovereign lords, and for whom women count no sacrifice too costly.
In the midst of his activity Montesma suddenly saw that white-robed figure standing at the top of the companion, and flew to her side. The boat was pitching heavily, dipping into the trough of the sea at an angle of forty-five degrees, as it seemed to Lesbia.
'You ought not to be here,' said Montesma; 'it is much rougher than I expected.'
'I am not afraid,' she answered; 'but I will go back to my cabin if I am in your way.'
'In my way' (with deepest tenderness): 'yes, you are in my way, for I shall think of nothing else now you are here. But I believe we have done all that need be done to the yacht, and I can take care of you till the storm is over.'
He put his arm round her as the stem dipped, and led her towards the stern, guiding her footsteps, supporting her as her light figure swayed against him with the motion of the boat. A vivid flash of lightning showed him her face as they stood for an instant leaning against each other, his arm encircling her. Ah, what deep feeling in that countenance, once so passionless; what a new light in those eyes. It was like the awakening of a long dormant soul.
He took the helm from the captain and stood steering the vessel, and calling out his orders, with Lesbia close beside him, holding her with his disengaged arm, drawing her near him as the vessel pitched violently, drawing her nearer still when they shipped a sea, and a great fountain of spray enfolded them both in a dense cloud of salt water.
The thunder roared and rattled, as if it began and ended close beside them. Forked lightnings zigzagged amidst the rigging. Sheet lightning enwrapped those two in a luminous atmosphere, revealing faces that were pale with passion, lips that trembled with emotion. There were but scant opportunity for speech, and neither of these two felt the need of words. To be together, bound nearer to each other than they had ever been yet, than they might ever be again, in the midst of thunder and lightning and dense clouds of spray. This was enough. Once when theCaymanpitched with exceptional fury, when the thunder crashed and roared loudest, Lesbia found her head lying on Montesma's breast and his arms round her, his lips upon her face. She did not wrench herself from that forbidden embrace. She let those lips kiss hers as never mortal man had kissed her before. But an instant later, when Montesma's attention was distracted by his duties as steersman, and he let her go, she slipped away in the darkness, and melted from his sight and touch like a modern Undine. He dared not leave the helm and follow her then. He sent one of the sailors below a little later, to make sure that she was safe in her cabin; but he saw her no more that night.
The storm abated soon after daybreak, and the morning was lovely; but Don Gomez and Lady Lesbia did not meet again till the church bells on the island were ringing for morning service, and then the lady was safe under the wing of her chaperon, with her affianced husband in attendance upon her at the breakfast table in the saloon.
She received Montesma with the faintest inclination of the head, and she carefully avoided all occasion of speech with him during the leisurely, long spun-out meal. She was as white as her muslin gown, and her eyes told of a sleepless night. She talked a little, very little to Lady Kirkbank and Mr. Smithson; to the Spaniard not at all. And yet Montesma was in no manner dashed by this appearance of deep offence. So might Francesca have looked the morning after that little scene over the book; yet she sacrificed her salvation for her lover all the same. It was a familiar stage upon the journey which Montesma knew by heart. Here the inclination of the road was so many degrees more or less; for this hill you are commanded to put on an extra horse; at this stage it is forbidden to go more than eight miles an hour, and so on, and so on. Montesma knew every inch of the ground. He put on a melancholy look, and talked very little. He had been on deck all night, and so there was an excuse for his being quiet.
Lady Kirkbank related her impressions of the storm, and talked enough for four. She had suffered the pangs of purgatory, but her natural cheeriness asserted itself, and she made no moaning about past agonies which had exercised a really delightful influence on her appetite. Mr. Smithson also was cheerful. He had paid his annual tribute to Neptune, and might hope to go scot-free for the rest of the season.
'If I had stayed on deck I must have had my finger in the pie; so I thought it better to go below and get a good night's rest in the steward's cabin,' he said, not caring to confess his sufferings as frankly as Lady Kirkbank admitted hers.
After breakfast, which was prolonged till noon, Montesma asked Smithson to smoke a cigarette on deck with him.
'I want to talk to you on a rather serious matter,' he said.
Lesbia heard the words, and looked up with a frightened glance. Could he mean to attempt anything desperate? Was he going to confess the fatal truth to Horace Smithson, to tell her affianced lover that she was untrue to her bond, that she loved him, Montesma, as fondly as he loved her, that their two souls had mingled like two flames fanned by the same current, and thence had risen to a conflagration which must end in ruin, if she were not set free to follow where her heart had gone, free to belong to that man whom her spirit chose for lord and master. Her heart leapt at the hope that Montesma was going to do this, that he was strong enough to break her bonds for her, powerful and rich enough to secure her a brilliant future. Yet this last consideration, which hitherto had been paramount, seemed now of but little moment. To be withhim, to belong tohim, would be enough for bliss. Albeit that in such a choice she forfeited all that she had ever possessed or hoped for of earthly prosperity. Adventurer, beggar, whatever he might be, she chose him, and loved him with all the strength of a weak soul newly awakened to passionate feeling.
Unhappily for Lesbia Haselden, Montesma was not at all the kind of man to take so direct and open a course as that which she imagined possible.
His business with Mr. Smithson was of quite a different kind.
'Smithson, do you know that you have an utterly incompetent crew?' he said, gravely, when they two were standing aft, lighting their cigarettes.
'Indeed I do not. The men are all experienced sailors, and the captain ranks high among yachtsmen.'
'English yachtsmen are not particularly good judges of sailors. I tell you your skipper is no sailor, and his men are fools. If it had not been for me theCaymanwould have gone to pieces on the rocks last night, and if you are to cross to St. Malo, as you talked of doing, for the regatta there, you had better sack these men and let me get you a South American crew. I know of a fellow who is in London just now—the captain of a Rio steamer, who'll send you a crew of picked men, if you give me authority to telegraph to him.'
'I don't like foreign sailors,' said Smithson, looking perplexed and worried; 'and I have perfect confidence in Wilkinson.'
'Which is as much as to say that you consider me a liar! Go to the bottom your own way,mon ami: ce n'est pas mon affaire,' said Montesma, turning on his heel, and leaving his friend to his own devices.
Had he pressed the point, Smithson would have suspected him of some evil motive, and would have been resolute in his resistance; but as he said no more about it, Smithson began to feel uncomfortable.
He was no sailor himself, knew absolutely nothing about the navigation of his yacht, though he sometimes pretended to sail her; and he had no power to judge of his skipper's capacity or his men's seamanship. He had engaged the captain wholly on the strength of the man's reputation, guaranteed by certain certificates which seemed to mean a great deal. But after all such certificates might mean very little—such a reputation might be no real guarantee. The sailors had been engaged by the captain, and their ruddy faces and thoroughly British appearence, the exquisite cleanliness which they maintained in every detail of the yacht, had seemed to Mr. Smithson the perfection of seamanship.
But it was not the less true that the cleanest of yachts, with deck of spotless whiteness, sails of unsullied purity, brasses shining and sparkling like gold fresh from the goldsmith's, might be spiked upon a rock, or might founder on a sand-bank, or heel over under too much canvas. Mr. Smithson was inclined to suspect any proposition of Montesma's; yet he was not the less disturbed in mind by the assertion.
The day wore on, and the yacht sailed merrily over a summer sea. Mr. Smithson fidgeted about the deck uneasily, watching every movement of the sailors. No boat could be sailing better, as it seemed to him; but in such weather and over such waters any boat must needs go easily. It was in the blackness of night, amidst the fury of the storm, that Montesma's opinion had been formed. Smithson began to think that his friend was right. The sailors had honest countenances, but they looked horribly stupid. Could men with such vacuous grins, such an air of imbecile good-nature, be capable of acting wisely in any terrible crisis?—could they have nerve and readiness, quickness, decision, all those grand qualites which are needed by the seaman who has to contend with the fury of the elements?
Mr. Smithson and his guests had breakfasted too late for the possibility of luncheon. They were in Cowes Roads by one o'clock. A fleet of yachts had arrived during their absence, and the scene was full of life and gaiety. Lady Lesbia held alevéeat the afternoon tea, and had a crowd of her old admirers around her—adorers whose presence in no wise disturbed Horace Smithson's peace. He would have been content that his wife should go through life with a herd of such worshippers following in her footsteps. He knew the aimless innocence, the almost infantine simplicity of the typical Johnnie, Chappie,Muscadin, Petit Creve, Gommeux—call him by what name you will. From these he feared no evil. But in that one follower who gave no outward token of his worship he dreaded peril. It was Montesma he watched, while dragoons with close-cropped hair, and imbecile youths with heads rigid in four-inch collars, were hanging about Lady Lesbia's low bamboo chair, and administering obsequiously to the small necessities of the tea-table.
It was while this tea-table business was going on that Mr. Smithson took the opportunity of setting his mind at rest, were it possible, as to the merits of Captain Wilkinson. Among his visitors this afternoon there was the owner of three or four racing yachts—a man renowned for his victories, at home and abroad.
'I think you knew something of my captain, Wilkinson, before I engaged him,' said Smithson, with assumed carelessness.
'I know every skipper on board every boat in the squadron,' answered his friend. 'A good fellow, Wilkinson—thoroughly honest fellow.'
'Honest; oh yes, I know all about that. But how about his seamanship? His certificates were wonderfully good, but they are not everything.
'Everything, my dear fellow,' cried the other; 'they are next to nothing. But I believe Wilkinson is a tolerable sailor.'
This was not encouraging.
'He has never been unlucky, I believe.'
'My dear Smithson, you are a great authority in the City, but you are not very well up in the records of the yachting world, or you would know that your Captain Wilkinson was skipper on theOrinocowhen she ran aground on the Chesil Bank, coming home from Cherbourg Regatta, fifteen lives lost, and the yacht, in less than half an hour, ground to powder. That was rather a bad case, I remember; for though it was a tempestuous night, the accident would never have happened if Wilkinson had not mistaken the lights. So you see his Trinity House papers didn't prevent his going wrong.'
Good heavens! This was the strongest confirmation of Montesma's charge. The man was a stupid man, an incapable man, a man to whose intelligence and care human life should never be trusted. A fig for his honesty! What would honesty be worth in a hurricane off the Chesil Beach? What would honesty serve a ship spitted on the Jailors off Jersey? Montesma was right. If theCaymanwas to make a trip to St. Malo she must be navigated by competent men. Horace Smithson hated foreign sailors, copper-faced ruffians, with flashing black eyes which seemed to threaten murder, did you but say a rough word to them; sleek, raven-haired scoundrels, with bowie-knives in their girdles, ready for mutiny. But, after all, life is worth too much to be risked for a prejudice, a sentiment.
Perhaps that St. Malo business might be avoided; and then there need be no change in captain or crew. The yacht must be safe enough lying at anchor in the roadstead. By-and-by, when the visitors had departed, and Mr. Smithson was reposefully enjoying his tea by Lady Lesbia's side, he approached the subject.
'Do you really care about crossing to St. Malo after this—really prefer the idea to Ryde?'
'Infinitely,' exclaimed Lesbia, quickly. 'Ryde would only be Cowes ever again—a lesser Cowes; and I thought when you first proposed it that the plan was rather stupid, though I did not want to be uncivil and say so. But I was delighted with Don Gomez de Montesma's amendment, substituting St. Malo for Ryde. In the first place the trip across will be delicious'—Lady Kirkbank gave a faint groan—'and in the second place I am dying to see Brittany.'
'I doubt if you will highly appreciate St. Malo. It is a town of many and various smells.'
'But I want to smell those foreign smells of which one hears much. At least it is an experience. We need not be on shore any longer than we like. And I want to see that fine rocky coast, and Chateaubriand's tomb on the what's-its-name. So nice to be buried in that way.'
'Then you have set your heart on going to St. Malo, and would not like any change in our plan?'
'Any change will be simply detestable,' answered Lesbia, all the more decidedly since she suspected a desire for change on the part of Mr. Smithson.
She was in no amiable humour this afternoon. All her nerves seemed strained to their utmost tension. She was irritated, tremulous with nervous excitement, inclined to hate everybody, Horace Smithson most of all. In her cabin a little later on, when she was changing her gown for dinner, and Kibble was somewhat slow and clumsy in the lacing of the bodice, she wrenched herself from the girl's hands, flung herself into a chair, and burst into a flood of passionate tears.
'O God! that I were on one of those islands in the Caribbean Sea—an island where Europeans never come—where I might lie down among the poisonous tropical flowers, and sleep the rest of my days away. I am sick to death of my life here; of the yacht, the people—everything.'
'This air is too relaxing, Lady Lesbia,' the girl murmured, soothingly; 'and you didn't have your natural rest last night. Shall I get you a nice strong cup of tea?'
'Tea! no. I have been living upon tea for the last twenty-four hours. I have eaten nothing. My mouth is parched and burning. Oh, Kibble!' flinging her head upon the girl's buxom arm, and letting it rest there, 'what a happy creature you are—not a care—not a care.'
'I'm sure you can't have any cares, Lady Lesbia,' said Kibble, with an incredulous smile, trying to smooth the disordered hair, anxious to make haste with the unfinished toilet, for it was within a few minutes of eight.
'I am full of care. I am in debt—horribly in debt—getting deeper and deeper every day—and I am going to sell myself to the only man who can pay my debts and give me fine houses, and finery like this,' plucking at thecrêpe de chinegown, with its flossy fringe, its delicate lace, a marvel of artistic expenditure; a garment which looked simplicity itself, and yet was so cleverly contrived as to cost five-and-thirty guineas. The greatest effects in it required to be studied with a microscope.
'But surely, dear Lady Lesbia, you won't marry Mr. Smithson, if you don't love him?'
'Do you suppose love has anything to do with marriages in society?'
'Oh, Lady Lesbia, it would be so unkind to him, so cruel to yourself.'
'Cruel to myself. Yes, I am cruel to myself. I had the chance of happiness a year ago, and I lost it. I have the chance of happiness now—yes, of consummate bliss—and haven't the courage to snatch at it. Take off this horrid gown, Kibble; my head is splitting: I shan't go to dinner.'
'Oh, Lady Lesbia, you are treading on the pearl embroidery,' remonstrated poor Kibble, as Lesbia kicked the new gown from under her feet.
'What does it matter!' she exclaimed with a bitter little laugh. 'It has not been paid for—perhaps it never will be.'
The dinner was silent and gloomy. It was as if a star had been suddenly blotted out of the sky. Smithson, ordinarily so hospitable, had been too much disturbed in mind to ask any of his friends to stay to dinner; so there were only Lady Kirkbank, who was too tired to be lively, and Montesma, who was inclined to be thoughtful. Lesbia's absence, and the idea that she was ill, gave the feast almost a funereal air.
After dinner Smithson and Montesma sat on deck, smoking their cigars, and lazily watching the lights on sea, and the lights on shore; these brilliant in the foreground, those dim in the distance.
'You can telegraph to your Rio Janeiro friend to-morrow morning, if you like,' said Smithson, presently, 'and tell him to send a first-rate skipper and crew. Lady Lesbia has made up her mind to see St. Malo Regatta, and with such a sacred charge I can't be too careful.'
'I'll wire before eight o'clock to-morrow,' answered Montesma, 'You have decided wisely. Your respectable English Wilkinson is an excellent man—but nothing would surprise me less than his reducing yourCaymanto matchwood in the next gale.'
That strange scene in the old house at Fellside made a profound impression upon Lord Hartfield. He tried to disguise his trouble, and did all in his power to seem gay and at perfect ease in his wife's company; but his mind was full of anxiety, and Mary loved him too well to be for a moment in doubt as to his feelings.
'There is something wrong, Jack,' she said, while they were breakfasting at a table in the verandah, with the lake and the bills in front of them and the sweet morning air around them. 'You try to talk and to be lively, but there is a little perpendicular wrinkle in your forehead which I know as well as the letters of the alphabet, and that little line means worry. I used to see it in the old days, when you were breaking your heart for Lesbia. Why cannot you be frank and confide in me. It is your duty, sir, as my husband.'
'Is it my duty to halve my burdens as well as my joys? How do I know if those girlish shoulders are strong enough to bear the weight of them?'
'I can bear anything you can bear, and I won't be cheated out of my share in your worries. If you were obliged to have a tooth out, I would have one out too, for company.'
'I hope the dentist would be too conscientious to allow that.'
'Tell me your trouble, Hartfield,' she said, earnestly, leaning across the table, bringing her grave intelligent face near to him.
They were quite alone, he and she. The servants had done their ministering. Behind them there was the empty dining-room, in front of them the sunlit panorama of lake and hill. There could not be a safer place for telling secrets.
'Tell me what it is that worries you,' Mary pleaded again.
'I will, dear. After all perfect trust is the best; nay, it is your due, for you are brave enough and true enough to be trusted with secrets that mean life and death. In a word, then, Mary, the cause of my trouble is that old man we saw the other night.'
'Steadman's uncle?'
'Do you really believe that he is Steadman's uncle?'
'My grandmother told me so,' answered Mary, reddening to the roots of her hair.
To this girl, who was the soul of truth, there was deepest shame in the idea that her kinswoman, the woman whom of all the world she most owed reverence and honour, could be deemed capable of falsehood.
'Do you think my grandmother would tell me an untruth?'
'I do not believe that man is a poor dependent, an old servant's kinsman, sheltered and cared for in this house for charity's sake. Forgive me, Mary, if I doubt the word of one you love; but there are positions in life in which a man must judge for himself. Would Mr. Steadman's kinsman be lodged as that old man is lodged; would he talk as that old man talks; and last and greatest perplexity of all, would he possess a treasure of gold and jewels which must be worth many thousands?'
'But you cannot know for certain that those things are valuable; they may be rubbish that this poor old man has scraped together and hoarded for years, glass jewels bought at country fairs. Those rouleaux may contain lead or coppers.'
'I do not think so, Mary. The stones had all the brilliancy of valuable gems, and then there were others in the finest filagree settings—goldsmith's work which bore the stamp of an Eastern world. Take my word for it, that treasure came from India; and it must have been brought to England by Lord Maulevrier. It may have existed all these years without your grandmother's knowledge. That is quite possible; but it seems to me impossible that such wealth should be within the knowledge and the power of a pauper lunatic.'
'But if that unhappy old man is not a relation of Steadman's supported here by my grandmother's benevolence, who can he be, and why is he here?' asked Mary.
'Oh, Molly dear, these are two questions which I cannot answer, and which yet ought to be answered somehow. Since that night I have felt as if there were a dark cloud lowering over this house—a cloud almost as terrible in its menace of danger as the forshadowing of fate in a Greek legend. For your sake, for the honour of your race, for my own self-respect as your husband, I feel that this mystery ought to be solved, and all dark things made light before your grandmother's death. When she is gone the master-key to the past will be lost.'
'But she will be spared for many years, I hope, spared to sympathise with my happiness, and with Lesbia's.'
My dearest girl, we cannot hope that. The thread of her life is worn very thin. It may snap at any moment. You cannot look seriously in your grandmother's face, and yet delude yourself with the hope that she has years of life before her.'
'It will be very hard to part, just as she has begun to care for me,' said Mary, with her eyes full of tears.
'All such partings are hard, and your grandmother's life has been so lonely and joyless that the memory of it must always have a touch of pain. One cannot say of her as we can of the happy; she has lived her life—all things have been given to her, and she falls asleep at the close of a long and glorious day. For some reason which I cannot understand, Lady Maulevrier's life has been a prolonged sacrifice.'
'She has always given us to understand that she was fond of Fellside, and that this secluded life suited her,' said Mary, meditatively.
'I cannot help doubting her sincerity on that point. Lady Maulevrier is too clever a woman, and forgive me, dear, if I add too worldly a woman, to be content to live out of the world. The bird must have chafed its breast against the bars of the cage many and many a time when you thought that all was peace. Be sure, Mary, that your grandmother had a powerful motive for spending all her days in this place, and I can but think that the old man we saw the other night had some part in that motive. Do you remember telling me of her ladyship's vehement anger when she heard you had made the acquaintance of her pensioner?'
'Yes, she was very angry,' Mary answered, with a troubled look. 'I never saw her so angry—she was almost beside herself—said the harshest things to me—talked as if I had done some dreadful mischief.'
'Would she have been so moved, do you think, unless there was some fatal secret involved in that man's presence here?'
'I hardly know what to think. Tell me everything. What is it that you fear?—what is it that you suspect?'
'To tell you my fears and suspicions is to tell you a family secret that has been kept from you out of kindness all the years of your life—and I hardly think I could bring myself to that if I did not know what the world is, and how many good-natured friends Lady Hartfield will meet in society, by-and-by, ready to tell her, by hints and innuendoes, that her grandfather, the Governor of Madras, came back to England under a cloud of disgrace.'
'My poor grandfather! How dreadful!' exclaimed Mary, pale with pity and shame. 'Did he deserve his disgrace, poor unhappy creature—or was he the victim of false accusation?'
'I can hardly tell you that, Mary, any more than I can tell whether Warren Hastings deserved the abuse that was wreaked upon him at one time, or the acquittal that gave the lie to his slanderers in after years. The events occurred forty years ago—the story was only half known then, and like all such stories formed the basis for every kind of exaggeration and perversion.'
'Does Maulevrier know?' faltered Mary.
'Maulevrier knows all that is known by the general public, and no more.'
'And you have married the granddaughter of a disgraced man,' said Mary, with a piteous look. 'Did you know—when you married me?'
'As much as I know now, dear love. If you had been Jonathan Wild's granddaughter you would have been just as dear to me. I marriedyou, dearest; I loveyou; I believe inyou. All the grandfathers in Christendom would not shake my faith by one tittle.'
She threw herself into his arms, and sobbed upon his breast. But sweet as this assurance of his love was to her, she was not the less stricken by shame at the thought of possible infamy in the past, a shameful memory for ever brooding over her name in the present.
'Society never forgets a scandal,' she said; 'I have heard Maulevrier say that.'
'Society has a long memory for other people's sins, but it only avenges its own wrongs. Give the wicked fairy Society a bad dinner, or leave her out of your invitation list for a ball, and she will twit you with the crimes or the misfortunes of a remote ancestor—she will go about talking of your grandfather the leper, or your great aunt who ran away with her footman. But so long as the wicked fairy gets all she wants out of you, she cares not a straw for the misdeeds of past generations.'
He spoke lightly, laughingly almost, and then he ordered the dogcart to be brought round immediately, and he drove Mary across the hills towards Langdale, to bring the colour back to her blanched cheeks. He brought her home in time to give her grandmother an hour for letter-writing before luncheon, while he walked up and down the terrace below Lady Maulevrier's windows, meditating the course he was to take.
He was to leave Westmoreland next day to take his place in the House of Lords during the last important debate of the session. He made up his mind that before he left he would seek an interview with Lady Maulevrier, and boldly ask her to explain the mystery of that old man's presence at Fellside. He was her kinsman by marriage, and he had sworn to honour her and to care for her as a son; and as a son he would urge her to confide in him, to unburden her conscience of any dark secret, and to make the crooked things straight, before she was called away.
While he was forecasting this interview, meeting imaginary objections, arguing points which might have to be argued, a servant came out to him with an ochre envelope on a little silver tray—that unpleasant-looking envelope which seems always a presage of trouble, great or small.
'Lord Maulevrier, Albany, to Lord Hartfield, Fellside, Grasmere.
'For God's sake come to me at once. I am in great trouble; not on my own account, but about a relation.'
A relation—except his grandmother and his two sisters Maulevrier had no relations for whom he cared a straw. This message must have relation to Lesbia. Was she ill—dying, the victim of some fatal accident, runaway horses, boat upset, train smashed? There was something; and Maulevrier appealed to his nearest and best friend. There was no withstanding such an appeal. It must be answered, and immediately.
Lord Hartfield went into the library and wrote his reply message, which consisted of six words.
'Going to you by first train.'
The next train left Windermere at three. There was just time to get a fresh horse put in the dogcart, and a Gladstone bag packed.
Lord Hartfield did not arrive at Euston Square until near eleven o'clock at night. A hansom deposited him at the entrance to the Albany just as the clock of St. James's Church chimed the hour. He found only Maulevrier's valet. His lordship had waited indoors all the evening, and had only gone out a quarter of an hour ago. He had gone to the Cerberus, and begged that Lord Hartfield would be kind enough to follow him there.
Lord Hartfield was not fond of the Cerberus, and indeed deemed that lively place of rendezvous a very dangerous sphere for his friend Maulevrier; but in the face of Maulevrier's telegram there was no time to be lost, so he walked across Piccadilly and down St. James's Street to the fashionable little club, where the men were dropping in after the theatres and dinners, and where sheafs of bank notes were being exchanged for those various coloured counters which represented divers values, from the respectable 'pony' to the modest 'chip.'
Maulevrier was in the first room Hartfield looked into, standing behind some men who were playing.
'That's something like friendship,' he exclaimed, when he saw Lord Hartfield, and then he hooked his arm through his friend's, and led him off to the dining room.
'Come and have some supper, old fellow,' he said, 'and I can tell you my troubles while you are eating it. James, bring us a grill, and a lobster, and a bottle of Mumms, number 27, you know.'
'Yes, my lord.'
'Sorry to find you in this den, Maulevrier,' said Lord Hartfield.
'Haven't touched a card. Haven't done half an hour's punting this season. But it's a kind of habit with me to wander in here now and then. I know so many of the members. One poor devil lost nine thousand one night last week. Rather rough upon him, wasn't it? All ready money at this shop, don't you know.'
'Thank God, I know nothing about it. And now, Maulevrier, what is wrong, and with whom?'
'Everything is wrong, and with my sister Lesbia.'
'Good heavens! what do you mean?'
'Only this, that there is a fellow after her whose very name means ruin to women—a Spanish-American adventurer—reckless, handsome, a gambler, seducer, duellist, dare-devil. The man she is to marry seems to have neither nous nor spunk to defend her. Everybody at Goodwood saw the game that was being played, everybody at Cowes is watching the cards, betting on the result. Yes, great God, the men at the Squadron Club are staking their money upon my sister's character—even monkeys that she bolts with Montesma—five to three against the marriage with Smithson ever coming off.'
'Is this true?'
'It is as true as your marriage with Molly, as true as your loyalty to me. I was told of it all this morning at the Haute Gomme by a man I can rely upon, a really good fellow, who would not leave me in the dark about my sister's danger when all the smoking-rooms in Pall Mall were sniggering about it. My first impulse was to take the train for Cowes; but then I knew if I went alone I should let my temper get the better of me. I should knock somebody down—throw somebody out of the window—make a devil of a scene. And this would be fatal for Lesbia. I wanted your counsel, your cool head, your steady common-sense. "Not a step forward without Jack," I said to myself, so I bolted off and sent that telegram. It relieved my feeling a little, but I've had a wretched day.'
'Waiter, bring me a Bradshaw, or an A B C,' said Lord Hartfield.
He had eaten nothing but a biscuit since breakfast, but he was ready to go off at once, supperless, if there were a train to carry him. Unluckily there was no train. The mail had started. Nothing till seven o'clock next morning.
'Eat your supper, old fellow,' said Maulevrier. 'After all, the danger may not be so desperate as I fancied this morning. Slander is the favourite amusement of the age we live in. We must allow a margin for exaggeration.'
'A very liberal margin,' answered Hartfield. 'No doubt the man who warned you meant honestly, but this scandal may have grown out of the merest trifles. The feebleness of the Masher's brain is only exceeded by the foulness of the Masher's tongue. I daresay this rumour about Lady Lesbia has its beginning and end among the Masher species.'
'I hope so, but—I have seen those two together—I met them at Victoria one evening after Goodwood. Old Kirkbank was shuffling on ahead, carrying Smithson with her, absorbing his attention by fussification about her carriage. Lesbia and that Cuban devil were in the rear. They looked as if they had all the world to themselves. Faust and Marguerite in the garden were not in it for the expression of intense absorbing feeling compared with those two. I'm not an intellectual party, but I know something of human nature, and I know when a man and woman are in love with each other. It is one of the things that never has been, that never can be hidden.'
'And you say this Montesma is a dangerous man?'
'Deadly.'
'Well, we must lose no time. When we are on the spot it will be easy to find out the truth; and it will be your duty, if there be danger, to warn Lesbia and her future husband.
'I would much rather shoot the Cuban,' said Maulevrier. 'I never knew much good come of a warning in such a case: it generally precipitates matters. If I could playécartéwith him at the club, find him sporting an extra king, throw my cards in his face, and accept his challenge for an exchange of shots on the sands beyond Cherbourg—there would be something like satisfaction.'
'You say the man is a gambler?'
'Report says something worse of him. Report says he is a cheat.'
'We must not be dependent upon society gossip,' replied Lord Hartfield. 'I have an idea, Maulevrier. The more we know about this man—Montesma, I think you called him----'
'Gomez de Montesma.'
'The more fully we are acquainted with Don Gomez de Montesma's antecedents the better we shall be able to cope with him, if we come to handy-grips. It's too late to start for Cowes, but it is not too late to do something. Fitzpatrick, the political-economist, spent a quarter of a century in South America. He is a very old friend—knew my father—and I can venture to knock at his door after midnight—all the more as I know he is a night-worker. He is very likely to enlighten us about your Cuban hidalgo.'
'You shall finish your supper before I let you stir. After that you may do what you like. I was always a child in your hands, Jack, whether it was climbing a mountain or crossing the Horse-shoe Fall. I consider the business in your hands now. I'll go with you wherever you like, and do what you tell me. When you want me to kick anybody, or fight anybody, you can give me the office and I'll do it. I know that Lesbia's interests are safe in your hands. You once cared very much for her. You are her brother-in-law now, and, next to me, you are her natural protector, taking into account that her future husband is a cad and doesn't score.'
'Meet me at Waterloo at ten minutes to seven to-morrow morning, and we'll go down to Cowes together. I'm off to find Fitzpatrick. Good night.'
So they parted. Lord Hartfield walked across the Park to Great George Street, where Mr. Fitzpatrick had chambers of a semi-official character, on the first floor of a solemn-looking old house, spacious, gloomy without and within, walls sombre with the subdued colouring of decorations half a century old.
The lighted windows of those first-floor rooms told Lord Hartfield that he was not too late. He rang the bell, which was answered with the briefest delay by a sleepy-looking clerk, who had been taking shorthand notes for Mr. Fitzpatrick's great book upon 'ProtectionversusFree Trade.' The clerk looked sleepy, but his employer had as brisk an air as if he were just beginning the day; although he had been working without intermission since nine o'clock that evening, and had done a long day's work before dinner. He was walking up and down the spacious unluxurious room, half office, half library, smoking a cigar. Upon a large table in the centre of the room stood two powerful reading lamps with green shades, illuminating a chaotic mass of books and pamphlets, heaped and scattered all over the table, save just on that spot between the two lamps, which accommodated Mr. Fitzpatrick's blotting pad and inkpot, a pewter inkpot which held about a pint.
'How d'ye do, Hartfield? Glad you've looked me up at last,' said the Irishman, as if a midnight call were the most natural thing in the world. 'Just come from the House?'
'No; I've just come from Westmoreland. I thought I should find you among those everlasting books of yours, late as it is. Can I have a few words alone with you?'
'Certainly. Morgan, you can go away for a bit.'
'Home, sir?'
'Home—well—yes, I suppose it's late. You look sleepy. I should have been glad to finish the chapter on Beetroot Sugar to-night—but it may stand over for the morning. Be sure you're early.'
'Yes, sir,' the clerk responded with a faint sigh.
He was paid handsomely for late hours, liberally rewarded for his shorthand services; and yet he wished the great Fitzpatrick had not been quite so industrious.
'Now, my dear Hartfield, what can I do for you?' asked Fitzpatrick, when the clerk had gone. 'I can see by your face that you've something serious in hand. Can I help you?'
'You can, I believe, in a very material way. You were five-and-twenty years in Spanish America?'
'Rather more than less.'
'Here, there, and everywhere?'
'Yes; there isnota city in South America that I have not lived in—for something between a day and a year.'
'You know something about most men of any mark in that part of the world, I conclude?'
'It was my business to know men of all kinds. I had my mission from the Spanish Government. I was engaged to examine the condition of commerce throughout the colony, the working of protection as against free trade, and so on. Strange, by-the-bye, that Cuba, the last place to foster the slave trade, was of all spots of the earth the first to carry free-trade principles into practical effect, long before they were recognised in any European country.'
'Strange to me that you should speak of Cuba so soon after my coming in,' answered Lord Hartfield. 'I am here to ask you to help me to find out the antecedents of a man who hails from that island.'
'I ought to know something about him, whoever he is,' replied Mr. Fitzpatrick, briskly. 'I spent six months in Cuba not very long before my return to England. Cuba is one of my freshest memories; and I have a pretty tight memory for facts, names and figures. Never could remember two lines of poetry in my life.'
'Did you ever hear of, or meet with, a man called Montesma—Gomez de Montesma?'
'Couldn't have stopped a month in Havana without hearing something about that gentleman,' answered Fitzpatrick, 'I hope he isn't a friend of yours, and that you have not lent him money?'
'Neither; but I want to know all you can tell me about him.'
'You shall have it in black and white, out of my Cuban note-book,' replied the other, unlocking a drawer in the official table; 'I always take notes of anything worth recording, on the spot. A man is a fool who trusts to memory, where personal character is at stake. Montesma is as well known at Havana as the Morro Fort or the Tacon Theatre. I have heard stories enough about him to fill a big volume; but all the facts recorded there'—striking the morocco cover of the note-book—'have been thoroughly sifted; I can vouch for them.'
He looked at the index, found the page, and handed the book to Lord Hartfield.
'Read for yourself,' he said, quietly.
Lord Hartfield read three or four pages of plain statement as to various adventures by sea and land in which Gomez de Montesma had figured, and the reputation which he bore in Cuba and on the Main.
'You can vouch for this?' he said at last, after a long silence.
'For every syllable.'
'The story of his marriage?'
'Gospel truth: I knew the lady.'
'And the rest?'
'All true.'
'A thousand thanks. I know now upon what ground I stand. I have to save an innocent, high-bred girl from the clutches of a consummate scoundrel.'
'Shoot him, and shoot her, too, if there's no better way of saving her. It will be an act of mercy,' said Mr. Fitzpatrick, without hesitation.