Next morning Gifford was in good time at the rendezvous, a sequestered corner of the park, and Edith Morriston soon joined him. "Let us come into the summer-house," she suggested; "it will be more convenient for my long story."
"First of all, tell me," Gifford said, "has anything happened since last night? Has Henshaw made any move?"
She took out a note and handed it to him. "Only that," she said with an uneasy laugh.
"There must have been some misunderstanding last evening," Gifford read. "I cannot think that your not keeping the appointment was intentional. Anyhow I can wait till to-night, then I shall be at the lane just beyond the church at 7.30. That you may not repent I hope you have not repented." That was all.
"A thinly veiled threat," Gifford observed. "The man in his way seems as great a bully as his brother. May I keep this? I am going to see Mr. Henshaw presently, and have a serious talk with him. After which I shall hope to be able to convince you that your troubles are at an end."
"If you can do that—" she said.
"The knowledge that I have been of service to you will be my great reward. I hope I am sufficiently a gentleman not to ask or expect any other."
She made no reply. They had entered the little rustic summer-house, and sat down.
"Dick has driven into Branchester," Edith Morriston said, perhaps to end an embarrassing pause. "He will not be back till luncheon, so we are not likely to be interrupted."
"That's well," Gifford answered. "Now please begin what I am most anxious to hear."
"The story I have to tell you, Mr. Gifford," Edith Morriston began, "is not a pleasant one and is as humiliating to me to relate as was the experience, the terrible experience, I had to go through. But to be fair to myself I must be quite frank with you, and am sure you will never give me cause to repent speaking unreservedly."
"You can rely upon my honour to respect your confidence," Gifford responded warmly.
"I know I may," the girl answered. "Well, then, you must know first of all, that my father married a second time, and he unfortunately chose a woman well connected enough, but heartless and an utter snob. I suppose men are often blind to these hateful qualities before marriage; doubtless a clever, unscrupulous woman is able to hide her faults when she has the main chance in view. My stepmother was a good deal younger than my father, and I dare say on the whole made him, socially at any rate, a fairly good wife. Her one idea was social aggrandizement at any cost, and I unhappily was to fall a victim to it.
"I suppose we ought not to blame her for determining that I ought to marry well; she wanted to do the best for the family and was constitutionally incapable of making allowance for or considering any one's private feelings. To make a long story short, my stepmother, in pursuance of her policy, determined that I should marry a certain peer whose name I need not mention. He was altogether a bad lot, and I soon came to know it. I received certain warnings, but without them I could see that the man was all wrong, and I told my stepmother what I thought of him.
"She scoffed at the idea that he was any worse than the average man. All I had to concern myself with was the fact that he was a peer of ancient lineage, of large property, and there wasn't another girl in the kingdom who wouldn't jump at him. I might well chance his making me unhappy since he could make me a countess, and to refuse him would be absolute madness; Mrs. Morriston's face grew black at the very thought of it. She soon got my father on to her side, and between them I had a hateful time of it. It's the old story, which will be told as long as there are worldly, selfish women on the earth, but it was none the less fresh and poignant to me who had to live through the experience.
"Things got so bad through my continued refusal to fall in with my stepmother's wishes that I was reduced to a state bordering on despair. My father, whom I loved, was turned against me; his mind was so prejudiced in favour of the man whom I was being gradually forced to take as a husband that he could see no good reason, only sheer obstinacy, in my refusal. Altogether my life was becoming a perfect hell. Dick, who might have stood by me, and made things less unbearable, was away on a two years' tour for big game shooting; I had no one to confide in, no one to help me.
"Just as things were at their worst and I was getting quite desperate, I met at a dance a man named Archie Jolliffe. He had been a sailor, but having come into money had given up the Service and settled down to enjoy himself. He and I got on very well together from the first; he was a breezy, genial, young fellow, fond of fun and adventure and a pleasant contrast in every way to the man who was threatening to ruin my life. I don't know that in happier circumstances I should have cared for Jolliffe; there wasn't much in him beyond his capacity for fun; he was inclined to be fast in a foolish sort of way; a man's man rather than one for whom a woman could feel much respect. Still he was not vicious like the other, for whom my dislike increased every time I saw him.
"Well, Archie Jolliffe fell in love with me and in his impetuous way made no secret of it. I need not say it did not take long for my step-mother to become aware of it, and with the idea that I was encouraging him she became furious. Except that poor Archie was a welcome change from the atmosphere of my home and the hateful attentions of the man who was always being left alone with me, I did not really care for him, and but for Mrs. Morriston's attitude I should have told him it was no use his thinking of me. Considering the sequel, I wish I had done so; but it is too late now for regrets. His love-making gave me a chance of defying my stepmother, and I rather enjoyed baulking her plans to keep Archie and me apart. If I did not encourage him—indeed, I refused him every time he proposed—I did not dismiss him as I ought to have done, and he evidently had an idea that perseverance would win the day. And so, after a fashion, it did.
"Matters reached such a pitch at last that it became plain that I must either consent to marry the man I loathed or leave my home for good. Goaded on by my apparent encouragement of Archie Jolliffe, my stepmother resolved to bring matters to a crisis. She started a terrific row with me one day, my father was brought into it, and I stood up against them both. The upshot was that when the interview was over I went out of the house boiling with indignation and for the time utterly reckless. Chance caught the psychological moment and threw me in the way of Archie Jolliffe. He saw something was wrong and pressed me to tell him what had happened. He was so chivalrous and sympathetic that I was led in my turbulent state of mind to become confidential, the more so when he told me he had known for some time how I was being treated.
"'You must not marry that man,' he said 'It is an outrage for your people to suggest such a thing. He is a big swell and all that, with heaps of money, but any man in town who knows anything will tell you he is quite impossible,'
"I had heard that, and had told my stepmother, but of course it did not suit her to heed me. She cared for nothing beyond the fact that I should be a countess, and said so.
"Archie and I talked together for a long time and with the result that in my longing for protection from the powers against me and my indignation at the way I was being treated I had promised when we parted to marry him, and we had planned to elope together that very night.
"At that time we were living at Haynthorpe Hall—you know it?—about ten miles from here. That evening I slipped out of the house after dinner and met Archie, who was waiting for me at a quiet spot outside the village. His plan was to drive across country to Branchester Junction, where it was not likely we should be noticed or recognized, catch the night train up to town and be married there next morning. You may imagine the state of desperation—utter desperation and recklessness—I was in to have consented to such a thing, but I could see no help for it, and of two evils I seemed to be choosing the least. The future looked hideously vague and dark; still Jolliffe was capable of being transformed into a decent husband, while the other man assuredly was not.
"Archie seemed overjoyed, poor fellow, as I mounted into the dog-cart; he had hardly expected that I should not repent. Once we were fairly off and bowling along the dark road, a sense of relief came to me, and whatever qualms I may have felt soon vanished. However wrong my conduct was I had been driven to it and my father, for whom I was sorry, by taking part against me, deserved to lose me.
"My companion had the tact not to talk much, and I was glad to think he could realize the seriousness of the step he had persuaded me to take. But the little he did say was affectionately sympathetic and, now that the die was cast, it comforted me to indulge hopes of him.
"All went well till we were about three miles from Branchester; then an awful thing happened. Our horse was a fast trotter, and Archie let him have his head, knowing that it would never do for us to miss the train. As we turned a blind corner we came into collision with another dog-cart which we had neither seen nor heard. The force of the impact was so great that our off-wheel was smashed; the cart went over, we were both flung out, and as I fell I realized horribly that my desperate expedient was a failure.
"I was not much hurt, for my fall was broken, and I soon scrambled to my feet. But Archie lay there motionless. The man who was the only occupant of the other dog-cart had pulled into the hedge and alighted. He came up to offer his help, and to express his sorrow at the accident, which he said, doubtless with truth, was not his fault. I dare say you will have guessed that the man was Clement Henshaw. Between us we raised Archie and carried him to the side of the road. He was quite insensible, and breathing heavily.
"'I am afraid he is rather seriously hurt,' the man said sympathetically.'We ought to get him to Branchester Hospital as soon as possible.'
"I was so overwhelmed by the sudden and terrible end to our adventure that I could think of nothing. By a great piece of luck a belated dray came along on its way to Branchester. Into this, with the driver's help, we lifted poor Archie; and then Henshaw and I drove on in his trap to prepare the hospital authorities for the patient's arrival. The doctor after a cursory examination gave very little hope, and I left the hospital in a most wretched state of mind, feeling more than indirectly responsible for the end of that bright young life. Henshaw arranged for the horse and smashed dogcart to be fetched from the scene of the accident, and then he asked where in the town he should escort me.
"I thanked him and said, a good deal to his surprise, that I was not going to stop in Branchester, but would hire a fly and drive to my destination. I stood, of course, in a hideously false position, and that he very soon began to divine; he would not hear of my getting a fly at that hour of the night, but insisted on driving me in his trap to wherever I wished to go.
"Unhappily I had no idea of the man's character, or I should never have dreamt of accepting his offer; but I was then in no state of mind to judge his nature or question his motives; he had proved himself infinitely kind and resourceful, so in my lonely and agitated condition I consented, little imagining what the dire result to me would be.
"On the drive back to my home I was naturally in a horribly distressed state of mind, and hardly dared think of the future. My companion tactfully refrained from much talking, although I had an idea that his curiosity was greatly excited to learn the explanation of the affair; he put occasionally a leading question which I always evaded, when he took the hint and did not press his inquiries. So far as every one else was concerned there had been no idea of connecting me with poor Archie Jolliffe. The hospital people believed that he had been driving alone, and that I had been in the trap with Henshaw. I dare say they took me for his sister or his wife.
"At last, after one of the most wretched hours I ever spent—and I have had more than my fair share of trouble—we reached Haynthorpe, and on the outskirts of the village I asked Henshaw to set me down. He stopped and looked at me curiously.
"'Can't you trust me to drive you to your home?'" he said insinuatingly.
"I replied that I preferred to get down where we were, and thanked him as warmly as I was able for all his services.
"'You haven't even told me your name,' he protested, 'Mine is ClementHenshaw; I am staying at Flinton for hunting.'
"My answer was that he must not think me ungrateful, but that I would rather not tell him my name. It could be of no consequence to him.
"'I should like at least,' he urged, 'to be allowed to drive over and report how your—friend—or was it your brother?—is getting on.'
"I thanked him, made the best excuse I could for refusing, got down from the trap and hurried off through the dark village street, thankful to get away from those awkward questions.
"But if I thought I had finally got rid of Mr. Clement Henshaw I was, in my ignorance of the man, woefully mistaken."
"When I reached the house luck unexpectedly favoured me. My maid, whom I had been obliged to take, up to a certain point, into my confidence, and who, after the manner of her class, had acquired more than a sympathetic inkling of the way my people had been treating me, was waiting up on the look-out for my return, and quietly let me in. She told me that no one but herself had any idea that I was out of the house; she had led them to believe that I had gone to bed early with a headache, which considering the stress of the past two days was plausible enough. So I got back safely to my room which it had not seemed likely. I should ever enter again, and next morning I could see that my over-night's adventure was quite unsuspected.
"Naturally I anticipated a continuation of my stepmother's attempts to force me into the marriage she had in view, and it rather puzzled me to understand why they seemed to be dropped. The prospective bridegroom did not come to the house, and, stranger still, his name was not mentioned. The explanation was soon forthcoming. I did not see the newspapers just then, in fact I have an idea they were purposely kept away from me; but some people who were calling mentioned a big society-scandal coming on in the Law Courts in which this precious peer was desperately involved. The relief with which I heard the news was unbounded considering all it meant for me, but my joy was turned to bitter grief by the news that Archie Jolliffe after lying unconscious for nearly a week had died of his injury. I had contrived, during the days he lingered, to make secret inquiries as to his condition, and so knew that what would have seemed my heartless absence from his bedside had made no difference to him."
"Poor fellow," Gifford commented.
"It was unspeakably sad," Edith Morriston continued, "but it seemed like fate, seeing how things rearranged themselves afterwards. Certainly if I was to blame for his piteous end, I was to pay the penalty. For no sooner was I out of one trouble than another was ready for me.
"After this long preface, I come to the most unpleasant episode ofHenshaw and his persecution.
"On the day I heard of poor Archie's death I had gone out for a walk possessed by a great longing to be alone in my grief. On my way home by a woodland path leading to the Hall grounds, I, to my great annoyance, came upon Clement Henshaw. I can't say I was altogether surprised, for I had caught a glimpse of some one very like him in the village a day or two before. Of that I had thought little, merely taking care that the man did not see me. But now there was no avoiding him, and I had more than a suspicion that he had been lying in wait for me. At the risk of appearing horribly ungrateful I made up my mind on the instant to try to pass him with a bow, but need not say that was utterly futile. He stood directly in my path, and raised his hat.
"'I am sorry to be the bearer of sad news, Miss Morriston,' he said.
"So he had found out my name, assuredly not by accident, and the fact angered me, perhaps unreasonably.
"'I have heard of Mr. Jolliffe's death,' I replied coldly, 'if that is what you have to tell me.'
"'I thought,' he rejoined, with assurance, 'it quite possible you might not have heard so soon.'
"From his manner I began to see that the man was likely to become an annoyance if he were not snubbed, but soon discovered that it was not so easily done. I thanked him coldly enough, and tried to dismiss him, but he insisted on walking with me. What could I do? He seemed determined to force his company upon me and I could not run away. He tried to get out of me how I had come to be driving with Archie that night, and although I evaded his questions it was plain that he had a shrewd inkling of the reason. Not to weary you with a long account of this disagreeable and humiliating affair, I will only say that from that day forward I became subject to a determined system of persecution from Clement Henshaw. He waylaid me on every possible occasion, holding over me a covert threat of the exposure of my escapade, till at last I was absolutely afraid to go outside the house for fear of meeting him."
"He wanted to marry you?" Gifford suggested.
Edith Morriston gave a little shudder. "I suppose so. He was always making love to me, and was quite impervious to snubbing. When, in consequence of my keeping within bounds of the house and garden, he could not see me, he took to writing, and kept me in terror lest one of his letters should fall into my stepmother's hands. I wished afterwards that I had taken a bold line, confessed what had happened, and defied the consequences. I think it was the fear of being disgraced in my brother's eyes on his return which kept me from doing so.
"In the midst of my worry my father fell into a state of bad health and we took him down to the Devonshire coast for change of air. Needless to say Henshaw soon found out our retreat, and to my dismay appeared there. His persecution went on with renewed vigour and I, having less chance there of escaping it, was nearly at my wits' end, when fate curiously enough again intervened. We were caught in a storm on a long country excursion, my stepmother got a severe chill and within a week was dead. We returned to Haynthorpe, my father being now in a very precarious state of health, Henshaw followed us with a pertinacity that was almost devilish. But I now ventured to defy his threats of exposing me; he strenuously denied any such intention and declared himself madly in love with me. I had now taken courage enough to reject him uncompromisingly; I forbade him ever to speak to me again, and, as after that he disappeared from the village, began to flatter myself that I had got rid of him.
"My father grew worse now from day to day; he lingered through the summer and with the chill days of autumn the end came. Dick hurried home and arrived just in time to see him alive. He left a much larger fortune than we had supposed him to possess, and Dick, always fond of sport, was soon in negotiation for this place which had come into the market.
"No sooner had we settled in here than, to my horror, Clement Henshaw began to renew his persecution. He had evidently heard that I had inherited a good share of my father's fortune, and was worth making another effort for. He recommenced to write to me, he came down secretly and waylaid me, and when everything else failed he resorted to threats, not veiled as before, but open and unmistakable. He vowed that if I persisted in refusing to marry him he would take good care that I should never marry any one else. He held, he said, my reputation in his hand; he hoped he should never have to use his power, but I ought to consider the state of his feelings towards me and not goad him to desperate measures. In short he took all the joy out of my life, for I had come from mere dislike simply to loathe the man who could show himself such a dastardly cad. And the worst of it was that I saw no way out of it. Dick is a good fellow and very fond of me, but, although you might not think it, he is almost absurdly proud of the family name and its unsmirched record. And if I had confided in him, and he had horsewhipped Henshaw, what good could that have done? It would simply have infuriated the man, who would have at once made public my escapade, and few people would have given me the credit of its being innocent. Dick had just sunk a large part of his fortune in this place, he had taken over the hounds and was certain of becoming popular. All that would be nullified and upset if this man, Henshaw, chose to let loose his tongue. For how could I even pretend to deny his story? At the very least the truth would mean a hateful reflection on my dead father, and the whole thing would have led to an intolerable scandal. Yet it seemed as though this could be avoided in no other way but by marrying my persecutor, a man whom I had reason to hate and who had shown himself to be such an unchivalrous bully. About this time—that is shortly before the Hunt Ball—rumours had got about the neighbourhood that I was going to marry Lord Painswick. He was certainly paying me a good deal of attention, and I fancy Dick would have liked the match, but I could not bring myself to care for Painswick, and indeed his courtship only added to my other worries.
"But Clement Henshaw heard the rumour and it had naturally the effect of rousing his wretched pursuit of me to greater activity. He vowed with brutal vehemence that I should not marry Painswick, and declared that when our engagement was announced he would tell him the story he had against me. That in itself did not trouble me much since I had no intention of marrying Painswick; still the man's relentless persecution was getting more than I could bear.
"I now come to the night of the Hunt Ball. For some days previously I had seen or heard nothing of Henshaw, and had even begun to hope that something might have happened to make the man abandon his line of conduct. I might have known him better. To my intense annoyance and dismay I saw him come into the ballroom with all the hateful assurance that was so familiar to me. I could not well escape, seeing that I was acting as hostess. For a while he, beyond a formal greeting, let me alone. But I felt what was surely coming, and it was almost a relief when he took an opportunity of asking for a dance.
"He must have seen the hate in my eyes as in my hesitation they met his, for he said with a forced laugh, 'You need not do violence to your feelings by dancing with me, Miss Morriston, if you don't care to, but there is something I must say to you. Let us come out of the crowd to where we shall not be overheard.'
"I had never felt so madly furious with the man as at that moment; and it was with a reckless desire to tell him in strong language my opinion of his tactics, to insult him, if that were possible, to declare that I would die rather than yield to him, that I led the way to the tower. My desire to get out of the crowd was even greater than his, for a mad hope possessed me that in some desperate way I might bring our relations to a final issue.
"We went into the sitting-out room. 'Some one will be coming in here,' he objected. 'Is there a room upstairs where we can talk?'
"'There is a room up there,' I answered, as steadily as my indignation would let me, and unheeding the idea of compromising myself I went up the dark staircase in front of him. Naturally the idea that our stormy interview was to have a witness would have been the last thing to enter my mind; it never occurred to me to make sure no one was already in the room when we entered it.
"You know what happened, Mr. Gifford, so I need not go through that. The man showed himself the cowardly bully that he was. Somehow up there alone with him, as at least I thought, in the dark, my courage gave way, and it was only when the man sought in his vehemence to take hold of me that anger and disgust cast out fear. It was quite by accident that I touched and caught up the chisel lying on the window-sill. As the man's hand sought me it struck the edge of the chisel, and got a wound; that must have been how the blood came upon my dress. He seized my arm, and after a struggle wrenched the implement away. But I never struck him with it, far from giving him his death-blow. The chisel was never in my hand afterwards. When I rushed for the door in a sudden panic, for, knowing that I had hurt him, I believed the man in his rage might be capable of anything, and when in springing after me he stumbled and fell, the chisel must have been held by him edge upwards, and so pierced him to his death."
"That, I am certain now," Gifford said, "is what must have happened."
"And you thought I had stabbed him?" the girl said with a reproachful smile.
"I hardly dare ask you to forgive me for harbouring such a thought," he replied. "Yet had it been true I, who had been a witness of the man's vile conduct, could never have blamed you. If ever an act was justifiable—"
An elongated shadow shot forward on the ground in front of them. Gifford stopped abruptly, and with an involuntary action his companion clutched his arm as both looked up expectantly. Next moment Gervase Henshaw stood before them.
For some moments Henshaw did not speak; indeed, it was probable that the unexpected success of his search for Edith Morriston—for such doubtless was his object—had so disagreeably startled him, that he was unable to pull those sharp wits of his together at once. But the expression which flashed into his eyes, and that came instantaneously, was of so vengeful and threatening a character, that Gifford felt glad he was there to protect the girl from her now enraged persecutor.
"I did not expect to find you here, Miss Morriston."
The words came sharply and wrathfully, when the man had found his glib tongue.
Gifford answered. "Miss Morriston and I have been enjoying the view and the air of the pines."
The commonplace remark naturally, as it was intended, went for nothing.Henshaw affected not to notice it.
"I am glad I have come across you, Miss Morriston," he said, with an evident curbing of his chagrin, "as I have something rather important to say to you."
"I am afraid I cannot hear it now, Mr. Henshaw," the girl returned coldly.
Henshaw's face darkened. "I really must ask you to grant me an interview without delay," he retorted insistently, as though secure in his sense of power over the girl. "I am sure Mr. Gifford will permit—"
"Mr. Gifford will do nothing of the sort," came the bold and rather startling reply from the person alluded to. "As a friend of Miss Morriston's I do not intend to allow you to hold any more private conversations with her."
No doubt with his knowledge of the world and of his own advantage Henshaw put down Gifford's resolute speech to mere bluff. And Gervase Henshaw was too old a legal practitioner to be bluffed. "I do not for a moment admit your right to interfere," he retorted with an assumption of calm superiority. "I am addressing myself to Miss Morriston, who does not, I hope, approve of your somewhat singular manners."
Gifford took a step out of the summerhouse and sternly faced Henshaw. "I am sure Miss Morriston will endorse anything I choose to say to a man who has constituted himself her cowardly persecutor," he said. "Now we don't want to have a dispute in a lady's presence," he added as Henshaw began an angry rejoinder. "You have got, unless you wish very unpleasant consequences to follow, to render an account to me, as Miss Morriston's friend, of your abominable conduct towards her. But not here. You had better come to my room at the hotel at three o'clock this afternoon and hear what I shall have to say. And in the meantime you will address Miss Morriston only at the risk of a horsewhipping."
Henshaw was looking at him steadfastly through eyes that blazed with hate. "I wonder if you quite know whom and what you are trying to champion," he snarled.
"Perfectly," was the cool reply. "A much wronged and cruelly persecuted lady. You had better postpone what you have to say till this afternoon, when we will come to an understanding as to your conduct. Now, as you are on private land, you had better take the nearest way to the public road."
Henshaw looked as though he would have liked to bring the dispute to the issue of a physical encounter, had but the coward in him dared. "I am here by permission," he returned, standing his ground.
"Which has been rescinded by the vile use to which you have chosen to put it," Gifford rejoined. "I have Miss Morriston's authority to treat you as a trespasser, and to order you off her brother's land."
Henshaw fell back a step. "Very well, Mr. Gifford," he returned with an ugly sneer. "You talk with great confidence now, but we shall see. You will be wiser by this time tomorrow."
With that he turned and walked off; Gifford, after watching him for a while, went back to the summer-house.
"I have put things in the right train there," he remarked with a confident laugh. "I hope to be able to tell you this evening that Mr. Henshaw is a thing of the past."
"You are very sanguine," she said, a little doubtfully. "I am afraid you do not know the man."
"I'm afraid I do," he replied. "He is obviously not an easy person to deal with. But I think I see my way. Tell me. He has threatened you in order to induce you to elope with him?"
"Yes. He has found evidence among his brother's correspondence of the hold he had over me and of his persecution. That would afford a sufficient motive for my killing him; and how could I prove that I did not strike the blow?"
"It might be difficult," Gifford answered thoughtfully. "But I may be able to do it. Of course he knows you to be an heiress."
"I am sure of that from something he once let slip. It has been my inheritance which has brought all this trouble upon me, at any rate its persistency."
"Yes. This man must be something of an adventurer, as his brother was. We shall see," Gifford said with a grim touch. "Now, I must not keep you any longer. I am so grateful for the confidence you have given me. May I call later on and tell you the result?"
Her eyes were on him in an almost piteous searching for hope in his resolute face. "Of course," she responded. "I shall be so terribly anxious to know."
Chivalrously avoiding any suggestion of tenderness, he shook hands and went off towards the town.
Punctually at the appointed time Gervase Henshaw was shown into Gifford's room. Kelson had received from his friend a hint of what was afoot and had naturally offered his services to back Gifford up, but they were refused.
"It is very kind of you, Harry," Gifford had said, "and just what one would have expected from you. But, as you shall hear later, this is not a business in which you or any one could usefully intervene. In fact it would be dangerous for me, considering the man I am dealing with, to say what I have to say before a third person."
So Kelson went off to spend the afternoon at the Tredworths'.
When Henshaw came in his expression bore no indication of the terms on which he and Gifford had lately parted. The keen face was unruffled and almost genial; but Gifford was not the man to be deceived by that outward seeming. Henshaw bowed and took the chair the other indicated. There was a short pause as though each waited for the other to begin. In the end it was Gifford who spoke first.
"I should like to come to an understanding with you, Mr. Henshaw, with regard to a very serious annoyance, not to say persecution, to which Miss Morriston has been subjected at your hands." Henshaw drew back his thin lips in a smile. "I have to tell you," Gifford continued, "once and for all that it must cease."
"Miss Morriston authorizes you to tell me that?" The question was put with something like a sneer.
"I should hope it requires no authority," Gifford retorted. "Having cognizance of what has been going on, it is my plain duty—"
"Why yours?" Henshaw interrupted coolly.
"For a very good reason," Gifford replied; "one which I may have to tell you presently."
He saw Henshaw flush and dart a glance of hate at him. It was plain he had misinterpreted the reply. But the exhibition was only momentary.
"Admitting in the meantime your right to interfere," Henshaw said, now with perfect coolness, "allow me to tell you that you are taking a very foolish course."
"I shall be glad to know how."
"The reason is, that if you have any regard, as you suggest, for MissMorriston, you are going the right way to do her a terrible injury."
Gifford rose and stood by the fire-place. "To come to the point at once without further preliminary fencing," he said quietly, "you mean, I take it, that I am forcing you to denounce her as being guilty of your brother's death."
For an instant Henshaw seemed taken aback by the other's directness. "There can be no doubt, holding the evidence I do, that she was guilty of it," he retorted uncompromisingly.
"I beg your pardon, Mr. Henshaw," Gifford objected with decision, "there can be, and is, a very great deal more than a doubt of it."
Henshaw shot a searching glance at the man who spoke so confidently, as though trying to probe what, if anything, was behind his words.
"Perhaps you know then," he returned with his sneering smile, "how otherwise, if the lady had no hand in it, my brother came by his death?"
"I do," was the quiet answer.
"Then," still the smile of sneering incredulity, "it is clearly your duty to make it known."
"Clearly," Gifford assented in a calm tone. "That is why I asked you to come here this afternoon."
Henshaw was looking at him with a sort of malicious curiosity. In spite of his smartness he seemed at a loss to divine what the other was driving at, unless it were a well-studied line of bluff. But that Gifford could have, apart from what Edith Morriston might have told him, any intimate knowledge of the tragedy was inconceivable.
"I shall be glad to hear what you have to say, Mr. Gifford," he responded, in perhaps much greater curiosity than he chose to show.
"Then I have to inform you positively," Gifford answered, "that your brother's fatal wound was the result of a pure accident."
Coming from Edith Morriston's champion, there was nothing surprising in that assertion. Certainly if that were the other's strong suit he could easily beat it. It was therefore in a tone of confidence and relief that he demanded, "You can prove it?"
"I can."
"By Miss Morriston's testimony?"
"Not at all. By my own."
"Your own?" Henshaw's question was put with a curling lip.
"My own," Gifford repeated steadfastly.
"May one ask what you mean by that?"
Henshaw's contemptuous incredulity was by no means diminished even by the other's confident attitude.
Gifford gave a short laugh. "Naturally you do not take my meaning.Obviously you think I am not a competent witness, that I know nothingexcept by hearsay. You are, extraordinary as it may seem, quite wrong.My testimony would be of nothing but what I myself saw and heard."
"What do you mean?" Henshaw had for a moment seemed to be calculating the probability of this monstrous suggestion being a fact, and had dismissed it with the contempt which showed itself in his question.
"I mean," Gifford replied with quiet assurance, "that I happened to be a witness of the interview in the tower-room between your brother and Miss Morriston, that I was there when he received his death-wound, and that it was I whom the girl Haynes saw descending by a rope from the top window."
Henshaw had started to his feet, his face working with an almost passionate astonishment. "You—you tell me all that," he cried, "and expect me to believe it?"
"I have told you and shall tell you nothing," was the cool reply, "that I am not prepared to state on oath in the witness-box."
For a while Henshaw seemed without the power to reply, dumbfounded, as his active brain tried to realize the probabilities of the declaration. "It seems to me," he said at length in a voice of which he was scarcely master, "that, whether your statement is true or otherwise, you are placing yourself in an uncommonly dangerous position, Mr. Gifford."
"I am aware that I am inviting a certain amount of ugly suspicion," Gifford agreed, "but the truth, which might have remained a mystery, has been forced from me by the necessity of protecting Miss Morriston. Perhaps you had better hear a frank account of the whole story, and the explanation of what I admit you are so far justified in setting down as concocted and wildly improbable."
"I should very much like to hear it," Henshaw returned in a tone which held out no promise of credence.
Thereupon Gifford gave him a terse account of the events and the chance which had led him into the tower and to be a secret witness of what happened there. Remembering that he was addressing the dead man's brother, he recounted the details of the interview without feeling; indeed he threw no more colour into it than if he had been opening a case in court. He simply stated the facts without comment. Henshaw listened to the singular story in an attitude of doggedly unemotional attention. Lawyer-like he restrained all tendency to interrupt the narrative and asked no question as it proceeded. Nevertheless it was clear he was thinking keenly, eager to note any weak points which he could turn to use.
When the recital had come to an end he said coolly—
"Your story is a very extraordinary one, Mr. Gifford; I won't call it, as it seems at first sight, wildly improbable, but it is at any rate an almost incredible coincidence. With your knowledge of the law I need scarcely remind you that the facts as you have just recounted them place you in a rather unenviable position."
"As I have already said," Gifford replied, "my story is calculated to suggest suspicion against me. But I am prepared to risk that consequence."
"In court," Henshaw observed, with a malicious smile, "handled by a counsel who knew his business, your statement could be given a very ugly turn indeed."
"As I have just told you," Gifford returned quietly, "I would take that risk rather than allow Miss Morriston to remain longer under suspicion. As for myself I should have every confidence in the result."
"It is well to be sanguine," Henshaw sneered. "If you have not already done so, are you prepared to repeat your story to the police?"
"Most certainly I am, if necessary," was the prompt answer. "But I do not fancy you will wish me to do so."
Henshaw's look was one of surprise, real or affected. "Indeed? Why so?"
"I will tell you," Gifford replied with a touch of sternness. "Because it would be absolutely against your interest. For one thing it would, short of absolute proof, leave still the shadow of doubt over your brother's death, it would effectually put a stop to your designs on Miss Morriston, which in any case must come to an end, and it would show up your dead brother's character and conduct in a very disreputable light. Now what I have to say to you is this. I know that, following in your brother's footsteps, you have been subjecting Miss Morriston to an amount of very hateful persecution. There may have been a certain excuse for it, at any rate a degree of temptation, but your designs have not been welcome to the lady, and they must forthwith come to an end. Now unless you undertake to cease your attentions to Miss Morriston, in short to put an end at once and for all to this persecution, I shall effectually remove the hold you imagine you have over her by going straight to the police, giving them the real story of what happened in the tower that night and as a natural consequence shall give evidence to that effect at the adjourned inquest. You will know best whether it would be worth your while to force me to do this. I simply state the position."
He waited for Henshaw's answer. The man was plainly cornered and seemed to be divided between a desire to let Gifford go on and place himself in a dangerous situation, and the more expedient course of raising a scandal which would touch him as well as disgrace his dead brother.
"This is a clever piece of bluff, Mr. Gifford," he said at length; "but—"
"It is no bluff at all," Gifford interrupted firmly. "I am merely determined to take the obvious course to save Miss Morriston from something a good deal worse than annoyance. I have no wish to discredit the dead, but I must remind you that the persecution of Miss Morriston by your brother had gone on for a very considerable time, and had latterly developed into an atrocious system of bullying. It is not an occasion for mincing one's expressions, and I must say that in my opinion your own conduct has been very little, if any, better; and that will be the judgment of every decent man if the truth comes out, as come out it shall, unless you agree to my terms before you leave this room."
For a while Henshaw made no reply. He sat thinking strenuously, evidently weighing his chances, estimating the strength of his adversary's position. Now and again he shot a glance, half probing, half sullen, at Gifford, who leaned back against the mantelpiece coolly awaiting his answer. At length he spoke.
"This is a very fine piece of bravado, Mr. Gifford. But I am not such a fool as it pleases you to think me. It is very good of you to explain to me my position in this affair; I am, however, quite capable of seeing that for myself. And you can hardly expect me to look upon your gratuitous advice as disinterested."
The man was talking to gain time; Gifford shrewdly guessed that. "I might be pardoned for supposing you do not altogether realize how you stand," he replied quietly. "But, after all, that is, as you suggest, your affair."
Henshaw forced a smile. "The point of view is everything," he said in a preoccupied tone; "and ours, yours and mine, are diametrically opposed."
"The point of view which perhaps ought most to be considered," Gifford retorted with rising impatience, "is that of the honourable profession to which we both belong. If you are prepared to face the odium, professional and social, of an exposure—"
Henshaw interrupted him with a wave of the hand. "You may apply that to yourself and to your friend, Miss Morriston," he said sharply. "I can take care of myself, thank you."
Gifford shrugged. "Very well, then. There is no more to be said." He crossed the room and took up his hat. "I will go and see Major Freeman at once." At the door he turned, to see with surprise and a certain satisfaction that Henshaw, although he had risen from his chair, seemed in no hurry to move. "You are coming with me," he suggested. "It would be quite in order, I think, for you to be present at my statement—unless you prefer not."
It seemed clear that the rather foxy Gervase Henshaw had really more than suspected a studied game of bluff. But now Gifford's attitude tended to put that out of the question.
"In the circumstances, as your statement will consist mainly of a slander against me and my dead brother," Henshaw replied sullenly, "I prefer to keep out of the business for the present. I fancy," he added with an ugly significance, "that the police will be quite equal to dealing with the situation without any assistance or intervention from me."
Gifford ignored the covert threat. "Very well, then," he said, throwing open the door and standing aside for Henshaw to pass out; "I will go alone. Yes; it will be better."
But Henshaw did not move.
"I don't quite gather," he said in answer to Gifford's glance of inquiry, "exactly what your object is in taking this step."
"I should have thought—" Gifford began.
"Is it," Henshaw proceeded, falling back now to his ordinary lawyer-like tone—"is it merely to checkmate what you are pleased to call my designs upon Miss Morriston?"
"That will be a mere incidental result," Gifford answered, shutting the door and coming back into the room. "My object is to put it, at once and for all, out of your power to hold over Miss Morriston the threat that she is at any moment liable to be accused—by you of all people—of your brother's murder, and so suggest that she is in your power."
"Why do you say by me, of all people?"
"You who profess an affection for her."
"Your word profess scarcely does me justice, Mr. Gifford," Henshaw returned, drawing back his shut lips. "I had, and have, a very sincere affection for Edith Morriston, which, it seems, I am not to be allowed to declare or even have credit for. As a man of the world you can hardly pretend to be ignorant of what a man will do when his happiness is at stake. What he does under such a stress is no guide to his real feelings. But we need not labour that point. My affection, genuine or not, seems to be in no fair way to be requited, and I had already made up my mind to leave it at that. I have merely kept up the game to this point out of curiosity to see how far your—shall we say knight-errantry?—would lead you. I will now relieve you from the necessity of going through an act of Quixotic folly which would assuredly, sooner or later, have unpleasant consequences for you."
So Gifford realized with a thrill of pleasure that he had won. He felt that in much of his speech the man was lying; that no consideration of mere unrequited affection had induced him to abandon his design.
"I am glad to hear you have come to a sensible conclusion," he said as coolly as the sense of triumph would let him. "Whatever happened you could hardly have expected your—plans to succeed."
"I don't know that," Henshaw retorted, with a touch of a beaten man's malice. "Anyhow I have my own ideas on the subject. But looking into the future with my brother's blood between us I think it might have turned out a hideous mistake."
"A safe conjecture," Gifford commented, between indignation and amusement at the cool way the man was now trying to save his face.
"Anyhow there's an end of it," Henshaw said with an air and gesture of half scornfully dismissing the affair. "And so I bid you good afternoon."
As he walked towards the door Gifford intercepted him.
"Not quite so fast, Mr. Henshaw," he said resolutely. "We can't leave the affair like this."
"What do you mean?" Henshaw ejaculated, with a look which was half defiant, half apprehensive.
"You have heard my story," Gifford pursued with steady decisiveness, "and have, I presume, accepted it."
"For what it is worth." The smart of defeat prompted the futile reply.
"That won't do at all," Gifford returned with sternness. "You either accept the account I have just given you, or you do not."
There was something like murder in Henshaw's eyes as he replied, "This bullying attitude is what I might expect from you. To put an end, however, to this most unpleasant interview you may take it that I accept your statement."
"To the absolute exoneration of Miss Morriston?"
"Naturally."
"I must have your assurance in writing."
Henshaw fell back a step and for a moment showed signs of an uncompromising refusal. "You are going a little too far, Mr. Gifford," he said doggedly.
"Not at all," Gifford retorted. "It is imperatively necessary."
"Is it?" Henshaw sneered. "For what purpose?"
"For Miss Morriston's protection."
The sneer deepened. "I should have thought that purpose quite negligible, seeing how valiantly the lady is already protected. But I have no objection," he added in an offhand tone, "as you seem to distrust the lasting power of bluff, to give you an extra safeguard. Indeed I think it just as well, all things considered, that Miss Morriston should have it. Give me a pen and a sheet of paper." Henshaw's manner was now the quintessence of insolence, but Gifford could afford, although it cost him an effort, to ignore it. With the practised pen of a lawyer Henshaw quickly wrote down a short declaration, signing it with a flourish and then flicking it across the table to Gifford. "That should meet the case," he said, leaning back confidently and thrusting his hands into his pockets. Dealing with one who, like himself, was learned in the law he had, to save trouble, written a terse declaration which he knew should be quite acceptable. It simply stated that from certain facts which had come to his knowledge he was quite satisfied that his brother's death had been caused by an accident, and that no one was to blame for it, and he thereby undertook to make no future charge or imputation against any one, in connexion therewith.
"Yes, that will do," Gifford answered curtly when he had read the few lines.
Henshaw rose with a rather mocking smile. "I congratulate you on your—luck, Mr. Gifford," he said with a studied emphasis, and so left the room.
With the precious declaration in his pocket Gifford lost no time in going to Wynford Place. His light heart must have been reflected in his face, for Edith Morriston's anxious look brightened as she joined him in the drawing-room. All the same it seemed as though she almost feared to ask the result, and he was the first to speak.
"I bring you good news, Miss Morriston. You have nothing more to fear from Gervase Henshaw."
"Ah!" She caught her breath, and for a moment seemed unable to respond."Tell me," she said at length, almost breathlessly.
"I have had a long and, as you may imagine, not very pleasant interview with the fellow," he answered quietly; "and am happy to say I won all along the line."
"You won? You mean—?"
He had taken the declaration from his pocket-book and for answer handed it to her. With a manifest effort to control her feelings she read it eagerly. Then her voice trembled as she spoke.
"Mr. Gifford, what can I say? I wish I knew how to thank you."
"Please don't try," he replied lightly. "If you only knew the pleasure it has given me to get the better of this fellow you would hardly consider thanks necessary. Would you care to hear a short account of what happened?" he added tactfully, with the intention, seeing how painful the revulsion was, of giving her time to recover from her agitation.
"Please; do tell me." She spoke mechanically, still hardly able to trust her voice above a whisper.
They sat down and he related the salient points of his interview with Henshaw. "It was lucky that I happened to have something of a hold over him," he concluded with a laugh; "Mr. Gervase Henshaw is not wanting in determination, and it took a long time to persuade him that he could not possibly win the game he was playing; but he stood to lose more heavily than he could afford. The conclusion, however, was at last borne in upon him that the position he had taken up was untenable, and that paper is the result."
"That paper," she said in a low voice, "means life to me instead of a living death; it means more than I can tell you, more than even you can understand."
He had risen, but before he could speak she had come to him and impulsively taken his hand. "Mr. Gifford," she said, "tell me how I can repay you."
Her eyes met his; they were full of gratitude and something more. But he resisted the temptation to answer her question in the way it was plain to him he was invited to do.
"It is reward enough for me to have served you," he responded steadily."Seeing that chance gave me the power, I could do no less."
"You would have risked your life for mine," she persisted, her eyes still on him.
"Hardly that," he returned, with an effort to force a smile. "But had it been necessary, I should have been quite content to do so."
"And you will not tell me how I can show my gratitude?"
"I did not do it for reward," he murmured, scarcely able to restrain himself.
"I am sure of that," she assented. "But you once hinted, or at any rate led me to believe, that I could repay you."
There could be no pretence of ignoring her meaning now. Still he felt that chivalry forbade his acceptance.
"I was wrong," he replied with an effort, "and most unfair if I suggested a bargain."
"Have you repented the suggestion?" she asked almost quizzingly and with a curious absence of her characteristic pride.
"Only in a sense," he answered. "I hope I am too honourable to take an unfair advantage."
She laughed now; joyously, it seemed. "If your scruples are so strong there will be nothing for it but for me to throw away mine and offer myself to you."
"Edith," he exclaimed in a flash of rapture, then, checked the passionate impulse to take her in his arms. "You must not; not now, not now. It is not fair to yourself. At the moment of your release from this horrible danger you cannot be master of yourself. You must not mistake gratitude for love."
Edith drew back with a touch of resentful pride.
"If you think I don't know my own mind—" she began.
"Does any one know his own mind at such a crisis as you have just passed through?" he said, a little wistfully. "Edith," he went on as he took her unresisting hand, "you must not be offended with me. Think. The whole object of what I have done for you has been to set you free, as free as though you had woke up to find the episode of these Henshaws had been no more than a horrible dream. You must be free, you must realize and enjoy your freedom. You are now relieved from the crushing weight you have borne so long; the release must be untouched by the shadow of a bargain expressed or implied. That is the only way in which a man of honour can regard the position."
"Very well," she returned simply, "I understand. I am sorry for my mistake."
Her manner shook his resolution. "I can't think you understand," he replied forcibly. "I only ask, in fairness to yourself, for time. Don't think that I am not desperately in love with you. You must have seen it, ever since our first confidential talk, that night at the Stograve dance. And my love has gone on increasing every day till—oh, you don't know how cruelly hard it is to resist taking you at your word. But I can't, I simply can't snatch at an unfair advantage, however great the temptation. I must give you time, time to know your own heart when the nightmare shall have passed away. I propose to return to town as soon as this man Henshaw has cleared out of the neighbourhood. Will you let us be as we are for a month, Edith, and if then you are of the same mind, send me a line and I will come to you by the first train. Is not that only fair?"
She gave a little sigh of contentment. "Very well," she said, "if that will satisfy you."
He took her hand. "It will seem a horribly long time to wait; but I feel it is right. Today is the 16th; on this day month I shall hear from you?"
"Yes, on the 16th," she answered.
"And so," he said, "you are free, unless you call me back to you."
"That is understood," she said with a smile.
He might have kissed her lips, her look into his eyes was almost an invitation, but, having steeled himself to be scrupulously fair, he refrained and contented himself with kissing her hand.
On reaching the hotel he heard with satisfaction that Henshaw had gone off by the late afternoon train and had suggested the unlikelihood of his returning. "So I suppose he is content to let the mystery remain a mystery," the landlord remarked. And the Coroner's jury subsequently had perforce to come to the same conclusion.
On the 16th of the following month, Hugh Gifford's impatience and anxiety were set at rest, as the morning's post brought the expected letter from Wynford.
"Dick and I are expecting you here tomorrow, unless you have changed your mind—I have not. The 3.15 train shall be met if you do not wire to the contrary."
When Gifford jumped out of the 3.15 Edith was on the platform. As they shook hands he read in her eyes an unwonted happiness and knew for certain that all was well.
"I had something to do in the town and thought I might as well come on to the station," Edith said with a lurking smile.
"I am glad you have not added even a half-hour to this long month," he replied as they took their seats in the carriage.
"It has been long," she murmured.
"Long enough to set our doubts at rest."
"I never had any," she replied quietly. He drew her to him and kissed her.
End of Project Gutenberg's The Hunt Ball Mystery, by Magnay, William