CHAPTER XXXIIA SURPRISE
At Boxwell Hall a large audience sat expectantly waiting the appearance of Mrs. Lucien.
Among the members present there were five with whom our readers are familiar. The lights were yet turned low, and there was the usual buzz and hum of low-voiced conversation which even those afflicted with superstitious awe could not repress.
“I had some trouble to persuade Major Walden to come,� said Nathan in an aside to his wife. “He has such a horror of this sort of thing, he flatly refused at first; but when I asked him as a personal favor to meet you, he consented.�
“I am sure he can’t denounce Mrs. Lucien, if she is as Elinor describes her,� said Lissa. “I have really begun to like her, just from the description. Ah, I wonder if she is coming now. What a perfectly seraphic face.�
Mrs. Lucien was clothed in a soft, clinging gown of white wool, from which her pure, oval face arose in statuesque grace and beauty.
The dark waves of her hair were brushed back from the rounded forehead and gleamed in shining ripples to her neck as the glare of the foot-lights fell upon her.
“What a striking face! A painter might have made a model of her for a Madonna. She is gracepersonified,� whispered Alice. “I can think of nothing but a statue of one of the graces.�
“Doesn’t she look more like a painting of St. Cecilia?� Mark replied.
“Yes, she does look like her. She is about to speak.�
The chairman of the psychical club led her forward and briefly introduced her as Madame Lucien, who would give exhibitions of psychometric reading and slate-writing. Mrs. Lucien bowed slightly for a moment to the vociferous clapping of hands which greeted her, and then spoke in a low, sympathetic voice, which thrilled her hearers.
“Dear Friends: I do not come to you to-night with any gift or knowledge of my own winning. For some inscrutable reason it has been given me to read that which my physical eyes cannot discern. By some psychic telepathy, or telegraphy, which is as mysterious to me as to any one here, I am made the bearer of messages and permitted to see and describe to you that which is not visible to our mortal eyes.�
She turned toward the gentleman by whom she had been presented, who now bound a handkerchief tightly over her eyes, and addressing the audience, requested that while Madame Lucien was passing under control an usher would gather up from the audience such articles as they would like to submit to the medium for psychic reading and identification.
Handkerchiefs, gloves, pocket knives, etcetera, were being collected, and Nathan was about to detach a charm from his watchguard with which totest her powers, when he chanced to glance up at Major Walden.
He was startled. The scene at the office seemed about to be reenacted. The Major’s face was livid and distorted.
“What is the matter?� Nathan asked with alarm.
“You—you—knew of this!� Walden hissed, with a desperate effort at self-control.
“Knew of what? Great Heavens, Major, what do you mean?�
“I can’t stay here. I will not!� He arose to his feet, and Nathan, taking his arm, led him to the open air.
“You’re a villain, sir! I wouldn’t have treated an enemy as you have me. And I thought you my friend and trusted you. O Nathan, Nathan, how could you have done it? Why didn’t you tell me?�
“Major Walden, I don’t understand what I have done that was wrong. ’Pon my honor I don’t!� said Nathan stoutly. “You knew it was a spirit—�
“Did you ask me to that place to-night? Tell me!�
“I certainly did, but I did not suppose it could be so offensive to you.�
“You asked me there to see her?�
“Her? Whom? My wife? I asked you to meet my wife, and Mrs. Wylie, and—�
“And her, the woman that—�
“Good God!� cried Nathan, a light breaking in upon him. “You don’t mean that Mrs. Lucien is—�
“My lost wife, Agnes! Yes.�
“Oh! my poor friend, forgive me. I neverdreamed of such a thing. Believe me, Major, I am innocent of any such plot as this. Mrs. Lucien is an entire stranger to me. I only knew of her through Mrs. Wylie’s friendship for her, and she knows nothing of her past history. We have been blind instruments in the hands of Providence, Major. Why should it have happened?�
“God knows, or the Devil. I’d rather have seen Agnes in her coffin, Bartram. That villain Teasdale must be with her.�
“Impossible! Did he not tell you otherwise? Don’t, Major, lay that crime upon her in your excitement. Surely, surely she is blameless and good. Her face shows that.�
“Aye! Her face is the face of an angel. O Agnes, Agnes! Nathan, I’m beset by a thousand furies and fiends of torture. What shall I do? I want to see her and talk with her. I must, now, now—that I’ve seen her at all.�
Nathan was perplexed.
“You might call at her hotel and see her in the morning,� he ventured to suggest.
“No, I’ll see her to-night. I’ll be here at the door when this infernal business is over, and I will see and speak to her. I want to lift the weight from my conscience, if possible, and Iwillspeak to her.�
“But, think of the shock to her. My friend, is it best?�
“Best? Perdition take me! I don’t know what is best. Leave me! Go back into the hall and tell your friends I am sick—vertigo—jimjams—anything. But leave me to think.�
“But,� began Nathan, loth to leave him by himself in his excited condition.
“Go in! I can’t be spoken to now. Go back into the hall. Will you?� he exclaimed vehemently.
Nathan turned away slowly and reentered the building, beset with many misgivings. What might not this irascible and tortured man do if left alone?
Mrs. Lucien had begun her reading. She held in her hand a knife which had been submitted to her for test.
“I am sure the person to whom this knife belongs is one of very orderly habits, or was. The present owner has not had it very long. I can see the woman to whom it formerly belonged. She has auburn hair, and is rather below the medium height. She is laughing, and says she won the knife on a philopena.�
“Is this true?� asked the chairman, taking the knife from Mrs. Lucien and holding it up.
“It is true,� responded a man from the audience. “I am acquainted with the knife’s history.�
Suddenly an idea presented itself to Nathan, upon which he immediately acted.
He picked up one of the Major’s gloves which, in his agitation, he had withdrawn and left behind him, and motioning to an usher, asked him to place it upon the table for Madame Lucien’s reading. Then he awaited results with eager curiosity.
One after another the articles were taken up and read.
“This brings me face to face with an agedwoman,� she said, as a thimble was presented. “She calls ‘Annette, Annette.’�
A woman across the aisle from Nathan began to sob. He noticed the tawdry showiness of her attire, and read in her face a pathetic history as she stood up to reclaim the thimble. “It was my mother’s,� she sobbed, as she dropped back into her seat.
Then Madame Lucien’s fingers lifted the glove Nathan had sent to her.
“I am sure the owner of this glove is a person of very positive character,� she began. “He will combat any irrational belief, or one not proven to his satisfaction. I can feel a chill of opposition. I—I—can—� Mrs. Lucien began to breathe in gasps. Her hands shook. Nathan was frightened at the spasm of agony which swept her face. She dropped the glove and stretched out her hands helplessly.
The manager came forward and assisted her from the platform, amid a buzz of excitement in the audience, returning in a few moments to announce that Madame Lucien had been affected by the heat of the room and would be unable to continue the reading, but he would introduce in her place the trance medium Mr. Eugene Potts, who was both clairvoyant and audient.
While this scene was transpiring in Boxwell Hall, Major Walden was hurrying down the street as though driven by a legion of furies. He felt that he must get away or do that for which he might be sorry. On, on he walked, heeding not his direction or whereabouts. He was fleeing from her and from this nightmare of horror which beset him. And thevision before his eyes of the pale, spirituelle face of his lost one kept pace with him. He could not escape it.
An hour later he had turned his steps homeward. He had walked away the uncontrollable emotion which had possessed him at the sight of Agnes, and a calmer spirit prevailed. He had decided that it was better that he should not meet her again. He would go to his office and write her fully, and send her again the letter which he had sent to her Eastern home and which had been returned to him through the dead letter office but a few days before this. She should know how completely he had been punished for his lack of trust in her, and should forgive him, if her sweet, forgiving nature could do so.
The people were returning from the hall. He stepped into the shadow of a doorway and waited for the crowd to pass by and the street to become once more deserted. He realized he scanned each face and figure closely. Was he hoping to see her? No, it were better that he did not; he had settled that question, but now, in the struggle with himself.
The street lamps flamed and flickered, casting weird shadows on the darkened buildings of the business street where he stood. Ahead of him, as he again started forward, he saw a solitary individual stop under a light and take a letter from his pocket, which, leaning against the lamp-post, he began to read. Something in his figure and attitude arrested Major Walden’s attention. He looked at him searchingly as he approached him. At the momentthe man, hearing his footsteps, turned his face from the letter toward him.
A flame of angry fire shot from the Major’s brain to each prescient nerve and muscle of his being. With a spring he was upon the man, his hand upon his throat.
“Ah, ha! You miserable, white-livered abomination! It is well I have found you now,—now, when your victim is here in this city,—you fiend-ambassador of Satan! Killing is too good for you!�
The attack was so sudden the victim had no chance to cry out, and sank to the ground, with no show of resistance, the Major’s hand in a death-grip upon his throat, shutting off breath from his lungs.
“Take that—and that—and that!� cried Walden, raining the blows with his clenched fist upon the other’s face and shoulders. “I shall kill you! do you hear?�
The victim struggled, his eyes, protruding from their sockets, pleaded for mercy, and his speechless tongue hung swollen from his lips. Voices were heard approaching him, but the infuriated and frenzied man did not heed them. The higher man had, for the time, been lost in the maddened animal.
“You snake! It is a joy to throttle you, to see your lying tongue palsied! Your forked tongue that has stung with its venom God’s best and purest. A thousand deaths could not pay for the ruin you have made, you viper!� and the Major’s eyes, red with passion and fury, glared into the terrified ones beneath him.
It is a fearful thing to see a man, made in theimage of God, unchain the passions of his soul and allow them to control him. Major Walden was, for the time, a madman.
“Hold on, what’s the matter here?� cried a voice, and a hand grasped the collar of the would-be murderer.
“I should think the fellow was holding on with a vengeance,� said another voice. “Come, let up that fellow, or you’ll be an assassin.�
Releasing his hand from his victim’s throat, Major Walden wrenched himself free from the intruder’s clutch, and planting his foot upon the prostrate man, turned defiantly.
“Is it murder to kill a reptile—a miserable, venomous viper?� he hissed.
“Good God! It is the Major. Have you gone mad, friend? What does this mean?�
“It means that I’ve nearly or quite squeezed the life out of that villain Teasdale. I’ll assure you I shall not let him go till I’ve finished him.�
“Markham! O Markham!�
“Agnes!� he faltered, as he heard the tones of her voice, so pathetic in its intensity.
She stood before him, her hands clasped, her pale face agonized with fear and supplication.
It was a scene for a painter. The gladiatorial attitude of the Major, the frightened faces of Lissa, Elinor, and Alice, with Nathan and Mark standing at either side as rescuers.
“‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord,’� feebly quoted Agnes.
The Major’s hands fell. He took his foot fromTeasdale’s body as the man began to breathe and struggle to rise.
Mark bent forward to assist him, then started back in disgust.
“It’s that contemptible hound Russell,� he said, with a gesture of abhorrence. “Lie where you are, sir, you travesty upon man, until we see about this! Lie still, or, by the powers, I’ll finish you myself!�
“Get him out of my sight, or I’ll not answer for the results!� the Major cried in a hoarse voice. “There is all of murder in my heart, and my conscience would not trouble me more than if I had killed a snake.�
“The lock-up’s the place for him. He’s unfit to run loose,� said Mark.
“I’m sorry to be found in such company, Captain Cramer, but Nathan will explain to you my cause of provocation,� Walden continued. “And this letter will explain to you,� turning to Mrs. Lucien.
He took a letter from his pocket with a dead letter stamp upon it, and handed it to her. “This has but recently been returned to me from Washington.�
“Wait! He shall explain,� cried Nathan, catching the battered and bleeding Teasdale, or Russell, by the collar and jerking him forward.
“Here, you knave, explain to these ladies that those letters you wrote and sent were but forgeries, fabricated and secreted by you or your emissaries, to work ruin and unhappiness.�
Russell gulped and gasped in an effort to speak.
“Speak! Out with it! Tell the truth!� Mark commanded savagely.
“I admit it,� he groaned at last. “I wrote the letters and bribed a servant to hide them in a desk at the Major’s house when his wife was away from home, in the hope that he might find them and believe that she was false to him. She knew nothing of them, nor did she ever receive a letter from me.�
“Oh, wretched man! How could you conceive of such infamy!� murmured Agnes, turning away her pallid face.
“It is to be hoped you will receive a just reward for your wickedness,� said Mrs. Wylie, who in the light of this scene could unravel all the mysteries that had so long puzzled her with regard to Mrs. Lucien’s past history.
“He shall receive it if there is any justice in this land of ours,� said Mark. “This is not the only crime he has to answer for. What could have been your object in this case, you dog?�
“Revenge!� Russell uttered the word with an evil sneer.
“Can you ever forgive me, Agnes?� Major Walden had turned from Russell and was looking at Agnes beseechingly.
“As I hope to be forgiven, Markham,� she replied solemnly.
“Thank you. It is more than I have a right to expect. I—� His voice broke in its utterance, and he turned away to recover his self-control.
“And now what shall we do with this fellow?� asked Nathan. “Turn him over to the police?�
“He certainly should not be allowed to go about leaving in his wake the slimy trail of the serpent,�responded Mark. “I’ll swear out a warrant charging him with abducting Esther McCleary.�
“There are reasons,� said Major Walden, “why it might be unpleasant to bring my affair into court. However, I am ready to testify against him if needed.�
Mark turned again toward Russell, but to his consternation and astonishment the man had vanished. Before the eyes of six persons he had managed to glide away unobserved. They looked up and down the streets, peered into stairways, and searched alleys, but he was not to be found. He had disappeared as suddenly and entirely as though the ground had opened and swallowed him.
“A guard of his imps must have snatched him away,� said Nathan as the men came back from their search to the place they had left the women.
“Perhaps he assumed his natural form and slithered away on the ground to his den,� said Walden.
“I imagine the fellow must have hypnotized us,� Mark replied. “I can’t account for his getting away without being seen by some of us by any other hypothesis. But let us believe it is good riddance. He’ll not be apt to trouble any of us again. I should like to have had him reveal Esther’s whereabouts, however.�
“It’s a pity he’s at large to ruin other homes,� Mrs. Wylie murmured. “But if God permits him to live, I suppose we may.�
“Markham!�
“Agnes!� The Major turned toward his former wife and stood with bowed head and dejected countenance.
“I must ask you a question which has been upon my lips since I met you, but which I am almost—afraid to ask. Is Freddie alive?�
“Yes, Agnes, yes. He is with me. I will send him to you at once. Oh, my God!�
“What is it? Is he ill? Is anything wrong concerning him, my precious boy?�
“No, he is well,� he groaned. “Freddie is well, and bright and good. You may well be proud of him.�
“Thank God, oh, thank God!� She put her handkerchief to her eyes and sobbed for very joy. The other women wept with her. Finally, while her moistened eyes shone with the happiness of the moment, she said tremulously: “I have news for you, Markham. I want to tell you what perhaps I should not have kept from you, that God sent me solace for the loss of my children. A little girl was born to me soon after the death of my darlings. She is with me here at the hotel. Do you care to see her, your child, the little Dolores?�
“Yes, only—Good God, I cannot!�
“Markham, I do not understand you. Have you aught against me now?� Agnes Walden said, raising her eyes, now filled with doubt and questioning, to search his face.
“No, no; Heaven knows I have not, but—some one tell her. I cannot.� Major Walden turned from her and walked forward several paces, his face set and drawn.
“He has another family, another wife,� said Lissa softly. “God pity both him and you!�