The bishop's emeralds

By Houghton Townley

The Project Gutenberg eBook of The bishop's emeralds
    
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.

Title: The bishop's emeralds

Author: Houghton Townley

Illustrator: Will Grefé


        
Release date: October 21, 2026 [eBook #79833]

Language: English

Original publication: New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1908

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/79833

Credits: AL Haines


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BISHOP'S EMERALDS ***






[Frontispiece: MABEL BANNISTER]



  THE
  BISHOP'S
  EMERALDS


  BY

  HOUGHTON TOWNLEY



  NEW YORK
  GROSSET & DUNLAP
  PUBLISHERS




  COPYRIGHT, 1908,
  W. J. WATT & COMPANY

  _Published June, 1908_




  THE
  BISHOP'S EMERALDS




The Bishop's Emeralds



CHAPTER I

Lady Hester Cardew was the Bishop's second wife, and as such was
regarded with a certain amount of suspicion.  For one thing, she was
very handsome.  Bishops' wives, and, indeed, the wives of the clergy
generally, do not usually err on the side of excessive physical
attractiveness, and a Bishop's lady should surely embody the
consolidated virtues and leading characteristics of all the helpmeets
of the cloth.  She refused to be dowdy; she drove her own dogcart;
she wore bright colors whenever the sun shone; and generally
displayed a fine, healthy, physical energy and enjoyment of life.
Her hair was such a beautiful auburn that the spiteful said it was
dyed.  She rode a bicycle and was at home on a horse, and it was
whispered that her ladyship had openly stated that her husband's
public position alone prevented her riding to hounds.

They forgave the widower Bishop, who was but a man, and fleshly--a
large, handsome, expansive, dogmatic, loud-voiced person with broad
shoulders, and standing six feet in his socks--because he had
succumbed to the wiles of Lady Hester Lennox in very different
surroundings.  They had married when he was merely the vicar of St.
Saviour's-in-the-East, and could not be expected to view matrimony in
the severe light that beats upon an episcopal throne.  He was nobody
then.

The _East Ripley Gazette_, at the time of the Bishop's enthronement,
had devoted a whole page to the life-story of his lordship, in which
the curious learned all that there was to know of his eventful life,
and read how he found his second bride in the East End of London,
where the beautiful lady was wearing herself to a shadow in the cause
of the poor and lowly.  That was fifteen years ago, and the diocese
was prepared to give the lady full credit for that heroic period of
her existence; but they could not forgive her being fashionable now.

So much for the general opinion of the diocese.  Lady Hester was
popular with the county, conscientious to a fault in her duties, ever
moving, ever busy, yet apparently never quite happy.  Sympathizers
declared that the stress and sorrow of that sad period of battle in
the slums still lingered.  Others thought that tragedy lurked in her
big brown eyes, which laughed and wept in shadow; and her sweet,
sympathetic, forgiving soul went out to wrong-doers with such lenient
charity that the Bishop himself was often compelled to admonish, and
protest that she lacked a proper sense of the expediency of earthly
chastisement.  She carried the Christian doctrine of forgiveness of
sins to absurd lengths, especially in judging the sins of women.  She
had actually been known to talk to a divorced woman in the streets of
Ripley, and had been found out in attempting to hush up a scandal,
the suppression of which would have robbed the diocese of at least
three months' tea table gossip.  Such conduct might be Christian, but
was it wise?

The county acclaimed her "a good sort."  She was invited everywhere,
and, sad to relate, she danced.  Yes, she actually danced.  Her other
sins were also tabulated:--

She was only thirty-eight!

She refused to wear black bonnets.

She rode horseback unattended.

She played tennis.

She lived.

She did not flirt.  That saved her, and every lovesick girl made her
a confidante.  As for the Bishop, he idolized his wife.  So did Jack
Cardew, the Bishop's son by his first wife.

Jack was twenty-five, and beginning his career at the Bar.  His
relationship to the prelate helped him a little, but his briefs were
short and the vacations long.  He was at home now at the Palace, and,
the vacation being near its end, he contemplated an early return to
London.

* * * * * *

Jack wanted to marry on nothing a year--or next to it--and the Bishop
had put his foot down.  Bishop Cardew's foot for trampling
undesirable schemes was large and firm.  The beautiful girl about
whom the difference of opinion had arisen between the Bishop and his
son was at the present time a guest in the house, and the Bishop
blamed his wife for bringing her there.

Lady Hester herself could not have quite explained why Mabel
Bannister had stayed so long.  Six weeks ago the girl was the guest
of Lady Beatrice Carew, a neighbor and daughter of the Marquis of
Ripley, and Lady Hester had suddenly extended an invitation to the
Palace, because she wanted to see more of the girl.

A slim, tall, upstanding, fair-haired stripling, with a fine poise of
the head, a proud, almost disdainful, grey eye, a baby mouth, and a
foreign vivacity, for which her education abroad was doubtless
largely responsible.  This was Mabel Bannister.

Jack Cardew, who was very much in love, was much incensed at his
father's opposition, because in an expansive moment the Bishop had
patronizingly admitted that Mabel was the very counterpart of Lady
Hester fifteen years ago, except for the spirit of folly, the light
laugh, and the easy, careless bearing, which were so different from
the restrained earnestness of the world-weary Lady Hester at the time
of her first meeting with the vicar of St. Saviour's-in-the-East.

But there was a practical side to the whole business.  Jack was
unable to enlighten his father concerning Mabel Bannister's family
connections.  She was an unknown, a chance schoolfellow of Lady
Beatrice Carew at an Italian convent school, a girl without a mother,
daughter of an indolent man about town whose social position seemed
to be summed up in the membership of several smart clubs and the
_entrée_ to some good country houses; and since childhood she had
known no home save school and the hospitality of schoolfellows.  The
seminaries were of the best, the very best, and her friends were
staunch, loyal, and devoted, and vied with one another in having the
motherless girl near them.  Indeed, for the last year, ever since
Mabel's finishing at B----, she had lived almost entirely in the
houses of her friends, with an occasional flying visit to her
father's London chambers at Stratton Street, Mayfair.

Her stay at the Palace was now coming to an untimely end, and
constraint had fallen on everybody since the Bishop withheld his
necessary consent to the engagement of his son--who was dependent
upon him for income--with a lady of no fortune or family.

Jack was in open mutiny.  An appeal to his stepmother brought no
comfort, only a counsel of "Patience, patience."  Mabel was entirely
under Jack's influence.  They were madly in love, and she,
transformed by her passion from girlhood to womanhood, was ready to
defy the whole world (and cry in Lady Hester's lap for sympathy).

A week of suspense had gone by.  A sudden, strange calm had settled
down.  The Bishop made no suggestion to his wife that Mabel should be
sent away; and Jack appeared to have accepted the situation with
grave resignation.  Mabel neither wept nor smiled, but fell into long
abstractions and stared into space, pursing her lips finely in a
manner suggestive of an obstinate resolution.

Lady Hester, who seemed to understand the working of the girl's mind
as if it were her own, instinctively divined the truth.  It came upon
her one day all in a rush.

"They are going to marry secretly," she cried.  "Secretly!  God
forbid!"

There was a note of horror in that "God forbid!" and she blanched as
in the face of an awful peril.

After that she watched Mabel's every movement until the day fixed for
the supposed departure for London.  Jack, under pretence of a sudden
call to town, was leaving the Palace on the same day, but earlier.
Mabel was not going till midday.

His farewell to the girl before his father and mother at the
breakfast table was almost that of a stranger, so frigidly polite and
absurdly indifferent was it.

The parting was unreal.  They were going to meet again, and something
must be done.  Lady Hester was in a fever.




CHAPTER II

The Bishop suspected nothing, nor did he notice the tremor in Jack's
voice, or the lingering, emotional handgrip.  He scarcely glanced at
the pale, determined face.  Mabel studied the pattern on her plate,
and, when her lover offered his hand, bade him farewell with
ridiculous nonchalance.  If this was the parting of broken-hearted
lovers their passion was made of shallow stuff, and the Bishop felt
that he was justified in crushing the projected marriage.

To tell the truth, he was a little disappointed.  In his fatherly
heart he sympathized with the young people.  He understood enough of
feminine charm to feel that had he been in Jack's place, he could not
have relinquished lovely Mabel Bannister so casually.  For all her
defects of character and family, she was the sort to drive young men
mad.  He had nerved himself for much trouble and argument with his
son, and several finely rounded periods and enlightening speeches,
specially prepared for Jack's edification in hours of youthful
despair, looked like being unrequired.

The Bishop, much relieved at the passing of the storm, betook him to
his day's duties; but Lady Hester prepared for action.

Mabel avoided her hostess all the morning under plea of final
packing, yet twice sought her out, and with moist eyes asked some
futile question.  Each time she hovered like one on the brink of
tears, or confession, yet mastered the impulse.  At last, when it was
time to watch the clock and talk of dressing, it became necessary to
express the usual civilities, and she feelingly protested that she
had been oh! so happy at the Palace, that she would never forget Lady
Hester's kindness, and would ever remember her as the one dear, dear,
sweet woman of her life.

Then she burst into a flood of tears--hysterical, shamefaced sobbing.

Lady Hester delivered her bomb.

"Mabel, I know your secret.  You cannot deceive me.  You are going up
to town to marry Jack.  You're not going home at all."

"Why do you say that?" gasped the girl.

"Because I know.  You cannot deny it."

Taken off her guard and rendered helpless and tearful, Mabel took
refuge in excuses.

"Oh! we love each other so--and he pleaded so hard.  I wanted him to
let me confide in you, but he refused.  He is unshakable in his
determination.  Oh, Lady Hester, you can't know, you can't
understand, what it is to love, as we love.  Marrying as you
did--and--and the Bishop not a young man----" she halted in her naïve
rudeness and faltered, "you know what I mean.  We are both young
and--and this is the heyday of life, and----"

"You are both foolish and impatient.  You are only quoting secondhand
Jack's preposterous arguments."

"Nothing will move us from our purpose, even if we have to live apart
all our lives.  We are going to get married!"

"Mabel, Mabel, are you the nice, reasonable, clear-headed girl with a
sense of humor that I grew so fond of?  Don't you see the absurdity
of what you are doing?  Is there no such thing as patience and
self-sacrifice for the sake of others?"

"I know, I know.  Jack admits that it would have been better to
wait--if we could have waited--and if we could be sure that things
would come right in the end.  But we're going to make things certain.
We are not to live together--at present.  At least----"

"Well?"

"We are going for a short honeymoon, of course."  The girl buried her
crimson face in her trembling hands, then flung herself into the
elder woman's arms.

"And are you concealing this from your father?" asked Lady Hester.

"Yes--and no.  That is, father has raised no objection to my
engagement.  I wrote to him about it."

"But he has never even seen Jack."

"Oh, you don't know father.  When I wrote to him he just sent me a
charming letter full of confidence in my good sense and judgment, and
gave the engagement his blessing; and that's all he'll trouble about
it.  He says I mustn't expect more than a hundred pounds for my
trousseau; so, you see, he can't make much fuss just because it's a
little hurried."

"You are not giving him any opportunity to object by this rash
acceptance of Jack's mad scheme."

"We cannot exist apart," sobbed the girl, "and we resolved yesterday
that no living soul should come between us."

"Neither shall they, my dear," murmured Lady Hester, clasping the
girl gently to her breast.  "All I ask is, don't--don't marry
secretly."

"But what does it matter?" pleaded the girl, a little frightened at
the sudden intensity of the appeal, and breaking away to dry her
tears.

Lady Hester paced the room for a few moments like a soul in torment.
Her cheeks were white and her lips drawn with emotion.

"Oh, how can I make you understand?  How can I frame words to warn
you against a thing you may regret to your dying day?  You must be
saved from this folly at all costs.  You must--you shall."

"Oh, Lady Hester, you won't interfere?  Jack would never forgive you.
It's too late now.  The train starts in an hour.  Please don't make
me cry.  I shall look horrid.  I am resolved.  I've given my word, my
oath.  Why should we ever regret?"

"Mabel," cried the elder woman, seizing her hand, "you must, of your
own accord, withdraw from the position you have taken up.  A secret
marriage is an abomination of hell."

The words came out with great suddenness, and the dignified Lady
Hester became strangely hysterical.  She recovered herself with a
great effort, seeing that her extravagance of speech had only
startled the obstinate girl.

"You think I'm exaggerating.  But if you only knew the misery, the
lifelong regret that can follow a secret marriage.  If I could only
tell you my own story--oh! what am I saying?  Can I find no arguments
to convince you of your wickedness, Mabel?  Oh, think--think!"

"Practically I have my father's consent.  The rest is Jack's affair,"
replied the girl, proudly.

"Mabel, Mabel, can you keep a secret if I tell you
something--something about myself that you don't know--that nobody
knows?  No, why should I?  Oh, Mabel, will you believe me when I tell
you that I speak upon this matter with authority--that I have
known--I mean, that I have seen--the dreadful misery that can come
from a secret marriage."

"I don't know what you mean," Mabel observed, calmly.

"Oh, girl, don't compel me to explain!  Don't you understand what I'm
trying to tell you?  Just now you questioned my knowledge of love and
youthful passion.  I was young as you once, and as foolish.  I, like
you, listened to honeyed, plausible pleading.  It was to be secret,
romantic, and beautiful.  Secret, do you hear?  Secret!  And oh, the
misery of it, the sickening deceit!  Be brave and strong and face
everything openly.  If you mean to defy us all, be courageous and
urge the same upon Jack.  If you should ever regret, there will be no
escape.  Don't I know to my cost what it means?  The very suggestion
of secrecy sickens me.  You might have to carry the burden of it to
your grave.  Girl, listen!  I have been through it.  I know."

"Do you mean that you were married secretly--married to the Bishop
secretly?"

"No, no!" cried the hysterical woman with a rasping laugh.  "It was
before that--oh! what am I saying?"

"You mean that you were married before you became Mrs. Cardew!"
exclaimed the girl in white astonishment.

"Did I say so?  Well, if I said so much I must tell you more.  I must
justify myself.  I am mad to speak of it, yet the desire gnaws at my
heart.  But you must swear eternal fidelity and faithfulness to me,
Mabel, whatever the issue of this business may be.  You mustn't
mention to a living soul what I am going to tell you?  You promise?"

"I promise, of course."

"Mabel, when I was your age I was very much like you, except that I
lived a secluded life in Bath with two straight-laced, old-fashioned,
rich, maiden aunts, to whom I was indebted for everything, and from
whom I should one day inherit an income.  I was an orphan.  My
father, a spendthrift, penniless peer, was dead.  I never knew a
mother.  My life was very dull, and there came a man into it, who set
my heart afire.  My guardians objected to him--and wisely.  He was
nobody--worse, he was a fraud.  He pleaded for a secret marriage,
and--and I consented.

"You understand the gravity of what I am telling you?  This is a
secret, a sacred confidence.  I have never spoken of it to any other
woman.  For some months, with the aid of a foolish, sentimental
friend, I lived a double life, discovering each day a new defect in
the idol I adored, until at last my eyes were opened.  He proved to
be a dreadful sham.  He was fond of me, in his way, no doubt.  He
must have loved me, or he would never have let me go as he did.  But
he was a black sheep.  Little by little the truth began to dawn on me
that I had linked myself to one who had only his persuasive guile to
recommend him, a villain, a fraud, an adventurer--worse, a thief."

"A thief."

"Yes.  He confessed his vile life to me little by little.  He wanted
me to play the fascinating decoy; for he was a polished high-flying
scoundrel.  Fortunately for me, he put himself in my power by his
confessions, and I was able to free myself and dictate my own
terms--which were silence, and secrecy, and freedom.  Freedom!  He
drove a hard bargain--God only knows how hard--but I knew that I must
be free at any price, or be forever damned and ruined; and he let me
go.  A thief!  Yes.  He robbed me of all.--Ah, it shocks you, I can
see.  You didn't think that I had this tragedy in my life.  You
didn't know that I had suffered and been driven mad to the verge of
self-destruction.  But I worked out my own salvation.  I left him,
and to keep myself from going crazy, I plunged into a hard, grinding
life of self-denial in the East End.  I worked for others--the only
way to forget private sorrows.  Then, by chance, I was freed by a
merciful Providence.  My precious husband died, and my secret with
him....  I rose to the surface again, and felt that I had a right to
live.  I had told nobody.  Better for me perhaps if I had.  I thought
that I could bear it all alone, that the years would wither my
secret.  Foolish hope--each day it grows greener and greener.  There
are moments when I can scarcely keep my lips from screaming out the
truth to my good, unsuspecting husband.  A secret like this is a
pestilent seed, it grows and grows and bears an endless crop of rank
deceits.  At first I bore it well.  I had injured no one but myself,
and--and another of whom I cannot speak.  I took joy in life again
after a fashion; and I bruised my heart to subtler tendernesses by
ministering to the pains and sorrows of others more unfortunate.  I
imagined myself ennobled, purified.  Then I met my present husband,
who offered me a share in his hard thankless labors and his meagre
vicar's home in a grim, sordid, squalid corner of the great city of
sin and suffering.  I refused at first.  I could not confess because
I knew that my story would destroy the dear, absurd ideals of me that
he had formed--and he was my only friend.  His wife was dead--she was
a weak commonplace person.  I was all to him that she could never
have been, and he pleaded so forcibly, and--and I was terribly
lonely.  I had hidden my secret that I might go back to the life and
the friends I had lost; only to find that I could not.  I was another
person."

"But you married Mr. Cardew--and you never told him?"

"Yes.  Have I not said so?  I stifled my conscience by weak
unconvincing sophistries as you are doing.  I married him.  Oh, yes;
I did it deliberately, thinking that I could atone by lightening his
grey existence.  At first I was rewarded beyond my deserts.  You know
how his fortunes changed ever for the better.  The time for
confession had gone by.  I dared not speak.  You see what infamy this
abominable secrecy breeds."

"You ought not to have told me this," observed Mabel coldly and
quietly.

"I had to tell some one.  It has been gnawing at my heart for years.
But I have abased myself to you to warn you and save you from a
similar fate.  Mabel, Mabel, you will not do this ridiculous, secret,
wicked thing."

"There is no similarity in our two cases," the girl continued,
remorselessly.  "And I have my father's consent.  Here is his letter."

Lady Hester, having gone too far, was frightened, and felt it
incumbent upon her to recover her composure.  She dried her tears,
and tried to read the letter; but her eyes refused to see, and her
senses to understand.  Her hands dropped, and she turned again to
Mabel.

"You will abandon this marriage?  For my sake you will?" she urged
plaintively.  "Think how I have betrayed and humbled myself to point
the moral----"

"Jack will be waiting for me.  I cannot abandon it now.  I can't--you
must see that I can't.  Jack would be broken-hearted.  Everything is
arranged, and Tom Nestor, of St. Jude's, is to perform the ceremony.
So you see somebody knows and sympathizes.  Tom Nestor thinks----"

"Mabel, you must, you must--you shall!" cried Lady Hester, hysterical
with helplessness.

"No.  I will not."

It was a very quiet and determined refusal.

"You must.  If you persist I shall tell the Bishop," cried the other
in petulant despair; "I won't see you ruin your own and Jack's life
in this fashion."  She walked threateningly towards the door.  "I
shall send a messenger at once, and----"

"If you tell I shall tell," replied Mabel, breathing hard.  There was
no mistaking her meaning.

Lady Hester collapsed into a chair, and covered her face with her
hands.

"Girl, you are going to ruin, and you want to ruin me, too."

Mabel showed by her calm and determined manner that all further
argument was useless.  She was alarmed, too, by the unsought burden
of responsibility.  She refrained from any further reference to the
outburst; and the other, scared by her quiet confidence, was humbled
and abashed to the verge of panic.  The girl's calm was forced, her
farewell tearless and hard.

But Euston was still some distance away; and her heart was full of
misgiving and uncertainty.




CHAPTER III

The arrival platform at Euston is not a very inspiriting place, but
on a sunshiny day it can appear quite cheerful to an expectant
bridegroom awaiting the coming of her whom he regards as brighter
than the sunshine and more wonderful than all the triumphs of railway
engineering skill.

Jack Cardew paced up and down restlessly.  He was a handsome fellow,
lithe and active, with more of the soldier about him than the lawyer,
a stiff carriage, and a small, shapely head, with fresh coloring, and
a very unlegal small brown mustache, sharply trimmed.  His grey eyes
were full and convincing, and just sufficiently nervous not to be
bold.  To-day his cheeks were flushed with long-repressed excitement.
He was excited and tremulously nervous--as a man should be when he is
taking the greatest step in his life contrary to the dictates of
common sense and in direct opposition to the wishes of his best
friends.  He argued his business with himself, employing almost
forensic eloquence in his attempts to demolish the case for the
defendants.  "Here am I," he mentally cried, addressing an imaginary
jury of well-wishers, "a young man in the pride of early manhood,
passionately in love with the most adorable of her sex, condemned by
an old-fashioned and obtuse parent to patiently wait until fortune
shall smile upon me.  Meanwhile the precious hours and barren years
are passing, and two souls are made wretched by living apart when
there is no earthly reason why they should not be joined together in
the holiest of bonds.  Here am I, struggling at the Bar, confronted
with years of drudgery, compelled to run the gauntlet of all the
temptations of this great city, while the sweetest girl in the world
is eating her heart out in some other place, longing for me every
hour of the day, yet forbidden to join her life with mine because I
have not attained that position of wealth and dignity which my father
considers necessary for the son of the Bishop of Ripley.  I am of
age, and can marry whom I choose.  My father is well aware of that.
It is only the question of income that keeps me in his power.  Men
and women should marry, not eat their hearts out during the best
years of their lives.  And there are some men who cannot live alone.
I am one of them.  Some cannot work unless their minds are at ease.
That is my temperament.  It is monstrous that----"

Further sophistical arguments were cut short by the roaring arrival
of the train.  It glided in majestically with remorseless, inevitable
force, and Jack vaguely likened it to the rush of fate that was to
carry him to-day irresistibly to the terminus of his bachelorhood.
He scanned the vibrating crowd of alighting passengers with some
trepidation, expecting every moment to see his goddess, yet at the
sight of every woman that was not Mabel he dreaded that she had
changed her mind.

A tall, slim figure in a white dress, wearing a bewitching hat, was
standing at the door of a first-class carriage watching his
excitement with some amusement.  She was within a few yards of him.
He ran to her, and she almost jumped into his arms.  He wanted to hug
her there and then, but she, with practical coquetry, evaded even a
kiss, and uttered the prosaic word "Luggage."

Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes bright, but not with happiness.
Two hours in the train--hours of mental uncertainty--had produced a
state of nervous indecision.  Lady Hester's pitiful story and her
cogent arguments were ringing in her ears.  Patience! patience!

Why had she been so rash?

The lovers had planned to spend the honeymoon in the little village
of Weybury, at the foot of the Chiltern Hills, where there was some
excellent trout-fishing; and presently Jack bundled his bride into a
cab and they drove off for St. Jude's, hoping all the way that no one
they knew would recognize them, and so self-conscious that it seemed
to be only necessary for a friend to see them to guess their errand
by clairvoyance.  Jack's fingers closed on Mabel's gloved hand, and
he held it tight in a fierce grip that was meant to signify
inflexible determination; but she drew her hand away, and dabbed her
eyes with a ridiculous little lace handkerchief.

"What, crying?"

"Oh, yes, Jack.  Don't you think we had better reconsider things
after all?"  She turned her great wistful eyes to his, knowing
perfectly well what he would say.

"Your courage failing, darling?"  He bent so near to her crimson
cheek that an errand-boy in the street greeted them with a whistling
shriek of derision, followed by some rude remarks about "leaving the
gal alone."

"Oh, Jack, I must tell you.  Lady Hester knows."

"You told her?" he cried, startled.

"No; she found out for herself.  She taxed me with it, and I couldn't
tell her a lie.  I had to own up."

"She'll tell father," he cried in alarm.

"No, she has promised not to do that.  She'll keep our secret."

"It's deuced inconvenient.  What an infernal nuisance!" cried Jack,
who was much more startled than he cared to admit.

"Oh, Jack, she urged me to abandon the idea of getting married
to-day.  She counselled patience.  She said that it was only
necessary for us to wait a little while and she would be able to
influence the Bishop.  Don't you think we might change our minds
after all?  We are sure of one another, Jack, without--well----"

"Darling, darling!" cried the bridegroom reprovingly.

Mabel began to tremble.  Tears filled her eyes.  "Of course, Jack, if
you insist----"

"I do insist," he cried hotly.  "Mabel, I thought you were looking
forward to our little honeymoon."

"So I am--so I am!" she hastened to assure him.

"Mabel, the other day you swore that you loved me, and that you would
follow me to the ends of the earth.  You would be mine forever.  You
would give yourself to me body and soul."

"Of course, Jack, of course.  When a woman loves nothing else
matters.  Am I not giving myself to you by marrying secretly to-day?"

"Yes, darling; but you suggested backing out."

"Oh! no, no, no."

"Then let's say no more about it.  The hours will be short enough."

"Yes, Jack."

She slipped her hand into his, and the cab rumbled on.  She had made
her attempt to reverse his decision, and it had failed.  There was no
more to be said.  But she had not tried very hard.

* * * * * *

Meanwhile, Lady Hester, at the Palace, had not been idle.  At first
she was overwhelmed with remorse at the futile revelation of her
secret.  Then reaction set in.  She knew it to be her duty to inform
the Bishop of his son's folly at all costs before it was too late;
but it was not easy.  The Bishop would have to be found, and when at
last the news reached him, he would be powerless to take any steps to
interfere.  If anything was to be done she alone must accomplish it.

Fortunately, in mentioning the name of Tom Nestor, late curate of
Ripley, Mabel had given a clue to the place where the marriage was to
be celebrated.  A telegram might carry some weight.  She resolved to
wire a last appeal to Jack himself, care of Tom Nestor.  But by the
time the telegraph form was under her hand the appeal became a
threat:--

"You must abandon your plan, or I shall tell your father to-day.
Wire reply.--MOTHER."

This telegram greeted Jack and his bride on their arrival at St.
Jude's.  Jack handed it silently to Mabel, who read it and passed it
back again without comment.  They looked at one another in dismay,
but gave the Rev. Tom no clue to their trouble.  They were in the
vestry of the dingy St. Pancras Church, and Tom Nestor, a
sandy-haired, lanky young man was getting into his surplice.

"It's too late now," whispered Jack in desperation, rapidly
formulating a plan.  "We must go on, darling, and brave it out.  Are
you ready?"

"I am yours to do with as you will.  I have promised."

She linked her arm in his, and they went into the church to wait
Tom's convenience.  And there they were married, with hired
witnesses, kneeling hand in hand, like two naughty children.  Tom
rattled through the ceremony with his usual shocking elocution, the
ring was slipped on the trembling finger, and at the conclusion of
the ceremony Jack pressed his bride to his heart, regardless of the
pew-opener and the brass-cleaner.

They returned to Euston as man and wife, receiving Tom's
congratulations on the step of the cab; and it was not until the
railway terminus was reached that they found time to consider the
real gravity of what had been done.

"I do hope your father won't be angry--that is, if Lady Hester tells
him," sighed Mabel.  "I think it will be very mean of her, and she'll
be sorry if she does."

"I don't care what she tells him," growled Jack.  Then he pictured
the furious anger of his lordship and trembled for the financial
future.

"I'll tell you what, little wife," he cried with sudden inspiration
as they paced up and down the platform.  "Father mustn't know, and
mother mustn't tell him.  In fact, mother herself mustn't know.  You
see it's an awful responsibility for her to keep such a thing from
her husband; but if I telegraph to her and say that we've changed our
minds--well, then, we are not married as far as she is concerned, are
we?  How would that do?"

"Oh, Jack, can't we avoid secrecy and deceit?"

"Our marriage is our affair, and nobody else's.  I shall send the
telegram.  It will relieve her of the responsibility.  She can think
what she likes, but she'll only know what we choose to tell her.
There's a telegraph office in the station.  Don't be alarmed, little
one.  Leave it all to me.  I'll wire her 'Plans abandoned for the
present.--JACK.'  How will that do?"

She nodded, and sighed regretfully, and pleaded with her fine eyes,
but Jack darted off and disappeared.  He came back congratulating
himself upon his astuteness; and when his pale, anxious wife reopened
the discussion he silenced her with a laugh and a playful threat that
if she said any more he would kiss her there and then on the platform
before all the people.

He darted off again to bribe the guard to reserve a first-class
carriage, and when that manœuvre was successfully accomplished,
the excitement of adventure entered their veins, their spirits rose,
and they were insanely happy.

* * * * * *

Lady Hester, waiting in suspense, and still hopeful that the reckless
sacrifice of her secret might not have been in vain, received the
lying message and read it with tears of joy, never doubting for a
moment that she had conquered.




CHAPTER IV

Four days later Jack Cardew returned home, looking less grave than
usual, and not nearly so depressed as a broken-hearted swain should.
The complete absence of any despair rather seemed to suggest that
there had been meetings with his sweetheart in London.

The Bishop was no simpleton, but he hated deception of any kind.  He
had commanded his son to continue no more than a casual acquaintance
with Mabel Bannister; and Jack had apparently accepted the situation,
under the threat of a discontinuation of his allowance of £200 a
year.  He now saw that his commands were certain to be disobeyed.

He was diplomatically genial to Jack on his return.  He took his
son's arm and walked him round the garden, discussing local affairs
and some Episcopal matters that interested Jack not at all.  But
discussion with his father while he was in a good temper was not to
be lost by the bridegroom, who was faced by the fact that sooner or
later he must overcome the Bishop's objections and break the
startling news of his marriage.  It was not easy.

The Bishop himself broke the ice with a sudden disconcerting
question:--

"When did you last see Mabel Bannister, Jack?"

"I have seen her--once--in London," replied the bridegroom evasively,
feeling excruciatingly uncomfortable.

"My boy, you think I'm an old fool.  I've come to the conclusion that
I owe you some further explanation of my objection to Mabel Bannister
as your wife.  I didn't intend to discuss her any more, but I see it
is necessary.  Have you met Mr. Bannister?"

"Yes, father, the other evening.  I saw him at the club, and
introduced myself.  He seems a charming man, with the most polished
manners.  He spoke of you in the highest terms."

"Humph!" grunted the Bishop.  "I'm sorry that the admiration is not
mutual."

"Why do you object to him, father?"

"My dislike is founded upon things I have heard."

"Heard!" echoed Jack loftily and disdainfully.

"Yes, don't repeat my words.  The knowledge came to me when we were
at St. Saviour's.  I attended the deathbed of a man named Judd, who
came to grief through Bannister, and the poor fellow in his last
hours was troubled by thoughts of the misery and ruin he had wrought
at Bannister's instigation.  Judd was once at Oxford, destined for
the Church, but he degenerated.  He went to the bad, eventually
ending as a rascally begging-letter writer; and he died miserably in
a garret.  I knew him slightly in his Oxford days, then lost sight of
him; and when next I came across him it was on his death-bed,
rambling, raving, dying.  He ascribed his downfall and ruin to this
man Bannister.  I never understood the nature of the crimes the poor
fellow had committed, but he seemed to be much troubled by the
recollections of one particular injury done to a woman whom Bannister
had ruined.  He declared that Bannister made love to a girl in Bath
under an assumed name--and there was a child.  For reasons of his
own, and apparently to keep the matter from the woman's people, the
child was taken away by the father and put out to nurse.  The girl's
relatives knew nothing of her trouble.  Then Judd was sent to the
woman by Bannister to tell her that the child was dead.  It was a
lie.  That was the first bit of dirty work he did for him.  Later
Judd was again sent to play the humbug and pitch up a pitiful,
plausible tale--this time to tell the woman the story of Bannister's
own death.  He carried the thing out artistically, and Bannister's
demise was even advertised in the usual way in all the papers.  Thus
Bannister--I forget what his alias was then--passed out of existence
so far as the girl was concerned.

"I don't pretend to understand the object of it all, but the thing
was vile and disgraceful.  The girl was deserted, and the child--God
knows what became of that.  I sometimes shudder when I remember poor
Judd's last shrieking moments, and wonder whether anything more
terrible than putting it out to nurse was ever done to the child.  I
believe Bannister wanted to marry money, and, having concealed his
real name and identity from his victim, thought it best to wipe out
all record of his guilty intrigue by allowing her to imagine that he
was dead."

"An ugly business," murmured Jack.  "But, surely, Mabel should not be
blamed for her father's youthful sins.  Nobody has anything to say
against Mr. Bannister now.  He is most popular.  He is received
everywhere.  Surely, you wouldn't visit the sins of the fathers upon
the children unnecessarily?"

"It is the divine law."

"But, father, you're judging Mr. Bannister, on your own showing,
solely from the ravings of a dissolute wreck who had lost all sense
of accuracy and fair statement."

"My boy, I cannot forget that betrayed, deserted, ruined woman going
through life with her sin heavy upon her.  I believe she was a lady
of position.  And of the little child--where is it now?  Grown to
womanhood with the passing of years, with neither a mother's nor a
father's care, and living a life of penury, if not of shame.  What
becomes of the children of dissolute men farmed out among harpies and
murderesses?  You know as well as I do, Jack.  You saw something of
it at St. Saviour's.  You remember the woman I got prosecuted at
George Street--the one who got rid of five children in a year, and
not one of them her own?"

"The picture you draw is an exaggerated one, father.  Men who move in
the smart set in London do wild things in their youth, and grow to
middle-age as respectable citizens.  If you were to drag out all the
skeletons from the cupboards of Mayfair they would make a sorry
exhibition.  Can I love Mabel less because her father was dissolute
in his youth?  No!" cried Jack hotly.

"Tut-tut, my boy, don't shout at me.  I'm not deaf.  I told you that
I--er--might have been un-Christian and uncharitable.  God forbid
that I should defame the character of any nice girl because of her
father's early sins.  Miss Bannister's mother is dead, I understand.
No doubt she was well-bred, and brought the money to her husband that
he needed.  But I don't like the man's record.  Is he rich?"

"I don't know, father.  You ought to meet him.  I'm sure you'd change
your opinion.  And nothing will alter my regard for Mabel.  Your
opposition, father, only postpones the day when we come together, in
spite of you.  We are pledged to one another.  But Mr. Bannister
naturally refuses his consent to our marriage until you also agree."

"That is very proper of him."

"You really must know Mr. Bannister, father."

"I will."

"Ah!" cried the bridegroom, hugely relieved.  His difficulties were
already dwindling.  In imagination he saw himself and Mabel going
again to the altar, and his secret marriage ratified in a full blaze
of Episcopal publicity.

"The diocesan conference takes place the week after next," said the
Bishop thoughtfully.  "We shall have to entertain many people then.
It would be easier to ask Mr. Bannister in an informal manner to come
to one of the meetings."

Jack smiled grimly at the idea of Mr. Bannister at a church
conference.

"He might stay the night," added the Bishop.  "I don't want to have
to entertain the man alone.  Your mother may not like him."

"I'm sure she'll be only too pleased to meet Mabel's father," cried
the enthusiastic lover.  "No one can be fonder of Mabel than mother."

"Very well, then.  He shall be asked."




CHAPTER V

Mr. Horace Bannister was one of the most perfectly groomed men in
London, a familiar figure in Bond Street, and an assiduous student of
modern art.  His chambers in Stratton Street reflected the man--a
roomy suite in correct taste, not too severe, but just masculine
enough to give no hint of an effeminate touch, although luxurious to
a fault.  Choice water-colors, pencil sketches, and rare prints lined
the walls, so close to one another that all other mural decoration
was superfluous.  Huge lounges filled the corners of the sitting
rooms, and the original windows had been replaced by something
latticed and quaint.  The rooms were on two floors, and only one
manservant lived upon the premises.  All work of a feminine kind was
done by a visiting charwoman accustomed to "the best families."

There was not a picture gallery in the West End where they did not
know Mr. Bannister.  Each fresh exhibition advertised in the gutters
on the boards of the sandwich men extracted his shilling, and he
could often be seen critically examining a Sainton silver point
through the large eyeglass that he always held at a little distance
from the eye, as though it were a magnifier.  He would go into
raptures over enamels and _repoussé_.  Inlaid precious stones
positively fascinated him (and he always made a point of discovering
who bought the specially valuable ones).  When the exquisitely
beautiful necklet of pearls and diamonds in silver designed by
Fallerie was stolen from Barwell's Gallery, he almost wept with
vexation--so they say.

He was singularly good looking, with black, waving hair and pointed
beard of the same glossy texture and color.  Not a tinge of grey; not
a wrinkle of age.  On the wrong side of forty, he remained young, and
looked like one who lived well and easily.  The eyeglass gave a
slight severity and hauteur to his bearing when in repose; but when
he smiled he was irresistible.

Wherever fashionable people foregathered--or, rather, moneyed
people--there Horace Bannister was to be found.  He lived in clubs,
and played bridge incessantly, which made him also an acceptable
guest in many large country houses.  When he traveled, he was always
accompanied by Voss, his man, the most perfect, self-effacing,
impenetrable gentleman's gentleman that ever drew breath.

It was only natural that Mr. Horace Bannister and Voss should not
regard the presence of tall, slim Mabel at the Stratton Street flat
as altogether convenient.  Bannister, apparently, was delighted to
have her whenever she came--until she had been there a few days, when
he always jumped at the suggestion of her going anywhere else--much
to Voss's relief.  The presence of the bright-eyed, light-hearted
girl, singing about the place and setting things straight, and prying
into corners, drove Voss almost wild, to the complete destruction of
his wonted imperturbability.  She had already stumbled upon several
strange things, the use of which was quite unknown to Voss, but which
he stored away again with alacrity; yet she suspected nothing.

On the same day that Jack returned home, Mabel arrived at Stratton
Street.  The four days' bride chose the hour when her father would be
taking his morning stroll, and crept guiltily into the house.  Voss
was startled, for he had received no intimation of her coming; and
she blushed crimson, as if her secret could be read in her face.

How dingy the dark rooms seemed.  She found herself wondering how
long she would be obliged to live here before Jack could have her
always; and fell a-dreaming at once.

She got through the ordeal of facing her father very well.  He
greeted her languidly, and taking her soft cheeks in his supple white
hands, kissed her affectionately, yet with that leisurely
deliberation which characterized all his movements.

"So my little girl has come home from the dear Bishop's palace."

"Yes, father," responded the bride, flushing hot and cold at the
unavoidable lie.

"And Jack Cardew, the Bishop's son, wants to marry my little girl?"

"Yes, father."

"All in good time--all in good time."

Then he laughed, a rasping laugh, and threw back his handsome head as
if the idea tickled him immensely.

"Why do you laugh like that, father?" she asked.

"It's so funny.  But never mind.  There's no need to talk about
it--not yet."

He wheeled round an armchair preparatory to settling himself for a
dip into his _Times_.  Voss, like a shadow, glided to his elbow with
cigars, and found excuses for remaining in the room.

"Let's have a look at you, Mabel," observed the languid father, as
Voss held a lighted match to his cigar.  "Stand there.  Ah!  Good
figure, but slender--fine hair--good teeth--eyes not too
virginal--almost too deep and understanding for an innocent school
girl."  A crimson flush dyed the bride's cheek, and the man frowned a
little as he watched its sudden rise.  "Ah, and no fool either!" he
continued.  "Frocks?  Rather simple and short, but that can be
remedied.  I think we'll be able to develop you."

"Have you done, father?" she asked, with an awkward laugh.  The laugh
died away, and the flash of timidity turned to anger as she saw her
father's eyes seek those of the wooden-faced Voss, as if in
confirmation and approval of his words.  This was a little trick of
his that had worried her before.  It seemed so ill-bred, and futile,
too, for Voss might have been stone for all the response he gave.

"We'll have to find a few men to amuse you, Mabel.  You must make the
most of yourself.  Darken those eyebrows a little.  The dark eyebrow
with the light hair gives more directness to the appeal of the eye.
Cheeks a little thin in color, my dear.  You must call on my friend
Madame Beatty, at No. 206.  She will give you a few tips on coloring
that will be invaluable.  She will explain how to make the flush
spread from the cheek back towards the ear artistically.  It gives
the effect of youth in fullest bloom, and helps the glitter of the
eye.  Be careful with the tinting.  You mustn't overdo it at your
age."

"Father, you horrify me."

"My dear girl, that is quite the mildest horror that you will
encounter in the next few weeks."

Again his eyes glittered and turned to seek the other man's, as much
as to say, "Eh, Voss?"  But Voss was carrying an ash tray to the
table at his master's elbow, and would not see.

"Try a different dressing of the hair.  It is becoming enough like
that, but too girlish.  Study the fashion papers and the Gibson
girls--the real ones, I mean, not the picture post-cards.  Now run
away, there's a good little girl, and study your mirror for awhile.
I want you to make the best of yourself for my sake as well as your
own."

[Illustration: "STUDY THE FASHION PAPERS AND THE GIBSON GIRLS..."]

He hid himself behind the ample pages of the _Times_, and the girl
swept from the room shocked and offended.  When the door closed the
paper dropped sharply and Mr. Bannister consulted Voss.

"Well, and what do you think, Voss?"

"I think she'll fetch 'em all right," replied the stony-faced one.
"But you'll have trouble with her.  Better let her work in the dark.
Don't expect her to help you with the cards yet.  She'll kick.  I can
give you the old tip as usual."  Voss stroked first his little left
whisker and then the right with a significant gesture.

"Yes, but we can't win much that way."

"Better go slow at first--until she's broke in."

"Has the Bishop's son got any money, Voss?"

"Not a cent."

"Then we must rule him out of the reckoning.  What about young Blunt?"

"The Kaffir plunger.  Yes, he'd do to go on with."

"Very well, I'll bring him round at about three.  I shall say nothing
to her.  You can casually mention that I am bringing a friend for a
game of cards, and I should like her to give him tea."

"That's right.  Go easy."

"Sir," corrected Bannister.

"Go easy, sir," replied Voss with a grin that showed how wonderfully
expansive and expressive his face could really be when the locks and
bolts were undone.

"You are apt to forget the proper way to address me," continued the
master.  "As you get used to the girl being here you'll drop into the
old way as if we were quite alone if you are not careful."

"Yes, sir."

Mr. Bannister returned to his _Times_, and after a casual glance at
the headings of the principal columns, confined his attention to the
law reports and police news.

* * * * * *

"Mabel, this is Mr. Blunt.  Blunt--my daughter."

"Daughter?  Good lord!  Didn't know you was old enough to have a
daughter, Bannister.  How d'ye do, Miss Bannister?  Pleased to make
your acquaintance."

She saw before her a short, thick-set, sandy-haired man of thirty,
with a brick-red face, the bluest of blue shirts, a light, woolly
suit of blanket-like texture and color, bright yellow boots, and an
enormous gold watch-chain.  He offered her a big, fat, moist hand,
and gave her a rough grip that made her wince.

"She's going to give us some tea," observed Bannister, wheeling round
a chair for his guest.

"Some what?" queried the guest, in mock horror.  "I thought you knew
me better than that.  Can't play cards on tea."

"Voss, the whisky."

"Ah, that's better, eh, missy?"

At a loss for words, she gazed coldly upon the young man, who had
commenced to ogle her admiringly, and was expanding visibly with the
intention of being very friendly.

"No, no; not that nasty, fiery stuff, Voss," cried Bannister, in
sharp reproof, as his man brought forward a tray; "let's have the old
'pot still.'  Mr. Blunt knows whisky when he tastes it."

"Rather!" ejaculated Blunt, with a wink at Mabel that started at the
corner of his mouth and absorbed the entire side of his face.

"Blunt generally knows a good thing when he sees it, eh, Blunt?"

"Ha! ha!" chuckled Mr. Blunt, nodding to Mabel, "that's one for you.
Know a good thing when I see it, eh?  Ha! ha!"

He was the most odious young man she had ever met, and the commonest.
She was glad that in the conversation which followed her father left
her out of it.  Blunt vainly tried to win her approval and draw her,
but she applied herself to making tea.  Voss mixed the guest a very
stiff drink, with more whisky than soda, and unobtrusively prepared
the card table by the window.

"Your little girl going to join us?" asked Blunt genially, when play
was about to commence.

"As you please, Blunt.  I'm afraid she's rather green; but you can
teach her a thing or two, eh, Blunt?"

"Ha! ha!" chuckled Blunt again, hugely gratified.  "There ain't many
girls I couldn't teach a thing or two, eh?"

The girl voted him a vain, vulgar booby, but he seemed very smart
with the cards.  She took a hand at poker reluctantly, after many
excuses.  Voss hovered round, apparently unnoticed by the men; but to
Mabel, whose eyes saw everything, he was a perpetual irritation.
Twice she saw her father glance at his man rather strangely during
the early deals--that questioning look which had irritated her in the
morning.  Each time the fellow took no notice, but stood rubbing his
little side whiskers while gazing thoughtfully at the door.  Then her
father played his hand--and won.  He had the most marvelous luck.
Blunt grew savage when he lost, and the stakes rose to a height that
alarmed the girl, although she was accustomed to card parties in
country houses.  Once Blunt's luck turned, and he regained a very
large sum.  Voss coughed and dropped a tray, and Bannister scowled at
him as though it were his fault.  Voss looked up at the ceiling next
time he scratched his left whisker, and his master's spirits rose.
He scratched his whisker deliberately and slowly as often as nine
times.

Bannister protested that this was his lucky week.  He certainly
seemed unable to lose.

Voss replenished the men's glasses assiduously, his master's from one
bottle and Blunt's from another, the latter's in huge quantities,
until Mabel herself cried out to him in protest.  Her father gave her
an angry flash that withered her up--and Blunt gurgled thickly over
his cards.  He lost again and again, and cursed, utterly regardless
of a lady's presence at the table.

Bannister's eyes sought those of the watching Voss, and Voss cast
swift glances at the guest's hand as he passed, and signalled.  It
must have been a signal.

The girl's color faded.  She grew faint with horror.

"Attend to your cards, Mabel, darling.  Remember that your losses are
mine also, because I shall have to clear off your liabilities," said
her father, sweetly.  "Blunt is a wonderful fellow for sudden changes
of luck.  He has twice cleaned me out at the club."

"There's d----d little luck coming my way this afternoon," growled
Blunt, sorting his cards.

That deal, and several others were disastrous to him, and he flung
down the cards at last, protesting that he never could play in the
afternoon.  When he rose from the table he staggered.  Mabel, sick
with disgust, welcomed the relief, and rose too.  Her heart was
beating painfully, and her head throbbing as if it would burst.  As
soon as she conveniently could, she slipped from the room.

* * * * * * *

My father a cheat!

The thought was treachery; the idea preposterous.  Yet her eyes had
seen.  She could not doubt the evidence of her senses.  Her
delightful, fastidious, tactful, suave father, who could not bear a
jarring sound or a false note of color, and was scrupulously nice in
all the small things of life, could not possibly condescend to work
in league with a common manservant and cheat at cards.

A cheat?

No.  He must be an instinctive gambler, who played as one under the
influence of an overmastering passion, one of the gamblers she had
met in novels, who would sell their souls to win at any cost.  If he
cheated, it must be because he could not help it, as the kleptomaniac
steals, because he must.  Any other idea was monstrous.  The
collusion of Voss--if there was any collusion at all--must have been
due to the man's own eagerness for his master to win.

It was so petty, so horrible, that the more she thought of it the
less real it became.  With true feminine inconsistency she resolved
to believe only what she wanted to believe--that she had made an
absurd mistake, and misjudged her father terribly.

Nevertheless, the idol was cracked.  Her immaculate parent was under
suspicion.  It was wonderful how many things, that hitherto troubled
her not at all, suddenly demanded explanation.  Why had she always
lived apart from her father?  How did he live?  Upon what income, and
how derived?

Her talks with her husband had done much to stimulate these
inquiries; but the possibility of mystery and ugliness in the
background of her father's life had never suggested itself before.
Jack had asked a dozen questions that she could not answer; and had
seemed surprised at her ignorance of such vital matters as the maiden
name of her mother, and knowledge of any kinsfolk of her father.  She
had explained to Jack that she had no relations.  Her mother died
abroad at the time of her birth--place unstated--and her father was,
so far as she knew, her only relation.  She had been taught to regard
this as sufficient.

It was when Jack began to talk about his people, to tell of his
aunts, uncles, and cousins, that a curious sense of aloneness came to
her.  She was astonishingly ignorant of her antecedents.

Her father's intimates, whom she had seen at foreign spas, and
fashionable centres during her brief holiday visits, always seemed a
little too intimate.  They ogled her and annoyed him; yet he had
seemed unable to check their familiarity.  There were no women with
whom she was allowed to be friendly, except titled and well-known
people whom she met on the promenades and other public places.  They
were civil but bored, and evidently found her _de trop_.  The homes
of her schoolfellows were opened to her, warmly at first, and
sympathy for a motherless girl made her many friends.  She was
clever, and possessed that unusual charm that drew women to her, and
bound her to them, if not with hoops of steel, at least with an
indulgent intimacy that ripened with time, and assured her of a
friendly welcome at several houses in England and on the Continent.
A few of these friends had dropped away suddenly.  Her father had
charmed them at first.  He was delightful.  He was everybody's
friend.  Then he moved on, and a strange constraint fell upon
everybody, definite but inexplicable, and through this iciness there
came a tinge of sympathy and sorrow for the motherless girl.  All
this Mabel had felt in a vague way.  Now, reviewing the past by the
light of present suspicions, these lapses became pregnant with
meaning.

A horrible and definite explanation of these strange rebuffs was
afforded by this glimpse behind the scenes of her father's life.  If
he were a gambler, and sometimes a cheat--it could only be
sometimes----  No, the thought was unthinkable, and she put it away.

It is surprising what four days of matrimony will do in altering or
awakening a girl's point of view.  Four days with Jack had stirred
all the latent energy of her young brain.  Love had aroused mothering
instincts and a passionate desire to better the world and all the
people in it, especially Jack, and her father, and the obstinate
Bishop.  She had dreamed of this marriage as the turning-point of
Jack's undistinguished career.  He was to be appreciated and helped
by everybody, her father most of all.  And now!

She shuddered, then laughed at her own morbid folly in making
mountains out of molehills.

She heard Voss go out--then her father and Blunt.  All was quiet, and
the sudden tumult that had worked in her brain died down; but she
felt the need of physical activity.  She must find something to do.
She entered the sitting room, which still reeked of smoke, and saw
the spirit bottles on the side table.  Her curiosity was aroused, and
it conquered her loyalty.  She examined the bottles.  The darker
liquid, which had been given to Blunt, was undoubtedly whisky.  The
lighter, in the other bottle, had a faint unpleasant odor much less
definite.  She poured out a little and tasted it.

It was not spirit at all--it most resembled sherry and water.
Bannister evidently kept a cool head while he plied his guests with
spirits.  Deception again, treachery, and lies.

It was horrible; it was mean, cunning, vile.  And she--what was she?

"Oh, Jack, Jack, what have I done!" she cried, and buried her ashen
face in her hands.

* * * * * * *

Tears would not come.  She sat shrivelled up, her youth gone, swept
away forever by this fateful knowledge.

Many unintelligible things now flashed up clear and terrible.  Her
father had always been so very anxious to get her into the houses of
the rich and those who squandered money.  He had taught her card
games as though they were an indispensable science; and he had shown
her with elaborate care how to beware of cheats at bridge--how to
cheat, in fact.  She had laughed innocently at the time.  Now it
seemed to have a painful significance.

"Oh, what would Jack think if he knew?  And the Bishop?  And Lady
Hester?  My father a cheat--in league with a common servant."

Blunt had obviously been plied with drink, and drink of a different
kind to that taken by her father.  She wished with all her heart that
she had remained in ignorance; and, as is often the habit of those
who suddenly come upon painful knowledge, began to juggle with facts.
Perhaps she was mistaken about the signals.  And, after all, her
father could choose his own drink.  Why should he be held responsible
if his friends drank more than was good for them?  That was their
affair.  She tried to think so.  She compelled herself to think so,
diverting her attention by "tidying up" in the grateful absence of
the officious Voss.

The room was littered with cards and cigar ash, but she knew the
cabinet where Voss kept the cards.  She found it almost full of new
packs, enough to stock a shop.  At the back of the drawer was a
broken packet, half full, from which cards had been withdrawn.

"The commonest and crudest form of swindling, chiefly practiced upon
drunken men, is by using concealed cards, a scheme at once simple and
dangerous."

Her father's own words recurred to her, and she ran through the
packet.  It contained only the lesser numbers; all the Court cards
were missing.

The packet dropped from her trembling fingers and scattered on the
floor.  At the same moment the key turned in the outer door of the
flat, and her father returned.  Guilty self-consciousness overwhelmed
her.  She scrambled them all back into the cabinet anyhow, but too
late to escape detection.

Bannister gave one glance, and frowned.  Then he smiled, and looked
another way.

"Always busy, little girl," he murmured, as he drew off his gloves
languidly.  "There's nothing like it.  If we could afford a staff of
servants you should recline on rose leaves and sup on honey.  But
alas! we must work.  Talking of roses----"

"You never work, father."

"Never work, my child?  I've had a most laborious afternoon--and I've
made four hundred pounds.  Four hundred pounds, little girl!"  He
pinched her cheek affectionately.  "And what is more important to
you, I have been to Solomon's to buy something that will cancel the
commission due to you, an exquisite bunch of roses.  You can have a
new dress, too, if you like, for your next visit to the dear Bishop."

"Father," she cried, with a gulp of stifled indignation.  "I think it
wicked to win so much as four hundred pounds in one afternoon from a
man who--well, he was almost drunk."

"Shocking exaggeration, my child.  Don't glare and choke over your
words like that.  Why is it that virtuous indignation--and everything
else virtuous, in fact--is so horribly distorting and self-torturing?"

"It was monstrous.  It was--dishonest."

"My child, I am tired.  Don't bore me with school-girl ethics."  He
dropped softly and wearily into a comfortable lounge, and pulled up a
pillow for his head.

"You are old enough to observe the ways of the world now without
making injudicious observations and comments.  Discretion in a woman
is more valuable than beauty.  You have the latter--cultivate the
former quality."

"Father, you can't expect me to sit by and see abominable things
done, and----"

"Little girls should be seen and not heard.  I've only half glanced
through my _Times_, and in a few minutes it will be time to dress for
dinner."

* * * * * * *

A letter from Jack--a big fat letter.  The color rushed to Mabel's
face, and her fingers trembled as she opened the envelope.  It was
like a breath of fresh air from the Chilterns.  From Jack! the same
Jack that she had left behind.  But was she the same woman?  Ages
seemed to have passed, mountains to have arisen, and the distance
between them had widened to the width of an ocean.


"_Ripley, Wednesday._

"MY DEAR SWEET SECRET,

"It is dreadful down here without you.  I can't think now how I tore
myself away just to put in an appearance at home when I might be in
London, where I could at least see you sometimes.  It's an awful
strain keeping up the delusion with Lady Hester that we are painfully
waiting, like good little children, till the apples are plucked for
us by other people.  She almost wept over me when I returned a
bachelor (!).

"I have one good piece of news for you, sweetheart.  I sounded the
governor, and found that he was not nearly so dogmatic and obstinate
as I thought.  It appears his objection to you was due to something
he had heard about your naughty papa--something that occurred
probably twenty years ago, when he was young and wild.  It was an
ugly story.  Perhaps it wasn't true at all.  He only got hold of it
from a dying man who was half mad and trying to make a good end of
things after a life of evil.  Father so far melted before we had done
our talk as to be charitable, and promised to meet your dad.  The
governor is really an awfully decent sort, but he's an awful stickler
for form and family and all that sort of thing, you know.  And if he
had the slightest suspicion that your dear papa was not all that a
good-looking, popular widower ought to be, he would be very nasty.

"That little crib at £300 a year, which I told you looked like coming
my way, is off.  Bates has got it.  I'm bitterly disappointed.  It
places me more than ever at the mercy of the old man, who is really
very conscientious about money.  So prime your gay papa for a dull
time at the Palace; and if he could rail against the Education Bill
and the Radicals he would go straight to father's heart at once.

"Warn him not to mention bridge; for it is father's pet aversion, and
he is preaching against it at the present time.  There is nothing
else I can suggest.  Whenever I close my eyes I hear the ripple of
the trout stream and the kissing of the leaves overhead.  Oh for an
hour under that weeping willow with my head in your lap!  But I am
forgetting our compact of secrecy.  This is not a proper letter to
write to Miss Bannister.  So good night, sweetheart.  Write and tell
me where I can meet you on Thursday.

  "Your loving, ----ahem!
      "JACK.

"P.S.--An awfully queer thing happened last night.  Father, being in
an expansive mood, showed me some old photos of himself taken long
before I was born, and a miniature which, at first, I mistook for
you.  It was the very image.  But it was only Lady Hester in a
nurse's uniform taken when she was about twenty.  The likeness was
really amazing.  So much for coincidences.  Of course, I didn't fail
to drive home the moral that being the son of my father it was only
natural that I should admire that style of beauty."




CHAPTER VI

Mr. Richard Bannister sat in a hard but comfortable chair while Voss
brushed his hair with a pair of exquisite tortoise-shell brushes.  He
held a letter in his hand which seemed to amuse him.  By the
reflection in the mirror Voss was able to watch the supercilious curl
of his master's thin lip, and the whimsical puckering of the
crowsfeet about the eyes.

The valet paused in his labors and peered over his master's shoulder
at the letter, a brush poised in each hand waiting for the next
stroke and oscillating in mid-air, while he also read from beginning
to the end of the epistle.  The brushes remained inactive so long
that Mr. Bannister became aware of the impertinent scrutiny.  Instead
of rebuking this man he handed the letter up over his shoulder for
the servant's more comfortable perusal.

It was only a formal invitation from Lady Hester Cardew to Mr.
Richard Bannister, begging him to come to Ripley, and make the Palace
his headquarters for one night.  Voss gripped the letter with an
inactive finger and held it aloft, brush and all, to get a clear
perusal.  He smiled thoughtfully as he handed it back, and put extra
vigor into the finer manipulation of the glossy hair.

"What do you think of it?" asked the master, with a whimsical smile,
surveying his man in the mirror.

"Seems all right," was Voss's comment.  Then, after a pause, "Going?"

"Haven't made up my mind."

"It's the right set.  Most respectable, and wonderful soft."

"I'm afraid 'soft' society doesn't stimulate me to a properly
adventurous spirit, Voss.  I get bored and impatient."

"Not impatient," chuckled Voss.  "There never was a chap so patient.
I thought I knew how to wait; but you, oh, lor'!  You make me ache."

"The man who follows a profession at once difficult, artistic, and
dangerous, should never rush at anything, Voss.  One good coup in
three weeks, carried to a successful issue and finished out of hand,
without the slightest trail for anxiety left behind, is far better
than a dozen rash, hasty ventures and hairbreadth escapes, leaving
behind a gnawing consciousness that some false step, some forgotten
clue, may bring retribution and disaster.  Have you ever had an
uneasy conscience, Voss?"

Voss was puzzled.  He paused in giving a pleasing twist to the front
lock, and gazed into the mirror inquiringly.  Seeing there only a
quizzical smile, he asked with a grin--

"Who're you getting at?"

"I mean what I say.  Have you ever had an uneasy conscience?"

"Maybe--occasional."

"A rare luxury, evidently.  Now, I'll warrant that the sensation was
entirely due to the dread that some act or avoidable indiscretion
might bring trouble in the uncertain future."

"How will that do?" asked Voss, combing the lock uninterested.  "Is
that front bit too high?"

"Of course it is."  Mr. Bannister seized the comb petulantly.  "Hair
should fall softly, in natural fashion.  Only a butcher or a
hairdresser likes his hair to resemble oiled wood."

The dandy caressed his beautiful front lock, with the grey strand in
the centre, and studied the effect at different angles, like a woman.
His soft, slender, white hand rested on the comb in a manner that
suggested an acute sensibility of touch, combined with cat-like
deliberation of movement.  The interest he took in his appearance was
keen; but he looked well pleased when he had completed his toilet.

On the table in front of him was a large framed photograph of Mabel,
taken by the most expensive photographer in Paris.  It was a really
charming picture, and his gaze was held by it.  Then he sighed and
bent nearer the mirror to examine the crowsfeet about his lustrous
Italian eyes.

"Of course, you'll go?" queried Voss casually.  His mind had been
running in the same groove since he last spoke.  His master's had
floated over the whole range of paternity, youth, love, marriage,
old-age, palsied limbs, and chilling death.  He wondered if paternity
really did bring any compensations in declining years--whether the
love of a daughter was more worth winning, and keeping, than the love
of a wife or a passionate houri.  Voss's query brought him back.  He
sighed and allowed his servant to help him on with his faultless
morning coat, but made no reply.

"Bishop Cardew is one of the Northallerton family," observed Voss;
"the chap who used to do the hero in the East End--the one old Judd
went to when he took on religion after the drink had done for him.
He married a nurse, or a sister of mercy, or something of that
sort--a woman with a title.  She's his second wife.  He's a cousin of
the Marquis of Northallerton.  I read it in the paper the other day.
Caught my eye 'cos it mentioned the Cardew emeralds, which was left
away from the marquis's side of the family, and now belong to the
Bishop's lady--which is a waste, as she never wears 'em.  In the
paper it said there was twenty thousand pounds' worth at the Palace
from year's end to year's end and never worn, only kept in a glass
case.  Lord! some people is fools.  Emeralds is fetching a bit just
now--fetching double, some say."

Mr. Bannister was listening, but he appeared to be taking more
interest in the last touches of his toilet.  While his back was
turned he casually remarked--

"Would you be surprised to hear, Voss, that my silly girl is going to
marry the Bishop's son?"

Voss paused in the act of folding his master's dressing-gown and
looked up, his face as expressionless as a mask of wax.  Then
surprise gave place to another emotion, and a curiously foxy and
cunning look crept into his eyes.  Speech came at last.

"Garn! you're getting at me."

"'Tis true, and funny 'tis, 'tis true.  That's why I'm invited to the
palace; the palace being, I am given to understand, a large,
uncomfortable, dreary mansion, in a sleepy, stupid town."

Voss indulged in a rare luxury; he laughed.  He sometimes chuckled,
but rarely did mirth commandeer all the muscles of his face.

Bannister flashed round angrily.

"D--n you!  what are you laughing at?  Do you think my daughter isn't
good enough for a jumped-up Bishop's son?  Gad, man, is there a girl
in the peerage more fitted to wear a coronet, or as well fitted?"

"I ain't got nothing to say against her looks," replied Voss sulkily,
as he took up his master's silk hat and brushed it mechanically.
"But I thought you was going to turn her into money.  If she'd only
top the wink to young Blunt and keep him dangling, you could get a
clear thousand out of the silly mug."

"A girl in love is not likely to easily lend herself to vulgar
intrigue, Voss.  You never calculate for the existence of finer
feelings.  Be careful, that hat had three ugly scratches on the front
yesterday.  If you can't get them out throw the hat away.  There's
another waiting in my box at Scott's.  Allow me.  The brush this way,
if you please.  Not so rough."  He took the hat with a touch that was
a caress, and delicately smoothed it, while Voss looked on
superciliously.

"I thought you reckoned upon the gal as an investment," observed
Voss, when the hat was in proper order and the brush handed back to
him; "that you was going to get back all you'd spent on her and more,
and she was going to increase your respectability and give you
'tong.'"

"Ton," corrected Bannister, with a twinge.  "Voss, you were in Paris
long enough to get a better accent than that.  And to think that you
swindled English hotel keepers as a French count before I took you in
hand and made a gentleman's gentleman of you!  I can hardly believe
it when I hear your accent."

"Broken English is a simple lingo, but to talk French as you do, easy
as whistling, requires eddication."

"Ah! that's so.  You're in your proper sphere as my valet.  But I
wish you'd curb your natural vulgarity of idea, and not gurgle at the
mention of jewels.  To use one of your favorite expressions, 'I am
not on that lay now.'"

"Bah!" exclaimed Voss; "clubs and play and city companies and all
them things is flnnicking."

"A steady income, Voss, a steady income."

"Yes, and what do you do with it?  That's what I can't make out.  You
must be making a tidy bit."

"You get your share, my good fellow," snapped the master, with
unusual acerbity.  He only allowed his servant and partner a certain
limit of familiarity.

"Oh!  I ain't complaining.  But you don't spend like you used to, not
of late years."

Mr. Bannister poised his silk hat at the proper angle on his head,
and intently examined his reflection in the full-length mirror at
close quarters and for quite a long time.

"What's the matter?" queried Voss.

"Sir," corrected the other sharply.

"Sir."

"It's the flight of time that is worrying me, Voss," sighed
Bannister.  "Age is creeping on me.  I've no intention of ending my
days in discreditable obscurity."

"Why, you're not much over forty yet.  That ain't old."

"Have you noticed my recent interest in land agents' catalogues and
_County Life_?"

"Yes, I've seen it.  I thought you was thinking of crib-cracking?"

"Voss, you shock me; your instincts are so abominably low.  I'm
thinking of settling down as a country gentleman."

Voss raised his eyebrows.  He was past being astonished at anything.

"A new lay," he observed wearily, "and in the country?"

"Not a new 'lay,' as you call it, but a retirement from business.
I'm going to buy a nice little place in the country, just large
enough for my old age, with a little land and some shooting.  By that
time I hope to see you, Voss, installed as an honest publican in some
thriving inn--near a race course, say--at a convenient distance, a
very considerable distance."

He paused in the act of drawing on a glove, and picked up a copy of
_County Life_ which lay open on a side table.

"Here's a little place, £7,000.  Six miles from Ripley, one mile from
church and post."

"And how far from the county jail?" asked Voss, with obvious anger.
Evidence of Bannister's affluence always annoyed him.  It gave extra
strength to the master's whip-hand, for money is power, even against
the law, and much more against an humble law-breaker.

"I could buy the place, Voss, but I couldn't keep it up.  It looks
pretty, and shooting pheasants is, I'm sure, a better game than
fleecing pigeons."

Bannister held out his hand for his cane.

"I don't want to meet Miss Mabel this morning.  She's looking
red-eyed and worried.  She saw too much when Blunt was here."

"That was your fault," replied Voss sharply.

"Sir."

"Your fault, sir," corrected Voss, polishing his master's malacca
vigorously.  "You got into a paddy, and you wouldn't see my signs.  I
went as close as I dared.  Cards is nasty things when women is about.
Jewels is better."

"Voss, you're a thief by instinct.  I am an artist.  I see and
understand how easy it is to convey wealth from one owner to another.
I use the same ingenuity and thought that financiers apply to the
amassing of wealth by so-called honorable means.  The jewels of the
Bishop's lady, for instance, are no more hers than mine.  They are in
reality a part of the wealth of a nation--the wealth that ebbs and
flows with the tide, and is cast here and there, in large waves and
little eddies, ever changing, ever shifting, according to
circumstance and the luck of birth, marriage, and death."

"Here, stow it!" growled Voss savagely.  He, too, allowed only a
certain measure of superiority in his master, as his master allowed
only a certain familiarity.  "Talk sense.  What about the Bishop's
emeralds?"

"Twenty thousand pounds did you say they were worth?"

"So the papers said.  That was the face value when they last changed
hands, twenty years ago.  Twenty thousand pounds' worth of emeralds!
Lord! it makes your mouth water.  They must be worth at least forty
thousand now."

"But if the Bishop's son marries my daughter they'll be hers in due
course."

"I ain't dealing in futures, or floating in fairy tales," retorted
Voss irritably.  To him the marriage of Mabel with a Bishop's son
savored of rank absurdity; yet it frightened him a little, for he had
long ago learned to dread the bold flights which the master mind of
Bannister occasionally sprang upon him.

"Well, at least I think I'll go down and visit the Bishop," observed
Bannister at length.  He surveyed himself again in the full-length
mirror with evident satisfaction.  "The Bishop's lady is delightful,
I am told.  Order me the last six numbers of the _Guardian_, the
_Churchman_, or any standard religious paper.  I must read up my
subject."

"You're a fair wonder," murmured Voss, as he rubbed his hands softly.

He saw emeralds in the air, and they meant excitement and change of
scene.

* * * * * * *

The same post that brought Mr. Bannister his invitation to the Palace
brought Mabel a letter from Lady Hester.  The sight of the familiar
writing was enough to set the girl palpitating.  It brought back her
last interview--the pale face, the urgent entreaties, the nervous,
hysterical warning, and the amazing confession.

Whatever Lady Hester might say or do in the future, Mabel felt some
satisfaction that she at least had been honest and faithful to Jack.
She had married him without reserve or deception, believing her
father to be an honorable gentleman, and her own life had been
blameless; whereas Lady Hester had suppressed the most vital of all
facts in entering matrimony--she had been married before, and did not
speak.

To a young girl it seemed incredible that any one could be so
charming as Lady Hester and at once so foolish and wicked.  She gave
little thought to the natural shame and despair of a woman of Lady
Hester's social position who finds herself allied to a social pariah,
a thief, or to the wild cravings for peace when chance freed her and
allowed her to go back to her own world, unsmirched in conscience,
and safe from the pointing finger of scorn so long as she remained
silent.  True, Mabel herself had acquiesced in the wilful deception
of Lady Hester after having given a promise, but she salved her
conscience by regarding that as Jack's affair, and there was nothing
for it but to go on with the deception.

It was not the need for hiding her marriage that troubled her so much
now as the awful discovery of her father's real character.  The
horror of it was intensified when viewed in the light of her new
relationship to Bishop Cardew, the noble, upright, zealous
enthusiast, who loathed shams and every form of wrong, and would cut
off his right hand rather than that his son--whom he loved devotedly,
in spite of his apparent severity--should ally himself to one likely
to bring discredit upon the Bishopric of Ripley, the great position
which he held in trust from heaven.

Lady Hester's letter was bulky and long, and Mabel began it with
bated breath and considerable trepidation.


"MY DEAREST MABEL,

"I've been thinking about you ever since you left, and oh! you don't
know how relieved I was to find that my advice had been taken.  It
makes me think that the sacrifice I made was not in vain.  Mabel,
dear, don't think any more about what I told you.  I shall tell the
Bishop some day, but just now is not the time; he is so overworked,
and must not be worried.  I know that he will judge me more leniently
than I deserve.  Oh, Mabel, don't, don't think about it.  The
dreadful skeleton has lain dormant so many years.  This affair of
yours has brought it all back.  I am working steadily in your favor.
The Bishop is really very fond of you, and he misses you.  But he
thinks that you have not received as much spiritual guidance as a
girl should in her early education.  Still, he is the last man in the
world to raise violent, unreasoning opposition to Jack's marriage
with the woman of his choice.  But you mustn't deceive him--at least,
Jack mustn't.  He would never forgive that.  He likes to think of his
son as the soul of honor, in things both great and small.  Jack is no
longer a boy, but there is no overlooking the fact that he is
dependent upon his father for his income, and you'll ruin him if you
allow him to deceive the Bishop.  An early, rash, secret marriage
could but spoil his career at the Bar, which is only just beginning.
Keep a clear conscience, and you'll have the joy of a light heart--a
priceless possession, never sufficiently valued until too late.

"I have asked your father to come down, and I leave it to you to
manage the rest.  I understand from Jack that your father was rather
wild in his youth, and that he mixes with a set against whom the
Bishop has been preaching very vigorously of late; but both are men
of the world, so there ought not to be anxiety about their meeting.
Personally, I am looking forward to meeting him.  From what you have
told me, I'm sure he must be a particularly charming and fascinating
man.  I confess to a little nervousness, for I'm afraid he will find
us dull.  I forgot to mention that the Bishop has written to him
forbidding any engagement between yourself and Jack, and your father
has replied that he, too, would not think of 'sanctioning any such
union'--I am quoting his own phrase, dear--unless it seemed advisable
after mature deliberation on both sides, and there were proper
settlements, and so on.  So you see, Jack having no money at all, and
not being in the position to make settlements, makes things all the
more awkward.  Nevertheless, I fancy your father's letter has
impressed the Bishop.  I am writing all this in the strictest
confidence and with the greatest frankness, dear, because I want you
to marry Jack.  Don't have any doubts on that point.  Come down with
your father if you wish, but I should advise you to stay away, and
Jack too.

"Don't meet Jack in town, there's a good girl.  Wait, and let
everything be honest and above board.  Don't deceive anybody; it
doesn't pay in the long run.  Convention is a terrible octopus; its
claws reach out in every direction.

"By the way, Aunt Caroline is here.  You will have heard Jack mention
her.  She has wormed out all there is to know about you already, and
she is very curious about you and your family, and especially about
your mother, your upbringing, schooling, and all that sort of thing,
you know.  She's not really a spiteful person, her intentions are
always good; but, like many good people, she arrives at her results
by particularly uncomfortable methods.  Give your father a hint to
secure her good opinion.

"Mabel, it will all come right, dear.  Spur Jack on to work.
Marriage will be all the sweeter when it comes from the consciousness
of having earned the right of independence and love.

"You see I am confident for your future, and I sign myself in
anticipation, your loving mother,

"HESTER CARDEW."


Mabel shed a few tears over this letter.  It wrung her heart both
ways, and, instead of making the way seem easier, only softened the
quicksands.




CHAPTER VII

Mabel was constrained and nervous in her father's presence.  A
barrier had arisen between them which neither flowers nor smiles
could displace.  The beautiful blooms which he had ordered as her
"commission" on the infamous card-sharping business were untouched
until Voss discreetly distributed them about the rooms, where their
odor sickened her, and recalled unceasingly the things she would
forget.

She was to meet Jack in town to-day--their first meeting after the
all too brief honeymoon--and instead of the delicious flutter of joy
and expectant excitement that should have been hers by right, she was
trembling, sick with apprehension, guilty, and ill at ease.  Lady
Hester's letter was as salt in her wounds.  The enormity of her folly
in marrying Jack so hurriedly seemed to have grown into a crime.  She
set out to meet him, nevertheless, and, like all criminals, was
sufficiently vain of her appearance to wear her prettiest frock--a
muslin thing that hung cloud-like upon her swift-moving, graceful
form.  As she stepped into Bond Street, pale, except for the sharp
flush on her cheeks, and with sparkling, troubled eyes, nervous and
roving, many a head was turned to gaze after her.  When she hailed a
cab the knowing ones guessed that her errand was not a prosaic one.

The cool air beat upon her hot brow, and her tired eyes opened wider,
as from a cleansing breath.  She heard again the ripple of the trout
stream and the whisper of the wind amongst the leaves.  She was going
to meet Jack--her husband--and what else mattered?  He and she were
one, bound indissolubly.  The troubles and scruples of Lady Hester
and the backslidings of her father were but pawns in the game.  Life
was love and love was life, and it was only in the beginning.

As the cab turned into Piccadilly she passed some people that she
knew, and dropped her head nervously so that the brim of the large
Romney hat screened her face.  There was a block in the traffic
later, and a cab drew up almost opposite her containing an
over-dressed bounder, who stared impudently through his eye-glass and
smiled after surveying her.  He guessed that she was off to meet a
man; it was written all over her.

If Jack had been there the insolent fellow would not have dared.

Yes; Jack was all she had.  When the dusty green of Hyde Park came
into view she strained her eyes for the first glimpse of the lithe,
tall form of her lover--her husband.

Husband!

She murmured the word and lingered over it fondly, and laughed the
low, soft laugh of careless excitement.  With an insouciance worthy
of her father she flung care to the winds, and forgot the
card-sharping, the Bishop, and Lady Hester.

She leaned forward eagerly at Prince's Gate, and was ready to cry
with delight at the sight of Jack restlessly pacing the shady plane
avenue and switching the grass viciously with his stick.  Her blood
tingled hot and eager.  She could not keep still.  She waved her
little handkerchief wildly.  When they came face to face, she was all
smiles, happiness, and love.  She almost leaped into his arms, and
evidently expected to be embraced, but Jack, with true British
marital self-consciousness, drew himself up stiffly, looking
nervously to right and left.

"Oh, Jack, Jack!" was all she could say as her hands rested in his.
His eyes showed how delighted he was to see her again.  The cabman
surveyed the meeting with a critical, fore-calculating eye, wondering
whether the gentleman would pay or the lady.  After they had walked a
few yards he called after them.

"Beggin' your pardon, miss----"

"I must pay the cabman and send him away, dearest," whispered Jack,
and Mabel came down to earth--or nearly.

The cabman did not drive away.  He waited and watched the lovers pass
into the gardens.  Jack felt almost nervous.

"We've got to be careful," he whispered anxiously; "there are such an
infernal lot of people about that I know, and people who know the
governor too.  They mustn't see us, or there'll be the dickens to
pay.  It's deuced hard on a chap that he can't walk with his own dear
little wife in a public park without having to play the fox.  But
there, it won't be for long, little one.  My clever little girl is
going to see to all that.  She's going to get round the old boy, and
then----"

"And then?" she asked, and she shivered as from a cold wind.  She
came right down to earth with a dull, heavy thud.

"Why, then we'll own up.  Oh, darling, you don't know what it is to
be married and live in chambers, and go on with the old life just the
same."

"Yes, I do, Jack.  You don't suppose that I find Stratton Street a
paradise."

"It's home, though."  She shuddered again.  "Home!  How often I've
thought of home since last week, Mabel, and dreamed of it, and
imagined my little fairy presiding at the evening meal.  Then comes
disillusionment, and I eat my solitary chop in a gaudy restaurant,
where men are dining with their wives and sweethearts, all jolly, and
off to the theatre.  And from my corner I sit and groan and think
of--my wife."

"Don't, Jack, don't!  You mustn't grip my arm like that.  That woman
over there in the blue frock looks very much like Mrs. Selwyn Carton.
She'll see you.  She is looking this way.  Let's take the other path."

Jack rattled on, grumbling and laughing by turns, until he had
exhausted his small stock of news.  Then it occurred to him that he
had done all the talking and Mabel the listening.

"Well, little one, and what is your news?  How goes it with your
adorable dad?  What would he say if he knew you were shopping in
Kensington Gardens--eh?"

"I don't think he'd mind very much," replied Mabel, with a gasp and a
horrid choking in her throat.

"Then he's not a very particular chap--eh?  Rather a good sort,
though."

"I--I don't know."

It was on her lips to tell Jack everything, but loyalty, pride, and
shame impelled her to hold her peace.  Why should she worry Jack with
her troubles when he had so many of his own?

Perhaps if she had spoken then things might have turned out
differently.

Woman-like, she tried to change the conversation; but Jack wanted to
know if his father-in-law--how strange it sounded on his lips--was
going down to the Palace.  When she told him that the invitation had
been accepted he laughed joyfully.

"That's ripping, little girl.  You're a rare little schemer, full of
tact and artfulness.  You'll be a gold mine to me when I'm made a
judge.  Once let our fathers meet, and imagine they are settling our
affairs for us, then all will be well; though I think I'd better see
papa-in-law, darling, and coach him up in the part he has to
play--without letting him suspect it, of course."

"I don't think I would, Jack, not yet."

Again she struggled to explain, to confess, to warn him.  Her tongue
was tied.  She laughed frivolously instead, and talked of Weybury and
the incidents of the honeymoon--of anything that would help her to
forget the awful tangle into which things were drifting.

The Long Water gleaming in the morning sunlight reminded them of
Weybury and their stolen holiday, and fired Jack with eagerness for
new indiscretions.  He was rash enough to suggest another brief
escape from civilization, but Mabel vetoed the project with a
firmness that hurt his vanity.

"No, Jack--impossible!"

"Nothing is impossible when one really loves," he retorted loftily.

"Don't be silly, Jack.  We must be very careful--for your sake."

"Why should I be compelled to live apart from my wife?" cried Jack
contentiously, as if demolishing the arguments of the plaintiff.
"Why should I suffer tortures of loneliness?  Why----"

"Jack, you must, you must.  One false step, and we shall be
discovered.  Oh, dear!  I am already weary of deceit.  I wish----"

"Don't say that you wish we hadn't been down to Weybury.  That would
be unkind, Mabel.  I thought you were happy there."

"Of course, Jack, of course.  You know I was.  But you must
understand that a woman, when she's married"--Jack grinned
delightedly--"must make her husband's welfare her first thought."

"Mabel, I don't care a hang for my welfare just now, or the world, or
father, or anything else--but you."

They were standing facing each other, and he excitedly seized his
wife, careless of eye-witnesses, but sheltered by a screen of
close-growing rhododendrons.  "Mabel, I can't do without you.  You
must come down to my chambers in the Temple.  I want you to see the
place.  You know you said you wanted to."

"Jack!  After all our noble resolutions at Weybury?  How patient we
were to be, and how strong!"

"Mabel, don't look at me with serious eyes like that.  They were
never meant for anything but laughter.  There's something about you
this morning that makes me reckless.  You're looking such a picture
of restrained devilment that----"

"I don't feel it, Jack."

"Well, never mind, you look it.  You're such a queer mixture of
demureness and diablerie.  I'm sure if I suggested to you that we
should run a race down to the Long Water, and play touch like little
urchins round the penny chairs, you'd enter into the fun and enjoy
yourself like the dear little kiddie that you are."

Mabel was excited more than elated.  The rhythm of Jack's full
baritone vibrated in her very heart-strings; when he was in high
spirits and reckless his mood was contagious.  And what woman in love
can resist high spirits?  Frivolity and coquetry were ever twin
sisters.

The abandon of mutual proprietorship suddenly seized them, and they
walked hand-in-hand like any park lovers--or husband and wife.  They
drifted back to honeymoon manners, oblivious of their surroundings or
the dangerous proximity of the carriage drive, and were only brought
back to earth by a sudden start from Jack, who relinquished his hold
and hurriedly raised his hat to a passing vehicle.

"Confound it!" he growled, with set teeth.  "Aunt Caroline."

The carriage sped swiftly by.  A pale-faced, hook-nosed, elderly lady
with an eagle eye bowed stiffly, and raised her pince-nez rather
pointedly to get a better view of the smartly dressed girl.  It was
the Bishop's sister, of whom Jack had often spoken in accents of
doubtful praise as "an awfully good soul," devoted to his father and
himself, but showing it in ways chiefly irritating.

"Well, she doesn't know me," said Mabel comfortingly.

"All the worse," groaned Jack.  "They'll hear at home that I spend my
mornings in Kensington Gardens strolling hand-in-hand with an unknown
female.  You will be described, and then----"

"Jack, we ought to be more careful.  We oughtn't to behave like this
at all.  I wanted to talk to you very, very seriously about--about
lots of things."

"Interfering old--busybody!" exclaimed Jack, still running on Aunt
Caroline.  "She knows everything and everybody, and turns up
everywhere.  A wonderful old girl for her years--but I wish she'd
leave off nosing into my affairs.  Depend upon it, she knows there
has been a row about you at home; and trust her for guessing who you
are."

"And Lady Hester begged me not to see you, Jack," observed Mabel,
with a woebegone look.  They stood and looked at one another
foolishly.  Then they both laughed at the absurdity of their
position--husband and wife in a fever of anxiety at having been seen
together by a maiden aunt.

"Mabel," cried Jack, with a sudden burst of desperation, "if you
don't promise to come down and see me in the Temple, I'll just hug
you where you stand, before all these people."  He seized her arm,
and she jumped away in mock terror.

"I'll come, Jack, I'll come.  I'm bewildered by the difficulties that
beset us.  But there is love."  She slipped her arm in his.  They
passed again into the shelter of the trees where the shadows were
deeper, and only a few nurse maids and their charges disturbed the
solitude.

Gone were all her fine resolutions, and the half-formed notions of
abandoning Jack forever and freeing him from the incubus of a
disreputable father-in-law.  After all, their world was themselves,
and they must revel in the sunlight.  Let to-morrow bring its burdens
and responsibilities.  To-day was theirs.

The day after would be Aunt Caroline's.

Jack was feverishly eager that they should snatch a few hours of
wedded bliss in the Temple, despite resolutions to the contrary; and
it was when urging this sort of indiscretion that Jack showed that
great facility of argument and fluency of persuasive speech that had
already stood him in such good stead at the Bar.

Mabel protested that it was horribly indiscreet, but he demolished
her weak arguments by the most elementary logic.  He talked long and
eloquently; and what could a young and infatuated wife do but submit?
Her father's erratic manner of life and the absence of any female
relatives left her very much her own mistress to come and go as she
pleased; so that she, personally, ran very little risk in visiting a
supposed bachelor in chambers, and would find little difficulty in
absenting herself from Stratton Street.  As for Jack, he argued that,
though brick walls might have ears, they had fewer eyes than London
streets.  He declared that with a wife's occasional counsel he would
be another man.  The future would hold no terrors for him, and the
high pinnacle upon which the woolsack rested was at once lowered to a
quite moderate elevation.  Despite their experience with Aunt
Caroline and the danger of being observed, they kissed farewell
beneath the trees, in full view of Mrs. Selwyn Carton's maid, who was
airing her mistress's discarded blue frock in sequestered paths.

Mabel parted from her husband with her head in a whirl, cheeks
crimson, and eyes glistening.  She walked all the way home, and only
in Bond Street became really conscious of the presence of other
people in the world.  She suddenly caught sight of her father gazing
in a jeweler's window, and halted guiltily, uncertain whether to slip
by or to join him.

He had seen her reflection in a window mirror, and was watching her
approach.  At the psychologic moment he turned and greeted her
affectionately, and drew her to the window.

"Look! is it not beautiful?"  He pointed to a glittering ring, which
caught a ray of the sunlight as it nestled on its white velvet
cushion.  "The design is an inspiration--so simple, yet so elegant.
Mabel, you must have that ring."

Before she could protest Bannister drew her into the shop, where,
apparently, he was well known.  He entered with a languid air, and
smiled genially on the fussy manager.

"Good morning, Bowman.  You're looking well."

"Pleasure to see you again, sir; such a long time since we had the
pleasure.  Saw you looking at that ring we have just received from
our Paris house.  It's quite in your style."

"Let's see it, Bowman.  I haven't bought a jewel for weeks.  I've
successfully mastered my infatuation for beautiful gems for at least
twenty-one days."

Mabel looked up at her father in some mystification, knowing so
little of his habits and moods.

The jeweler saw the look, and explained:

"Your father, Miss Bannister, has a wonderful taste in this sort of
thing."  He gently put forward a tray of gems.

"Ah, I've bought many a jewel from Bowman," observed Bannister
patronizingly, as he drew forward a chair for Mabel; "and I've sold
him a good few, too.  I never keep them long."

"Well, it's a pleasant hobby, sir, collecting jewels."

"Deuced expensive, Bowman."

"Oh, no, sir," smiled the jeweler deprecatingly.  "You're a good hand
at a bargain, sir.  The things you've sold me brought their value,
I'm sure."

"I only bring Bowman my bargains," explained Bannister to Mabel, who
was looking at the ring with natural delight, but with a tremulous
fear of she knew not what.  "When I see a thing like that going at a
reasonable price I must have it.  And when I grow tired of it I bring
it back to Bowman.  Gems of all kinds have a wonderful fascination
for me--haven't they, Bowman?--till I weary of them.  But of late
I've held myself in check--eh?"

"Well, you haven't brought us anything lately, sir.  We were almost
giving you up as lost."

"And how much is the ring, Bowman?"

"Well, to you, sir, fifty guineas.  You know its value too well for
me to ask you more."

Bowman purred as if he were being very clever, and Bannister smiled
languidly as though he were flattered.

"Do you like it, Mabel?"

"It's lovely, father, but I have five already."

"Discard the one you like least and Bowman will buy it--won't you,
Bowman?"

"Certainly, sir."

"Well, my daughter likes the ring, Bowman, so we'll have it.  By the
way, I haven't a check-book on me."

"That's all right, sir.  Your convenience is ours, sir."

"Is that an emerald?" asked Bannister, screwing his eyeglass on more
tightly, and pointing to a gem in the glass case on the counter.

"Yes, sir, a particularly dark one."

"They're worth their money now--emeralds?" queried Bannister casually.

"Yes, indeed, sir.  We could take more emeralds than we can get just
now.  There's a run on them."

"Indeed, is that so?  I believe I've quite a number in my
collection--foolish big things I bought years ago."

"Really, that is very interesting."

"In my ignorance I bought them because they were big.  The settings
were atrocious, and I had them unmounted."

"I should like to see them very much, sir.  But when you tell me the
jewels are ugly I can scarcely credit it, for it is not like you to
buy ugly things, sir."

"Ah, I bought them years ago, when I thought the price of more
importance than the setting--when I first began collecting, and got
the gem mania badly."

Again Mabel looked wonderingly at her father.

"Miss Bannister would probably like them cut down," said Bowman,
expanding genially towards Mabel.

"Oh, no; such things are not for little girls," said Bannister
sharply.  "The ring is enough.  If you have a blank check, Bowman,
I'll settle for the ring out of hand."

"By the bye, sir, I believe we owe you something.  We bought
something of yours a month or two ago, and we never settled."

"Oh, I can't be bothered now, Bowman.  You must still owe me the
balance on that transaction.  You know how I hate bothering about
money."

"As you please, sir, as you please.  But I would rather----"

"Nonsense, Bowman, you're as safe as the Bank of England."

"It's very kind of you to say so, sir."  Mr. Bowman smiled again, and
produced a blank check book.

Bannister dashed off a check, talking all the while, and forgot to
sign it until he was reminded.

"Dear, dear, I am so careless in these matters," he explained with a
drawl, and signing with the weary air of a man burdened with
superfluous wealth.

Mr. Bowman packed the ring for Mabel, and bowed them out with a very
sweet smile for Mabel.  He admired her exquisite grace, especially
the poise of her beautiful neck, which seemed, to his eyes,
especially designed to display a diamond necklace to perfection--and
he had several in his shop that might tempt the fastidious Mr.
Bannister.  But so far he had bought more jewels of the gentleman
than he had sold him.

Mabel walked home with her father as beside a total stranger.  He
talked amusingly and cleverly on every subject except jewels and his
recent purchase.  But the suspicion was deepening that the idol of
her school days had more than feet of clay.  He was hollow, unreal,
mysterious, terrifying.  She knew that, in his own cynical way, he
was cunningly revealing to her his real personality.  She shrank from
the revelation with terror.  That he had been lying to the jeweler
she was certain, but to what end?

She escaped from him as soon as they arrived home, and shut herself
in her little bedroom--her only refuge in their very confined flat.

The imperative necessity of understanding more, of knowing all that
there was to know about herself, her father, her dead mother, her
lack of relatives, gripped her with a keen desire to probe.  She was
in the toils of mystery, and everything about her assumed a new
aspect.

Voss from an obsequious man servant had become an enigma, a factor in
the household to be reckoned with, an unknown quantity, and a
venomous influence.  He was with her father now.

Voss was reading something aloud to his master, and she caught the
word "Cardew" and "emeralds."

She stepped softly from her room.  The corridor was dark and narrow,
but it was covered with a thick carpet, so that her foot fall was
inaudible.  A paroxysm of inquisitiveness had seized her.  She must
know at all costs the things she dared not ask.  But the wildest
nightmare never approached the horror of the revelation that was to
follow.

Voss's unpleasant voice was raised to a high-pitched, inexpressive
monotone, and he gabbled as he read aloud.  He had rediscovered the
paragraph concerning the Bishop of Ripley's family jewels which he
had previously quoted to Bannister, and was now reading it with a
considerable amount of noise intended for emphasis.

"The Bishop is one of the Gladstone creations, and as a Churchman a
Tory, but distinguished by his plain speaking and unconventional
sermons.  He owes not a little of his success to his charming wife,
the only daughter of the late Marquis of Cromarty, the Irish peer.
She is a most popular figure in society, but brought her husband no
great dowry, for the poverty of the Lennox estates is proverbial.
Her interest in church work, however, is as keen as her husband's.
She is the fortunate possessor by her marriage of the Cardew
emeralds, which were once famous at Court.  These emeralds, by the
way, came to the Bishop through his mother, and are reported to be
the finest in the world, the value of one necklace alone being
estimated at £20,000.  Although possessed of exquisite taste in the
matter of dress, Lady Hester has affected puritanical severity of
late years, and the famous Cardew gems are never worn.  But they are
always available for the inspection of connoisseurs at the Palace,
where they are kept on show as part of the family heirlooms."

"There you are," said Voss triumphantly.  "What did I tell you?  They
don't keep 'em at the bank."

"I only said it was probable," replied Bannister irritably.  "Don't
talk so loud.  I've not made up my mind at all."

"The old dodge will work," urged Voss eagerly; "it worked before.  A
chisel in the window, a wire across the path, a duster round my
boots, and a walk over the flower-beds to make it look as though the
business had been done from the outside; then Mr. Bannister's valet
will tell a fairy tale about a man creeping along the corridor, the
alarm will be raised, the sparklers gone, and the police will rush
off and scour the whole country for a burglar.  I'll take good care
not to go near the swag, so they can't suspect me.  But you, being a
gentleman, no one will question what part of the house you was in.
Once get 'em out of the house and cut 'em up, and the rest is as easy
as winking.  Why, then you'd be able to buy your place in the
country."

"When I want your advice I'll ask for it," hissed Bannister, with an
impulsive, angry movement towards the door.  "Haven't I told you
before that I won't allow business to be discussed while there is a
third person in the house?  Do you want the girl----"  The rest was
inaudible, except when Voss's voice broke in again, rather
insolently--

"How was I to know the girl was in?  I thought she was out.  I didn't
see----"  The door closed with a bang, and silence followed.

Mabel tottered back to her room, trembling and white, and
understanding, yet stubbornly refusing to accept the wild suggestion
that was forming on her brain.

Thieves!  Common thieves!

Lady Hester's story came back--the sudden disillusionment when she
discovered that she had married a plausible scamp.  The coincidence
was ghastly in its suggestiveness.  But for that story she would not
have believed it possible for a man like her father, who moved among
the best, and professed the most fastidious refinement, to be a
social vampire, working in league with light-fingered rascals of the
class of Voss.

She laughed hysterically at the absurdity of the idea, and gazed
round with blanched face at her luxurious surroundings.  Here was no
sign of poverty, no sign of war with mankind.  Her own life, as far
as she remembered it, had never rubbed shoulders with low and vulgar
associations.  She had moved only amongst the rich.  Her intimates
belonged to the most favored class.  And yet--the daughter of a
thief!  Horrible!

The noble image of the fine old Bishop of Ripley flashed up like an
ogre of condemnation.  What would he say if he knew?  And she, his
son's wife, his daughter, walking perilous paths with an
unscrupulous, unabashed fraud of a father.  It was no use shirking
the awful truth.  Many things, hitherto inexplicable and mysterious,
were now made clear.  She flushed, now hot, now cold, as queer
memories surged through her brain.

Her father's affection for herself was undoubted.  He had given proof
of it in diverse ways.  But she understood now the meaning of many
strange moods and fits of irritation that would come over him when he
had been lavish with his caresses.  She remembered scenes long ago,
when she was a little girl, and there were tears in his eyes at
parting from her at the convent gate--genuine tears, such as a mother
might shed.  Could a rogue be sentimental?

She had always imagined that her likeness to her mother had endeared
her to him.  He said so once, and could not bear to talk of the dead.
Was it true?  Was anything true or real about her?

The shock was overwhelming.  She was helpless and panic-stricken.
She could not face a meeting with him any more that day, and,
pleading a sick headache, remained in her room, wrestling with the
awful problem.  If she had not been Jack's wife it would have been
less terrifying.  She could have disappeared utterly--where to, when,
or how she did not speculate.  In the great revolt panic succeeded
panic as she considered the wheels within wheels, the mesh in which
she was entangled by her rash marriage with Jack.  She was numbed
with fear at the thought of her father visiting the Palace.  He and
his rascally servant were going there as honored guests--to steal.
No other construction could be put upon their talk.

To steal!  From Jack's father!

Oh, the mad indiscretion of her marriage!  She had ruined Jack
utterly.  She faced the worst bravely and desperately, and resolved
that no one must know of that dreadful false step.  No one knew; no
one must ever know.  That was her first and dominant idea.

A night of broken rest with dreadful dreams, a morning grey and
hopeless, with no course of action decided upon, no fixed resolve,
and the necessity of attending to bodily needs in the way of food.

The woman who came to the flat to cook by the day when required
brought her breakfast, but she sickened at the thought of eating the
bread of sin--of crime.  Her father sent an affectionate message,
with some beautiful flowers, and a more practical mark of concern in
the shape of a prescription made up by a neighboring chemist.  The
exquisite rogue was a man, after all, with the same instincts,
affections, and sympathies as his fellows.  He, too, suffered from
headaches, and could not bear to think of his beautiful Mabel
enduring physical pain and spoiling her flower-like beauty.  He
supposed that it was the Blunt incident, which her sharp eyes had
detected more by accident than by design upon his part, and was
genuinely sorry.  He had encountered the symptoms of revolt and
horror in a high-spirited woman before--many years ago--and knew the
virulence of the poison.  He instinctively dreaded that the malady
would take the same course and end in the same way, unless he took
steps to throw dust in his child's eyes and enabled her to recover
her lost self-respect.  He had no notion of the real extent of her
knowledge.




CHAPTER VIII

"I say, Mrs. Maguire, can't you hear me?"

Jack thrust his head through the narrow opening of his bedroom door
and shouted for his ancient laundress, who was always in the way
except when wanted.

"Did you call, sir?" inquired a pale woman with a thin voice, as she
shuffled into the sitting room, which adjoined the bedroom.  "I've
got a nasty return of my last winter's cold.  I'm a bit deaf on the
left side, sir--the side what's mostly against your door, sir."

"Sorry you're not well, Mrs. Maguire, but I want you to give me a
little extra time this morning.  You see, I've a friend coming to
tea--a very particular friend--er--ah--a lady, and I want the place
to look clean, tidy, and decent.  It isn't what a lady would call
clean, Mrs. Maguire."

"If I can't satisfy you, sir, there's plenty others waiting for my
services.  I know my business, sir.  Twenty years come Michaelmas,
and never no complaint before.  Not clean!"

"Oh, lor'!" sighed Jack, as he waited for the lady to pause for want
of breath.  "You quite misunderstand me.  What I mean is this: I want
all my old bits of things to look like new this afternoon--polished
and all that--and some flowers and plants put into the vases."

"Oh, if that's what you want why didn't you say so at first?  And
before you goes out, sir, if you could give me the money to get the
flowers, being, as it were, a bit short.  It's nearin' the end of the
week."

"Right you are, here's a sovereign.  Get some cakes and things,
and--yes--better buy a pot of jam.  Ladies like jam sandwiches--don't
they?  Sort of afternoon tea is what I want for--for a lady.  My
aunt, you know."

"Oh, indeed, sir, your aunt.  It's wonderful how fond of the Temple
the ladies is.  But there's many stairs, if she's elderly."

"Yes, yes; get on with the preparations and clear out by two at
least."

"I'll be finished, sir, never fear.  Mr. Newbolt below is going at
two to-day, and I've got to clean his stairs, so I shall be 'andy if
you should want me."

Jack said angry things internally and retreated.  But he was soon
singing and whistling with amazing light-heartedness, and brushing
his hair with unwonted vigor.  This was the great day that was to
bring the wife of his bosom home to the domestic--and
much-neglected--hearth.

His chambers in the Temple were not particularly luxurious or
artistic.  They could hardly be said to reflect the man, because the
general design was some hundreds of years old, and the furniture,
though of less antiquity, showed signs of wear by a previous tenant.
It is not possible to impress one's personality upon a second-hand
tenement without fair time and a clean sweep of the previous owner's
leavings.

Jack spent as little time there as possible--much less time, perhaps,
than his future career needed.  But all that would be altered.  Mabel
would come, and with one touch of her magic fingers transform the
place into a paradise.  She was to bring in the sunshine, and not be
shocked at the paucity of the furniture for the sun to shine upon.
There was one easy chair, certainly, and a horsehair sofa that would
support one person when the hollow in the centre was filled with a
cushion.  There was a charming old window much in need of cleaning, a
mantel shelf loaded with pipes, and papers, and china ornaments that
were once worth sixpence-halfpenny each.  Several pictures were
pinned upon the wall, and the large pedestal desk looked like
business; but the mass of documents upon it allowed no room for the
breakfast tray, which, perforce, stood upon a rickety card table in a
dark corner.

Mrs. Maguire did her best--or her worst--with the place, and Jack was
beginning to count the hours to the time of Mabel's expected arrival.
He stood in the centre of the sitting room with a feeling that it was
not altogether gay.  Despite the flowers, which he had rearranged
himself rather clumsily, and the clean white tablecloth with two
large holes in it, and the pile of stale restaurant pastry that was
to tempt the appetite of his "maiden aunt," there was no air of
festivity about the place.  An extra vigorous sweeping of the carpets
had caused the dust to settle on everything, and Jack thought with
dismay of Mabel's white muslin, fully expecting her to appear as he
had seen her last and continue exactly where they had left off.

His heart was throbbing almost painfully when the actual hour arrived
and passed by.  He listened for her step on the stairs, and inwardly
cursed Mrs. Maguire's scrubbing brush.  Presently there was a pause
in the stair washing, murmuring apologies from Mrs. Maguire, and a
light, quick step.

It was she at last.

He flung wide the door, and wanted to shout like a school boy.  His
arms instinctively spread out to receive his wife with a great,
joyous hug, but he received a check when a dark-clad figure, with a
pale face and great woebegone eyes speaking nervous terror, came
faltering towards him.

"My darling!" he cried, and folded her to his heart.  "Welcome,
little wife!  Why, what----"

"Oh!" gasped Mrs. Maguire, ten stairs below, despite her deafness.
"Little wife, eh?  Another of them hussies!  He's as bad as the rest."

"So you have come," he cried, as he closed the door.  But his voice
dropped; he was chilled.

"Jack," she quavered, without so much as looking round at his festive
preparations.  "I have come, but I am going away again.  I must
go--at once."

"Go at once, darling!  But why?  What have you come for?"

"Only to go away again, Jack--only to say good-bye."

"Come to say good-bye!" gasped Jack, in dull amazement.

He was not quite sure of her meaning.

She turned her eyes to his face piteously.  "Yes, Jack, you'll be
surprised, and shocked, and heart-broken, and angry, I know.  But I
can't stay.  I must get back at once.  I oughtn't to have been seen
here.  That horrid woman on the stairs was quite rude to me, and told
me you were expecting your aunt, and I'd better not go up."

"Oh, that's all right!" laughed Jack.  "I thought to stifle her
curiosity and get her out of the way by a fiction.  You are the aunt.
But why this state of excitement?  What has happened?"

"Jack, you'll think it very strange; but I can't tell you what has
happened.  Things are different with me.  I'm not the person I
was--or rather, I thought I was.  We made an awful mistake in not
taking Lady Hester's advice.  Oh, Jack, I have ruined you.  But it is
not too late."

"Ruined me?  What do you mean?  Have they found out at home?"

"No, not at your home."

"Ah, at yours?  Pshaw!  Papa turned up rusty?  Well, we'll soon talk
him over."

"My father doesn't know, Jack.  God forbid that he should."

"Then what is there to worry about?"

"Jack, Jack, I am almost crazy!  I've thought everything out from
every point of view until I'm nearly mad.  Our marriage was a
mistake--a hideous, awful mistake."

"Mabel!"

"Nobody knows but Tom Nestor, and he must be sworn to silence.
Nobody knows.  Nobody ever must know.  It's for your good, Jack.
You're a man, and you've got to live and make a career for yourself.
You mustn't be ruined by--oh, how can I tell you!--I can't tell
you--I can't--I simply can't!"

"Look here, little girl, you're upset and talking in riddles.  Come
here--let me put my arms about you and sober you.  You're excited."

"Jack, Jack, I am heartbroken.  You don't understand.  I've really
come to say good-bye--no, don't touch me.  Keep away!  I can't bear
it."

"Oh, if it's like that, I'll hear your explanation from the
hearthrug," observed Jack, rather testily.  He took up his position
in front of the mantelpiece and rammed his hands into his trousers
pockets.  "Come now, what is it?  What have I done?  What have you
done?  What has happened?"

Mabel sat with writhing hands clasped in her lap, shoulders bent, and
eyes cast on the ground.  She wrestled manfully with her torturing
sorrow, yet true to the quixotic resolution she had made, to keep her
own counsel.  She had nerved herself to face Jack and deny him so
much as a touch of the hand lest she should break down in hopeless
despair.

"Jack, I know you'll think me strange--mad, if you like, but I can't
explain.  I am not the person I thought I was.  My father is not the
man I imagined.  I don't know who my mother was, and whether I have a
right to the name I bear.  I am nobody--nothing--worse than nothing.
I should bring discredit upon you.  Your father would never forgive
me, and Lady Hester--ah, well, Lady Hester might understand.  But we
must part, Jack.  Yes, don't look at me like that, as though you were
amused.  It is breaking my heart, but it will have to come, and
better now than later, when people had found out and I had
compromised you by--by coming here, for instance."

Jack's face grew serious.  The tragedy in Mabel's eyes was too real.
The determination of her little mouth was grim and threatening.

"Look here, Mabel, I see you're upset, and it's no good my being
angry with you.  But I'd prepared tea and got the place ready for
your homecoming, and was looking forward to a jolly, happy time, when
you burst upon me with mystery and threats that stagger a chap.  Take
off your hat, little girl, and settle down and recover your balance.
Here's a nice, comfortable chair I've had recovered for you.  As for
saying good-bye--well--it's all tommyrot, you know.  There can be no
earthly reason for a husband and wife to part unless love is dead and
they are sick of one another.  Even then they don't generally part
until one or the other has had too much of it.  And we haven't begun."

"Oh, if I had only known!" sobbed Mabel, bursting into tears at last,
and burying her face in her hands.  Her grief was so tumultuous that
Jack caught his breath in alarm and stood staring helplessly.

"What's the matter, Mabel?  What have I done?  You can't have
repented in this short time.  Why, how many hours is it since we
parted in Kensington Gardens?  Explain yourself.  Here, don't cry.
Tell me what you want.  What is it?  You've no business to keep me in
the dark.  Look here, Mabel, I say, don't cry like that, for God's
sake!  I don't know what on earth to do or say to comfort you."

He dropped on one knee before her and tried to draw her to him.  But
she shrank away.  "No, no, don't touch me.  It is all over.  It must
be.  It is your only chance, Jack.  It isn't too late.  You've got to
forget me."

"But we're married."

"Yes.  I know.  But I never intend to be your wife."

"Never intend?  Why?"

"I cannot explain, Jack.  It would only mean needless misery for me
and sorrow and disgrace for you."

"Needless misery for you?  Is your love for me dead, then?"

"Y--yes."

"Oh, that's comforting.  You seem to have arrived at that frame of
mind rather quickly."

He returned to the hearthrug pale with anger and mortification.

"Jack, I--I am a disgraceful person.  You would be ashamed of me.
You could never own me.  You would be ruined socially, and in time
you would come to despise me."

Jack scratched his head and showed signs of rising temper.  He kicked
away the hassock beside the armchair, and took a turn up and down the
room.

"I know you've a right to be angry," faltered Mabel, raising a
trembling hand.  "You will think dreadful things of me, and there
will come a time when you'll curse the day we ever met; we mustn't
meet again."

"Mabel, you're talking nonsense," cried Jack, with gathering anger in
his fine eyes.

"Don't look at me like that, Jack, I can't bear it.  I don't want you
to think hardly of me.  It is not altogether my fault."

"Is it mine, then?" he blazed out.  "What have I done in heaven's
name that my wife comes to me in this amazing, sensational fashion,
and coolly tells me that I must regard my marriage as nothing, and
forget her, and go through life as though I'd never known the love of
a wife.  At last, I thought I'd known it.  Were you playing with me?
Did you treat it as a joke?  Do you suppose the bond tied by Tom
Nestor isn't really binding?"

"People have married before," she faltered, "and have lived to regret
it, and parted, and--and the mere ceremony can't much matter to a man
after the first twinge of sorrow is over, especially if the woman
never raises her voice to say a word, or admits that she is his wife.
I've thought it all out, Jack.  I am impossible to you as a wife.
Your family would disown me.  It is good-bye."

"You appal me."

Poor Jack felt cold shudders down his back, as he saw the implacable
earnestness in his wife's face.  She meant what she said, and he knew
enough of her already to understand that she had a will of her own
when her emotions were roused.

"Jack, you wouldn't like them to say that you had married an
adventuress?"

"An adventuress?"

"Yes, and the daughter of an adventurer.  You think my father is a
gentleman--oh, I can't, I can't tell you.  Those four days at Weybury
were the happiest in my life."

"Mabel, you don't mean it!" cried Jack, triumphantly, in accents of
real relief.  He rushed to her and folded her in his arms.

"Don't!" she groaned, as though his touch were agony.  "I shall never
know happiness again.  I must forget the past."

He clasped her to his heart and pressed hot kisses on her cheeks.
"Mabel, you've been hiding something from me, something I ought to
know.  But I don't care.  You are mine--mine!  I love you.  You are
my little wife, and I've got you here imprisoned in my arms and you
cannot escape me.  I don't believe your stories.  You love me.  There
was no sham.  Kiss me, darling.  You are in my arms.  We're here
alone, away from all the world, and whatever your trouble is, it is
mine."

"Let me go!" she gasped, thrusting herself away from him whitefaced
and terrified as though his lips were afire.  "Let me go!  I'm too
horrible and loathy.  I am a living fraud.  I can never look again
into the faces of those who have been kind to me--and you, Jack,
you'll drive me to kill myself if you don't let me go.  Let me go, I
tell you.  You are killing me."

"I won't.  I won't!" he cried passionately, holding her to him in a
grasp of steel.

"Jack, you shan't!" she screamed in a wild outburst of hysterical
frenzy.  A mad cry that was almost a shriek escaped her lips, and
Jack's blood ran cold.  He released her like a hot coal, for an
instant, almost doubted her sanity.

The tense moment was startlingly relieved by a dull thud on the outer
door.  One heavy bang at the knocker was followed by another a trifle
louder.  It was Mrs. Maguire's accustomed summons, and usually
heralded her imminent entry without further ceremony when Jack was
alone--and the door was not locked.  He had forgotten to turn the
key, and Mrs. Maguire's head appeared with startling suddenness.
Jack strode to the door with a curse upon his lips.

"What the----"

"Your aunt, sir," announced Mrs. Maguire calmly, quite unmoved by the
outburst.  "She's come.  I told her that you was engaged for a few
minutes; but she's got as far as the second landing, and says she
finds the stairs so trying she'd be glad if you'd give her your arm."

"It's nobody for me, you idiot!  Go away."

"Beg pardon, sir, she asked for you.  'Tell him it's Aunt Caroline,'
she says; 'he doesn't expect me, but as I was passing I called,' and
she ain't got no card."

"Aunt Caroline!" groaned Jack, vaguely recalling a long-forgotten
promise of his aunt to visit him in his chambers and be shown over
the Temple Church.

"She mustn't see me!" cried Mabel, recovering her equilibrium in the
face of danger.

"No, miss, that's what I thought," observed Mrs. Maguire tartly.
"She is trying the next flight, sir."

"Let me go," whispered Mabel appealingly.

"You can't go down; you'll meet her on the stairs," groaned Jack,
and, of course, he fell back on the ancient and convenient expedient
much beloved by writers of farce, and occasionally resorted to by
bachelors and owners of chambers with limited accommodations.  He
pointed to the door of the inner room, and Mabel vanished.

Jack smoothed his ruffled hair, and tried to recover his balance and
his breath.  Surprise was following upon surprise so rapidly that it
was not easy to assume composed features.  He quite forgot to hide
the evidences of festive preparations, but he was sufficiently a
humbug to play his part well.  As soon as he could control his voice
and rearrange his tie he dashed down the staircase to greet his
father's sister.

"Well, aunt, this is a surprise!  How are you?  Who'd have thought of
expecting you?"

"Who'd thought of finding you at the top of so many stairs, Jack--and
such dirty ones?"  This with a withering look at draggled Mrs.
Maguire, who sniffed her resentment.

"Is it much further up, Jack?"

"Only a few stairs, aunt.  That's my door there, at the top."

"With your assistance I can--(puff)--get up.  I'll never attempt it
again."

"I wish you had not attempted it now," thought Jack, but he declared
that it was very good of her to have tried.

"I was passing the Temple, and we drove through.  When I saw the name
Middle Temple Lane I remembered my promise to call, and yours to take
me over the church.  I think it's the only important church in London
I have never yet seen, and I regard its inspection as a duty."

"It's a bad day to-day, aunt--that's right, only two more
stairs--and--and if you're going over the church wouldn't you go
before tea and save a double climb?  I can soon get my hat and come
down to you.  Don't come any higher."

"What! struggle up these stairs again for tea?  No, Jack, thank you.
I suppose this person who attends to your comforts can make a cup of
tea?"

"Oh, that'll be all right, aunt.  Mind the bend, it's rather
dangerous."

Aunt Caroline was a very severe, prim, upright old lady of more than
medium height, good-looking in her way, but pallid, sharp-eyed,
hook-nosed, and hawk-like.  She was never strong, except in mind.
She was dressed in a black, close-fitting costume, that displayed a
figure still handsome.  Her head was set upon her shoulders
uncompromisingly, and her black chiffon bonnet was by no means
frumpish, and harmonized well with her sombre appearance.  A lady
undoubtedly, but one of the old school that considers it bad form to
bend the back and droop even in declining years.  Her eyes usually
missed nothing, and her tongue was nimble.  Jack trembled inwardly as
he led her into the sitting-room.

"Is this where you work and live?" she asked, pausing on the
threshold and raising her forbidding pince-nez.

"Yes, aunt, this is my humble abode.  Not very gorgeous--is it?"

"It looks comfortable enough.  Humph! flowers.  Never knew you were
fond of flowers."

"Oh, yes, aunt--always," cried the truthful nephew eagerly; "always
fond of flowers, but never took much trouble about the place--always
did at Oxford.  It relieves the gloom a bit--doesn't it.  Sit down,
aunt, and we'll get you some tea."

"I never saw any flowers at Oxford."

Aunt Caroline waved away the newly-covered armchair in favor of a
hard, wooden-backed thing near the wall, from which point of vantage
she could survey everything.  Her eyes alighted first upon the holes
in the table cloth, then she stared at the two cups and the plate of
indigestible pastry, the thin bread-and-butter, cut by Jack
himself--also full of holes--and at a wine-glass, from which a
beautiful red rose drooped grace-fully, set beside one of the cups as
a mark of favor to the expected guest.

For whom else but a woman?

Aunt Caroline was transfixed with astonishment and discreet horror,
and it was a full minute before she could withdraw her frigid gaze--a
minute of cold terror for Jack, whose brow grew clammy with the
mental effort of groping in the mists of self-consciousness for a
suitable remark to break the spell.  Aunt Caroline came to his rescue
adroitly with a cold, steely utterance.

"It is remarkably fine weather, Jack."

"Yes, aunt, awfully fine; so--so good for roses.  Awfully fine
weather for roses!" exclaimed Jack, repeating himself stupidly and
putting a boisterous emphasis into his remarks, when Aunt Caroline's
eyes turned once more to the wine-glass.  "There's a chap comes here
sometimes to tea with me who is awfully fond of roses.  I picked that
one out for him in case he should come."

"Then you are expecting him?" queried Aunt Caroline icily.

"Yes, he may turn up at any moment.  But it is uncertain."

"And does he eat that peculiarly repulsive pastry?" She bent down and
examined Mrs. Maguire's purchases through her lorgnette.

"Oh, he can eat anything.  So can I."

"You have changed then, my boy.  You used to be a particularly dainty
feeder."

"Oh, you get cured of that in chambers, you know.  Burnt bacon for
breakfast and emaciated fried eggs."

Aunt Caroline looked at the clock, wondering mentally how long she
could keep her carriage waiting in the hope of being on the spot when
the gentleman with the cast-iron interior turned up.  Jack busied
himself with the kettle on the gas ring to hide his constraint.  He
knew perfectly well that Aunt Caroline did not believe a word he had
said.  The pause gave her eagle eye time to sweep the apartment, and
in a moment she detected the presence of a thing under Jack's boot
which a mere man would never notice--a woman's veil, light as
gossamer.  She gave a little snort, and Jack turned inquiringly.

"Did you speak, aunt?"

"No," she replied, with a sniff, again surveying her surroundings and
diagnosing the building structure.  "That must be his bedroom," she
thought, "that the kitchen.  If I stay here long enough I shall make
myself very much in the way, and perhaps learn something."

Jack talked volubly about Ripley and the Temple, and churches, and
everything likely to interest his aunt; but her answers were
monosyllabic, and she fell into long abstractions with her eyes glued
upon his bedroom door, as though her piercing gaze would penetrate
the panels.  He devoutly hoped that Mabel would not make a sound.
Aunt Caroline paid very little attention to his conversation, for,
during a pause, she blurted out without any preamble--

"You ought to get married, Jack.  This is not the sort of place for a
decent man to live in."

"No, aunt; I agree with you.  It is not; and I want to get married.
I can't imagine a more blissful state; but father has other views."

"Does he know the life you're living?"

This was rather disconcerting, and Jack was flustered.

"The life I'm leading?  Oh, yes.  I've told him how miserable it is
in this ghastly place; but, you see, I can't afford anything better.
Not only does he scout the idea of my marrying, but he refuses to
sanction even an engagement."

"I should think so, indeed!"

"Yet you say I ought to get married, aunt."

There was an awkward pause.

"Who's the girl, Jack?" snapped the old lady, biting off her words
one by one, with her eyes fastened upon the rose.  He positively
gasped.  He could not answer.  He ran his hand over his hair
uneasily, and stammered before he could reply.

"The--the--lady I am in love with is--is the most charming girl
imaginable.  Father likes her, and mother simply adores her."

"So I've heard.  Is she respectable?"

"Aunt!"

"Does she dress in clouds of white muslin, and go about unattended in
the park in the morning, holding hands with men?"

"Ah, you've seen her!" cried Jack, with a wonderful burst of memory,
and beaming genially.  "Of course, you passed us."

"If she is the person I saw with you in Kensington Gardens, I don't
think much of her.  Your father is quite right.  Matrimony is a
precarious business, and a man's wife should bring him credit and not
be a gay flyabout who has never known a mother's care, and runs wild
meeting men in the park."

"But she was meeting me, aunt.  We love each other."

"Yet you promised not to see her for the present."

"I am not aware that I promised anything.  Father made some absurd
stipulations, forgetting that I am no longer a boy."

"Jack, that's not the sort of woman for you.  Have you forgotten that
you have no money?"

"Am I likely to forget it here?" he groaned gloomily.

"Have you forgotten that you are my heir, Jack?"

"Well--well, I never thought about it, aunt.  What has that to do
with it?"

"It has this to do with it, my boy, that if you showed any promise of
succeeding in your profession and applying yourself to the serious
business of life, I should be quite prepared to supplement your
father's allowance by another equally large----"

"Oh! aunt, that's wonderfully kind of you!  I never thought of such a
thing."

"No, nor I, till it came to my ears that you were philandering with
women instead of attending to your work."

"Philandering, aunt?  I am in dead earnest.  There is only one woman
for me----"

"Yes, and that is Beatrice Carew," snapped the old lady.  "The girl
has been in love with you for years.  She is well connected, and a
splendid match in every way."

"Beatrice, my wife!" exclaimed Jack, with a smile of incredulity.  "I
never thought of such a thing."

"Yes, you did, until this fluffy schoolgirl person with her foreign
ways came along from Italy, or wherever she came from, and fooled you
by a display of frivolity and animation to which you were not
accustomed.  Beatrice Carew is in every way desirable.

"I care nothing for Beatrice, aunt.  Besides, she's Mabel's dearest
friend.  I never cared a rap for Beatrice."

"Nonsense!  You hunted with her, played tennis with her, walked with
her, fished with her----"

"But you were always there, aunt.  You know that very well----"

"Yes, and if this Mabel person hadn't come along you would have
married Beatrice.  I should have seen to that."

Jack shrugged his shoulders and smiled with a superior air that
irritated the elder lady.

"Jack, who saw to your bringing up?"

"Why you did, aunt--after mother died."

"And before that, too.  Your mother, poor thing, was always helpless;
and I'm afraid you're the same, unless you're looked after."

Again Jack shrugged his shoulders.  Aunt Caroline glared once more at
the rose.  "I brought you up with decent ideas, and I intended that
you should marry as early as possible a decent woman."

"There's only one woman for me, aunt.  I am resolved."

"Oh, yes, love in a cottage on nothing a year.  Poverty, squabbles,
and a good man spoiled by a silly wife.  I am quite in accord with
your father.  You must cast this Mabel person out of your mind."

"This Mabel person, as you call her, is all the world to me."

"Nonsense, my dear boy.  There are more women than one in the world,
and I'm sorry to see that you've already found it out."

Jack, with an apparently absent-minded movement, pushed the
wine-glass with the rose behind the teapot out of sight.

"You'll be easily consoled, Jack; and, what is more to the point,
you'll be able to marry Beatrice Carew comfortably.  She has a
reasonable income, though a small one; and as for you--well, do you
know how much I'm worth?"

"I haven't the faintest idea, aunt.  I never thought about it."

"How do you think I manage to keep up a house in town and the cottage
at Ripley, and horses, and servants?"

"I never really gave it any consideration.  You and father have never
known the want of money--that's all I know.  I supposed that
father----"

"Perhaps you'll be surprised to hear that your father's private
income is less than mine?"

Jack opened his eyes wide in astonishment.

"Would you be surprised to know that it was I who paid for your
education and your debts at Oxford--everything?"

"Well, aunt, you know, you've been such a mother to
me--that--that----"

"That you have set no value upon services rendered.  So like a man!
Jack, my income is three thousand a year--and I don't spend two.  I
am your father's elder sister, and most of the money was left to me
for fear he should squander it in the fantastic philanthropic schemes
which absorbed all his interest as a young man.  I've looked upon the
money largely as left in trust.  I have no other nephews and nieces,
and your father has enough now for all his needs.  I can spare at
least a thousand a year for you, Jack----"

"Aunt!"

"When you are married."

"You overwhelm me."

"Don't be overwhelmed.  Money never changes hands without conditions.
It is Beatrice Carew or nobody.  If you marry this foreign-bred,
frivolous person with the loose manners, not a penny will you get,
now--or hereafter!"

"Then, aunt, I can only thank you for your good wishes and decline."

"Tut-tut, boy.  Don't make an absurd parade of sentiment.  You
haven't an ounce of it in your nature."

"I'm sure I can't see how you arrive at that estimate of me."

"Can't you?" snapped the old lady, bristling.  "That's how I arrive
at it," dragging out the rose, "Will you kindly explain to me how a
man who professes to be irrevocably lost in love with Miss Mabel
Nobody can fill in the hours with this sort of thing--and this?" Aunt
Caroline made a dive with her umbrella and raised the trampled veil
which had been torn from Mabel's hat in the struggle with her husband.

"Where on earth did that come from?" queried Jack, screwing up his
eyes, and peering at it with wonderful innocence.  "What is it?"

"A woman's veil.  You can't deceive me.  Ah, I know the sort, my boy.
I've not lived in the world for over fifty years with my eyes shut,
although I _am_ your maiden aunt.  And, what is more, the sort of
woman who likes to eat that stuff," indicating the plate of horrible
Fleet Street confectionery, "must be of the lowest type."

Jack was completely nonplussed.  He bit his lip, and choked, and
tried to protest, but the old lady hushed him down.  Yet, despite her
assumed anger, there was just a twinkle of amusement in her stern
eyes.  Aunt Caroline could be surprisingly human at times.  In fact,
the humanity came uppermost rather suddenly.

"Who is she, Jack?" she asked almost confidentially, and with an
eager, feminine curiosity which suggested that Aunt Caroline had a
certain sporting instinct.  "Is that the one?" indicating with her
umbrella the portrait of a buxom minor actress peeping out from
behind the corner of the picture of the cathedral.  It was only a
card from a cigarette packet; but Aunt Caroline didn't know that.

"Aunt, your suggestions wound me.  They are so abominably low," cried
Jack, with hauteur.

"Where's your friend who adores roses, then, eh?  He hasn't come yet.
And does this belong to the lady who scrubs the stairs?"

She spread out the veil and examined it before the light.  "Yes, it
looks like it, doesn't it?  Shall we ask the stair-lady?  Or shall I
go into that room there, and tell your actress to come out?  No, my
boy, it's no good blustering, fuming, and grinding your teeth like
that.  I'm not preaching any sermons"--again she smiled that queer
smile--"or saying that I'm shocked beyond words, because I'm not.  I
suspected it.  I was afraid of it.  I know you better than you know
yourself, Jack."

"Wonderful penetration!" sneered Jack, now thoroughly roused, and
bubbling over with injured innocence.

"I never made unfounded assertions; and I'm quite prepared to admit
that, after all, it may be only a harmless tea-party of two that an
old woman has disturbed.  Your sleeping apartment has, in the
emergency, been turned into a hiding-place, regardless of
appearances.  We will assume it is nothing worse than that."

"Aunt, you are jumping at conclusions."

"I'm not," contradicted the old lady, snapping out her words; "I'll
prove them, if you like."

Without any warning, she stepped over to the bedroom door, and with
the heavy, cat's-eye knob of her parasol banged once, loudly, upon
the thin oak panel, which gave out a sound like a pistol shot.  A
startled cry escaped Mabel involuntarily.

Aunt Caroline laughed--not a pleasant laugh,--a rasping, acid chuckle
that set Jack's teeth on edge.

"Now, then, Jack, we'll go and look over the church.  I'm sorry to be
a nuisance.  But I cannot risk coming here again; and I must see the
church.  If I'm making demands upon your time, I consider I am
entitled to it.  You owe me something, my boy.  I gave you a good
training, which seems to have been of little value.  If you'll go
over the church with me, it may bring you to a more sober frame of
mind, and allow the lady to escape and go home quietly."

Jack sighed despairingly.  He was cornered.  He was accustomed to
obey Aunt Caroline from childhood; and to irritate her further by a
refusal would only prejudice his case at home.  That her silence was
to be bought by discreet behavior he did not doubt.  Aunt Caroline
had a way of rising to amazing heights of discretion in times of
crisis, and could be blind and deaf at will.  She stalked with
dignity to the door, and waited for him to open it, then out on to
the landing, surveying everything as she went, and shuddering at the
dirt on the walls.  Jack lingered, and she knew why.  She smiled
sardonically and waited at the top of the stairs.  He stepped to his
bedroom door and whispered, "Wait for me, darling, I shan't be long;"
then followed like a school-boy taken to church for punishment.

Mabel had heard everything through the slender wooden partition which
divided the two rooms.  All that had passed only seemed to confirm
the wisdom of her decision to release her husband.  She had already
injured him and lowered him in the eyes of his foster-mother by
coming to his chambers unattended; but she burned with indignation at
the old woman's horrible insinuations.  She longed to rush out into
the fresh air.  She had regarded herself as vile enough since her
discovery of her father's infamy, but there were others ready to
consider her viler.

She looked round for her veil, and her eye caught sight of the rose
in the wine-glass.  She seized it and pressed it to her lip, sobbing
quietly.

The worst part of her task was over.  She had prepared Jack, but she
could not face a continuation of the interview so rudely interrupted.
She could bear reproaches; but Jack's arm about her, and his wild
caresses would utterly break her up.

She sat down at the writing-table and pencilled off a note, saying
good-bye, with a promise of a letter; then, taking the rose, fled
down the damp, newly-scrubbed stairs, out into the roadway.




CHAPTER IX

To a stranger the Temple is a labyrinth of passages, with the maximum
number of corners and the minimum number of exits--a weary maze for
those who would escape its quiet in haste.  Mabel hurried on
guiltily, striving to find a way out, and flushing hot beneath the
gaze of every inquisitive man who stared at her.  They seemed to be
questioning her presence in a place given over to men.  Aunt
Caroline's sneers were still fresh in her memory.  When at last she
escaped through a dirty iron gateway into a stuffy court, and thence
into the Strand, she was well-nigh desperate.  An idle cab conveyed
her home, and the glances of the passers-by intensified her feeling
of isolation.  She had been accustomed to go about alone before, but
since Aunt Caroline's scathing comments she was horribly
self-conscious.

Yet what did it matter?  She was alone forever now, and could not
expect to go about wrapped in cotton-wool.  An adventurer's daughter!
A nameless thing in pretty clothes, unfit to associate with even the
shabby City clerks or the humblest shop-girls!

A chaperone indeed!  A wife without a husband, a daughter without a
father, eating the bread of sin.  She sought consolation in the fact
that Jack had escaped.  His aunt had not seen her, and apparently had
no suspicion of their marriage.  At any other time she would have
laughed at the suggestion of Jack and Beatrice Carew marrying; now it
was with a twinge of jealousy she realized that by opposing his aunt
he would forfeit wealth in the future and very necessary comfort in
the immediate present.

Yes, it was fortunate that she had not ruined Jack utterly.  She
choked down her sobs and set her teeth, and tried to look upon the
world from a new point of view.  So far she had been dependent upon
friends for human society and sympathy, with the crowning joy of
Jack's love.  It was hard to realize that she was now but a straw on
the current of the great stream of London life--homeless almost, for
she could not stay at Stratton Street.  The very clothes she wore
belonged by right to some one else, since they must have been secured
with tainted gold.

She wondered where she would be in a year's time, what humble, honest
post she would be filling.  Would it be in a dreadful shop?  She was
not skilled enough for a clerk, and even a girl in a shop must have a
training and a beginning and honorable antecedents.

She thought of appealing to Lady Hester, as the only person who could
understand her terrible plight.  Lady Hester had faced a worse
situation and come through the ordeal unscathed.  But then Lady
Hester was somebody before she fell into the toils of a bad husband,
and could go back to what she had left.  She was not leaving a man
she loved to set behind her all that was worth having and go back to
nothing, penniless, friendless, and helpless, with that ignorance of
the way to work which comes of a life of comfort and luxury.

On her arrival home Voss opened the door of the flat, and a rank odor
of cigars puffed into her face.  She heard voices, the loudest of
them easily recognizable as Blunt's; he was laughing and shouting
triumphantly.

"The master wishes to see you the moment you return, miss," said Voss
softly.  "Mr. Blunt is here."

What a sickening memory the name recalled!  She had no intention of
watching the pigeon being plucked again, and would have escaped to
her room; but her father heard the door close, and cried out--

"Who is that?"

Voss barred her progress to her room, and she was forced to enter the
sitting-room.

"Ah! how d'you do?  Good afternoon," cried Blunt, who was beaming.
He gave one look up from his cards, crossed his right hand over his
left to offer her a hand, and hardly took his eyes from the cards.

"I'm winning," he explained.  "There you are!  Fifty again.  Ah, yes,
I am winning to-day.  My luck has turned, and your dad is fair wild.
He can't win even on a bluff."

"Sit down, Mabel.  That's a pretty rose you've got," observed
Bannister, motioning to Voss to wheel forward an arm-chair.

"I think I'll take off my things," murmured Mabel, eager to escape,
yet interested, in spite of herself, to hear that Blunt was winning.

"No, don't go," urged Blunt.  He shuffled the cards and stuck his
cigar in the corner of his mouth, and found time to give her an
admiring glance.  "Yes, a very pretty rose," he murmured, shifting
the cigar to the other side with his lips and puffing out clouds.
"Fair as the bosom that bears it--eh?  Ha, ha!  Not exactly what I
meant, but--you know."

"I expect Blunt would like the rose if you could spare it, Mabel.
He's a grower of roses, you know.  A wonderful chap for flowers.
Look at that bunch of lilies over there--his own growing, and brought
for you."

"It was very kind," murmured Mabel mechanically.  "But the rose is
falling already.  I--I think I'll put it in water."

"Ha, ha!  Given her by some johnny!" chuckled Blunt.  "Won't give it
up--eh?"

She colored deeply, and Bannister gave her a swift look.

Blunt won again, and Voss hovered round.  Mabel watched the fellow as
a cat watches a mouse, but though he passed a sidelong look at the
cards, she saw no secret signs.  The stakes were very high, and her
father would, of course, win in a minute.  But he did not.  She was
puzzled.  Was it, after all, a delusion?  Had she jumped to dreadful
conclusions without sufficient evidence?

She dropped back in the easy-chair and took up a newspaper, watching
her father stealthily all the time.  The genuine concern on his face
was very puzzling.  He seemed to be trying hard to win, and the cards
were always against him.  Voss brought forward whisky and her father
drank freely, forgetting his guest in the interest of the game.

She went cold all over with doubt and fear.  She had not yet measured
her father's genius for deception.  He was losing for Blunt's benefit
and for hers, to throw dust in the eyes of both by losing heavily for
once in a way, and making a great fuss about it for Mabel's
edification.  He had repented of his haste in allowing her a glimpse
behind the scenes of his life.  He liked everything to go smoothly
and softly, for he was genuinely fond and proud of his beautiful
daughter.  There was really no need for her delicate susceptibilities
to be wounded rashly.

He had decided many things in the last few hours.  He, too, had been
taking stock of the situation, and had made several noble
resolves--noble, that is, for him.

Resolution 1: was that it would be wiser to keep the ugly side of his
life from Mabel altogether.

Resolution 2: She should marry the Bishop's son at all costs.

Resolution 3: He would economize and labor feverishly for one year
more, until that substantial dot at the bank was large enough for him
to turn respectable.

Resolution 4: He was going to purchase the little place near Ripley,
if on examination it proved to be all that the advertisement
represented.

The idea of abandoning for ever the dangerous profession by which he
had become rich had been steadily maturing for three years now--ever
since Mabel had grown to womanhood.  But it needed several big
successes, several risky ventures yet, before he could amass the
proper amount to maintain himself in respectability and luxury
commensurate with his needs and usual habits of life.  Each year he
needed less and saved more, but it was slow work.

Voss brought in tea.  Mabel poured it out with a trembling hand,
keeping an eye on the game all the time.  Voss waited near, in full
view, behind Blunt's chair, and scratched his cheek idly, as if bored
and indifferent.  Bannister flashed an angry look at him and played
his hand and--lost, muttering, "Extraordinary luck! extraordinary
luck!"  At which Blunt chuckled and jumped in his seat in ecstasy,
like a delighted school-boy.

"It's turning at last--my luck's in!  I told you it would.  Thank
you, I'll take tea.  Don't often touch it, but from your fair
hands--eh?"

She passed the cup, and her hand shook so badly that Voss raised his
eyebrows in respectful surprise.

Gone was her wild resolution to denounce her father, regardless of
consequences.  The dust thrown in her eyes did not blind her, but it
dimmed her vision, and caused her to flounder.  She had too much
sense to utterly disregard the evidence of her senses upon previous
occasions; but somehow things did not seem so dreadful, and she
quaked at her rashness in jumping to such frightful conclusions.

Oh, if she could only doubt more!  If she could allow but a glimmer
of hope!  It meant--Jack and love!

Her father won the next deal.  Blunt pushed aside his tea rudely.  "I
always lose if I touch the d----d stuff."

Mabel trembled again.  Her father won once more, but it was only a
temporary change of luck.  Blunt grew desperate, doubled the stakes,
and played excitedly, like a novice, and won.  He laughed derisively
in his joy, and Bannister pretended to lose his temper, which pleased
Blunt almost as much as winning, for the languid exquisite usually
never turned a hair.  It was a triumph to excite the imperturbable
Mr. Bannister.

Mabel would have escaped, but her father called her back.  "We shall
be done in a minute.  Once more, Blunt, and then we stop, or you'll
clean me out."

Play finished, Bannister rose and stretched himself and smoothed his
pointed beard, and looked with pleasure upon his daughter.  He
recovered his broken spirits very quickly, and picked up a copy of a
land agent's catalogue from the side table to show Blunt.

"Blunt, you're a man from the country; I want your advice.  I'm
thinking of buying a little place near Ripley.  This is the
advertisement, with a good photograph of the place.  How does it
strike you?  I know nothing about the value of land and house
property.  My father discreetly left me his little fortune in funds."

The two men looked over the catalogue together, while Mabel surveyed
them with growing stupefaction.

"You see, I'm going to settle down as a respectable old widower, with
some good shooting to offer you youngsters.  I shall want you to come
down, and shoot with me, Blunt."

"Delighted, though I ain't much of a hand at that sort of thing.  We
kill our chickens in Africa by screwing their necks.  None of your
hand-reared stuff for me.  But I suppose it's classy, and I've got to
take to it.  Oh, yes; I'll come down and see you in the country,
especially with such a hostess," turning to Mabel with a grin and an
offensive wink.

"Oh, Mabel won't be there," laughed Bannister; "she's going to marry
Bishop Cardew's son."

"Indeed?  You surprise me.  My congratulations, miss."

Mabel was tongue-tied.  She flushed painfully, yet managed to flash
an angry glance at her father, who only looked amused.

"She's blushing, Blunt," he cried, playfully seizing her arm and
drawing her in front of him so that he could place his hands upon her
shoulders--a favorite trick with him when he wanted to survey his
lovely possession with fatherly pride.  She could have screamed.  She
held herself in check and bit her lip, resolved at all costs to
suffer all that was demanded of her until the proper time for
rebellion.

"Yes; she's going to marry the Bishop's son.  It is all settled."

"Father, you are premature.  You know it isn't settled."

"Oh, yes; Jack's father and I settled it this morning."

"This morning!" she murmured in surprise.

"Yes; I breakfasted with Panoli, the dramatist, this morning.  He
gathers to his table all the notabilities of the day, and the Bishop
was in town and going to be there, so I invited myself.  I was
dreading my promised visit to the Palace; churchmen are not in my
line.  But when I saw the jolly old Bishop--fine old fellow he is,
too,--and put the matter sensibly to him as father to father, he came
round to my way of thinking.  You see, it was all a matter of
settlements.  They're devils for cash, those church boys.  He didn't
want his son to marry a penniless nobody; but I explained that I
could spare you a thousand a year, and he was as meek as a lamb.  As
a matter of fact, he didn't intend to allow his son as much as that,
but he'll have to.  You can manage on a thousand, Mabel."  Then,
turning to Blunt, "It ought to be enough for a girl--eh, Blunt?"

"Well, I reckon if she's got her father's tastes and freehandedness
with money, it won't go far," chuckled Blunt, counting up his
winnings on a bit of paper at the card table.

This indiscriminate revelation of family affairs before Blunt was
done to disarm questioning on her part.  She understood that; but her
consternation at this news was written on her face.

"Then--then you are not going down to the Palace?" she stammered.

"Oh, dear, yes.  I want to see your friend, Lady Hester.  The dear
old Bishop is a man of the world, and a jolly old boy.  I've accepted
his invitation there for a week."

Voss, who was clearing away the tea things, almost dropped a cup in
his astonishment and joy.  This was the first intimation he had
received of his senior partner's next move.

"I think I'll put that rose in water," murmured Mabel chokingly, and
rendered utterly dazed by the conflicting ideas aroused by these
surprises.  She was almost on the verge of a faint.  The ground
seemed to turn to cotton wool, the pictures on the walls swam before
her eyes; she overturned the wine glass and dropped the rose.  How
she escaped from the room she scarcely knew.

When she came to herself she was seated on the side of her bed, with
Jack's rose all crumpled in her hand.

Everything settled--and a thousand a year!

Either she had been the victim of an absurd delusion about her
father's manner of life, or he was lying for Blunt's benefit.

The situation was confusing in the extreme.  Doubt surged on doubt
until she floundered in a sea of conflicting emotions.  She recalled
her father's lies to Mr. Bowman, the jeweler, about his collection of
gems.  Was this last pronouncement of the same order?  Yet he never
lied deliberately to her.

She had no knowledge whatever of his finances.  He might be rich, for
all she knew.  She had supposed him to be a beggarly adventurer,
living from hour to hour upon what he could filch from honest men.
An allowance of a thousand a year sounded large, but not so large to
a girl accustomed to the conversation of very wealthy people.  Yet
she knew school girl friends who had embarked on matrimony with three
hundred for pin money from their parents, and considered themselves
fortunate.  Jack had talked of making a thousand a year at the Bar in
the dim future, as though it would mean unlimited riches.

Again, her father's promises to the Bishop might be wilful deception.
Yet the talk of buying property near Ripley argued considerable
wealth, and she knew that it had been a cherished ambition with him
to own a place in the country.  His continuous interest in land
agents' catalogues and occasional journeys, and oft-expressed
admiration of places he spied from the railway carriage windows, all
colored his assertion that he was in a position to become a landed
proprietor.  Before she would have taken all these things as a matter
of course, never questioning where the money came from.  But now the
hopeless mystification of everything was maddening.




CHAPTER X

For a brief hour Mabel managed to delude herself into the belief that
her infamous suspicions of her father were groundless, and the future
was rosy; but feminine instinct was stronger than reason.  She
suspected that his estate near Ripley and the thousand a year, were
only items in an elaborate fraud of which the unsuspecting Bishop and
herself were to be the victims.

Any doubts she might have had about his meeting the Bishop at the
dramatist's house were set at rest by an impetuous telegram from Lady
Hester, which arrived as she was dressing for dinner.

"Bishop just home.  Have heard the news.  Said it would come all
right.  Come down with your father to-morrow.--HESTER."

To-morrow--as soon as that?  It was like him to give her no warning
of his movements.  She could not demand his refusal of the Bishop's
invitation unless she gave reasons; and when it came to speaking out,
her accusations seemed too preposterous and terrible.  It would mean
a heart-rending scene with one inevitable end--flight from her
father's roof.

They now dined frequently at the houses of her father's friends, or
at some West End hotel, where he generally managed to meet people he
knew; for the culinary arrangements at the flat were very variable,
and quite inadequate to satisfy Mr. Bannister's fastidious tastes,
and he shunned _tête-à-têtes_ with his daughter.  He ate little at
home, and Mabel put up uncomplainingly with whatever she could get
when her father's engagements made it impossible for her to accompany
him.

This evening he had announced, on passing her door, that it was to be
"dinner at the Berkeley," and Lady Charley's afterwards--Lady Charley
being a well-known and rather rapid person at whose house a mixed
gathering assembled nearly every evening for play, and where stakes
ran high.  Her father's luck at cards was proverbial; it had a
terrible significance now; and she shuddered at the thought of
accompanying him.  Yet it had to be faced.  It would give her one
more opportunity of watching him.  Voss certainly would not be there;
and, if he won--well, how was she to know the means employed, when
others, more experienced, gamblers by instinct and hard-head men of
the world, were taken in.

She looked five years older as she stood in the little sitting room
waiting for him, a motionless figure in shadowy black draperies,
against which her white shoulders and arms and colorless face gleamed
like ivory in an ebon setting.  The red-shaded light of the electric
lamp, an exquisite bronze-figure holding the light aloft, sent a soft
and mysterious glow over everything, and intensified the pallor of
the drawn, anxious face.  Her eyes glowed large and luminous with a
flickering, uncertain, dangerous light in them.  She moved
mechanically towards a little table containing a collection of
Japanese curios--tiny opium bottles of green jade, pink coral, and
amber, and some wonderful little ivories and bronzes, and her nervous
white fingers played over these treasures with an indefinite
fluttering movement which told of mental pre-occupation.  Then her
eyes traveled round the room, the contents of which she seemed to be
really seeing for the first time.  Everything about her told of
wealth, of refinement; and there was that undeniable restfulness
about the place which at once satisfied the mind and the eye.  She
looked round wonderingly and critically; there was no jarring or
false note anywhere.  A beautiful landscape by Corot set the key for
the whole room; its silver-grey tones intensified by the soft red of
the heavy silk with which the walls were covered, the rosy glow of
which also emphasized the delicacy of some flower studies by Fantin
Latour--queer pictures for a man's room.  There were quaint, antique
silver vessels filled with flowers on every table.  He loved flowers.
Remembering this gentle trait, she again set the balance in his
favor; for by some odd method of reasoning women are always willing
to believe the best of a man who is fond of children, dogs, and
flowers; and they always associate crime with reserve, ferocity, and
ugliness.

Her reverie was broken by the sharp tinkle from the little Empire
clock upon the mantel-shelf.  A thin, shuddering sigh came brokenly
from her lips, which again grew hard in expression, and the dangerous
gleam leaped back into her eyes as she heard Voss speaking to her
father.  She drew on her long white gloves; tugging at them in a
sharp, impatient manner quite new to her, like a woman of action, not
the lackadaisical, pleasure-loving, feminine, flower-like thing she
had always been.  She had dressed with unusual rapidity, and her
whole being was alert, ready for action.  The wife and woman in her
were awakened.  The lowest depths were stirred.  Her whole life hung
in the balance.

If her father could wear a mask and make his moves stealthily in the
dark, so could she.  She was powerless to control anything, but at
least she could watch the current and peer into the eddies, and
decide whether she was to go helplessly on the bosom of a raging
torrent or strike boldly for the shore.

"I am a wife--a wife!" she murmured inwardly.  "I must be forbearing.
I must risk nothing, and be patient for Jack's sake.  I have been
rash; I must be cautious, and cunning.  If I make a mistake I lose
all and gain nothing.  But I must know, I must know."

Voss followed her father into the sitting room, carrying his evening
coat and hat.  Bannister looked his best in evening dress, so
_distingué_, so slender, so restrained in movement.  There was
something foreign--or perhaps better expressed in the word
"cosmopolitan"--in his bearing.  The sharp pointed crimped beard, the
dark eyes, the graceful black hair with the grey tuft over the
forehead, and the white effeminate hands suggested the foreign
diplomat, or Italian or Russian aristocrat, rather than a trim,
well-groomed Englishnian.  He was humming lightly to himself, and
gave no greeting to Mabel, although his eye swept over her in a
swift, comprehensive glance of approval.  He acted as though no cloud
existed between them, and no change had taken place in his
light-hearted daughter.  He addressed all his remarks to Voss,
however, and with a final "Come along, child," led the way down
stairs to the cab.

They drove in silence to Piccadilly.  The hotel porter smilingly
assisted her to alight.  The head waiter received them genially, and
ushered them to the table which was always reserved for Mr. Bannister
till after a certain hour.

"No, no, not there."  He waved his disapproval.  "Not to-night.  I am
expecting a guest.  The other table, if you please."

"Who is the guest, father?" she managed to ask.

"All in good time, little girl--all in good time.  I invited no one;
but I have a suspicion that a gentleman who knows where to find us at
this hour will turn up by accident and join us."

"You don't mean Mr. Blunt?  We can't be seen with him here.  He is so
dreadful."

"Blunt--good heavens, no!"

She was not left long in uncertainty.  Before the soup was removed
her father's eyes glanced quickly towards the door, and he waved
genially to some one who immediately made his way across to their
table.  Her back was turned towards the newcomer, and she dreaded to
look round.  She feared everybody now, and trembled at the sight of a
friend.

"Mabel, my child, a friend of yours," murmured Bannister, with a
smile as he rose.  Mabel looked up, and, to her amazement, saw Jack
bending down with outstretched hand and beaming face.

"Jack?" she gasped, looking very frightened.

"I got your telegram, Mr. Bannister," explained Jack, wringing his
future father-in-law's hand genially.  "It was very kind of you.  I
also had a wire from Lady Hester," this with a meaning look at Mabel,
who dropped her eyes, and went paler than ever.

Jack joined them for the meal, and he tried to cover his
disappointment at Mabel's strange, cold timidity by an excess of
amiability and boisterousness, and she could not help comparing his
rough, British gaiety with her father's suave self-possession.
Bannister talked of everything but the subject which was upper-most
in the minds of all; but as the meal progressed Jack broached the
subject of the recent meeting with his father.  Bannister at once
enlarged upon the Bishop's charming personality, and declared that he
was looking forward to going to Ripley with the greatest zest.  Mabel
was coming too.

Jack gave a swift glance across; and she explained that Lady Hester
had invited her by telegram.

"I wish I could come too," he declared sadly.  "But I've
unfortunately got a brewery case coming on that will keep me busy for
a week.  If I can get away for the week-end I shall certainly run
down."

Mabel was eating nothing, and her husband, who was by no means blind,
saw that there was a change in her.  At the mention of her father's
visit to the Palace she gave him a frightened look; a strange
expression of bewilderment swam in her eyes.  Remembering his
extraordinary interview with her in the Temple, he knew that
something was wrong, but was quite unable to imagine the source of
the trouble.  Bannister kept the conversation running on the Palace
and Ripley, and made many inquiries concerning the surrounding
country and the little property known as Dingle Hall.  Jack knew the
old place well, and described it.  When Bannister casually remarked
that he was coming down to purchase the place if it came up to his
expectations, Jack stared in obvious surprise.

"Ah, you think an idler, a town idler like me, has no need of a place
like that.  I'm a town bird, I admit.  But I have accepted so much
hospitality from my friends that the time is coming when I must
return it, or they will grow tired and forget me.  You two young
people won't be able to afford an estate in the country yet
awhile--so I understand from your father, Jack--but when I'm under
the ground Dingle Hall may come in useful to you."

"You speak as though everything, even to details, had been settled
between you and father, Mr. Bannister."

"Well, practically so, my boy.  You see, it was a question of
settlements; and when I told the Bishop that I was prepared to make
Mabel an allowance of a large slice of my income, he withdrew all
opposition at once.  I can't spare her more than a thousand a year,
Jack; but she's very dear to me.  It will mean the curtailment of a
good many unnecessary extravagances, a little less play, and a little
more sport in the fresh air of the country.  By the bye, who's going
to win the Hunt Cup?"

"I never bet," replied Jack tamely, rather staggered, and subdued by
Bannister's easy way of talking of money and country estates.

"Racing isn't much in my line, either," observed Bannister.  "But I
always have a hundred on the Hunt Cup.  It gives one an interest in
the running.  Let me see, who won last year?  Ah, I remember, I went
down on the Duke of Redmond's motor.  There's a fellow for you, one
who ought to be worth a gold mine to a lawyer.  Always in litigation.
You know him?"

Jack humbly disclaimed any knowledge of so exalted a person, but
thought his father knew the duke.  Mabel listened in increasing
wonderment and confusion.  How impossible it seemed that a man moving
in her father's set could be the scamp adventurer that she had
imagined from the overheard conversations with Voss.  Once more she
choked down her wild doubts, and tried to smile and be natural, and
the color returned to her cheeks.

Jack's eyes had been greedily devouring her.  She was in a charming
gown that he had not seen before, and her hair was dressed in a
manner new to him.  She seemed less girlish, but exquisite.

"My wife--my wife!" he was saying to himself whenever there was a
pause; and her mysterious hysterical outburst of the early afternoon
receded further and further into the back ground.  Bannister's
announcement that he was going to allow Mabel an income much larger
than his own, a sum that would make marriage pleasant and easy, moved
the young man to almost affectionate geniality.

What a handsome pair they were, and what a bore he felt beside the
polished cosmopolitan!  How ignorant he was on even such trivial
matters as the delicacies of the table.  Bannister made a splendid
host, and had selected strange, fascinating dishes and rare vintages
for Jack's benefit.  Mabel was sufficiently wide awake to know that
her father did not take so much trouble over everybody, but that he
could take a great deal of pains in this fashion when he had an
object in view.  It was reasonable enough that a man should desire
the esteem of his son-in-law; yet, to the suspicious, watchful girl,
he seemed to be overdoing it; and Jack was surrendering to his
blandishments with almost boyish simplicity, and drinking an unusual
quantity of champagne.

The favor was all on Bannister's side; yet the arch-rascal managed to
convey to Jack the idea that the penniless barrister was conferring
an honor in seeking Mabel for a bride.  Once in discussing love and
marriage Jack was so moved by his host's broad-minded views that he
was on the point of dropping a gentle hint, and there was one
reckless moment when he almost blurted out the truth--that they were
married.  But a look of terror in Mabel's eyes warned him to desist.
To him there seemed to be no time like the present for revealing the
inevitable secret; such a good opportunity might not come again; and
Mr. Bannister would be an invaluable ally against Aunt Caroline; but
his solemn pledge to Mabel that he would not divulge anything until
they had both agreed upon the moment of revelation kept his tongue
quiet.

Bannister appeared to see nothing of the looks that passed between
the young people.  He pretended to be examining the ceiling and
caressing his beard when Mabel was darting her warning glances
across.  He was puzzled.  There was something between these two--some
secret understanding.  He rather dreaded that Mabel might have
injudiciously told the story of the Blunt incident.  Yet, if so, it
must have had very little effect on Jack.

He tried to draw the two together in conversation, and so discover
the lie of the land; but Mabel had scarce word for her husband, and
Bannister fell back upon trivial conversation again.  He laughingly
told them some anecdotes about well known people, especially a story
concerning a rather flighty lady who was dining in a far corner of
the room with a gentleman who certainly was not her husband.  His
remarks were chiefly directed to Jack; but once or twice the young
husband's eyes twinkled as Bannister hinted at a certain suspicion
that the lady had been out of town when she was supposed to be in
London.  In an unguarded moment--and being well primed with his
father-in-law's champagne--Jack gave a sly look at his wife, and
dropped certain references that would have been in bad taste uttered
in the presence of an unmarried girl.  Mabel looked down at her
plate, blushing deeply, and Bannister was staggered.  The
understanding between the lovers was amazingly intimate, and there
was a subtle change in his child.  She was no longer a girl.  What
was it?  What was behind the veil of that new modesty?

All at once the truth flashed upon him.  He almost cried his thought
aloud.

"Egad--they're married!"

He breathed heavily with the astonishment of it; but the next instant
was smoothing his beard and surveying the ceiling decorations
absently, while Jack talked foolishly of the delight of
honeymoons--obviously for Mabel's edification.  She went hot and cold
at his reckless allusions, and at last found her voice to change the
conversation.

It was too late.  Bannister understood now the meaning of all the
things that had puzzled him, of the sudden mental change in his
child--the leap from girlhood to womanhood.  Yes, it must be that.
They were married.  It was obvious.

When he recovered from his surprise, he laughed in soft triumph; and,
as Jack gazed inquiringly, the elder man pointed across the room to a
queer head-dress, which, he pretended, had evoked his mirth.




CHAPTER XI

The Bishop of Ripley had dined well; but he was tired.  He had
traveled from town after breakfasting there with Mr. Panoli, and
later attending a meeting at the Sunday School Institute.  On his
arrival he learned that his sister Caroline had come down by the
previous train to consult him and stay the night.  She always came
thus without invitation.  She had done it in the time of his first
wife, and Lady Hester had been powerless to alter her ways.  Her room
was always ready for her, and she used the place rather freely.

Perish the thought that the Bishop was not pleased to see her!
Nevertheless, he would have been just as comfortable if she had not
arrived.  Dinner _tête-à-tête_ with his charming wife would have been
pleasanter than with Caroline sitting like a death's head at the
feast.  He knew why she had come.  It was about Jack.  He was weary
of her letters on the subject, the last of which he had not answered;
and it was awkward that she should arrive on this day, of all days,
when he had practically withdrawn all opposition to Jack's marriage.

The quiet satisfaction in Lady Hester's face, and the relish with
which she imparted to Aunt Caroline, before dinner, the joyful news
that all friction between Jack and his father was at an end, and the
engagement a settled fact, was particularly galling.  Aunt Caroline
never did, and never would, approve of her brother's choice of a
wife; and now he had chosen one for Jack, of the same worldly,
sensuous, ornamental type, Caroline felt it her duty to bring her
heaviest guns into action.

The Bishop wanted to talk to his wife at dinner about Mr. Bannister,
who had made a remarkable impression, and Lady Hester would have
revelled, woman-like, in every little detail of the business of
Jack's engagement.  It was an event in their colorless, domestic
life.  But Caroline's grim, uncompromising stare all through dinner
had compelled the conversation to turn upon other matters.  The
Bishop pleaded fatigue, and betook himself to the library, leaving
his wife to face the music and give Caroline what details she thought
wise.

Jack's aunt had not been consulted at any point.  Everything had been
rushed through, apparently, in a deceitful, shame-faced fashion.
That the engagement should have been sanctioned by her brother,
without his introducing Mabel to his sister--to whom he owed so
much--was, from her point of view, little less than an insult.
Having had views of her own concerning her nephew's welfare, this
upsetting of plans was very provoking, and merited the most
uncompromising opposition.

Lady Hester led the way after dinner to the gaunt, white drawing
room, where a particular chair was always reserved for Aunt Caroline
to doze in for an hour after meals.  But the good lady was not dozing
any more, and she was not going to be carried off by Lady Hester.
She followed her brother into the library, where he had subsided into
a spacious lounge with a coffee and a liqueur by his side.

"Ah!  Caroline," he murmured drowsily as she entered.  "The evening
papers are on the table"--yawn--"I don't think you'll find them
interesting."

"I was looking for you, John, not the papers.  You are avoiding me,
and I can guess the reason why.  No, don't get up.  This chair by the
table will do."

It was a sombre, old, brown room, completely lined with books in
gilt-edged bookcases reaching to the ceiling, and in the centre was a
large, oval table with the heavy, high-backed, carved oak arm chairs
upholstered in red leather set at equal intervals round it.  The
ample floor space was broken by spreading lounge chairs of greater
comfort, and large writing desks occupied the spaces in front of the
two wide windows.  Aunt Caroline dropped into one of the high-backed
seats, which harmonized appropriately with her gaunt, uncompromising
figure.

The Bishop settled himself doggedly, and stared straight ahead, with
his hands folded on his waistcoat, compelled to listen when he would
rather be deaf.

"John, this preposterous engagement of Jack to the Bannister girl is
a mistake."

"It is late, my dear, don't you think, to take up that attitude.  The
matter was settled to-day.  Perhaps Hester hasn't told you what a
good match it will be for Jack.  The girl will have a thousand a
year, and a reversion in Dingle Hall estate, or some other place
equally good--which Mr. Bannister is negotiating for, I believe.
Jack is not brilliant, Caroline, and we have always been agreed that
marriage is the very best thing for a young man, provided that he
incurs no burdensome obligations likely to handicap him in his
career.  My son, I'm happy to say, has not altogether disappointed
me.  He is not, as I said just now, brilliant, but he is busy with
his fourth large brief, and he has won all the other three."

"He is reckless and inclined to pleasure----"

"And so were we, Caroline, at his age."  Caroline sniffed and
shuddered.  "Miss Bannister is a very charming girl."

"I'm glad you think so."

"Don't you, Caroline?"

"I've never seen her," snorted the irate lady, sitting more erect and
growing stiffer.  Her nostrils dilated, and her grey eyes flashed.

"Dear me--dear me, is that so?" murmured the Bishop, with assumed
surprise.

"When I say I have not seen her, I mean under proper conditions.  I
admit I saw her in the park the other morning, unattended--except by
Jack--and behaving atrociously."

"Well, lovers, Caroline, lovers.  When the cat's away, you know----"

"There is no cat in this case.  The girl has no mother, and her
father is a profligate and a gambler."

The Bishop shifted uneasily, and showed signs of growing irritation.

"In his youth Mr. Bannister may not have been all that one would have
desired; but you cannot deny that he has brought his daughter up as a
man should, giving her every opportunity, every accomplishment, every
care, spending money lavishly----"

"Have I not done the same for Jack?"

"That is beside the mark, Caroline.  What is your objection to the
girl?  If you have any, say it outright."

"Who is she?  I mean, who was her mother; and who was her mother's
mother?  Who, if it comes to that, is Mr. Bannister?"

"Well, really--er--I didn't acquaint myself with the whole
genealogical tree of the Bannisters.  The man is a gentleman, and a
widower.  He is going to settle down in the country, and that is why
he is buying Dingle Hall."

"Buying Dingle Hall doesn't give the girl a mother," Aunt Caroline
snorted.

"Hester and I both like the girl.  Jack is in love with her.  What
would you have me do?"

The old lady tapped irritably on the newspapers lying on the table at
her side, and her fingers worked faster and faster as her anger
warmed.  She struggled with herself for a few moments, then blurted
out her next remark with all the intensity of long pent-up irritation.

"Hester likes her!--of course, always Hester.  John, I have never
said anything to you about your own foolish marriage--your second
marriage, I mean--or your wisdom in the selection of a wife; but you
know you've made a mistake, and I've helped you to recover.  I've
kept things straight for you, and guided your frivolous wife through
the quicksands for more than fifteen years now; and I thought you had
learned a lesson.  I even imagined you had bought sufficient
experience to withstand the wiles of a cooing, simpering, sensuous
woman, and had mastered and outgrown worldly lust and admiration."

"Caroline!" he cried, passionately thumping the table.

"Oh! yes; we've got one over-dressed, powdered, perfumed, social
fly-about in the family.  We don't want any more.  The world has
forgiven you, John, and they made you a Bishop in spite of your
second wife.  But you surely are not going to let your son follow in
your footsteps----"

"Silence, Caroline!" thundered the Bishop, starting up.  "How dare
you talk to me like this--you, who have known nothing but kindness
and consideration from Hester ever since we were married.  Your
jealousy is ludicrous after all these years.  There is a limit to
your interference in our affairs, my good sister."

"I've never interfered."

"Thanks to the good sense and tact of my wife you have not been able
to.  Caroline, I've known for years that you have hated my wife, and
I chose to ignore it, out of consideration for your sincere love for
Jack.  Keep the wicked thing in check.  It is an ugly sin."

The irate lady tried to speak, but rage choked her utterance.  The
Bishop rarely put his foot down, but when he was roused he was not
always judicious in his choice of words, outside the pulpit.

"If you had been at home, Caroline, you might have seen Mabel
Bannister, and have judged for yourself.  The boy is hopelessly in
love, and the girl too.  They rushed into things.  I couldn't send
the girl to Switzerland to receive the seal of your approval; but I
called a halt.  I never really intended to refuse my consent; but I
did think it right and proper that Jack should not be engaged till he
was in a position to support a wife.  At that time I believed the
girl to be the daughter of an impecunious idler."

"A profligate and a gambler, a man who lives by playing cards," cried
Caroline.

"Really, Caroline, your freedom of assertion is appalling.  Where do
you get these notions?"

"Never mind how I get them.  I have them."

"That is very feminine."

"And you are a very masculine fool, John."

"Really, Caroline!  Confound you!"

"Really, John!"

She rose and faced him, white and glaring.

"Tut, tut, tut, tut!" cried the Bishop, waving her impatiently back
to her seat, and turning his back upon her to pace the long room.
"Don't let us quarrel, for goodness' sake.  You set your heart upon
Jack marrying Beatrice Carew, and he has chosen some one else.  My
wife and I approve of his choice.  The matter is settled.  I admire
the boy's determination and singleness of purpose!  And, if you must
be told everything, he would have married her without my consent.  I
am letting you into the secrets now, for Hester has confided to me
that she was only just in time to stop them marrying on the quiet.
What do you think of that?"

"Stuff and nonsense!" cried his sister shrilly, and tearing holes in
the _Times_ with her fingers to relieve her feelings.  "The boy is
fooling away his time in London with loose women."

"Caroline!" cried the Bishop in horror.  It was his turn to go white,
and distend his nostrils, and frown fiercely.

"I tell you it is true.  I've come down here straight from his
chambers this afternoon.  I paid him a surprise visit, and found a
woman hidden in his rooms.  I took them by surprise, and there was no
time for her to get out.  Oh, yes, it's true.  But I wasn't as
surprised as you are.  He ought to have married Beatrice before he
took up his residence in London alone.  I was prepared to resign part
of my income in his favor, and give him a fair chance.  But you and
your wife, with your quixotic notions of liberty and independence and
romance, and seeing the world, allowed the boy to go out into
temptation----"

"Caroline, Jack is not a child," shouted the Bishop angrily.  "And I
won't have you traducing him by infamous assertions that you can't
prove."

"I tell you there was a woman in his chambers this afternoon."

"You saw her there?"

"No, I didn't.  But I heard her; and Jack lied to me, as he was bound
to do."

"Caroline, your imagination has run riot," gasped the Bishop, who was
more staggered than he cared to admit.  "You have no proof."

His sister tugged at her skirt to find a pocket, and took out
something which she flung upon the table, where it fell noiselessly.

"Is that a thing a man wears?" she asked, pointing to Mabel's veil.
"I found that in his rooms.  The boy has got into the mire, and
doesn't know where he is.  The disposition to petticoat influence is
hereditary.  You were wild once, John--before you were ordained.  You
remember how you broke out----"

"Silence!" thundered the Bishop, stamping his foot, and clenching his
fist, ashen with passion.

"Oh, you don't frighten me, John, for I know I'm in the right.  A
young man in love who can entertain that class of woman to tea in his
rooms----"

"Was there no man there?"

Aunt Caroline smiled pityingly and superciliously.

"But you didn't see any woman, Caroline?"

"No, but I made her cry out by striking the inner door and
frightening her."

"There might have been two women there," suggested the Bishop
helplessly.

"There were only cups for two, John.  One for the person, the other
for poor Jack, who can't live without Mabel Bannister."

"Stop, Caroline, stop!  Don't talk to me any more!  Leave me alone,"
groaned the Bishop, waving towards the door.  "Send Hester to me.  I
must talk with her.  This is awful."

"Hester--always Hester," sneered the jealous sister.  "Can't you
discuss a simple matter like this with me frankly, and decide what is
to be done?"

"Frankly, Caroline?  Your speech is much too frank, and your
suspicions too vile.  Ah!  I see it all.  The whole thing is plain as
a pikestaff.  Jack and Mabel have been meeting in London.  I forbade
it.  It was an absurd condition to make.  Yes, they've been meeting."

"Well, that is no news."

"Can't you understand, Caroline?  They couldn't meet where they would
be seen, and--and--the girl has gone to tea at his chambers.  It is
very simple."

"Good heavens!" gasped Aunt Caroline, who with all her perspicacity
never dreamed of this.  "John, you make it worse and worse.  You're
now insinuating that Jack is a cad, and the girl--well--I'll send
Hester to you.  This is not a fit matter for me to discuss.  She
probably understands that sort of thing."

Left alone, the Bishop gave way to a sudden outburst.  He stamped his
foot and ground his teeth, and his lips seemed to be shaping words of
unchristianlike violence.  His fingers clawed the air, and he looked
as though it would have eased him considerably if he could have
seized somebody's throat.

His eye caught the veil on the table, and he picked it up.  Its soft,
filmy texture on his fingers must have had a soothing influence, for
he stopped, and smoothed it out, and examined it.  It was undoubtedly
a woman's veil, and a very pretty one.  It seemed a familiar veil,
too.

When the door opened quietly and Lady Hester entered, reposeful and
slow of movement, a slight smile upon her lips, she almost laughed to
see her husband standing in comic dismay with a gauzy veil spread out
on his fingers.

"What have you got there, John---my veil?" she asked, coming up and
putting a gentle hand upon his arm.

"Hester, this is a woman's veil, isn't it?"

"Of course it is."

"A young woman's veil?"

"Well--it's mine," with a laugh.

"Yours?"

"Well, it isn't Caroline's, is it, with those gold threads?  By the
bye, Caroline seems excited.  Have you been having words about Jack?"

"This veil, Hester, are you sure it is yours?"

She took the gossamer thing into her hands, and examined it more
closely.  "Well, it looks like mine, though it seems large.  But it
must be mine, because it is a piece from the length I brought from
Geneva.  I shared it with Mabel.  We halved it.  But as she is not
here it can't be hers.  What's the matter, dear?  You look worried."

"Hester," groaned the Bishop in sepulchral tones, "Caroline has been
to Jack's chambers and surprised a woman there--with this veil.  The
woman dropped this veil."

"Oh!"

This evidence concerning the ownership of the veil was all that was
needed to endorse Caroline's spiteful assertions.  She fingered the
veil for a few moments, then she spoke her mind.

"The old cat!" she exclaimed passionately.  But, seeing that she had
shocked her husband, she laughed.  Then with that dreadful
inconsequence which was one of her charming traits, she whispered
confidentially, "John, they must be married at once."

"And are you not shocked, Hester?"

"Good heavens, no!  Jack is always having tea parties at his
chambers.  Why, Beatrice and I went there the first week he got the
place to himself.  Jack is a gentleman, and Mabel the sweetest and
proudest of girls.  But for me they would have been married now.  I
really wish I hadn't interfered.  Caroline must be suppressed.  She
has come down here with the deliberate intention of wrecking Jack's
engagement and preventing his marriage.  If she intends to stay over
to-morrow, when the Bannisters come down, I shall ask her to go."

"Hester, you can't do that.  I quite agree with you that they should
be married as soon as possible, or there will be a scandal.  Jack
ought to know better."

The Bishop paced up and down in his favorite way; with his hands
behind his back.  "I'm surprised at him.  I'm shocked.  It was
ridiculously weak and foolish.  It has given Caroline a stick to beat
the girl with, and she won't scruple to use it.  Not that I think
Caroline will continue her opposition when things are settled, once
and for all, by a wedding.  Yes, Hester, you are right--the wedding
as soon as possible--that is, if Mr. Bannister is agreeable.  He
rather hinted at a long engagement, and spoke of the folly of hasty
marriages, but I've no doubt that when he understands Jack's
peculiar, impetuous temperament, and sees that there is nothing to be
gained by waiting, he will raise no objections."

Aunt Caroline did not give them long alone together.  The door opened
and she appeared once more.  Hester's lips were hard set, and her
eyes flashed dangerously.

"Well?" asked the old lady, with the air of one who has come for the
decision of a judge.  "Well?"

"What is it you want, Caroline?" asked Lady Hester sharply.  "You
told me that John wished to speak to me alone.  I have hardly had
five words with him."

"Well, and have you decided?" asked the eager old lady, quite
unabashed.  "Have you settled the fate of the gambler's daughter?"

Hester paled with anger, and the Bishop, who hated scenes, turned
away, sniffing and coughing, as though he were clearing his throat
for a sermon.  His wife spoke first, and to the point courageously.

"John and I have decided that the sooner Jack and Mabel are married
the better.  The less delay, the fewer secret meetings there will be
between them."

"Then you approve!" cried Caroline, aghast, displaying the palms of
her hands in astonishment.

"Certainly not, neither of their actions nor yours.  No one with
proper feeling would approve of a young man's maiden aunt going
uninvited to his chambers to pry into his private affairs, and
collect evidence of nothing like--like a detective."

"Hester, Hester," protested the Bishop reproachfully, "remember my
sister's views are strictly orthodox in these matters."

"They're just horrid, and spiteful, and unkind," cried Lady Hester,
losing all patience.

The Bishop prepared for an explosion; but Aunt Caroline only snorted
contemptuously, and turned to her brother.  "John, your wife surely
does not voice your sentiments when she says that you would hasten
this preposterous marriage----"

"Caroline, you must leave this matter to me and my wife.  Jack is not
a child.  He will probably settle the matter for himself.  The
Bannisters are coming to-morrow, and it will be time enough then to
reconsider things--if any reconsideration is necessary--after you
have seen the girl herself."

"I don't want to see her, or her father either.  This house is no
place for him.  He's a rascal.  I don't believe his name is Bannister
at all.  He is strongly suspected of being a card sharper, and in one
London club there has been talk of asking him to retire.  Besides, he
hasn't been Mr. Bannister all his life.  There was a time when he
posed as a 'Mr. Gordon' in Vienna."

"Hester, Hester, what's the matter?" cried the Bishop, running to his
wife's assistance.  She had turned angrily upon the elder woman; but
the torrent of her words was stemmed at the outset by the name of
Gordon.  She went white to the lips, and faltered.  Aunt Caroline
supposed that wicked passion was choking her brother's wife; but the
Bishop knew better.  She seemed really ill.

"Don't bother about me," she murmured, sinking into a chair, and
recovering very quickly.  "Arguments of this kind always upset me."

"But you are quite white, my darling.  Caroline, how dare you upset
Hester in this fashion?  I forbid you and everybody else to say
anything more about Jack's engagement.  There seems to be need of a
little more Christian charity and forbearance.  Mr. Bannister's
daughter is not responsible for her father's weaknesses."

"No, she only inherits them."

"Silence, Caroline!--or you will exasperate me beyond endurance.  If
you don't like the Bannisters you'd better not be here when they
come.  Hester, my dear, sit in a lower chair; you will feel better."

"Oh, it is nothing--nothing," cried the startled wife, with a forced
laugh; but all the while that name was ringing in her
brain--Gordon!--Gordon!  Her own name.  The name taken on her first
marriage.  Aunt Caroline had rapped it out with such strange, marked
emphasis, accompanied by a withering, triumphant look, that, for a
moment, the veil seemed to have been ripped from the past.  Of course
the coincidence could have nothing to do with Mabel and her father;
but her nerves were raw from much anxiety.  That dreadful time, which
had been swallowed up in the mists of forgetfulness, seemed to be
coming back daily, hourly--nearer, nearer.  She could almost hear
Richard Gordon's voice suggesting that she should accompany him to
Vienna and prey upon the traveling Americans, who at that time were
beginning to overrun Europe and flood Continental towns with their
dollars.

Aunt Caroline subsided obstinately when the Bishop shouted and
dictated in his pulpit voice, as she always did.  She swept from the
room, muttering that she intended to see both Mr. and Miss Bannister,
and would on no account lose the opportunity.

Lady Hester was powerless to put any pressure upon the lady in
matters concerning Jack's welfare; for Jack had always been
considered Aunt Caroline's property since his mother's death; and her
position in the household was that of Jack's wealthy guardian.
Whenever the son of the house was coming home, Caroline was informed
as a matter of duty, and she put in an appearance as though she were
his natural mother.  The sincerity of her love was her excuse; and of
late years she had interfered very little with Lady Hester, or even
intruded upon her social gatherings.  She held aloof, keeping largely
to her own room in the west wing, and only appearing at intervals.
Unfortunately for Lady Hester, Jack's affairs were to the front just
now, and so was Aunt Caroline.

Next morning found the old lady pottering about Jack's rooms,
straightening up with her own hands, and running over his spare linen
and dress ties to see that all was ready.  She laid out and brushed
his extra dress suit, and even dusted his patents upon the
boot-trees.  These things were outside Lady Hester's jurisdiction
altogether; but, if the door had not been locked, the mistress of the
house might have seen the old lady drop a tear or two as she grappled
with the demon of jealousy which was at the root of a good deal of
her opposition to Jack's marriage.  She was losing her boy, the boy
for whom she had economized, and scraped, and saved for twenty years,
in order to leave him a fortune and start him handsomely in life.  He
was in the toils of a strange woman, of an adventurer's daughter, and
she had not been consulted at any stage.  She alternated between
tears and bursts of irritability, opening and shutting drawers with a
bang, and doing small violences to the furniture like a man.

There was little or nothing for her to do there, but she could not do
enough.




CHAPTER XII

Lady Hester had quite recovered from her guilty scare of the previous
night.  The mere coincidence of a name was enough to stop her heart
beating just now; and she rated herself soundly for her weakness in
the presence of Aunt Caroline.  She was busy preparing for her
guests, several of whom had been invited to dine specially to meet
the Bannisters.  She also lost no time in spreading the news of
Jack's engagement in the neighborhood.  Every outsider coming to the
house with formal congratulations was an ally on her side against the
enemy.

She was in a flutter of expectation and excitement.  In brief
intervals of rest her mind jumped forward as far as the wedding, and
she had resolved exactly what she would wear, chosen the color for
the bridesmaids' gowns, and settled the composition of the dinner
party at the Palace after Jack and Mabel were one, and Aunt Caroline
was squelched forever.

After the wedding the old lady would have no possible excuse for
interfering with the domestic arrangements of the Palace, or harrying
the maids under pretence of making things comfortable for Jack--for
no manservant had been allowed to pamper the Bishop's son and
encourage him in habits of indolence and foppery.  Aunt Caroline did
not believe in personal servants.  No lady's maid ever dressed her;
such affectations were the monopoly of the Bishop's wife.

By the time that Mabel and her father were due to arrive, Lady Hester
had worked herself into a state of excitement.  She wanted the dinner
party to be a success.  She desired with a woman's natural vanity to
make a good impression upon Mr. Bannister, who, from all accounts,
was a person who appreciated feminine beauty, and understood the
worth of an exquisite gown as well as any woman.  She had chosen a
particularly artistic creation, quite her most effectual frock, and
one that harmonized well with her wonderful hair, its pale gold
surface covered with an exquisite tracery of softest orange velvet.
The dress fitted her perfectly, too, revealing the lines of her
figure somewhat generously, and falling about her feet in a foam of
rippling flounces.

The room that Mabel occupied during her stay at the Palace was again
at her disposal, although so far no communication had come from the
girl to Lady Hester either as friend or hostess.  Bannister had wired
that they would be coming down by motor car in the afternoon, and
pleaded for a little grace in case there should be delay.  There had
been heavy rain for an hour, and that probably accounted for his
arriving at the Palace when the light was fading.  Lady Hester heard
the car enter the courtyard, and drew aside the curtains as excitedly
as any girl.  She saw the ponderous motor swing round the bend of the
drive, with a faultless chauffeur in white overalls, and two people
in the tonneau.  Mabel's pale face was recognizable instantly.  Her
father's eyes were shaded by a large peak cap, but his eyeglass
caught a glint of light, and his trim beard concealed the lines of
his face.  He looked young and interesting, however, much younger
than she expected.

The house steward received the guests in the absence of the host and
hostess in their dressing rooms; and Bannister inquired anxiously if
his man had come down by train.

His man had.  Voss was there, and was already busy in his master's
room--and several other rooms where the doors were open, peeping,
prying, measuring, calculating, speculating, and generally making
himself acquainted with the geography of the rambling old house.

Mr. Bannister was also concerned about his new car--he had only hired
it for a month--and explained politely that he was very particular
where it was housed.  The Bishop kept no proper motor house, and he
suggested that it should go to an inn in Ripley, within telephone
call.

The car was sent away--which was convenient.  It prevented the
chauffeur from informing the staff of the household that he was not
on the strength of Mr. Bannister's establishment in town.

Lady Hester heard the soft, drawling tones of the guest as he passed
along the corridor outside her room in the wake of Gray, the butler.
There was something strangely musical in the voice that was almost
familiar.  It was possible that she might have met him before at some
social function, where he passed unnoticed among other guests; there
was certainly something in his bearing in the car that was familiar.

Mabel had rushed up stairs without ceremony.  Her previous stay at
the Palace had made her more or less at home there.  She was told
that her old room was ready; but instead of going there she asked for
Lady Hester.  When told that her hostess was dressing, she turned her
steps to the familiar room, and knocked without hesitation, a sharp,
impatient rapping.

"Who is it?"

"It is I--Mabel.  May I came in?" said a tense, thrilling, anxious
voice.

"Yes, Mabel, come in."

Lady Hester, although only half through her toilet, turned with open
arms to greet Jack's future wife.

"Ah, my dear girl--at last!" she cried.  "But how pale you are.  Are
you cold?  Did you get wet?"

"Oh, no, no," replied Mabel, rubbing her cheeks.  "I must apologize
for coming to you like this.  But--but I wanted to see you.  Would it
be asking too much to have my room changed?"

"Certainly, if you wish it.  I thought you liked that room, because
of the window seat."

"Can I have one next to father?"

"Yes, dear, if you wish it.  Speak to Gray about it, or Harriet."

Mabel felt that some explanation was wanted for this unusual request,
and stammered out an excuse.

"You see--you see, Miss Cardew's room is so near mine now."

"Oh, yes, of course, of course--I understand," laughed Lady Hester.
"It will be nicer, perhaps, if you are near your father.  Besides,
you know the place so well, you can pilot him through the maze of
corridors upstairs.  You have plenty of time to get ready, Mabel.  I
hope you've brought a stock of pretty dresses, child.  I've invited
quite a lot of people to meet you, and we are to have a really
festive gathering.  I have spread the news of your engagement far and
wide, because Aunt Caroline has set her heart upon wrecking it.  Be
civil to her, for heaven's sake.  If she insults you, overlook it.
If she ignores you, you must ignore her.  She is quite helpless.
When you are introduced to her, go up and kiss her--and may I be
there to see the fun!  She's a very good soul at bottom, but the
depths are a long way down.  You must manage the old lady skillfully.
If there's any fighting to be done, leave that to me.  You must make
it all right with Aunt Caroline, because she's got heaps of money,
and Jack must have it; or else it will go to a home for lost dogs, or
incompetent curates.  Stay with me awhile and let us discuss the
wedding."

But the girl made excuses.

"I'm disturbing you.  I shall be in the way while you dress; besides,
it's late already, and I've a lot to do."

Lady Hester detected the change of tone instantly.  A latent anxiety
and apprehensiveness had crept into Mabel's voice, dulling its
vivacity and youthfulness.  She turned to the girl in kindly scrutiny.

"Mabel, aren't you happy?  You look so worried and unlike yourself,
child.  You're not regretting?"

"No.  Of course I'm happy now everything's settled.  But the journey
down upset me, I fancy.  I'm not used to fast motors; and we came
down at an awful pace."

"I didn't know your father had such a fine car."

"No?"

"Has he had it long?"

"I'm sure I don't know.  He doesn't tell me much about his affairs.
I'll go and dress now.  We'll talk presently."

"He shall take Aunt Caroline out for a drive--and lose her," laughed
Lady Hester, and Mabel escaped.

Lady Hester hurried feverishly through her dressing.  The excitement
had given her a rosy flush.  Her eyes were sparkling, and she had
never looked younger since she became Lady Hester Cardew.  She seemed
to have bridged the gap of years, and gone back to the days before
sorrow and anxiety had thinned her cheeks, and darkened the shadows
beneath her eyes.  She was in the ripest maturity of womanhood,
life's Indian summer.  The girlish vivacity was gone, but the
stately, graceful figure remained; and as she surveyed her
full-length reflection in the long mirror she laughed triumphantly to
think that Mabel herself, with all the bloom of youth, could not
outshine her this evening.

One more critical survey, comprehensive and satisfied--her gown was a
complete success, and its unusual gaiety of tone pleased her--and she
hurried down.  She rustled along the soft-carpeted corridor to the
head of the broad, curved stone staircase that leads down to the oak
hall of Ripley Palace.  Some one was descending ahead of her, a
perfectly groomed, broad-shouldered man, whom she guessed at once to
be Mr. Bannister.  She intended to introduce herself, and while he
stood poised on the last stair, with his back towards her, gazing up
at the grand oak carving upon which the light from the lamp in the
centre fell softly and mysteriously, she ran impetuously down three
steps.  Her foot caught in the chiffon flounce of her dress--she
stumbled--and put out her hand to save herself; but she was too far
away from the balustrade.  With a cry she went down, half turning as
she fell, and measured her length upon the stairs with a dreadful
thud.

It all happened in a moment.  The man down below turned in
astonishment, for he had supposed himself to be alone.  He rushed up
two stairs at a time.  "Are you hurt?" he cried.  "Let me assist you,
madam."

[Illustration: HE PUT HIS ARM UNDER HER AND LIFTED HER UP]

She moaned in pain and tried to rise.  He put his arm under her and
lifted her up, so that his face came over hers; and when the first
swooning sensation had passed, she looked up with a forced smile of
apology.

"It's awfully kind of you--but----"

Their eyes met, and the man gasped in startled confusion.

"Good God!--Hester!"

He almost let her fall, but recovered his composure with remarkable
suddenness.  His eyes were gazing into hers, but still she did not
understand.  The light shone down upon her face where she had fallen,
whereas his was in shadow, with the lamp above him.  He raised her
gently, and, when at last she stood alone, holding on to the
balustrade, and trying to laugh at what was a painful shock, she saw
him plainly.

"Who--are you?" she asked, with growing uneasiness.  He was familiar,
yet strange.  Memory found its tongue.  She screamed--

"Dick!"

He seized her wrists roughly, and shook her back to reason.
"Silence!" he whispered.  "Don't be a fool.  Don't give yourself
away."

"Hester, my love!" said the voice of the Bishop, who emerged from the
library, and stood with the handle of the door in his hand, looking
upward anxiously.  "Did I hear you cry out?"

"Yes--yes, I fell, dear.  My foot caught in my dress----"

"A very nasty fall, a most dangerous fall, Bishop," explained
Bannister.  "Fortunately I was here to help her.  I think you're
better now, Lady Cardew."

"I'm afraid you're not, dear," cried the Bishop anxiously.  "Look at
her--quick!--she'll fall."

The Bishop ran forward, but Bannister was before him, and Lady Hester
dropped fainting into his arms.

He held her to him, full of concern and sympathy, and carried her
down the few remaining stairs, thrusting the Bishop aside.  Even then
he could not relinquish her.  His arms would not unclasp from that
soft, yielding form that once was his--that seemed to be still his.
It brought back the old days with a rush--the painful, hysterical
scenes--the last wild quarrel that had ended even as this fright had
ended, in a fainting woman dropping into her husband's arms,
mercifully dazed by a wild convulsion of emotion too terrible to bear
consciously and live.

"Set her down--set her down!" cried the Bishop, helplessly waving his
hands and fidgeting round, ready to lend assistance when the other
had released her.

"There's no couch here.  I can't drop her on the floor," snarled
Bannister, as though he, and not the Bishop, had the prior right to
take the lead in this emergency.  Nevertheless, he allowed Hester's
form to sink gently, and supported her head upon his knee.

"Bring water--bring water!" gasped the Bishop, turning to the first
person near--Aunt Caroline.

"What's the fuss?" asked the old lady, levelling her glasses and
surveying the strange scene, the deathlike woman in the yellow
gown--a brilliant gleaming patch of color, relieved by the dark
carpet and the black clothes of Bannister.

"Water, Caroline--water!  She's fainted."

"Water won't help her.  She's coming round.  Let her head go lower,
man.  Don't hold her like that."

Bannister came back to the present surroundings, and Voss was at his
elbow with a glass of water, coming from no one knew where.

Lady Hester was recovering with low moans, murmuring "Dick!
Dick!"--but fortunately the words were inaudible to all but
Bannister, who bent low over her, peering so close to her face, that
Aunt Caroline took him by the coat and tugged him away.

"Give her air, man.  She won't recover if you smother her like that.
Haven't you ever seen a fainting woman before?"

Bannister for once forgot himself.  He gave Aunt Caroline a glance
that was devilish in its angry remonstrance, but soon returned to
Hester.  "Pull yourself together, Lady Cardew," he said, putting
considerable emphasis on the name Cardew.  "The Bishop is here,
and--and your mother."

"Mother?" murmured Aunt Caroline angrily.

"This is Mr. Bannister, Caroline.  He caught Hester as she fell and
carried her down for me.  See, her eyes are opening now.  Hester, do
you think you'll be able to get up?"

"Oh, yes, John."  She saw only the Bishop.  Consciousness of her
surroundings came back slowly; then Bannister's warning eyes came
within range, and she screamed a little, drawing away, as from a
spectre.

"It's only Mr. Bannister, Hester darling."

It was Bannister's hand that raised her to her feet.  She tried to
laugh, but it was a very sorry attempt.

They were joined by others now, news of the accident having spread
through the household.  Mabel came running down stairs, looking
almost as white as her hostess, and dreading, she knew not what.  As
far as she could see, there had been a scene, and her father was in
the thick of it; and Aunt Caroline, too, whom she now saw face to
face for the first time.

"I'm quite all right," sighed Lady Hester, waving them all away.
"I'm completely recovered.  And I'm much obliged to--to this
gentleman for his timely aid.  Mabel--this is your father, I suppose?"

"Yes, dearest, Mr. Bannister," explained the Bishop.  "This is a
strange introduction, and I wish it could have happened under happier
circumstances.  Caroline, this is Mr. Bannister--my sister."

Bannister smiled sweetly, and advanced to the grim lady,
instinctively divining where his chief difficulty lay.

"Miss Cardew, you spoke to me just now, and I fear I was rude.  I
should have given way to your superior knowledge.  Allow me to offer
you my apologies, and shake you by the hand.  I have heard of you
from your nephew; and if you are worthy of half his praises your
acquaintance is indeed to be desired.  Mabel, my dear, this is Miss
Cardew, Jack's aunt, whom he has so longed for you to see."

"Sorry the desire was not mutual," sniffed Miss Cardew rudely, and
raising her pince-nez to give Mabel a more discomposing stare.
"Perhaps when I know Miss Bannister better I shall be able to meet
her more cordially."

"Caroline!  Caroline!" cried the Bishop in amazement; but Caroline
had turned and disappeared into the library.

"Mr. Bannister, you must excuse my sister.  She is impulsive,
and--and very fond of Jack.  She's jealous--that's the long and short
of it," he whispered.  "An old woman's jealousy is a strange and
terrible infliction.  Take no notice of it.  You'll esteem her highly
when you know her better."

Mabel could have cried with humiliation, but she set her teeth, and
her pale face showed no trace of emotion.  Her meeting with Aunt
Caroline was a failure.

"Give me your arm a moment, Mabel," asked Lady Hester, rising from
the chair into which they had put her.  "I shall be all right soon.
That's right.  Take me upstairs--for a few moments--and all of you go
away, and forget me for a little time."

She bore up wonderfully.  Only Mabel could see the awful struggle to
be calm.  Bannister drew the Bishop into the library with an easy,
familiar clutch of the arm, intended to be sympathetic.

"It is so disturbing to see one's own wife lose consciousness," he
observed.  "I've been through it, Bishop.  And the thing they hate
most is to have a fuss made about it.  Leave her to my daughter for a
little while, and if she doesn't pull round, I should insist upon her
going to bed.  That was a nasty fall she had, and she must have hurt
herself badly to have fainted so quickly."

"Of course she must.  Hester never faints.  You've no idea what a
turn it gave me to see her so white.  Poor Hester!  She mustn't go
through with a dinner party if she's in pain.  They are nasty stairs,
too, to fall down."

He went back to the hall to look at the stairs, and asked to be shown
the point where she slipped.  Bannister had to describe the whole
thing in detail, with a little fanciful coloring.  He threw in a few
words of praise of Lady Hester's fortitude, and cleverly contrived to
lead the Bishop to talk of himself and his wife when they returned to
the library.

The Bishop fell into the trap, and, while imagining he was talking of
Jack's future, told Mr. Bannister all that gentleman wanted to know
about his past.  Bannister vainly strove to draw Aunt Caroline into
the conversation.  She sat at the far end of the library behind a
copy of the _Guardian_, over the top of which she watched as she
listened.  She saw strange lights flash in Bannister's eyes; a
quizzical smile played round the corners of his mouth; and there were
moments when he passed his hand across his hair, as if worried and
bewildered.  But sardonic amusement was twinkling in his eyes most of
the time.

When the Bishop was called away to meet some guests from the
neighborhood who were arriving, Bannister forgot all about the old
lady in the corner.  He dropped into a chair and chuckled.

"You seem amused, sir," observed Aunt Caroline.

He was taken off his guard--but only for a moment.  "It was this," he
explained, tapping an open copy of _Punch_ upon the library table.

"Humph!  Clever of you to laugh before you saw it.  Ah, you may well
smile at my brother's absurd talk about his second marriage.  And as
there is a proposal to make you one of the family, I don't apologize
for referring to it.  It never had my approval, and it never will.
But it did not provide me with as much amusement as you seem to get
out of it.  You evidently knew Lady Hester before her marriage."

"I?" cried Bannister, with barefaced innocence.  "I never had that
privilege, madam, or perhaps she would not have become Mrs. Cardew.
A magnificent creature--a perfect woman!"

"Then why did she call you Dick?"

"Call me Dick?" he murmured in magnificent astonishment.  "My name is
not Dick."

"You are Mr. Richard Bannister, are you not?"

"True, my name is Richard.  But I've never been called Dick--always
Richard.  Dick is horribly familiar--a sort of name that suggests
everybody's friend."

"Don't try to fool me by prevaricating.  She called you Dick; and you
have never been known as Dick!  Yet you remind me of Dick Gordon, of
Vienna; perhaps you reminded her of Dick Gordon."

"Dick Gordon, of Vienna?" echoed Bannister, slowly and wonderingly.
"Wherever have I heard that name before?  Was he a jockey?"

"No, an adventurer, and a rascal."

"The scoundrel!  Was he a friend of yours whom I resemble?" unable to
resist the temptation to make Aunt Caroline furious.  "Surely never
an intimate of the Bishop's family!  I've been told I'm like a
popular actor, a French nobleman, and one of the Greek statues--but
never like--like--what name did you say, 'Gordon?'  Did the
resemblance frighten Lady Hester, poor woman!  Do you think it was
that?"

"I'm sure of it," replied the old lady grimly, with the nearest
approach to a smile that she could summon on this irritating day of
days.  She admired Mr. Bannister's _sangfroid_.  His impertinence was
superb; and Aunt Caroline was not utterly devoid of a sense of humor.

Further conversation was interrupted by the hasty return of the
Bishop, who came to announce that Lady Hester would be obliged to
abandon the idea of appearing at dinner.  She seemed very much
upset--almost hysterical, in fact, and begged to be excused.  His
guests came almost at his heels, and were introduced to Mr.
Bannister, and all joined in commiserating their host, and expressing
sorrow for Lady Hester.

"Caroline, my dear, you must take my wife's place, and look after Mr.
Bannister."




CHAPTER XIII

It was a strange dinner party.  The guests had been carefully
selected in order to make a more than usually genial gathering.
Manipulated by Lady Hester they should have mixed excellently.  For
Aunt Caroline, Lady Hester had invited a particular _protégé_ of the
Bishop's sister, an elderly reformed bachelor, who had, of late
years, given up wild ways--and drink--for active church work and
mothers' meetings, and Sunday school organizations.  Mr. Crick was
his name, a small, white-haired, pimply-faced person of uncertain
age, probably sixty; but with the small, spare figure of a boy.  He
stuttered slightly--unkind people said as the result of nervous
debility following a life of dissipation.  This person found himself
without a partner now that Aunt Caroline was in charge of the lion of
the evening--the elder lion, that is, in the second degree, for of
course Jack was the centre of much interest and congratulation among
the Bishop's friends, although he soon subsided into a secondary
place, for Bannister outshone everybody.

It was a pleasant scene, the gaily decorated table loaded with white
flowers, and rare fruits set in dishes of silver gilt, old family
plate of which Lady Hester was especially fond, although it only saw
light on special occasions.  At one end of the long table the Bishop,
with a stout lady on his right, the archdeacon's wife; and facing him
Aunt Caroline, grim and severe; on her right the thief.  Near the
Bishop was the reformed character, Mr. Crick, looking down at his
plate, and feeling exquisitely uncomfortable.  Bannister--who knew
several of the men at the table before he met them there--peered
across at Mr. Crick with critical, inquiring eyes, in which there was
a suspicion of latent recognition.  Mr. Crick bowed his head as if
prayers were in progress; but at last, in an unguarded moment, caught
Mr. Bannister's eye.

A marked expression of severity transfixed Mr. Bannister's features.
He paused in his conversation as if shocked to see Mr. Crick at the
table of a Bishop, and, when the opportunity came, he bent over Aunt
Caroline, and whispered--

"Pray, who is that person at the other end of the table--the man with
the red face?"

"That is Mr. Crick.  I see you recognize him.  He is the gentleman
who knew Dick Gordon in Vienna."

"Good heavens, you don't mean to say you got that ridiculous notion
about my likeness to--er--what name did you say?"

"Dick Gordon."

"Ah, to Dick Gordon, from poor old Crick?"

"I did."

"Madam," whispered Bannister impressively, "I don't like to criticize
my host's visitors; but really that person ought not to be at your
table.  When did they release him from the asylum?"

"From the asylum?" gasped Aunt Caroline.

"Yes.  He was put away.  Haven't you heard of it?  He comes of good
family, I believe; but he drank shockingly; and then he had
delusions--that was why he was put away.  His chief delusion was that
he was being cheated when he lost at cards.  He accused Lord
Strathmeny of cheating at baccarat, and was promptly kicked out of
the club."

"Is that so?" murmured Aunt Caroline, rather disconcerted.  The news
did not surprise her so much as Bannister's amazing nonchalance and
persistence in refusing to be insulted or abashed by his "likeness"
to Dick Gordon.  She was almost sorry for her haste in making rash
assertions on the evidence of so unreliable a person as Mr. Crick.
But it was odd that she had not heard of the asylum incident--and
unfortunate.

Mr. Crick knew everybody in the great world of London--at least, so
he pretended--and to him Aunt Caroline had gone, when she first heard
of Jack's engagement, to learn all about Mr. Bannister.  The
information that Bannister was really an adventurer under an alias
was stated with much emphasis by the little man--in Mr. Bannister's
absence--and he had once made a similar accusation in a London club,
while under the influence of drink.  Unfortunately Mr. Crick himself
was such a discredited person that--although he had undoubtedly
recognized in Mr. Bannister a certain traveling American of years ago
who passed as Mr. Dick Gordon, and fleeced him at cards--he was
painfully uncomfortable now at having defamed one who was received
everywhere, even at a Bishop's table.  At the time of Aunt Caroline's
inquiry Mr. Crick had no notion that Jack Cardew had engaged himself
to Miss Bannister, or he would not have dared to make the rash
accusation.

"Madam, you must confront me with that person after dinner,"
whispered Bannister, pressing home his advantage.  "If you have
anything to do with him he'll be making libelous assertions
concerning your private life.  By the bye, that reminds me, I think
I've heard him mention you."

"Mention me?" gasped Aunt Caroline.

"Yes.  Surely you are the Bishop's sister whom he accused of eloping
to Paris with a rascally curate--named Judd, I think--a bad lot who
went utterly to the dogs."

Aunt Caroline gave an awful gulp.  Mr. Bannister had pitched upon her
one and only indiscretion of the past, a silly elopement at thirty
with her grandfather's curate many years ago.  They got as far as
Dover, where she discovered that her lover had no intention of
marrying her; on learning which she virtuously returned to her
father's roof, and eschewed men and marriage ever after.  How on
earth Mr. Crick could ever have become possessed of this knowledge
was not apparent; and it turned her quite green with faintness.

"Don't think for a moment, Miss Cardew, that I credit anything that
person alleges," whispered Bannister.  "We have both been fooled.  I
only mention this to show you how absolutely unreliable he is.  I
should give him the cold shoulder, if I were you; and drop a hint to
the Bishop that the man he is entertaining is a rascal, although so
very well connected.  I'm sorry for his people; the Cricks are a
proud family; but lunatics at the dinner table--well, I'll leave him
in your hands, Miss Cardew....  Yes, Bishop, I heard what you said.
Honeymoons are going out of fashion, but it was a good fashion in its
day."

Mabel looked pale and Jack grinned.

"Ah, you are right," cried the Bishop heartily, "I can truly say that
the pleasantest weeks of my existence were spent away from the hum
and bustle of life in country lanes and green fields--eh, Mabel?
What do you think?  And you, Jack, you don't veto a honeymoon,
surely?"

"I don't know," responded Jack sheepishly; and Mabel dropped her
eyes, coloring for the first time.  Bannister adroitly changed the
conversation, and, between every few sentences, managed to glare with
virtuous indignation at poor Mr. Crick, until the helpless little man
wanted to crawl under the table with mortification.  After dinner he
managed to get nearer to the gentleman and whisper that he would like
a few words with him in private.  Mr. Crick declined the honor
timorously, and began a lame apology; but Bannister looked so deadly
and devilish that the words dried up in his shrivelled throat, and he
almost felt Dick Gordon's fingers clutching him there.

* * * * * * *

Upstairs a wretched woman sat all huddled up on the bearskin rug
before the empty grate in her husband's bedroom.

She had wandered there like a restless soul, pacing from room to
room, and had dropped down overcome.  The awful realization that she
had no right under the roof of this house, much less in this
sanctum--beloved by the Bishop because it was tended only by her
hands--was slowly making itself felt.  The flowers in the vases, the
carefully dusted row of books by the bed-head, the little table with
writing material by the window, on which the clean blotter was always
ready, with a new quill by its side, in case he should want to put to
paper his burning thoughts; the fine old chest in which she kept his
vestments and linen softly perfumed; the big oil painting of St.
Saviour's-in-the-East in the gorgeous gold frame presented to the
Bishop by his late parishioners; the large Chesterfield lounge in
front of the fire--all these brought back with a rush the beloved
reality of her life for the last twenty years, the life that was
ruined in one crashing collapse.

She had been a good wife and a good helpmeet to the bluff, jolly
vicar.  He had brought sunshine into her desolate existence, and she
had helped to make him a Bishop; yet all the while she had been a
miserable dupe, living unconsciously in adultery with a man who would
have died rather than take to his bosom another man's wife.

The sting of it all lay in the fact that in part she had consciously
sinned--how grievously she now recognized for the first time.  It was
only in the intimate life following her marriage that she learned the
Bishop's peculiar views on marriage, which were almost Oriental in
their severity.  If he had known that Hester Lennox had been a wife,
although her husband had gone over to the majority, she would never
have become Mrs. Cardew.  That was really why the awful confession
was postponed, and postponed, and never made.  She had shut down the
past, and for the last ten years it had seemed but a dream.  No child
was ever vouchsafed to her second marriage.  Perhaps it was the grief
of this that in time roused the demon of recollection in her, so that
year by year, up to the time of Jack's meeting with Mabel, the weight
of her guilty secret grew and grew, till the need of a confidante was
sometimes almost maddening.  The pent-up fires flamed out when Jack
was going to deceive the Bishop too.  Now----

She was completely stunned by the one appalling concrete fact that
Dick Gordon lived.

He lived!  He was not dead, as his friend the Rev. Silas Judd had
assured her.  The whole dreadful time of her rash, secret marriage
and subsequent supposed release came back as vividly as if it all
happened yesterday--the first stolen meetings with romantic Dick
Gordon, the wild girlish love that she gave the plausible rascal, and
the honeymoon in detachments--a few days at a time; then the brief
period of married life abroad under the shelter of a friend's
chaperonage, and the discovery of her husband's real mode of life.
The horror of that revelation drove her well-nigh crazy at the time,
and added to it was another problem looming.  Motherhood had claimed
her, and she went through all the horror of concealing the birth of a
little girl, born in secrecy and knowing no father, and placed in the
care of strangers.

Then followed the parting--the release.

In her present dazed condition she could only think of the one vital
thing--that Dick was down stairs, Dick, her girlish idol whom she had
loved with all a woman's passion even after the mask was stripped
from him--loved him because, though he had shamefully dragged her
into deep, dark waters, he was always kind, and seemed to have been
genuinely sorry for the ruin he had wrought.  Yet he had been
crueller than the vilest betrayer.

She gave no thought to Mabel at present.  She only existed in the
demented woman's mind as Jack's sweetheart.  That the beautiful girl
was Dick Gordon's daughter, perhaps her own daughter, alive and grown
to womanhood, was not yet a solid idea.  Stupefied and stunned, it
was Dick, and Dick only, that filled her horizon.  She cared not how
he had lived, or what ties he had contracted since their parting; he
was not dead, and living he was a menace, and a terror.  How often
she had wept--even after her marriage--over the recollection of the
reckless, contrite lover-husband, who had sworn before heaven that,
if she no longer respected him, he would release her, because he
loved her.  Dick Gordon in those days was tender-hearted wherever a
woman was concerned.  He had a little pride too.  He saw the futility
of clinging to the beautiful girl whom he had ruined but could not
degrade, and devised his own cunning, plausible scheme to release
her.  It cost him something to give her up.  Their child was put out
to nurse; but its baby fingers had tightened upon his, its eyes had
smiled innocently upon him, and the rogue realized the existence of a
passion hitherto undreamt of, the passion of paternity.  In his
despair at the failure of all his plans to secure a dashing,
beautiful, reckless mate to help him prey upon his victims, he was
faced with the necessity of giving up both his wife and child.

And Dick Gordon was never good at giving up anything.

It was a wonderful triumph over self that made him relinquish Hester.
But the child was his; she could not take it back to her friends.  He
advised her to conceal it and go back to spinsterhood.  She wanted to
have it near her, but he had no desire for the child to be reared by
a bitter, disappointed woman, and taught to hate him.  It jarred upon
his idea of what was nice and charming.  His vivid imagination had
depicted the child growing up into a little thing with golden hair,
decked out in white and toddling after him; and later as a romping
school girl--still picturesque and delightful; then as a daughter
grown to womanhood, an ornament and comfort to his old age--for
Bannister, who loved youth and hated grey hairs, dreaded old age,
and, unlike most rascals, stuck rigidly to a banking account.

He was clever enough to know that he could not be a rascal all his
days, and that money easily made was just as easily saved.  He never
considered himself as having anything in common with the
white-haired, sponging, pathetic wrecks who were the grandfathers of
his profession; and he had urged this fact upon his wife when she
scornfully spurned him, as an inducement to wait until he could turn
respectable.

Dick Gordon parted from his beautiful wife in the full flush of
sentimental grief; and he wanted to do what he considered the right
thing.  The only service he could render her was to die and free her
completely.  That was inconvenient; but the renegade curate Judd was
paid to tell the plausible tale of Gordon's and the child's death.
The thing was carried through, like everything attempted by Dick
Gordon, artistically, and with no loose edges.

At that time the sentimental rogue thought he would never enter
England again, having made it rather hot for himself in one or two
directions--and as Hester had violently declared that she, on her
side, would never again leave English soil, the supposed death and a
new alias seemed likely to answer all purposes.  It left her free to
live what life she chose; and at the same time give him complete
liberty with safety, for she had threatened to expose him, and he was
never quite sure what she might do.

They had met again, and she could not expose him now.

Little by little all that she had heard of Mr. Bannister from Mabel
and Jack came back to her; the description of his luxurious rooms in
Bond Street, his fastidious ways, his love of glitter and color and
fine clothes, his love of art, his priceless collection of
etchings--all these things belonged to the old Dick Gordon.  He was
more flourishing than ever, apparently, for he had motor cars now.
For one brief moment she allowed herself to believe and hope that it
might be an honorable life he was living, on wealth that had come to
him by some lucky and legitimate channel.

There was not much time to speculate.  The flood gates of memory were
open, and a torrent of recollections swept onward, beating down all
the barriers set up during the years of her second marriage.  In her
first panic and clear realization of the truth the present was as
nothing, a background only for the past, all the details of which
showed with startling distinctness.  She even found herself recalling
the gowns she wore on different occasions during her brief married
life abroad; and especially one which Dick had always admired; and
some orchids he had bought her to wear with it; magnificent blooms of
flaming yellow.  She looked down at the mass of billowy chiffon with
which her fingers were playing.  Yes, they were almost the same shade
as the velvet on the gown she was wearing.  A ghastly smile dawned in
her eyes; to vanish again on the instant as consciousness of her
surroundings brought into prominence the present, with its
overwhelming crisis.

It was of herself that she must think.  What line of action must she
take?

Dinner over, the Bishop, she knew, would make an excuse to come and
see how she was.  She would have to face him, and look into those
steady and kindly eyes and--lie.

She was not his wife now.  The situation was wild and fantastic.  As
she compelled her mind to contemplate it, a wave of cold terror swept
over her.  It was as if the solid ground from beneath her had given
away, and she had become the sport of some new element, with powers
that she could neither gauge nor control.

Of what account were the years that were gone, those years that she
and the Bishop had spent together, planning good works and building
up a grand reputation?  It had been a life lived upon the thin crust
of a morass.  She had married Dick Gordon and loved him, and he
died--but he was now alive.  She recalled every word of the curt
announcement of his death in the papers, her first sense of relief,
and later a kindlier feeling and regret that she had not been with
him at the end, to say at least that she forgave him.  And now a
vengeful God had brought him back--back to her.  It seemed like a
punishment for her wicked deception of the man who now loved and
trusted her.

Dick Gordon alive!  And Dick Gordon was the father of Mabel, the girl
Jack was going to marry!  Mabel was Dick Gordon's daughter!

His daughter!--Dick's daughter!

By whom?

Her own child had died, else----

She sat up suddenly, rigid and pale, every nerve and pulse in her
body held tensely in the grip of a new thought.  Her lips grew dry
and dropped apart, and a thin scream came from beneath them; a cry
scarcely human, save for its note of agony.  Then her hands went up
to her throbbing temples, and closed across her face, which was
distorted and agonized.  For a few minutes she remained in this
position, then dragged herself towards the divan, where she knelt and
tried to pray.  She could not compose her thoughts.  No words came.
She rose to her feet and rushed from the Bishop's room to her own as
though chased by fiends, her strangled sobs almost choking her.

A maid servant who was in the corridor hurried towards her; but Lady
Hester passed quickly into her room, shut the door and bolted it.

One idea alone possessed her.  No one must see her like this.  All
self-control was gone, and she feared for her terrible secret.  All
she desired was time to steady herself and think out the situation in
all its bearings.

The story of Dick Gordon's death was a lie and a fraud.  Why not the
story of the child's death, too?  How she had wept over the lost
babe, cursing herself for her weakness in letting them take it from
her!  And she had believed them when they told her it was dead.  She
let the child go--the precious gift vouchsafed to her by Heaven under
circumstances of supreme trial, but none the less given into her
sacred care, a trust from God.  And how had she discharged this
trust?  She had let Dick take it away, and accepted a stranger's word
that it was dead.

Mabel!--his daughter!

Mabel Bannister.  She repeated the name to herself again and again.
Perhaps Dick had taken a second wife.  Yes, that was the solution of
it.  Then she remembered the Bishop's comments on Mabel's likeness to
herself.

"My daughter!" she cried wonderingly.  "Mine!  He calls her his--she
must be mine too--mine!"

Why did he hide the child away?  He had spoken of it as an
incumbrance to be got rid of; yet Mabel's life was a record of
innocent girlhood and an indulgent father's love.

And Mabel was to marry Jack.  It was amazing--maddening.  Who was she?

It was Farce grinning through Tragedy's mask.  Jack, the Bishop's
son, was to marry Mabel, the daughter of the adventurer, Dick Gordon,
knowing nothing of her antecedents, and believing her to be the child
of a gentleman.  And Bannister was going to buy Dingle Hall and
settle a thousand a year upon his daughter.

That must be all a fraud.  He could not be rich.  Yet he used to
boast that, by the time he was forty, he would have amassed a
fortune, and would be independent of his precarious, adventurous
existence.  He had a way, too, of achieving everything he set his
heart on with real determination.  It was just possible that he had
grown wealthy; that he was now what he seemed to be.  She had lived
down the past--why not he?

She laughed at the absurdity of it; but her laugh ended in a scream
the sound of which sobered her; and she hid her face in the lace
coverlet of her bed, striving to stifle the choking hysterical cries.
Reason seemed to be tottering.  Like many self-contained and
seemingly undemonstrative women, Lady Hester was extremely emotional.
Circumstances had, in a great measure, altered her disposition, and
now, when the guard arm was down, she shrank back, appalled at her
own weakness.  But she was not a weak woman, and she was supremely
conscious that her only hope lay in self-control.  She must pull
herself together and meet Dick Gordon face to face.  There must be no
faltering, no hesitancy.  One false move on her part, and she might
bring ruin upon the life of the man who had given her the only peace
and true happiness she had ever known, the man to whom honor was as
the breath of life.  She wanted, and must obtain at all costs, a
respite from immediate ruin and exposure.  Dick Gordon must be bribed
or silenced somehow.

She owed the Bishop much before; she owed him more now; his good name
must not be besmirched or his honor dimmed.  She could die--she must
die, if death would wipe out all offences; and by her own hand, if
need be, to save him.

The necessity of uttering her thoughts to some one else was
overmastering her.  Her brain was racing, teeming with ideas; but
they were nebulous, needing speech to make them concrete.  She talked
aloud, but her voice sounded harsh and discordant, and she clapped
both hands over her mouth, and bit the flesh in her struggle to
master her hysteria.  It was the sight of her own reflection in the
mirror at last that steadied her; for the face that looked into hers
was haggard and drawn, a tablet on which any one could read that
which she would hide.

Again she thought of Mabel--Mabel, who might be her own daughter, the
babe taken from her, the child she had mourned as dead, accepting
death as Heaven's punishment for her desertion.  It was here, beside
her, grown to womanhood.  The long arm of coincidence and the
remorseless chain of circumstance bound her with iron shackles from
which she could not escape.  She was tethered, no matter in what
direction she struggled to get free.

Some one rapped at the door.

A definite and clearer appreciation of her difficulties came to her
with appalling clearness.  She expected the Bishop, yet dreaded to
see him; and while she hesitated a moment, uncertain of the command
of her reason, Aunt Caroline's voice made itself heard--a potent and
cruel reminder of the vengeance at hand.

The Bishop, unable to leave his guests, had sent his sister to
inquire after the invalid, and to see whether Lady Hester had dined.
He had heard from the butler, who was devoted to her ladyship, that
the tray sent to her boudoir had come down untouched, and that her
ladyship had locked herself in her bedroom.  The sound of Aunt
Caroline's hard, clear voice gave back to the terrified woman the
courage which had deserted her.

"What do you want?"

"It is I, Caroline.  My brother wishes to know if you are any better.
Let me in, Hester.  I don't expect to be kept waiting on the mat like
a housemaid."

"I'm sorry I can't let you in.  I'm coming down shortly, but I want
to be left quiet a little longer."  She spoke slowly, like a weary
invalid.  She was weary enough, God knows; but Aunt Caroline's voice
and manner raised all the spirit she had in her.  She would have
given the world to shout at her and tell her to go away, for Aunt
Caroline of all people would be the first to triumph at her downfall.

In this she did the old lady an injustice.  As Bannister knew--and as
his old colleague the Rev. Silas Judd knew--Aunt Caroline had, in her
day, risen to amazing heights of indiscretion, and was only saved
from a villain by her own level-headedness.  If Lady Hester had only
known, she would have been a valuable ally in the present awful
crisis; for Caroline Cardew was one of those queer old women who go
through life with an unreasoning suspicion of their own sex, and
absolute distrust of the self-contained woman; but let them loose in
the middle of a real tragedy and arouse their sympathy, and they will
champion a woman against their better judgment, and, if need be,
against the world.  And such a woman was Caroline Cardew.

"If you don't want me to come in I'm sure I don't want to.  But if
you're ill, somebody ought to see what's wrong with you; and if
you're not ill it's very bad taste on your part to select this
particular evening to make a scene, when the house is full of all
sorts of horrible people who are here at your invitation.  I shall
send your maid to you."

"No, no--go away," groaned the wretched sufferer, and her misery must
have crept into her voice, for Aunt Caroline's voice softened.

"You'd better have some one with you," she persisted.

"Then send Miss Bannister to me, please--that is, if she can come
without being missed."

"Of course she'll be missed.  But I'll tell her you want her."

The rest of Aunt Caroline's muttering was lost as she walked away
with an angry frown that meant no good to any one.

Lady Hester rose quickly from the couch, where she had thrown
herself, and lighting the candles on her dressing table, peered
anxiously at the woman in the mirror.  She was deathly pale, and
there were heavy shadows about the eyes; but no signs of weeping.

She opened her bedroom door and looked into the corridor.  Aunt
Caroline was standing at the landing window gazing intently at
something in the yard below.

"You needn't trouble to ask Mabel to come up, Caroline; I've decided
to come down."

Aunt Caroline did not reply; a usual habit with her when she was
displeased; but she had not, as a matter of fact, heard the remark.
She was too intent in watching a man in the yard below, a servant who
was apparently counting the windows, indicating them one after the
other by the aid of a pencil in his hand.  She could neither see the
color of his clothes nor his face, but he looked like Mr. Bannister's
solemn faced man.

"Queer," she muttered, as she walked slowly down stairs.

Somebody was singing in the drawing room, and she waited till the
song was finished; then, passing in, went up to Mabel, saying icily,
"Lady Hester requires your presence upstairs."

Mabel rose to go, quaking with apprehension.

The men in the drawing room were almost merry; they had warmed up
after dinner; but, as usual, with the hostess absent, they had drawn
together in a knot, and the women were left very much to themselves,
with only Mr. Crick to entertain them.

Bannister was amusing the Bishop and the archdeacon and a very
youthful curate with some good stories particularly appealing to
churchmen, and they were laughing heartily.  The Bishop forgot to be
frigidly polite.  He applauded all his guest's sallies with gusto;
while Mr. Crick, on the other hand, was not at all brilliant or
amusing, and a silence fell upon the women which had gradually made
itself felt.  Aunt Caroline, who had been very much disconcerted by
Bannister's amazing knowledge of her past--learned by him from the
rascal Judd of course--found that she could not talk herself or
listen to other people.  She sat glued to her chair, ever and anon
turning her eyes upon Bannister with amazement.  One moment she
admired his incomparable sangfroid; the next she doubted whether
after all he was a villain and a rascal.  Then she glanced at the
stammering, idiotic Mr. Crick, who was making feeble jokes and
giggling over them to the point of suffocation, and wondered which of
the two it was safest to trust to keep her awful secret.

As a matter of fact poor Mr. Crick had never said a word to Bannister
concerning Aunt Caroline's early peccadilloes, and knew nothing of
them; while she, of course, could not question him on the point.

The old lady's suspicions might have died a natural death but for the
extraordinary conduct of Lady Hester herself, and her dramatic
recognition of Mr. Bannister earlier in the evening.  Hester must be
very ill indeed to keep away from her guests and surrender the reins
of government to her sister-in-law.  Under ordinary circumstances she
would crawl down if she were dying, rather than disappoint her
friends and ruin a festive gathering like this.  But fresh surprises
awaited Caroline when Hester, pale as marble, calm and self-composed,
entered the room, and walked up to the nearest guest as though
nothing had happened.

"Oh, my dear--you're better?  I'm so glad," cried the archdeacon's
wife, impulsively going to meet the pale, calm looking woman.

The others of course crowded round.  The Bishop jumped up, and
hurried over to his wife, whom he seized by the arms gleefully, like
a big school boy.  "Ah, my darling--that's right.  You're better now.
You're looking pale, though.  I hope you're not overdoing it."

"Oh, no, no--only a faint.  When I caught my foot in my dress and
fell, the shock was greater than I thought."

"If it hadn't been for me she would have fallen the whole flight,"
chimed in Bannister.

"Yes, Mr.--er--Mr. Bannister.  I haven't thanked you."

"It was my privilege to be of service," replied Mr. Bannister, with a
queer, complacent smile that was not lost upon Aunt Caroline and
struck terror to Lady Hester's soul.  He adjusted his eyeglass
critically and almost rudely.  Anger rose in the wretched wife's
breast because he was obviously only amused.  He was unabashed,
perfectly self-possessed, and playing the polite guest in the house
of his own wife as though it were the most ordinary thing in the
world for a woman to have two husbands--and one of them a Bishop.

"Sit down and rest, my dear," suggested the Bishop.

"Yes, don't tire yourself," echoed the women.

"This chair is extremely comfortable, Lady Cardew," said Bannister
softly; and he drew forward a big lounge chair, setting it beside a
standard lamp.

She accepted dumbly, and tried to keep her eyes from his face.
Curiosity, fear, hauteur, anger, all in turn flashed from her eyes;
and Mabel, sitting by Jack's side at the other end of the room,
turning over a pile of music for the benefit of a stout lady with
vocal accomplishments who was going to the piano, looked across and
saw the furtive glances passing between her father and her friend.
They mystified and at the same time frightened her; for she guessed
that the faint upon the stairs was due in some way to the meeting
with her father.  Lady Hester must have had some previous knowledge
of him--and was it to his credit?

Bannister had carefully put Lady Hester's chair under the light that
he might talk to her and look at her well--she was so changed; and
the alteration made on a beautiful woman by the passage of years is
always interesting--if it is not painful.  The amazing novelty of it
grips the attention.  The woman is the same, yet not the same.  The
old ego is behind, but the outer shell breathes a different
atmosphere.  The eyes--those fine eyes!--moved in exactly the same
way; the lips had the same curve; the cheeks were a little fuller,
yet so slightly altered as to defy the minutest examination.  The
hair was differently dressed; the superb neck and shoulders were
fuller, giving a new dignity to the torso, yet the graceful
proportions were the same.  The modern fashion in hair dressing had
perhaps made the greatest change of all in the woman of twenty years
ago.  Dignity of design had taken the place of girlish curls; the
amazing, beautiful, and unusual color was the same, and the
complexion retained the old peach-like bloom, except for the
heightened pallor of to-night, which he knew to be unusual.

Bannister's attempted _tête-à-tête_ with Lady Hester was interrupted,
and again he became the centre of a group.  The men begged him to
tell some more stories; and called the women to listen; but he begged
to be excused, and protested that it might jar on Lady Hester.  If
she could have found it in her heart at that moment to thank him, she
would have been grateful.

The stout lady having settled at the piano, with Jack on duty by her
side Mabel was free to drop back into the cushions of the lounge and
watch the issue of the tragedy.

So far the girl had been able to evade any direct questioning by
Jack, who was burning with curiosity and eager for enlightenment.
She had avoided sitting out with him in the hall, and carefully kept
within earshot of the other guests.  When he muttered sulkily about
her want of feeling, she whispered that they must be more distant and
avoid the watchful eyes of Aunt Caroline.

He was incensed at his aunt's manner of glaring at Mabel when they
first met, as though she were a reptile, and he had an uncomfortable
suspicion that she might have guessed her to be the lady discovered
at his chambers.  That, of course, would account for a good deal;
yes, it was wiser to disarm her suspicion.

All her interest was now concentrated upon Mr. Bannister.  Mabel had
noticed this at dinner, and strained her ears to catch a little of
her father's conversation with the old lady, but not a word had she
heard, although she saw that Mr. Crick was under observation, and
that Miss Cardew got up from the dinner table looking flurried and
uneasy.

Finding it impossible to talk privately to his wife, Bannister joined
the party who were at the other end of the room ostensibly listening
to the lady at the piano; but his eyes were greedily devouring his
wife, the new and more wonderful Hester.  Mabel watched him in
fascinated amazement.  She had never seen him look like that at any
woman, although she had seen many a woman try to win his approval.
As he gazed at his wife's familiar, yet unfamiliar, charms, his color
came and went, and his eyes glittered with an exultation that was
unusual, disconcerting, and terrible to the woman.

A constraint fell upon the company after the arrival of Lady Hester.
No one seemed quite at ease; conversation flickered and died, and at
times there was a sudden hush in the great drawing room that was
depressing.

Lady Hester felt it, and made a supreme effort, calling all her
natural instincts as hostess and mistress of the house into play.
But her faculties seemed numb and unresponsive.  Yet nothing was
really changed.  All that was here was hers--except Dick Gordon.  He
was an interloper, an outlaw, a vulture.

He too had changed with the passing of years, but not for the better.
His eye was keener, his cheeks thinner, his beard with the foreign
point a novelty that offended.  He looked harder, crueller, and more
sinister.  And, after all, he was as much in her power as she in his.
She was no longer the impressionable, easily cowed, easily swayed
girl of twenty years ago.  Now was the time for her to show what she
had learned by suffering, and let Dick Gordon see that she had
developed character and courage, and a recklessness almost as daring
as his own.

"I'm really feeling much better, and you're all so absurdly quiet,"
she cried, jumping up.  "You're all thinking about me instead of
amusing yourselves.  Mr. Crick, you don't know Mrs. Harkaway, do you?
I ought to have introduced you.  Come over here.  And Mrs. Bennett,
you sing, don't you?  That duet I heard at your house was charming.
Won't you sing it now with Mr. Bennett?"

Mrs. Bennett explained that it was only a frivolous little thing.  A
cold had robbed her of her voice.  Wouldn't somebody else step into
the breach?  Didn't Mr. Bannister sing?  She was quite sure that he
did--he looked like it.

Mr. Bannister smilingly disclaimed any talent in that particular
direction, and said that he expected his daughter to take on her
shoulders the burden of her father's share of the entertaining.

"Miss Bannister sings," exclaimed two or three people at once.

Jack, who had never heard Mabel sing, jumped at the idea.  It was a
novelty, and he was quite excited about it.  Mabel gulped down an
inclination to sob.  How could she sing to-night, with Jack
there--ruined, and Lady Hester shaking with terror at the sight of
her father--and the Bishop blissfully unconscious that anything was
amiss?  The old gentleman was carrying on a rather heated argument in
whispers with the archdeacon over Clause IV. of the Education Bill.
To focus attention upon herself was the last thing she desired.  But
Jack drew her forward playfully, determined to dispel the clouds
somehow.

Lady Hester had forgotten Mabel's existence in these dazed moments of
panic and mental confusion.  She forced herself to attend, and smiled
a mechanical smile.

His daughter!

This was the girl--the Mabel that she had taken to her heart of late
in a way quite unusual with her, the girl whose voice and face had
always seemed familiar as half-forgotten music--Dick Gordon's
daughter.  After all, maternity must be a divine instinct akin to
inspiration.

Her daughter!  Her own child!

The girl seated herself at the piano, and ran her trembling fingers
over the keys.  The music brought back a little courage.  She began
in a quavering voice an old Italian convent song which few of those
present could understand, except the Bishop and Bannister.  The
former applauded vigorously at the end, and, turning to his wife,
with beaming countenance exclaimed--

"Hester, for a few moments, when she began, I could have sworn it was
your voice.  How is it we never knew that she sang?"

"Yes, Lady Hester sings too, and we had forgotten it," cried Mrs.
Bennett, who was very eager to be asked again.  "Ah! how well I
remember your singing in the anthem solo at St. Saviour's ever so
many years ago.  Dear old Saviour's! where you were married, too,
wasn't it?"

Dick Gordon coughed behind his handkerchief, and reddened to the
eyes.  He was laughing.  It roused the demon of resourcefulness in
Hester, and her fear dropped away.  She could have struck him.  Her
voice rang cold as steel and her eyes flashed as she demanded--

"What amuses you, Mr. Bannister?"

"Oh, nothing--nothing," he replied, and darted an answering glance to
her challenge.  "The name of St. Saviour's recalled to my mind an old
friend of my youth, a curate, a sad dog in his day.  I remember his
going to take duty at St. Saviour's, and he wanted me to come too.
I'm sorry now I didn't.  A queer fellow, but never intended for the
church.  He had a weakness for elopements"--Aunt Caroline choked--"he
was in love at least once a week, and always drowned his
disappointments in strong liquor.  A black sheep.  He went utterly to
the dogs; but he was an amusing fellow."

The Bishop coughed and looked uncomfortable, and darted a glance at
Jack, who looked another way.

"He fell on bad days at last and died miserably, I heard.  Did you
ever know of such a person, Lady Hester, while you were at--I forget
the name of the church?"

"St. Saviour's," murmured the wretched woman.  "I never heard of any
such person."

"I once met a curate of that name," observed Aunt Caroline coldly,
and with wonderful self-possession.  "He was a friend of that Dick
Gordon of whom we were speaking at dinner."

At the name of Dick Gordon Lady Hester gave a great choke and a gulp
that was something between a scream and a sob.  She clutched at her
full, white throat.

"Hester, my dear Hester!  You're really not well.  You shouldn't have
come down," cried the Bishop, running to her.  "Caroline, my dear,
take her upstairs."

Everybody crowded round full of sympathy, and Bannister glared
savagely at Aunt Caroline.  But Lady Hester would not give in.  She
protested that she would be better presently.  And Aunt Caroline was
satisfied that she had probed a certain distance into the mystery.
Hester had known Dick Gordon, and Crick's assertions were not far
wrong after all.

Lady Hester's mental suffering was as plain to Mabel as if
interpreted by spoken words.  She saw that her father was stabbing
her friend with invisible darts.  While the others imagined that mere
physical weakness was the trouble, she knew that the woman was being
cruelly broken.  She stepped quickly up to her father, and, going
close to him, flashed a look into his eyes that he had never seen
there before.

"Why did you do it?  You're a coward!  You--you----"

"Tut-tut, be quiet, child.  Don't make a fool of yourself," he
whispered between his grinding teeth.  He looked as though he could
have struck her; but Jack came towards them, and his features were
instantly wreathed in smiles.

"Mabel, my darling," he purred, "I'm sure Jack would like to talk to
you.  He hasn't had five minutes alone with you since we came down.
Go over there and amuse him.  I have much to say to the Bishop."

Jack was only too glad to get his wife into a corner, and, taking
advantage of the interest aroused by Lady; Hester, he tackled her
seriously.

"You haven't written to me, Mabel."

"I had no time.  Everything was so hurried."

"And I want to know what you meant by talking of good-bye."

"I can't explain now--not here," she replied almost absently,
watching Lady Hester and her father all the time.

"Never mind my mother, attend to me, little girl.  I want to know
why----"

"Ah, she's laughing now.  She must be feeling better."

"Oh, yes, your father is taking her in hand.  He'll amuse her and
bring her round.  It was only a little faintness.  She'll be all
right after a night's rest.  You needn't be so alarmed.  You look as
though you thought your father would eat her."

It was true; the girl's eyes watched the pair as if fascinated.  She
saw her father seat himself at his hostess's side and talk
commonplaces; and Lady Hester forced an artificial laugh, and kept up
the farce until the interest which had been concentrated upon her was
withdrawn; then with a stealthy glance to left and right to be sure
that she was unobserved, she talked swiftly and earnestly.

"Mabel, attend to me.  Have you lost all interest in my society?
Have you forgotten?" whispered Jack petulantly.

"No, Jack, but don't talk to me just now, not to-night."

"Oh, if you are bored or annoyed with me----"

"I'm neither, Jack, dearest.  I've much to say to you that can't be
said with all these people near.  And I can't say it--just yet.  I
must have time."

"I'll come to you to-night after they are all gone and the others are
in bed; then we can talk in privacy."

"To-night--here?  Oh no, no, I've changed my room.  It would be
madness."

"Nonsense.  I can get to your room all right.  And who is to know?
They'll be asleep by midnight."

"No, not here.  You terrify me."

"Well, I seem to have become a regular bogey of a husband already,"
he growled, tugging at his mustache.  "What do you think I came down
for but to see you?"

Very much the same sort of conversation was in progress on the other
side of the room, where Lady Hester was masking her excitement by a
pretence of showing Bannister a Japanese mirror and talking _sotto
voce_.

"I must see you--I must talk to you alone," she whispered.  "You must
go away at once."

"Nonsense," he replied, "I am coming down to buy Dingle Hall and live
near you."

"You will do nothing of the kind."

"I shall.  There are the young people to consider--my daughter."

"Yours?"

There was a world of query in her voice.

"Yes, mine--_and yours_," he whispered, with a cynical smile.

"I knew it--I guessed it--I felt it.  Oh, Mabel!"

She rose with an impulsive movement, and walked swiftly across to
Mabel, who rose quickly, just in time to catch her sobbing mother in
her arms.

"I knew it--I knew it!  She ought not to have come down," cried the
Bishop helplessly.  "Caroline!  Caroline!"




CHAPTER XIV

A young wife in her night dress praying beside her bed.  The prayer a
jumble of appeals, questions, lamentations, and sobs.

The room was a severe, old-fashioned one with a four-poster, and red
curtains hanging from a massive canopy which reached to the low
ceiling.  On the dressing table candles burned, one on either side of
the large oval mirror.  The girl's pretty clothes were strewn about
in confusion, showing that she had undressed hastily with her mind on
other things.  Her hair was tumbling over her eyes, and gathered in
two long plaits, one on either shoulder--as Jack loved to see them.
She looked more girlish than in her modish satin gown earlier in the
evening.  Her eyes were dry; but her throat was thick with sobs that
seemed to be choking her.  Her soft white hands were clenched upon
the pink coverlet, twining and working in harmony with the twisting
of her troubled brain.

She had locked the door, and the key was on the bed.  Jack had
refused to listen to her denial, and was coming for the explanation
which she could not give.  He was coming to his wife to look into
happy, bright eyes, and hear her confess that she was once more happy
in his love.

To risk detection thus was reckless; it was foolish; but it was an
enterprise to Jack's taste.  Stolen kisses were ever sweetest, and he
was determined that the clouds which had risen between them should be
speedily scattered by satisfactory explanations.  His curiosity to
know the reason for her change of attitude was stronger than his
discretion.  He would not be guided by his wise little wife.

"I shan't let him in.  O God, help me!--guide me--give me courage to
go where I can never see him more," she prayed.  "Don't let me ruin
him and be a drag upon him all his life till he grows to hate me.  He
knows I love him--he will never doubt that.  And he will
understand--he must understand--that it was for his good I am doing
this.  My father is a bad man--a cruel man.  He is only using me for
his own ends.  He is weaving a web about this house.  O God, you can
understand.  Guide me, help me, show me where to go!  I am so very
much alone."

There was a rustle on the corridor outside.  Her heart stood still;
her breath strangled in her throat, and she could not extinguish the
second candle.  She looked round in panic.

A regular knocking at her door, soft and steady, yet dangerously
loud.  She made a sound in moving towards the door, and knocked over
a scent bottle.  The person outside evidently heard.

"Mabel, I'm coming in--may I?"

It was Lady Hester.  The voice was husky and hardly recognizable.
Mabel tried to answer, but the words choked her.  She wanted to
temporize and make an excuse; but ere she could articulate the door
opened, and Lady Hester, in a long cream dressing gown, and with her
hair untouched since retiring to rest, entered and closed the door
after her.  The mother could not keep away from her child.

"Mabel, my dear," she cried, extending her arms with strange
tenderness; "Mabel, I wanted to see you before I went to sleep."

The girl came to her obediently.  There was a strange, illuminating,
beatific expression in those big, tearless eyes.  They seemed to be
telling her something.

Lady Hester folded her daughter to her heart and dropped her head
upon her shoulder.  She kissed the soft, girlish cheek, and passed
her hands over the turbulent hair.  Then she drew away and stood with
her back to the candle, in order that the light might fall on Mabel's
face and reveal the eyes that had always seemed to be saying
something to her that she could not understand.

"My child--my child!" she murmured, and kissed her again, holding her
tight.  Then the flood gates opened--tears at last.

Still holding the girl from her at arm's length and looking into her
face, she spoke with more calmness.  "You are going to marry Jack,
Mabel.  That's what I came to see you about.  The Bishop seems to
have thought out and arranged everything--in his own mind--in rather
a hurried way.  I don't want you to think me unkind, or mysterious,
but--but I want you to put it off for a little while.  A nice, long
engagement, so that all things may be straightened out."

"I don't think I am going to marry Jack at all," said Mabel quietly.

"No?  You have quarrelled, then?" asked Lady Hester, with very little
show of surprise, and striving in vain to repress the excitement in
her voice.

"You see, when we were engaged I didn't know--whom I was."

"Then you know now.  He has told you?"

"Ah, then I am right," sobbed Mabel.  "You, too, know the kind of man
my father is.  He is not fit to be in this house.  I am not fit to be
here.  Jack must never be ruined by me."

"So the cross is bearing you down too," said Lady Hester
impressively.  "What has he told you?"  This anxiously, and with her
eyes averted.

"He has told me nothing.  I've guessed how he lives, how he must
always live.  Who I am, and whether I have any right to the name I
bear, I don't know.  Sometimes I hope that I may not be his child at
all."

"Would to God you were not, Mabel!  Oh, my darling, you are----"

The confession would not come.  The agonized mother flung her arms
about the girl and held her to her breast again, twining her arms
tightly and impulsively about her, but she could not speak the
amazing words.

Mabel broke away at last, sobbing as badly as Lady Hester.

"You knew him.  You must have known him before to-night," faltered
the girl.  "Tell me, what do you know about him?  You told me about a
man once, a villain who took you into strange company and showed you
another side of life to that you were used to.  Did you ever meet my
father in those days?  Birds of a feather flock together, they say.
Oh, it is horrible!  Yet he seems to have always known decent people
and to have visited nice houses.  Oh, tell me he isn't what I think
he is.  I know that men are often gamblers and unscrupulous--I've
heard about it often--and some women always cheat at bridge--but he
isn't--he isn't----"

"Yes he is, Mabel; he is a thief!" cried the other bitterly.  "I see
you have found him out.  At least, that is what he was when--when I
met him."

"Oh--oh!  I shall kill myself," sobbed the wretched girl.  "I won't
know him.  I won't live with him.  I won't ever touch him.  He is
vile, although he is my father.  If I haven't courage enough to kill
myself I--I shall kill him.  I am quite alone--I've got nobody.  It
doesn't matter what I do or what becomes of me."

"Yes, you have some one, Mabel.  You have me."

"Oh, you can't know me," cried the girl hysterically, drawing away.
"I'm not fit to sit at your table.  The Bishop, if he knew, would be
horrified.  Oh, how shabbily I am treating him by letting him imagine
my father is a gentleman, and an equal!  Oh, Lady Hester, Lady
Hester, he has only come down here to steal.  I know it.  I overheard
it."

"To steal--here!"

"Yes, and he's brought that man Voss with him."

"Voss?  Who is Voss?  The name seems familiar."

"He's his servant, or pretends to be.  But he's quite familiar with
him when they're alone, although father insults him all the time.
They're planning something dreadful, I know they are.  They want your
emeralds."

"Oh, the emeralds are in a safe, dear," laughed Lady Hester
mirthlessly.  Again she drew the unhappy girl to her, and looked
wonderingly into her eyes, ready to unburden her heart and make the
great confession which must come sooner or later.  The words would
not shape themselves.  Her emotions were too overpowering--she grew
dizzy again.  The cords of her brain seemed to be snapping.  She
opened her arms dumbly, and Mabel, seeing the pain in her face, came
to her embrace tenderly and comforted her.

They stood thus for a few moments, the elder woman weeping quietly on
the younger's shoulder, making but one shadow against the candle
light.  They forgot all else but their troubles.

They did not hear the door softly open behind them, but they heard it
close.  The next moment Jack's voice cried exultantly--

"Ah, I've got here, you see, little girl."  He took a bound forward,
and the women jumped apart.

"Jack!" gasped Mabel.

Her cry was echoed by Lady Hester.

"Jack?--here?"

"Good Lord--mother!" gasped Jack, falling back breathlessly and
shamefaced.  Then he cursed beneath his breath, while Lady Hester
stood gazing at him in astonishment.  Mabel hurried into a dressing
gown, timid and ashamed.

Jack saw that he was caught.  He ground his teeth and set his jaws
obstinately; then rammed his hands into the pockets of his dressing
gown, and stood awaiting the inevitable.

"Jack, you here at this time of night?  What do you mean?  Why have
you come?"

Lady Hester looked from one to the other; but Mabel was only crying
miserably, and playing with the lace of her dressing gown.

"We're caught, that's all," growled Jack defiantly.  "Mabel, you
might have told me you expected visitors, or have you arranged this
as a surprise for me?  Does mother know?"

"She knows no more than she has seen, Jack.  I've told her nothing,
and what she thinks I don't care.  As I am never going to marry you,
Jack, it doesn't matter what I do, or what Lady Hester knows."

Jack stared uncomprehendingly.

"She has discovered our secret," he muttered awkwardly.

"Secret--secret?" cried Lady Hester despairingly, flinging up her
hands.

"We're married," he added.

"Oh, fools, fools! why couldn't you wait?  You deceived me--both of
you."

"Yes, we're married, that's the long and short of it," growled Jack,
diving his hands deeper into his pockets, and striding up and down as
though he were bored at this intrusion of Lady Hester into his
domestic affairs.

"Married!" echoed Lady Hester.  "Secretly?"

[Illustration: "YES, MARRIED," HE SNAPPED.  "MARRIED."]

"Yes, married," he snapped.  "Married.  And what of it?"  He jerked
out his reply in a temper, and glared at his stepmother.  "We've been
married ever so long."

"Oh, Jack, Jack, you needn't have told her!" moaned Mabel, sinking
into a chair.

"Needn't have told!  I'm not going to have people thinking idiotic
things about you and me.  It's got to be kept quiet.  But what does
it matter now?  Father has agreed to everything; so it hurts nobody."

"Fools! fools!" cried Lady Hester, flinging up her hands again, and
making for the door.  "Your secret is safe with me--but God help you!"

With a sob she escaped, leaving Jack more nettled than ever, and
utterly mystified.

Still dumb, he stared at his wife with as much dignity as he could
command in a dressing gown and slippers, angry and irritated; angry
at being caught out by Lady Hester, irritated because he was vaguely
conscious that there was mystery in progress, something outside his
ken.  He was temperamentally very like his father, and hated anything
that was not plain sailing.

Mabel had dropped into a chair, where she sat huddled up with her
hands clenched on her knees, the very picture of weary despair.  He
waited for her to speak now that Lady Hester had left them.  It was
only natural and proper that his wife should give him an explanation
of the extraordinary interview which he had interrupted.  But she
remained silent, troubled, and self-engrossed.  She was still
overpowered and swayed by the emotions that stirred her when she
talked to Lady Hester about her father; and her brain was benumbed;
the present, with its hideous complications, filled her horizon.
What mattered the future?  All her bold resolves were rendered
useless now Lady Hester knew of her marriage.  Renunciation was of no
avail.  Jack naturally would demand an explanation, and she could
give none--without telling all the hideous truth about her father and
her own mysterious origin.

One fact alone stood out from the bewildering tangle.  It was still
impossible for them to face the world together as husband and wife.

It was awful to be the veriest plaything of circumstances.  How could
Jack hold up his head if he knew, he had a thief for a father-in-law,
and that his own father's cherished heirlooms were at that moment in
jeopardy?  What would he think of her as the decoy and cat's-paw of a
rascal who had used her to get into the Palace solely for the purpose
of robbery?

Scalding tears forced themselves from under her burning eyelids, and
as they fell upon her clenched hands she looked down at them, half
expecting to see them blister the white flesh.  Surely no girl had
ever endured such torture as hers.

"Well, Mabel, perhaps you will explain why I find Lady Hester here,
and why you allow me to get caught like this."  Jack's voice was hard
and cold.

"You should never have come--you should never have come!" she moaned,
wringing her hands.

"And while we are on the explanation tack, perhaps you'll also give
the reason for your extraordinary behavior in town, where you talked
about good-bye forever, and all that sort of thing.  Aunt Caroline
caught us then, and now it's Lady Hester.  What's the meaning of it?"

"Lady Hester took me by surprise.  I couldn't send her away.  I--I
forgot you were coming for the moment.

"Forgot, eh?" exclaimed Jack loftily.  "One would think we had been
married six months."

"Jack, we ought not to have married at all.  We ought not to have
deceived Lady Hester."

"Look here, Mabel, is all this emotion and agitation due to what you
overheard of Aunt Caroline's conversation in the Temple about
Beatrice Carew?  Why have you changed so utterly?"

"There is no change in me, Jack.  The change is in other people.
Oh--don't ask me--don't drive me crazy!" she exclaimed, starting up
and clasping her throbbing temples.

The piteous trouble in her eyes moved him in spite of his anger.
"Mabel, my darling, you're not yourself at all.  You're not my sweet
little wife who fished with me at Weybury, and planned out a rosy
future, and----"

"No, I'm not, Jack--I'm not."

Further explanations were cut short by a step outside, and a knocking
at the door.  Lady Hester had returned.  Jack opened the door, and
she beckoned to him to come outside.

"Your father, Jack.  He has heard that you're going up to town the
first thing in the morning, and as he won't see you then, he wants to
talk to you to-night and is going to your room.  He may be there
before you.  Quick!  You must not let him suspect anything."

With one troubled look at Mabel, Jack fled.  Lady Hester, after
watching him go, went in to comfort her daughter.

Her daughter!

She put her arms about her, lovingly and tenderly.  There was no
anger now, only a great pity; and she folded her to her heart,
murmuring, "My poor child--my poor child!  This comes of listening to
a man in love."

She wept with her, alternately whispering words of comfort and words
of gentle condemnation until she was compelled to hurry away in order
to avoid inquiry from the Bishop.

Mabel locked herself in, and paced the room till the candles burned
low in their sockets, groping blindly in the maze of doubt and
difficulty, vainly seeking an outlet that promised some possibility
of sane, rational conduct.  She was hemmed in on every side.  The
cords of love were tugging at her heart.  Matrimony chained her to
Jack, and filial ties hedged her round.  She was tethered hand and
foot!  There seemed to be only one way out--to die.

That was too wild and irrational to appeal to her level-headed
instincts.  Youth was hot within her; life was still precious; and
she had always been accustomed to put her head on her pillow at night
with a pleasant consciousness that the morning would dawn fair and
bright with another day full of possibilities of joy and health.  To
contemplate self-extinction by violence was repugnant and horrible.

Jack, on his way to his room, hurried blindly along the dark corridor
to the west wing, and, after going a few yards, bumped into some one
coming in the opposite direction--a man.

It was Voss.  But to Jack he was a stranger, or nearly so.

"Who the--dickens are you?"

"I'm Mr. Bannister's man, sir."

"What are you doing down here at this hour of the night?"

"Just getting some water for Mr. Bannister, sir.  I couldn't find the
bath room for the hot water, sir.  Would you be so kind as to direct
me?"

"There's a bath room in the other wing, three yards away from your
master's room.  Don't be an idiot.  Look about you when the lights
are up, and don't come prowling about the house like this."

"I'm very sorry, sir.  I'd no idea I had wandered so far.  I'm much
obliged to you, sir.  I'll find the other bath room."

Jack hurried on, for he heard the Bishop's door opening, and his
father's voice telling Lady Hester not to wait up for him, as he
might be a long time.

What the Bishop had to say to his son was not interesting.  It bored
Jack unutterably.  It was a well-meant, paternal homily on marriage,
and the duties of marriage, its responsibilities and ideals.  It was
almost a sermon.  The old gentleman was careful to refrain from
revealing anything he had learned through Aunt Caroline of the lady
hidden in the Temple; but much of the Bishop's talk about chivalry
and discretion and the fair name of her who was to be his wife was
prompted by Aunt Caroline's revelations.

Jack, being a married man, and a worried one at that, naturally took
little interest in a private sermon from his parent concerning the
proper frame of mind in which to approach the altar.  The Bishop sat
on the end of his son's bed in a manner that was meant to be genial,
fatherly, and confidential; and if Jack had opened his heart to his
natural mentor, he might have sprung upon the old gentleman the great
secret which was worrying him exceedingly.  He had no idea that
keeping up the sham of bachelorhood after the honeymoon was over
would be such a strain.

The most interesting part of the discourse came at the end, when the
Bishop announced that, in view of Mr. Bannister's generous settlement
upon his daughter, he (the Bishop) could do no less than double
Jack's present allowance, to prevent him being too much dependent on
his wife.

The small hours were well advanced when the Bishop returned to his
room.  All the up-stairs lights were extinguished, and he groped his
way as best he could, going softly for fear of disturbing his wife.
He stopped outside her door for an instant and listened, because he
fancied he heard a movement within.  She was evidently not yet
asleep, for the light showed through the keyhole of the door; or she
might have fallen asleep and have left the candle burning.  He was
about to knock and turn the handle when a stifled sound, like a sob,
disturbed the stillness--and the next instant the candle went out.

"I'd better not disturb her.  Poor Hester!  One of her nervous
attacks; her fall must have shaken her badly."

He passed on, and, like Jack, tumbled on some one in the darkness.
"Who is it?" he murmured.

"It is only me, sir, Mr. Bannister's man.  I was going to get him
some hot water.  There's none in the other bath-room."

"Well, my man, go quietly.  Another time light the gas at the end of
the corridor before you try to find your way in a strange house."

"Yes, my lord--certainly, my lord.  But I didn't care to take the
liberty for fear I should disturb anybody."

A few minutes after the Bishop had begun to undress, he heard Voss
turning on the tap in the bath-room, making a deal of unnecessary
noise.  He almost went out to rate him soundly for daring to run the
risk of disturbing her ladyship by such carelessness; and he voted
Mr. Bannister's man a stupid idiot.

Voss carried an empty can to his master's room, and let himself in.
Bannister was not yet in bed.  He was lounging at his ease on a couch
reading--he was always late to bed.  He looked up when Voss entered,
showing irritation.

"Sorry," murmured Voss, "but I was obliged to come.  I ran into the
Bishop, and told him a yarn about hot water.  Everybody seems to be
prowling about the corridors to-night; first her ladyship, then Mr.
Jack, and then the Bishop."

"Where have you been?" asked Bannister, as he closed his book and
stretched his arms languidly with a yawn.

"Been prospecting."

"There's no need, you fool.  I told you so."

"But we must know the ground."

"You'll do as I tell you.  I say it is unnecessary."

"I've counted the windows from outside.  It's the third from the end.
The safe must be in the wall, and the wall quite a yard thick."

"You needn't concern yourself with useless calculations.  It won't be
done that way.  There are other means of opening safes than those you
would employ, my good Voss."

The fellow tidied up the bedroom in the mechanical way of a servant.
He was a strange combination of servility, usefulness, and villainy.

"Emeralds ain't easy," he murmured thoughtfully as he folded a towel.
"They ain't like diamonds, where one's just like another.
Emeralds----"

"Silence!" hissed Bannister, blazing out at him with unusual energy.
"Don't let me hear you mention the word within four walls.  You're
growing more and more careless.  I'm here to arrange the marriage of
my daughter to the Bishop's son; that is enough for the present.
Have you talked to the other servants?"

"Yes, I've gassed about the way we live in town, and money no object,
and all that sort of thing; and what a lucky boy Master Jack Lawyer
is to marry an heiress."

"And what do they say?"

"That Aunt Caroline--that is, Miss Cardew--ain't taking to it at all
kind; and nothing goes right in this house if she don't cotton to it.
She means to make trouble, and talks as though the girl was only down
here on appro', so to speak."

"I think I've put a check upon Aunt Caroline."  Bannister smiled and
stroked his beard, and dropped his eye-glass, and surveyed himself
pleasantly in the mirror.

"Do I look old, Voss?"

"Old--what do you mean?"

"Do you think I've changed much in twenty years?"

"No, not since I've known you."

"Ah, I wear very well.  Do you think I've improved?"  He ran his
fingers lovingly through his hair.

"Matter of taste," observed Voss, who rather wondered at the strange
question.  He knew from old association that it was always necessary
to wait till his master arrived at the point, and not to forestall
him.

"Do you think Lady Hester has changed?"

"How should I know?"

"You never saw her before?"

"No."

"Quite sure?"

"I seemed to fancy her sort of familiar.  But them sort of people get
their photographs in the papers, and when you meet 'em they're like
old friends.  But I reckon you've met her before."  This with a grin.

"Oh!  How do you arrive at that?"

"I see her fall down-stairs.  Lor', it gave me a turn!  I thought you
was spotted at the beginning; but no doubt it's all right.  Old
flame, I suppose?"

"Yes, we were rather--friendly once, years ago, at about the time
when I first took you in hand, Voss."

"She was a kid then, surely."

"No, not exactly.  She looks young, doesn't she?"

"Yes, for an old codger like the Bishop."

"Ah, you think somebody younger would appeal to her.  She and I look
more suited to one another than the present arrangement, eh?"

"Oh, I see your game," grinned Voss.  "Going the soft way as usual.
No, no, it won't work.  She ain't that sort."

"That is a matter beyond your powers of discernment, Voss.  I thought
it best to warn you, so that you may make yourself useful--and
scarce, sometimes--and keep that watchful eye of yours upon corridors
and staircases, and garden paths.  You understand?"

Voss frowned his disapproval.  He showed his preoccupation by folding
and re-folding a towel that was in his hand, until Bannister fidgeted
uneasily.

"You will notice that I don't ask your advice on the matter, Voss.  I
merely give you an indication of what to expect."

"Just so," sighed Voss, with monumental weariness intended to signify
disapproval.

"Now you can bring that chair and brush my hair quietly for five
minutes--with the medium brushes.  I've got a headache; and I shan't
sleep to-night unless my nerves are mechanically soothed.  And don't
hum and whistle while you're doing it.  It annoys me."

Voss unpacked the brushes, and cast an eye at the clock on the
mantelpiece.  It was one-thirty.  Then he began his task, and looked,
as he brushed, at his master's reflection in the mirror.  He saw an
unusual brilliancy of eye, a slight pink flush--very rare--upon each
cheek, and supercilious lips muttering nervously as if in imaginary
conversation.  These were the only signs of excitement that he ever
detected in his master, and they appeared on very special occasions
only.

He gave the solution as "Emeralds."

He was wrong.  It was a woman, whose aching head was tossing on a
pillow not far away.  Bannister was thinking of her, and remembering
how she looked years ago, when the pillow was smoothed by his own
white hand.




CHAPTER XV

Breakfast at the Palace was always an uncertain meal.  The Bishop's
duties necessitated so many erratic journeys that he was wont to
describe himself as "a commercial traveler of the Church," and a
fixed breakfast-hour was impossible.  On the morning after the dinner
to celebrate Jack's engagement he was astir earlier than usual, and
his son was off before eight, returning to town by train.

Lady Hester breakfasted in her room, pleading indisposition--and,
indeed, she looked ill.  Her husband was much concerned, and
suggested the family doctor, but she protested that she would be
better soon, and needed no advice.  She begged him to go about his
duties for the day--which necessitated a short journey--without
troubling about their guests, and come back as soon as possible.

Mr. Bannister never breakfasted in public if he could avoid it,
begging indulgence on the plea of insomnia.  Voss attended him in his
room, and announced that her ladyship was indisposed.  He smiled.

Mabel was the only one besides Aunt Caroline who appeared down-stairs
at the regulation hour.  She had avoided Jack, taking cowardly refuge
behind her bedroom door; but she waved to him from her window as her
father's "second motor" took him to the station, and the anxious
husband was much relieved.  The fluttering handkerchief, although
waved by a sorrow-stricken, tearful woman, who was uncertain whether
it might not be her last farewell, suggested at a distance a touch of
gaiety.  He hoped that she was feeling better this morning, and that
her secret worry, whatever it was, would cure itself.  He compelled
his brain to a careful consideration of the brewery case, which he
ought never to have left for an instant.  The brief was in his bag,
and he spread it out on his lap, resolved to employ every precious
moment in priming himself with dry facts and technicalities.

It was not easy.  The recollection of Mabel's pained, drawn face and
terrified eyes persistently interfered.  He wondered, too, what Lady
Hester would do--what attitude she would adopt with regard to their
secret, and what the consequences would be if she informed his father.

The brewery case was more important at the moment because, if it went
well, it would mean more work and the possibility of independence of
his father's purse.  He sincerely hoped that Lady Hester would not be
so foolish as to precipitate a crisis.  The Bishop would be furious,
especially after the dinner of last night, which advertised to the
world his complete ignorance of anything more serious than an
engagement.  The hasty marriage was a mistake, and he had been
entirely at fault.

Instead of conning his brief, he found himself dictating imaginary
letters to his wife demanding an explanation of her mysterious
trouble and advising her how to tackle Lady Hester.

* * * * * * * *

The state of mind of Lady Hester was pitiable.  She forced herself to
remain in bed until the Bishop had made his farewell; then she leapt
up and paced her room again--she had been pacing it nearly all the
night.  The soft, calm years that had slipped by so gently had left
her weak and irresolute, unable to grapple with the crisis when it
came.  Panic and hysteria had swept over her in the first gusts of
the hurricane, but she was bracing herself for the battle royal now.
The old proud Hester who had forced her unscrupulous husband to his
knees and demanded freedom as the price of silence was coming to life
again.  Her brain had ripened with the experience of maturer
womanhood, but the heart, weakened by the new emotions of motherhood,
was doubly vulnerable to attack from the archrascal who once more
held her in his power.

There were others whom she would drag down now if she went under.
The country would ring from end to end with the scandal of her
marriage to the Bishop.  The sin of deception was the same when she
married the hard-working vicar, but its consequences and perils had
increased with every step in John Cardew's progress toward the mitre.

If he only knew--if he only knew!

It was the burden of all her thoughts from the moment of the
resurrection of Dick Gordon; but the amazing revelation of Mabel's
real origin relegated it to a second place.  The discovery brought
with it a wave of joy and wonderment, brief enough, but real while it
lasted.  It had saved her reason, and touched tender chords, whereas
Dick Gordon's return would only have driven her to tragic
expedients--suicide or murder--to save poor John from the blasting
breath of public scandal.

Mabel's engagement would have been a calamity; her marriage was a
tragedy.  There was no loophole, no escape from that.  It was one
more tangle in the skein; yet it gave Lady Hester an ally and a
confidante, which was something to a woman aching with years of
lonely brooding.

Her agonizing bewilderment alternated with brief transports of joy
when she thought of her child.  Mabel was hers, beautiful and
delightful, all that she could have wished, untainted by her strange
parentage, unspoiled by her motherless training, with her innocence
carefully guarded and respected by her extraordinary father.  It
argued the presence of some good in the man.  She sought comfort in
the thought that Mabel being married to Jack, was out of Dick
Gordon's jurisdiction for ever; and whatever happened, no one could
rob her of her motherhood.  It was this one brief, fixed star in the
whirling constellation of revolving troubles that saved her reason.
The necessity of safeguarding herself would not have been sufficient
to steady her without the all-absorbing need of shielding the Bishop
and her daughter.  It was for others she must work.  She, personally,
was utterly lost, hopelessly discredited and done for.  The Bishop
was no longer her husband.  The shackles of that early wedlock held
her to the villain who once imagined that he could mould her to his
will, and would certainly make fresh terms.  It must be a duel to the
death, for her own sake, for her child's sake; and the Bishop's
claims were greater than either.  Woman-like, she was ready for any
sacrifice, any subterfuge, any lie, to keep inviolate his spotless
reputation.

To confess anything to him now was out of the question, until she
knew what her former husband was going to do.  The shock of Jack's
secret marriage would be enough for the old man to bear.  If the real
state of his domestic affairs was known to him his action would be
swift and terrible.  He would not spare himself or her.  She would be
put away as an unclean thing; and the world would mock at the
reverend man for a fool who had been hoodwinked by a designing woman.

What a triumph for Aunt Caroline!  Strange as it may seem, her
greatest dread was of what the old lady would say and do if she got
so much as an inkling of the truth.  The name Dick Gordon upon Aunt
Caroline's lips had struck terror to her soul, and at first suggested
that she knew everything; but a little reasoning made it clear that
this could not be so.

For the sake of appearances Lady Hester sent a polite message to her
guests pleading indisposition, and begged that Mr. Bannister and
Mabel would follow their own inclinations until lunch time.

Mr. Bannister's reply was that he hoped Lady Hester would on no
account trouble about him.  He would take the opportunity of motoring
over to Dingle Hall, and sincerely hoped that he would find her
better at lunch time.

The message, delivered by Voss with due obsequiousness, was
tantamount to a truce.  He was going to give her a few hours'
respite.  He was in no hurry.  Always leisurely; and always more
deadly when he approached things slowly.

* * * * * * * *

Mabel had something of her mother's power of self-control before
others.  She had gone down to breakfast to find Aunt Caroline already
there, presiding in solitary state.  The greeting between the two
women was frigid in the extreme.  The girl, true to her promise to
Jack to be tolerant, shut her eyes to the obvious rudeness of the
other's greeting.  So far as she understood, Aunt Caroline knew
nothing to her detriment, and had no suspicion of the shadow in the
house.  So she applied herself to propitiate Jack's aunt with
well-bred tact and gentleness, conscious that the very worst Aunt
Caroline could think about her was not nearly so bad as the truth.

The conversation ranged over a limited area, including the weather,
the cathedral, the Bishop's latest portrait in the _Graphic_, and the
singing in the drawing-room over-night.  The old lady's replies were
sharp and blunt to the verge of offence.  Yet she was not insensible
to the girl's gentle voice, her well-bred air, and her persistent
deference to one who was her elder.  She had more leisure to inspect
her personal charms, to note the soft, melting eyes, the small hands,
the low, restrained voice, and the very plain, simple, morning gown.
In spite of a desire to be antagonistic her curiosity was aroused,
and she startled Mabel by one or two questions.  After staring ahead
out of the window for some time, lost in thought, as though Mabel did
not exist, she suddenly rapped out an embarrassing inquiry.

"When did your mother die, child?"

"I--I'm sure I don't know.  I was too young to remember.  I never had
any knowledge of my mother.  I think she died when I was born."

"You think.  Don't you know?"

"I have never questioned my father closely upon the subject.  It is a
painful one with him, and he has never discussed it with me."

"Humph!  Strange thing for a girl not to know.  Who was your mother?"

Mabel looked puzzled and confused.  She did not quite understand the
other's exact meaning.

"I meant what was her family, her maiden name?  You surely have
relations who could tell you what your father's sensitive disposition
prevented him discussing."  This with a sneer was not lost upon Mabel.

"I have no relatives but my father."

"I suppose I seem rude to you," observed the stiff old lady, after
another pause, piercing the girl through with her cold, grey eyes.

"Not at all--not at all."

"You see, I'm Jack's aunt.  You are being treated as one of the
family, and I suppose you think you are going to marry him."

"That rests with Jack, doesn't it?" replied the girl evasively.

"You haven't told me who your mother was.  What was her maiden name?"

"That I have never been told; and I fear it had little interest for
me because--because, having no relations----"

"An extraordinary position.  I've never heard of such a case.  Your
father has money, I believe, and he inherited it from some one.  Are
his family London people?"

"I have never heard him speak of his family, except to say that he
was an only son, left an orphan while he was at Oxford."

Mabel's face was white as the table-cloth, and she dared not face
those relentless eyes.  Aunt Caroline smelt a rat.  "The girl knows
all about her father, and something to his discredit," she thought.
"She's only an artful hussy after all."

The impression that Mabel had made up to this point was distinctly
favorable; but to all inquiries about her father she replied with
such palpable hesitation and embarrassment that her mental suffering
showed in her face, which was a mirror of pain.

The conversation was interrupted by the arrival of Voss in the
breakfast-room--Voss subdued, soft-voiced, and self-effacing.  He
entered apologetically, and approached Miss Cardew humbly, as if
distressed at having to disturb her.  He came with a message from his
master.

"Mr. Bannister's compliments, and he is going over to Dingle Hall
after breakfast in the motor.  If Miss Cardew has not made any
arrangements for the morning he would esteem it a favor if she would
accompany him and give him the benefit of her valuable advice."

The naïve audacity of it took away her breath.  Once again she found
herself staggered and disconcerted, wondering whether, after all, she
had not done this amiable gentleman a serious injustice by listening
to Mr. Crick's libellous slanders.  She had never ridden in a motor
car, and would dearly have loved to accept.

Caution and suspicion got the better of her.  "The rascal wants to
kill me," she thought, and replied tartly--

"My compliments to Mr. Bannister, but I never motor."

Voss bowed and withdrew; and when he was well behind the old lady's
back allowed his face to express some disappointment.  He returned to
his master, who was lounging in dressing-gown and slippers, and
making a poor breakfast, chiefly on the contents of the _Times_.

"Well?" asked Bannister, looking up as Voss entered.

"No go," replied the other.  "She don't motor; she ain't taking any."

"What are we to do then, Voss?  The old girl must be quieted somehow
and got out of the way.  I suppose she intends to remain here for
some time."

"So her maid says.  She almost lives here when there is anything
going on, or anybody is visiting the Bishop--just the time they don't
want her."

"Have you any suggestions, Voss?"

Voss scratched his right whisker and looked wise.  "It would have
been better to take her out and smash her up altogether."

"Ah, yes.  Something that will keep her to her bed is the only thing
that will serve us."

"I could give her a drop of something in her tea.  I've got a bottle
or two with me."

"No, no, Voss, none of your mixtures.  I thought you were cured of
that weakness of yours for crude methods belonging to mediaeval ages."

"Oh, they'll do for all ages, and the old girl's not so very old."

Bannister smiled pityingly.  "I said mediaeval ages, middle ages."

"Well, I said it was good for any age."

Bannister laughed softly, and gave up attempting to translate his
meaning.  He loved to use phrases that were beyond Voss's
understanding, and the more stupid the man's blunders the more he was
pleased.

"Drugs are the implements of reckless fools, Voss, and at best their
effect is only temporary.  It is always mysterious, and liable to
provoke suspicion.  No, you must think of something better."

"A telegram," suggested Voss.  "A message from a dying friend, or
something of that sort."

"A mere temporary expedient, and clumsier than the others."

"How long do you want for your philandering with the Bishop's lady?"

"An unlimited time.  It will be impossible to get ten words with her
with that old dragon about."

"Take the lady in the motor, and leave the old girl at home."

"Ah, that is better, Voss.  My compliments to her ladyship, and does
she think that a gentle ride in the motor to Dingle Hall will do her
headache good."

Voss departed to find Lady Hester's maid, and presently returned with
the answer.

"Her ladyship's compliments, and she is sure it would make her
headache worse."

Bannister laughed, and rose and paced the room with unusual energy.
He paused before the mirror and admired himself--and laughed again.
There was no mirth, but rather irritation.

"Ho, ho, we are haughty, are we?  We throw down the gage.  Very well,
we shall see.  Voss, my compliments to her ladyship, and I feel sure
that the motor ride will do her good."

Voss, unaware of the nature of his master's power over the mistress
of the house, elevated his eyebrows in surprise.  But it was not his
place to question.  Assuming his best wooden-faced expression, he
went off again to find Lady Hester's maid.

When he was gone Bannister showed less restraint.  His eyes
brightened, and those red patches on the pale cheeks glowed over the
edge of his beard.  He mentally reviewed his chances of success.

"She will come, or she will not.  If she does, well and good; if not,
I shall know the spirit in which to approach her.  I could not expect
her to be glad to see me.  But the shock over, surely memory will
arouse the woman in her.  I saw her looking at me very strangely last
night.  Ah, yes, I think I have improved."  This to his small mirror.

He strode into his dressing-room and admired himself before the long
mirror.  With the comb he arranged his beautiful black front locks,
caressed his beard to a nice point, and indulged in a pose of
inordinate vanity--that vanity which is the inevitable characteristic
of your thorough-going criminal.

Yet he was irritated that Lady Hester's lovely image, although
changed by time, should still fire his admiration.  He could remember
distinctly how she looked last night, everything she wore, even to
the combs in her hair.  Being the only woman who had ever aroused in
him a spark of self-respect, the only one who ever touched his better
self, he had loved her as deeply as it was possible for a man so
self-absorbed to love any one.  A procession of women had filed
through his life, amorous, indecorous, useful, romantic, passionate,
according to mood and circumstances and the chance encounters of his
wandering life.  For some he had set snares.  Others had come of
their own accord and flung themselves hysterically into his arms.
All found him utterly merciless.  Only for one woman had he ever made
a self-sacrifice.

His surrender of his young wife had cost him many a pang.  The girl
whom he had ruined, but loved, and whom he could never have hoped to
break and bend to his dishonorable mode of life, had been voluntarily
released at some cost to himself.  Perhaps it was the only time in
his life that he had ever taken any trouble to undo a wrong.  His
elaborate fraud to make her think him dead--and at the same time to
wipe out the personality of Dick Gordon--was his way of trying to
make amends.  He relieved her of the incumbrance of the child, and
descended gracefully to the grave through the columns of the _Times_,
flattering himself that he had done a noble act by severing as far as
possible the ties that bound them, and leaving her free to return
unsullied, as far as the world knew, to spinsterhood.

The recollection of it had always been one of his most comforting
memories.  Whenever his self-esteem needed a little tonic he was
accustomed to look back upon that episode as a positive orgie of
self-abnegation.  Out of regard for this woman whom he had loved he
reared her child as she would have had it reared, had she known that
it lived.  Thus did he liquidate his debt to her, and at the same
time indulge a mild instinct of paternity which, next to his love for
his lost wife, was his only constant human emotion.  If Mabel had
been a boy he would have preferred to have her drowned; being a girl,
and the daughter of her lovely mother, there was a possibility of her
growing up to be a joy and an ornament, a comfort and a plaything.
During her childhood he saw her at intervals--sometimes very long
ones--and each time was more pleased and more satisfied with his
venture in paternity.  He regarded his child as an investment for his
old age, and an amusement for idle hours.  She was a pretty pet, and
he loved her much as he would have loved a dog.

As the romance of his life receded into the past, dim and shadowy, he
looked back upon it as an episode begun and ended.  He refused to
consider the woman any further as a living personality moving in
another world to his own.  Whether she had married, or died, or
immured herself in a convent, he cared not.  She had ceased to exist
as a reality--until he took her in his arms the other night, warm and
pulsating, a very real thing; the same old Hester, but ripened in the
sunshine of peace and prosperity.  How the blood had raced through
his veins!  What an effort to retain his usual sangfroid!  It was
only later, when his sense of humor was tickled by the amazing irony
of the situation, that he managed to recover his equilibrium, and
survey the woman and her new husband with cynical amusement.

He was still magnanimous enough to hold his peace and not interfere
with Hester in her new sphere if she would show a spark of gratitude
for the great self-abnegation of his youth.  With his perverted sense
of virtue he still considered that he had done a great and chivalrous
act under the influence of disappointed youthful passion.  He was not
equal to such self-denial now-a-days, and he wanted full credit for
past virtue.

Mabel's secret marriage with Jack had complicated things in such a
way that Hester's future and his own were once more irrevocably
linked.  He did not for a moment contemplate robbing her of the proud
position of wife to the Bishop of Ripley.  He expected her to cling
to it as to life itself.

Mabel was her child.  She knew it now; and he was willing to share
his daughter with her mother.  In what way better than by Mabel's
marriage with the Bishop's son?  Jack was no blood relation of the
girl, and he was a reasonably good match.  A husband had come upon
the scene in the nick of time to take care of her, just when her eyes
were opening to the things around her, and she was likely to become
troublesome to her parent.  Her marriage with a Bishop's son was an
appreciable testimony to his own respectability, issued at a
propitious moment when his reputation was getting distinctly frayed
at the edges, and the allotted span of his criminal career was
nearing its close.

The caution and deliberation which had stood him in such stead in his
raids upon society was also responsible for his lifelong
determination to prosper on his ill-gotten wealth and retire from
business like any other successful artist.  His gambling profits were
never large--he was too cute to win always, and, when occasion
needed, could lose as effectively as he won.  To win always was a
fool's game.  To lose cleverly and effectively was artistic, and set
him on a different plane from the professional swindler.  But at
intervals during the years after his parting with Hester,
opportunities of bringing off big things had come in his way--brought
to his notice chiefly by the greedier and less artistic Voss--venture
not for hundreds, but for thousands--diamonds, and bonds, filched
chiefly from silly women traveling in strange countries.  These had
filled the exchequer to overflowing.  He never attempted anything
where the odds were not in his favor ten to one.  Voss did the dirty
work, and his master took the lion's share.  Voss was fairly rich,
too, thanks to the almost despotic control exercised over him by the
superior mind of his master.  Both rascals worked for a common end,
strengthened and fortified by a financial backing which is as useful
in the sheep-shearing business as in any other.

They wanted one more big coup, one handsome haul to round off the
balance; and it had come their way in the inevitable cycle of
professional luck, in the shape of Lady Hester's emeralds.  Voss
intended to have them.  The value of the emeralds--quite an unknown
quantity--increased as his imagination played round them.

Bannister, for the second time in his life, was standing on dangerous
ground.  His inordinate vanity had led him to believe that he was
impervious to all common emotions, and would never again be swayed by
chivalrous impulses, tenderness, pity, or uncontrollable passion.
Hester was still beautiful, and being linked--poor thing--to a man
old enough to be her father, must necessarily be more vulnerable than
ever.  He imagined that he had only to smile and to gaze into the
depths of those fine eyes, to re-kindle the old fires and resume the
old mastery, while still retaining perfect control over himself.  At
one time he had writhed under her withering contempt; now it was she
who must grovel, and tremble, for she was perched upon a pinnacle in
the market-place, and her fall would be in the sight of all men and a
notorious thing.

The extreme irony of the situation tickled him so much that he
laughed softly.  The emeralds were his already.  They would in due
course come down to Mabel, and to transfer them now from the Bishop's
palace to the dealers in Amsterdam would only be anticipating the
future.  They were worth a huge sum of money; they were never worn;
and Hester would not miss them; nor would Mabel.  Their transfer
would swell his reserve fund to such a figure that he could turn
respectable at once.  What greater excuse could a thief have?

The purchase of Dingle Hall could be carried through in good faith,
and he would ever after be a model father to his son and daughter,
whose interests he could thus further by the aid of the Bishop's
surplus wealth.

Hester would have to swallow her pride, and be friends again.  He put
behind him the great temptation of love which had come over him last
night in a wave of passionate desire.  The violence of it had
surprised and troubled him.  This morning he tried to be amused at
it.  Hester, with her conscientious scruples and high notions of
honor, would scorn to deceive the Bishop.  It would be madness.  Yet
he liked the idea of that kind of madness in a woman, and was vain
enough to believe that he could provoke it at will if he chose to
exert his irresistible powers of fascination.  It offered a pleasant
prospect of excitement in the days of social respectability to come;
with Hester at the Palace and himself at Dingle Hall--a pretty and
diverting situation.

The more he thought of her the harder it was to put the temptation
behind him.  Why should he have compunction in robbing the Bishop of
Hester--it was really the Bishop who had robbed him.  A man could not
sin with his own wife.  In fact, he had a perfect right to be jealous
of the prelate.

He scorned the idea of jealousy; yet there had been an ugly gnawing
at his heart and a growing hatred of the pompous, benevolent old
gentleman.  When he saw them together last night, and witnessed the
prelate's tender anxiety, and possessive, caressing way with Mrs.
Dick Gordon, it made him savage.

Bah! jealousy was a woman's weakness.  A man of the world should
despise it.  Yet he was eager and impatient to draw her to himself,
if only to quarrel and begin recriminations.  The moments of the
Bishop's absence had already become precious.  He wanted to see her
face to face--as in the old days.

Voss returned with her ladyship's answer.

"She won't go.  Says she hopes she'll be well enough this afternoon
to take you to the Cathedral and show you the points of interest."

"Ah, that's better," laughed Bannister softly.

Then he wondered if she had chosen the Cathedral as a place for
discussion because it offered sanctuary, and would allow her to keep
him at arm's length.  She was afraid, obviously; afraid to be alone
with him.  She doubted her own strength.

The idea pleased his vanity.  He hummed a little tune, and placed
himself in Voss's hands for dressing with an almost eager haste, as
though he would hurry on the hours to the time of meeting.

Before his toilet was finished to his complete satisfaction, Lady
Hester's maid left a sealed note at the door, which Voss passed to
his master wonderingly.  Bannister opened it quickly, and his eyes
danced as he read.

"Ah!" he exclaimed, with a big sigh of satisfaction, and folded the
grey sheet carefully.  "There is no answer, Voss."

Voss fidgeted.  He expected his partner to confide in him; but he was
mistaken.  Bannister never imparted to his man any details of
_affaires d'amour_.  Judging by his high humor and evident
satisfaction it was obvious that the missive exceeded his most
sanguine expectations.




CHAPTER XVI

Mabel's cross-examination at the hands of Aunt Caroline was
conveniently interrupted by the arrival of a very early visitor.  The
old lady, who was sitting opposite a window looking across the broad
acres of the Palace park, saw a horsewoman riding through the
chestnut trees in the direction of the house.

It was Beatrice Carew, who for the last two years had been accustomed
to call in unconventional fashion upon Lady Hester whenever the mood
seized her.

"Ah, Beatrice!" murmured the old lady, "the very person I wanted to
see."  And she left the room without apology to greet the new arrival
in the hall.

Now Beatrice had been Mabel's friend; perhaps her dearest and best.
They met four years previously at an Italian convent school, and
struck up an intimate acquaintance, which was renewed after Beatrice
left and Mabel had finally settled in her native country.  It was to
see Mabel that Beatrice had come over to the Palace to-day, rising
with the lark, as was her way, and riding unattended across country
from her father's house at an hour when most people were thinking of
going down to breakfast.  In the ordinary way Mabel would have run
out to greet her friend; but since the eavesdropping in the Temple,
and Aunt Caroline's frank observations concerning Jack's future, she
felt a little constrained.  She was glad enough to be relieved of the
old lady, and was in no mood to greet her once dear friend.

It was only natural that the girls were not quite so devoted since
Jack had fallen in love with Mabel.  Lady Hester had discreetly
refrained from inviting Beatrice to the celebrations over night; but
the girl had heard of the official engagement, and had bravely come
to offer her congratulations.

She rode straight into the stable yard without ceremony, and flung
the reins of her horse to the nearest man.  Then, with a bound, she
dismounted, curtly remarking that she would not be long.

The Marquis of Ripley's daughter was a big-boned girl of a very
modern type, athletic, brusque, and offhanded to the verge of
rudeness.  The only daughter in a large family of boys, she had grown
masculine in her ways.  She was a very downright person, and boasted
openly that she had not an ounce of romance in her disposition.  She
was independent to a fault, and almost intolerant of small acts of
chivalry and courtesy on the part of men.  This had earned her a
reputation for angularity and snappishness.  But everything she did
was done seriously and with all her might.  She had no sympathy with
simpering, fainting, hysterical girls of her own age, and the surest
way for a man to provoke a snub was to profess admiration of her in
complimentary terms.

"She ought to have been a boy," was the verdict of the women who knew
Beatrice Carew.  All were slightly apologetic for her; and nobody
more fiercely resented being championed than she.

This independence of character provoked great respect for the girl in
many quarters.  Miss Cardew admired her.  "There was no nonsense
about Beatrice;" and it was the greatest praise the old lady could
give any girl.  It summed up everything from her point of view.  She
objected to the ultra-sentimental, the ultra-religious, or the
ultra-frivolous young woman, and had settled in her mind long ago
that Beatrice was the ideal mate for Jack, because that young man
showed excitable, emotional tendencies, and required--from her point
of view--keeping in check.  And what better way to steady an
impressionable, romantically-inclined young man, whose vocation
needed the soundest of common sense, than to marry him to a
clear-headed, practical girl.

Beatrice was not beautiful; yet none but an enemy would have called
her plain.  She was just healthy and normal.  Her mouth was not too
large, her eyes were not too small, her nose was of quite a common
shape, and her hands were strong enough to master the toughest mounts
in her father's stable.  She hunted, of course, as a lady should; but
she never rode a bicycle, and this was a point in her favor with Aunt
Caroline.  Her feet were not small; but then she could do twenty
miles on foot level with Jack any day; and her boots were always
designed for walking, not for coquettish exhibition.

Her habit was a loose-fitting one, and her whip was old and shabby.
Her gloves were large, and had seen a good deal of wear.  She was not
untidy; but there was nothing unusually trim and smart about her.
She wandered towards the house flicking her skirt with her whip and
staring at anything that caught her eye with the free and easy manner
of one quite at home, and in no hurry.

Aunt Caroline met her at the top of the steps.

"Good morning, aunt," she observed curtly.  This was a familiar term
to which she had grown accustomed from much association with Jack.

"Good morning, my dear Beatrice.  I am very pleased to see you.  We
must have a talk together."

"Mabel here?" asked Beatrice laconically.

"You mean Miss Bannister, I presume?"  This with a sniff.

"Well, her name is Mabel, isn't it?  You ought to know it by this
time.  Hear she's going to be one of the family.  Looks like rain,
doesn't it?"  Beatrice turned and stared straight down the chestnut
avenue, as though quite unconcerned.

"I think it rather rests with you, Beatrice, whether she becomes one
of the family or not."

"Eh?  Rests with me?  What rot!"

Aunt Caroline was not offended.  She objected to all such expressions
in women--except from Beatrice.

"Come in, my child.  I want to talk to you.  We have much to say to
each other."

"Oh no, I won't come in.  I was just riding across--heard Mabel was
here--thought I'd look in.  Had breakfast yet?"

"We have just finished--only just."

"What, all of you?"

"No, Jack has gone to town, my brother is off somewhere, as usual,
and Hester is not well."

"Oh, then, I'll come in.  Where's Mabel?"

"This way, my dear," murmured the old lady coaxingly, opening the
door of the library and beckoning her in mysteriously.  Beatrice cast
a lightning glance around the hall and took in everything.  She saw
Jack's cap and stick lying on a table, and she seemed to be
swallowing a lump in her throat.  Her voice was cold and quite bored
when next she spoke.

"Not in the mood for talk this morning, aunt."

"Beatrice, my dear, you've heard the awful news?" whispered Aunt
Caroline tragically, as she closed the door.

"About Jack's engagement?  Oh yes, everybody knows of it by this
time, I suppose.  Why didn't they invite me last night?"

"I do not issue the invitations from this house, Beatrice."

"Mabel's a friend of mine.  It was I who introduced her here.  She
might have thought about me when the cards were going out."

"Mabel, as you call her, had nothing to do with it.  Miss Bannister
has no standing in this house--thank God!--at present."

"You don't like her?"

"You are very blunt in your observations, Beatrice."

"Always am.  Find it easiest--saves time.  What's the matter with
Mabel?  Nice enough, sweet enough, and pretty enough for anybody.
Jack has found that out."

"Ah! if he had only been a little less blind!"

"Blind?  He seems to have been pretty wide awake."

"Do you mean that he deceived you, Beatrice?"

"Deceived me?" cried the girl, flashing out.  "How dare you say such
a thing.  What has he got to deceive me about?"

"Beatrice, Beatrice, you know what my intentions were with regard to
you and Jack."

"Goodness gracious, you don't mean to say you are still harping on
that old idea?  Jack's engaged.  How could you have imagined that
Jack would ever give a thought to me?  I told you so before.  You
made me very angry then, and you make me angry now.  It requires two
for that sort of thing, and it was never in my line.  Go too much to
do.  Never thought much of Jack--except as a good pal."

"Pal!  My child, what horrid terms you use.  You have known one
another for years.  You have been the most intimate friends.  Jack
has told you all his troubles, and you are the only girl he ever
really consistently devoted himself to."

"Because he didn't love me.  That was it.  Always knew it.  And never
could have loved Jack myself.  I should have bullied him."  Her
fingers tightened on her whip.  She was ready to lie or make any
foolish assertion rather than admit that Beatrice Carew showed
preference for any man or felt disappointed on hearing of the
engagement of another woman.  "Jack has loved half-a-dozen girls,"
sneered Beatrice, "and Mabel is the last.  I was never one of them,
and don't you ever insinuate that I was.  If you do, I'll--I'll never
forgive you.  I've come over to offer my congratulations to Mabel.
If you allow her to think that--good heavens!--Jack and I?
Preposterous!  I'd never set foot in the place again or hold up my
head before my friends.  She's more to me than any girl I've ever
known, and I intend she shall be happy with Jack.  She's just one of
those soft, mousey sort of girls that he loves, but she's true as
steel.  She's going to have money, too, I hear.  News to me.  Always
thought they were poor.  So much the better for Jack.  And you told
me that when he married you were going to allow him a really handsome
income.  That will be splendid for them."

"Never!" cried Aunt Caroline, crossing her arms and nursing her
elbows, and drawing herself up stiffly in her high-backed chair.

"You can't go back on your word, and Jack must have money.  You
promised me."

"Yes, I promised you.  If you married Jack----"

"There you go again--for goodness' sake stop!  There was never any
idea of that except in your imagination, Miss Cardew.  I wouldn't
marry Jack for all the gold in the Indies.  He's not my sort--too
much talk.  But talk is his profession now, and a poor one.  It's
mean if you cry off and let him be dependent upon his wife for
income.  That's what it'll mean.  It's horrible."

Caroline frowned and scrutinized the girl keenly.  The mask of
indifference fitted so well that even the keen old lady failed to
penetrate it.  There were no symptoms of the broken heart, and the
girl's sharp, practical appreciation of a situation puzzling for
older heads rather disconcerted her.

"Jack's money affairs are his father's and my business, Beatrice."

"Not Jack's then?" sneered Beatrice impertinently.

"It is not parsimony on my part, or greed of wealth.  It is
disapproval of the girl herself that tightens my purse strings.  He
will never marry her, Beatrice.  Mark my words.  This engagement is
nothing.  Her father is nothing.  He has nothing.  He's a scamp."

"You seem to know him pretty well," observed Beatrice, with growing
interest.  "Mabel didn't give me that impression."

"The child is a fool--at least, I thought she was.  I am now inclined
to believe that she's perfectly well aware that her father is a
humbug."

Beatrice puckered her brows and was thoughtful, and looked out of the
window.  Miss Cardew did not speak like this, as a rule, without
chapter and verse.

"Never liked him myself," she observed.  "Not the sort of man to
appeal to you or me, aunt.  Too much perfume--finnicking in his
habits--never rides if he can help it--always ready for cards first
thing after breakfast.  But women rave about him."

"Because most women are fools, Beatrice."

"Oh!  Never noticed it."

"Beatrice, your snappy, laconic way of contradicting me is not polite
for a girl of your age."

"Who's contradicting?" cried Beatrice, looking almost startled, and
relinquishing the languid posture into which she had dropped.

"You are.  You are extremely curt, not to say impertinent in manner.
I know you don't really mean it, or I could not overlook it.  I'm
fond of you; I'm working for your benefit, for your happiness, you
know that.  You've got to marry Jack; you want to marry him; you're
in love with him, you know you are."

"I'm not.  How dare you!  Say that again----"  Beatrice jumped up,
and twisted her tapering whip in both hands threatening.  "Say that
again, and I'll--I'll break something."  She gazed savagely at two
old-fashioned, hideous, but precious, Dresden shepherdesses on the
mantel-shelf.  "I won't have you say it.  It isn't true.  I--I hate
him.  I won't stay in this house.  Do you think I come here for--for
Jack?"

"It is only the accident of his going to town that has prevented your
seeing him this morning, my dear.  And I don't think you came to see
either me or Mabel."

"How dare you!  How can you insult me by such insinuations!  Jack may
have to put up with your absurd ideas, but I won't."

Aunt Caroline smiled provokingly, for Beatrice was as near to tears
as any one had ever seen her.  She was grinding her teeth, and
twisting her whip savagely.  Her eyes blazed and roamed round in
search of something fragile to sweep to the floor.

The passionate outburst was checked by the opening of the door.
Mabel entered, pale and astonished, and almost withdrew at the sight
of Aunt Caroline.  But, seeing Beatrice, her careworn eyes lighted up
and she advanced eagerly.

"Beatrice," she cried, with tremulous joy, and opened her arms.  The
two girls embraced, and Beatrice hugged her friend with genuine
fervor while Aunt Caroline looked on astonished.  No one had ever
seen Beatrice Carew hug any one before--or even kiss a woman if she
could possibly avoid it.

"You're looking pale, Mabel," cried the visitor, holding her friend
at arm's length, and controlling herself with difficulty.  Mabel
wished Miss Cardew at the other end of the earth, and so did
Beatrice.  The faint cloud that had risen between the friends had
melted in the warmth of that simple embrace.  They understood one
another; and an understanding was possible now that Mabel's
engagement was a fixed and settled thing.  Beatrice scorned jealousy
as a disease of brainless femininity; and Mabel was in sore need of a
friend.

Miss Cardew withdrew to a window, where she stood with folded arms,
gazing sternly at the landscape.  She was evidently not going away,
yet disdained to notice the existence of Mabel Bannister.

"You'd better go, aunt.  We've got lots to talk about," cried
Beatrice rudely.  Mabel gasped, and Aunt Caroline flushed with
annoyance.  Only Beatrice dared "cheek" the old lady like this.  Not
even the Bishop could chaff her as Beatrice did.

"Well, if you don't go we must," she continued, with a laugh.  "We
can't go out into the garden because it is coming on to rain, and no
one is likely to disturb us here."

"If my presence is an offence----"

"It isn't, aunt, you know that very well.  It's only superfluous and
embarrassing."  Then, turning to Mabel, "You'll soon learn how to
treat Aunt Caroline, Mabel--she's the best-hearted soul in the world,
the dearest old thing, if you don't take her seriously.  Her bite
isn't half as bad as her bark.  Everybody's afraid of her but me--I'm
not--and when she's rude to me I'm rude to her.  Then we have a flare
up, and it clears the air.  And she simply loves Jack better than a
Christian woman should love anything in this wicked world."

Aunt Caroline snorted and tried to speak.  Anger shook her from head
to foot.  This was mortification indeed before the upstart child,
Mabel.

"It's no good, aunt," cried Beatrice, checking the outburst with
upraised arm.  "I'm not going to quarrel.  I'm an angel this morning.
Everything will come all right presently, you silly old, dear thing."
Beatrice, with a laugh, suddenly flung her arms round the old lady's
neck and kissed her on the cheek.

Poor Aunt Caroline was utterly unnerved.  The act was as surprising
as it was rare; and she had learned by experience that it was useless
to attempt to argue with Beatrice when her deeper feelings were
aroused.  The girl was playing a part--she was scarcely master of
herself.  This show of impudence and rudeness was only her way of
hiding the rents in a broken heart, and giving vent to feminine
feelings that would have best been relieved by a flood of tears.

The old lady stalked from the room.

"So you are going to marry Jack?"

Beatrice put her hands upon her friend's shoulders, and looked her
straight in the eyes.  Mabel was weary of the talk of "going to
marry," and she would have liked to scream out, "I am married," but
prudence forbade.  She was longing for a confidante; but a
half-confession would be no good; and how could she explain her
suspicions of her father to Beatrice, who was fond of Jack?  Her
friend searched her face keenly, and saw the lines of care, the
evasive glance with a touch of panic in it, and the many signs of
general suffering too subtle to be particularized.

"Have they been worrying you?  You mustn't mind Aunt Caroline.  She's
just jealous of Jack, and will find fault with any one who comes
between her and her boy."

"No, it isn't that."

"Then why unhappy when everything is coming your way?  The old boy is
agreeable; Lady Hester delighted, of course; and Jack in the seventh
heaven of delight.  Saw him when he came down here the other day--he
didn't see me.  He was walking about as though he owned the earth and
had a reversionary interest in something beyond it.  Aunt Caroline
seems to object to your father."

A look of terror swept over Mabel's face.  "Yes, she evidently
doesn't like him.  He plays cards too much for her, I suppose.  You
see, she is very strict in her notions."

"Fiddlesticks!  She's not strict at all.  I've played cards with her
on a Sunday.  No, there's something else behind, Mabel.  What is it?
Can't you trust me?"

"I can't trust anybody," cried the girl, suddenly collapsing into a
chair and wringing her hands.  "Sometimes I wish--I wish that you and
Jack----"

"Oh, Aunt Caroline has been talking about me and Jack, has she?  An
old woman's delusions.  You've been quarrelling with Jack, that's
what's the matter."

"No, I haven't.  I'm in a dreadful predicament, and no one can help
me.  I've ruined Jack."

"That's a tall order.  You're not worrying about Aunt Caroline's
money, surely.  I'll make her life a burden to her if she doesn't
shell out."

"It isn't money--it isn't Jack--it is myself.  Oh, don't ask me any
more, or you'll tempt me to say things I shall regret."

Beatrice frowned and looked more puzzled than ever.

"What have you been doing, Mabel?"

"I--oh, nothing."

Lady Hester, white and ill, entered the library at the moment, and
interrupted the inevitable confession.  Beatrice would have drawn her
friend's secret from her little by little by the mere exercise of
sympathy; but it was not to be.

Beatrice greeted the mistress of the house with her usual laconic
abruptness, and explained that she had come over to offer her
congratulations to Mabel on her approaching marriage.  The word
marriage came out with difficulty, for Lady Hester must have known
the state of Beatrice's feelings, and it was hard to assume
indifference before one naturally so sympathetic.

"Yes, everything is settled," murmured Lady Hester, going to the
table and searching for a newspaper.

"Forgot me in your dinner party last night, didn't you?" observed
Beatrice curtly.

"So I did!  Good heavens! how absurd of me.  I put your name down,
I'm sure.  Didn't I send you a card?"

"No.  When's the wedding?"

"Well, we have hardly got as far as that," replied Lady Hester, with
a wan smile and a glance at Mabel, whose eyes were full of fear.
"Mr. Bannister has come down to stay with us for a little while."

"Yes; I saw his motor waiting in the stable yard just now.  Are you
going out in it?"  Beatrice glanced at the folded mackintosh which
Lady Hester had flung over the back of a chair.

"Oh, no, I hate motors.  It is raining, and I've been seedy.  I
thought a little walk in the grounds would do me good."

"Good idea.  Let's all go," suggested Beatrice.  "Mabel, get yourself
a 'tosh.  I simply love a walk in the rain."

"No, no, you girls must stay here.  You've got lots to say to one
another."

"Oh, no, indeed," protested Mabel, "but I've got some letters to
write.  If you and Beatrice feel like walking in the rain, I'm sure I
don't.  I think I'll write my letters upstairs."

She moved nervously towards the door, and Lady Hester's eyes followed
her with a strange, yearning look that was not lost upon Beatrice.
She knew that her hostess was very fond of Mabel, as an elder woman
can be fond of a younger, and patronize her, and give her a good time
in a big house which is always full of guests, but she was at a loss
to understand the almost hungry admiration with which she followed
every step, every movement of the girl.  The troubled mother held out
her hand to touch her as she passed--then recovered with an effort,
and crushed down the impulse, so new, and strange, and weakening.

Mabel escaped.  It seemed to be her vocation now to dodge through
life, to evade questions and looks, and watch and wait for the next
move in the tragic game of sins and secrets.  She was afraid to be
away long from the upper corridor, where her father's room was.  From
the open door of her bedroom she had kept a sharp watch upon Voss;
but nothing that was not quite normal had happened.

Lady Hester, left in the library, was at her wits' end to know how to
get rid of Beatrice.  She watched the clock anxiously, for she had an
appointment with her husband, Dick Gordon, and was terrified at the
thought of disappointing him, or provoking him, by the slightest
display of indifference or independence.  The night's agony had shown
her that she was utterly at his mercy, and must dance to his tune, no
matter what it was.  She was burning to know his real attitude of
mind.  One minute's conversation would be enough to set at rest the
horrible doubts and sickening misgivings that were shaking her like
an ague and numbing body and brain.

"There's something going wrong here," was Beatrice's unspoken comment
of the situation.  Her sharp eyes watched Lady Hester; and she could
read the signs of wretchedness as quickly as any woman.

The rain came down faster, and the idea of walking in it for
amusement, even under the trees, was absurd.  Lady Hester dropped
into an arm chair with a newspaper, and carried on a desultory
conversation so aimlessly that Beatrice almost took offence.  It was
tantamount to a request to go.  She was obviously in the way.

"I see it is raining too fast for you, Lady Hester," she observed,
going towards the window.  "But it won't hurt me.  I love a ducking.
That's the best of being thick-skinned.  Oh, there goes somebody who
doesn't mind the rain, evidently.  Why, it's Mr. Bannister."

"He is going motoring, and motorists don't take any notice of the
rain."

But Mr. Bannister was not going in the direction of his motor, and in
the ordinary way it would have been brought to the front door.  He
was in a long white mackintosh and cap, and was striding down the
chestnut avenue, smoking a cigar.

"Well, good-bye, Lady Hester.  I'll come over again to see Mabel
before she goes back.  And I must pay my respects to the adorable
Bannister.  Expects everybody to fall down and worship him, doesn't
he?  That's the worst of being an Adonis.  Not my sort.  You like
him?"

"I detest--I detest men of that kind as a rule, but he seems a very
agreeable person."

"Surprised at 'Rippey' taking to him."  "Rippey" was the pet name of
the Bishop, which Beatrice never scrupled to use before his wife.
"He's rather a dog, isn't he?"

"I'm sure I don't understand your allusions," replied Lady Hester
haughtily.  The girl's levity grated.

"Evidently made an impression on you.  I mustn't say anything.  Well,
so long!  My mare is in the yard, and I'll have to get wet."

"I sincerely hope I'm not driving you away.  Let me ring and have
your horse brought round," murmured Lady Hester.  "I know I'm very
stupid this morning.  It is my head."

"Want me to clear.  I understand.  Shouldn't come here if you didn't
give me the straight tip when you wanted me to go.  But as a rule
you're more frank about it."

"You really mustn't go in the wet, Beatrice.  I have many things to
do this morning----"

"And you want me to go.  Good-bye!"

Beatrice kissed her hand in good humor and strode out of the room,
slamming the door after her like a man.  Lady Hester at once became
feverishly active.  She slipped on her mackintosh and drew the cape
over her head.  Then softly and guiltily she slipped out of the house
by the front door, the nearest way to the avenue and the quickest for
getting out of sight.  The sun broke through and the rain stopped.
She took a different path to the one chosen by the man in the
motoring coat, but did not go far.  She turned down a side path and
through an opening in the hedge to a portion of the kitchen garden
which had once been a favorite resort of the inmates of the house in
the old days.  Here a Grecian arbor, supported by two white columns
falling to decay, ivy-grown and neglected, provided shelter for Mr.
Bannister.  A yew hedge made a screen, and it was quite the most
secluded spot in the grounds.

He was already there, watching the rain and smoking.  As Lady Hester
came through the opening in the hedge he flung his cigar away, and
stepped forth to greet her.

"Ah, my dear Hester--my dear Lady Hester, I should say--you have
chosen a quiet spot indeed, a lost corner of the world.  I can smell
the mildew of past ages in this spiders' paradise.  Why didn't you
come with me in the motor?  Ah, it is quite like old times--a
clandestine meeting while the old people doze after meals.  Don't sit
there, it is dirty."

She had taken his proffered hand as if mesmerized.  His voice subdued
her and rang like forgotten music in her ears.  She was faint and
could not stand.  He dusted the old, rickety seat with his
handkerchief, and led her to the most convenient resting place.  But
she shook him off.

"Don't touch me.  I haven't much time.  I want to know what you
intend to do?"

"Do, my dear Hester?  What would you have me do?  This delightful
encounter after the lapse of years was unfortunate, coming when it
did.  I for one do not regret it, although I admit that it makes me
feel a fraud and a humbug.  You thought I was dead."

"Of course, I did," she moaned.  "Why didn't you die?  Why have you
come back to torture me and ruin me?  You wrecked my life once.  You
mean to wreck it again."

"Tut-tut, Hester, you do me an injustice.  I've come down here to
marry my girl to your husband's son, and the long arm of coincidence
has been reaching out rather far, that is all.  The world is a very
small place, after all."

"What do you mean to do--what do you mean to do?" she cried hoarsely,
drumming her clenched hands upon her knees.

"There is nothing for me to do.  Rather ask me what I feel."

"But we must come to some decision at once.  I cannot go on like this
in misery and terror.  I am living with a man who is not my husband."

"But he is your husband, my dear Hester."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that Dick Gordon died years ago.  Mr. Richard Bannister has
no connection with the old firm.  _Chérie_, you didn't suppose for a
moment that I came here to disturb the sweet placidity of this
cathedral town by a hideous scandal?"

"Why did you deceive me?  Why did you tell me that my child was
dead?" sobbed the woman, breaking down from pure impotence.

"It was the outcome of a quixotic and chivalrous desire to give
freedom to one who regarded me as a monster of iniquity.  Hester, I
loved you in the old days, you know I did."  He dropped down beside
her, and seized her arm roughly.  His tone changed.  All cynicism
dropped away, and a tigerish light leaped into his eyes.  "You wanted
to be free, and I, like a fool, gave up the only thing that was worth
having--the woman I loved.  You couldn't go back to your old life and
take the child with you, and I had no fancy for having it brought up
to revile the name of its father.  I've brought her up well, Hester.
You yourself could not have done it better.  She's unsullied,
innocent, and pure.  Moreover, I suspect she is already married to
your precious step-son."

"You suspect.  You don't know?"

"I am pretty well sure of it.  She deceived me a little while back
and disappeared for four days.  I've taken the trouble to make
inquiries; and I have very grave suspicions that Miss Mabel is really
Mrs. Cardew."

"Does she know that you suspect it?"

"I see the idea doesn't startle you.  Perhaps you know something of
it?"

"I--why should you think that I have any knowledge of it?"

"Hester, you can't deceive me.  You are lying.  Your dear, sweet face
is like it always was, readable as an open book.  I can see the
emotions as they pass.  Your thoughts are written in your
countenance."

He tried to take her hand tenderly and draw her to him; but she shook
him off with fierce anger.

"If you can read me so well, perhaps you know what I feel when I see
you here before me in the flesh, devilish, cruel as ever.  I hate
you!  I wish you were dead!  If I had the strength to do it I would
kill you--yes, kill you here where you stand now."

He laughed harshly, then reddened to the roots of his hair with rage.
But he only shrugged his shoulders and dropped back into the old tone.

"'Murder by a Bishop's wife!'  What a lovely headline for the evening
papers!  The mystery of a past unveiled.  Lady of title with two
husbands.  The body in the summer house."

"Ah, you think I'm the woman you knew years ago.  You think you can
sneer me into subjection and taunt me into despair.  I have changed.
I know the world better now."

"So I observe, my dear Hester.  You are older, and should know
better.  And you have improved in looks, but you can't afford to
spoil them by tears and hysteria."  He pulled out his cigar case.
"You don't mind my smoking?  The odor of this place is offensive.
The mildew of years is on the place, and the same mildew seems to
have settled in your brain as well.  Yet it hasn't spoiled the
peach-like bloom of your skin, or the cherry red of your lips, and
your teeth are as pearly white and as wonderful when you smile as
ever.  If I were you I shouldn't wrestle with mental problems; they
only deepen the crows' feet round the eyes.  Rely upon your physical
charm--a woman's most potent weapon--for--I am but a man."

He lighted the cigar leisurely, looking at her all the while.  She
shrank beneath his gaze, which was dim with lustful passion.  "I'm to
be bought, but not to be bullied, Hester.  You are mine, all mine.  I
have chosen to live away from you and deliver you up to my lord the
Bishop of Ripley, but it is too great an effort of self-sacrifice.
When I see you again, more delightful than ever, is it to be wondered
that Mr. Richard Bannister wants Dick Gordon's wife; and is it wise
on the part of the lady who holds so responsible and prominent a
public position to flaunt her charms--I note that you have put on a
charming dress--before her dead husband, and load him with reproaches
at the same time?  Have you no word of thanks for poor Dick Gordon,
who's dead?"

"What do you mean?  Speak plainly.  Let me understand the worst,
whatever it is.  Then I shall know what to do."

"The worst is, Hester, that you are still devilishly beautiful, and
that I am as much in love with you as ever.  I'm not good at giving
up anything that I want, and when ripe fruit is dangling before my
lips--well----."  He sidled nearer.

"Stand away--stand away, or I'll scream!  You shan't touch me, you
vile, detestable thing!"

He drew back, stung to the quick, but mastered himself quickly.
Shrugging his shoulders, he walked out of the arbor on to the garden
path, where he looked up at the sky.

"The rain has stopped.  You'll be able to come with me in the motor
after all.  You'd better get ready."

"In the motor?  I'm not coming."

"You'll come because I tell you to, do you hear?" he cried, stamping
his foot and blazing out for the first time.  He shook from head to
foot, and his eyes seemed to be starting out of his head.  "Do you
hear what I say?  Come with me in the motor.  Get ready.  I expect my
wife--do you hear?--my wife, to join me in twenty minutes."

He strode away without a look back, puffing fiercely at his cigar,
and disappeared through the opening in the hedge out on to the grass
that edged the drive.  He saw a girl on horseback coming towards him,
and he passed her by, unseeing.  A moment later Lady Hester, faint
and terrified, followed in his wake, just after Beatrice had passed.
She followed her husband as if fascinated.  He was her master still.
She had lost ground in the first encounter.

Beatrice turned round on her saddle and looked back.

"Oh, that's why she wanted to get rid of me.  Who'd have thought it!
It's pretty rotten of her."

* * * * * * *

Those twenty minutes allowed her by Bannister were perhaps the most
agonizing of Lady Hester's life.  She had received an ultimatum which
was in substance, "Obey me, and there is hope; defy me, and you are
lost."

The situation was an impasse.  One dominant idea only survived in the
whirlwind of emotions that swept over her--the Bishop's good name
must be safeguarded at all costs, no matter how great the sacrifice.
It was she who had sinned, she who must suffer.  Things might have
been better if Jack's marriage had not taken place; she could have
gone away with Mabel--where or how she did not question--for the tie
which bound her daughter to the Bishop's son was stronger than that
unholy bond which had linked her to the Bishop for so many years.
The tangles in the mesh were knotted, and knotted again.  There was
no unravelling them.  It was a nightmare where every step leads to
greater terror.

The minutes slipped by before she could decide to go with her husband
or defy him.  When fifteen had passed, her body seemed to tell her
what her brain had resolved; for she moved about the room,
mechanically Collecting her garments, and all the time praying that
she might have strength to refuse.  She rang for Harriet, her maid--a
plain, old-fashioned domestic of the vicarage days who refused to be
called by her surname--and announced that, after all, she was going
for a spin in the motor, and required her rugs to be taken down to
the car.

At the last moment the wretched woman stood on the stairs irresolute
and trembling.  It was possible for him to wreck her life, and that
of her child, and the man she regarded as her husband, and provoke a
hideous scandal; yes, it was surely better to temporize.

She wilfully shut out any recollection of his strange glances in the
summer house, and would not permit herself to believe that he was
more than an ordinary villain, playing with her, as a cat plays with
a field mouse, with no intention of devouring it.

The arrival of Harriet and the rugs was the first intimation that
Bannister received of his wife's capitulation.  He smiled
triumphantly, and stood at the door of the car ready for her.  He was
wondering how she would look.  He had noticed that some women made a
striking picture in a motor veil.

She descended the steps with outward calmness, murmuring instructions
to the footman as she passed, as though the drive were the most
ordinary occurrence--as indeed it was, so far as the servants were
concerned.

He offered his hand to assist her at the step, and his grasp closed
upon her fingers tightly.  Perhaps it was triumph, perhaps it was
intended as a hint of his power to crush her.  She wrenched her hand
free as from contamination.  He seated himself beside her, and talked
commonplaces for the benefit of the chauffeur; but as soon as the car
was well under way, and whizzing along, the winding lanes to Dingle
Hall, he bent nearer and tried to be amiable.

She was incapable of any conversation, and shrank away in fear.  His
eyes scorched her.  They were ever roving over her, noting the subtle
differences made by the lapse of years.  He slipped his fingers over
hers; and when she tried to release herself, he held them in a
vise-like grip and shot a warning glance of anger.  He intended to be
on a very familiar footing.  His way with women was always familiar,
and they allowed him a deal of license because of his insinuating
courtesy and gentleness.  To his wife every touch was like the
searing of hot irons--at first, until her hand had rested in his for
some time; then she was surprised at her indifference.  The years
seemed to be wiped out.  His clasp was more familiar than the
Bishop's.  It deadened her will power, and produced a sense of
deplorable weakness.

If he could mesmerize her thus, and carry her back over the gulf of
years by a clasp of the hand, what was she going to do if he pressed
his attentions further?

He spoke softly, and bent near to her face.  When she murmured
confused answers, his eyes followed the movements of her ripe, full
lips with obvious pleasure.  She remembered, as if yesterday, all his
old tricks of admiration, and points of her beautiful person that he
had praised and worshipped with passionate abandonment.  In those
days he always said the things a woman loves to hear, noted and
admired the points which she knew to be her best, and made her feel
that he was the natural complement of her nature.

She did not feel that now.  It was only the intense familiarity and
the bold admiration of the eye that remained.  The man, the lover,
the husband, was dead.  This was the shell of him; a dangerous
libertine hidden within.  Her purity was in jeopardy, her honor at
stake, yet she was defenceless, and driven into a corner.

Therefore she temporized.  She studiously refrained from referring to
the difficulties of the situation, and listened while he talked, and
stared ahead, sometimes as if turned to stone, until they reached
Dingle Hall, which she knew well by sight.

Bannister was impressed by the first glance at his future home; for
he had settled in his mind that this place was going to answer his
purpose, and was resolved to make it do, on account of its close
proximity to the Palace.  The agent's photographs and descriptions
had not lied.  It was a charming old house, creeper-clad over the old
portions, and gleaming white where a large wing and stables had been
added within the last generation.  He forgot his companion, and
keenly scrutinized everything as they passed till they drew up before
the door, and the caretaker shuffled out.

"More than promising," he exclaimed, jumping down with unusual
alacrity.  "You're coming over the place, Hester, of course?"

"You're surely not going to look over it?" she murmured.  "You are
not serious?  You don't really want the place?"

He smiled a queer smile, then laughed outright at her.  "I believe,
Hester, that you imagine I can't afford it.  You're living in the old
days.  Things have changed since then.  I may have been a sinner, but
never a fool.  And I did not--ahem--er--earn money in order to spend
it with both hands.  I dare say, if the truth were known, I am as
rich as the dear Bishop.  Come and look over the place, and give me
the advantage of your advice.  Your taste was always faultless.  You
must advise me in the furnishing, and you shall come over, sometimes,
and visit me."

"Never!"

"Really, we are too haughty altogether.  Hester, you will look over
the place?"

"No."

"I insist!"

She obeyed meekly and followed him, shaking with fear.  On the
threshold he waved away the caretaker, and announced that he would go
over the place unguided.  His terrified wife hung back, but he seemed
so genuinely interested in the house, and talked so naturally and
enthusiastically, that he seemed like the old Dick who was ever hot
upon a new scheme that promised big possibilities.

"This would make a fine billiard room," he exclaimed.  "That room out
there for cigars--and cards.  No, perhaps we'll do without the cards.
Let us see the library.  What a fine corridor this, with the windows
down one side.  My pictures would look well along there.  Yes, I've
got some masterpieces at home, Hester.  I told you I would have them
some day.  I bought them, too--most of them.  You must see my flat in
Stratton Street.  It is unique in its way.  This hall seems small;
don't you think so?--but there, I suppose it is large enough for a
house of this size.  That's a nice grate there."

She found herself interested in spite of herself; for what woman does
not love the imaginary furnishing of a house?  He seemed to have
forgotten her existence as anything but a listener, and talked in the
frankest and most natural manner possible with almost boyish
enthusiasm.  There was no doubting his sincerity.  He meant to have
the place.  Once she found herself wondering who would pay for it,
and what was the nature of the swindle.  She could not accustom
herself to the idea of a rogue grown rich by cautious economy.

They exhausted all the rooms of the house, and before they had
finished the survey he announced his satisfaction and intention to
purchase.  The grounds were the next to be visited, and at the first
suggestion of getting out into the open air she agreed with too much
alacrity.

"Yes, let us go into the grounds," she murmured, making for the door.
They were in a large room on the first floor looking out on to the
tiny park belted with woodland.  Her obvious fear of being too long
alone with him emphasized her helplessness.

"Not so fast, my dear Hester," he cried, seizing her arm.  "You
should cultivate repose; it is especially desirable in a Bishop's
lady.  We are quite alone now.  No one can hear or interfere with us.
Come to the window and let me have a good look at you.  I've been
admiring you all the way here, and I'm hanged if I've got any eyes
for the house when you are by my side.  How do you manage it?  How do
you keep this wonderful youthfulness?  Is it ease and contentment?  I
could never have imagined you contented in the smug atmosphere of the
church after--well, after our life.  It's funny.  It makes me laugh."

"Let us look at the grounds and get home," she urged, breaking away.

His fingers slipped from her soft, round arm to her wrist, and he
caught her gloved hand.  She cried out as if in pain.  He
passionately pressed her fingers to his lips, then allowed her to
drop away suddenly.  The miserable terror and consternation in her
face angered him.  Yet he was so very satisfied with himself and with
the progress of things generally that he could afford to be merciful.

"There, there!  I'm not going to eat you.  You needn't be afraid.
You can escape from my pestilential perseverence.  You thought I was
going to kiss you, I suppose.  No, I'm not going to struggle for
kisses from my own wife, like a school boy under the mistletoe.  When
you come back to me, Hester, you'll come of your own accord."

"Never!" she cried scornfully, and quivering with rage, in spite of
her fear.

"We shall see, we shall see.  At present we are purchasing an estate
for ourselves"--tapping his breast--"and our daughter--our daughter,
Hester."

"Do you think you are going to bring her here?"

"Undoubtedly, until it suits her husband to enlighten the Bishop.
What is mine will be hers one day, when I am old bones.  I presume
you have nothing to leave her, Hester; and her husband hasn't made a
fortune yet.  Allow me to give you a hand down this staircase.  It is
narrow at the bend.  Ah, that's a good bit of carving.  Yes, I'll
have more of that.  I can get some panels for that corner.  I've seen
some at Duveen's."

His mind was still running on the house, even amid the discussion of
the most vital, terrible things.  She wondered how he could detach
himself so completely, so quickly, so callously.

"My Israels will hang there, in the middle of a panel," he continued.
"The light is subdued, and the wall will be dark.  Ah, I am boring
you.  I was forgetting; we are to look at the grounds."

He lighted a cigar at the door, and surveyed the smiling acres
stretching as far as the eye could reach, with the air of proud
proprietor.  At the foot of the steps she pleaded faintness, and
begged to be allowed to sit and wait in the motor.  Her face was very
white, and he understood that she was suffering acutely.

"By all means, my dear Hester, by all means.  I have tired you; allow
me.  I hate to see you like this.  It makes me feel that it is my
fault, whereas I would see you all smiles and tenderness as once upon
a time.  Ah, me!"

Her eyes blazed out resentfully in their helpless misery.  He meant
to be kind, and she imagined that he was trying to be cruel, and
stabbing her at every vulnerable point.  He shrugged his shoulders,
and wandered away to survey his land.

It was his already, and he walked with the step of a Briton.  If
Hester could have found it in her heart to admire him ever so little,
she would have seen him at his best at this moment.  The languid,
cynical affectation of the man disappeared.  He was keen as a
sportsman, eager as an explorer.  After a long survey, which seemed
as satisfactory as his examination of the house, he returned to the
car and jumped in.

On the return journey he was preoccupied.

The woman sat huddled up at the other end of the seat, burning to
question him, and longing to know what his real attitude towards her
and the Bishop was going to be, yet afraid to speak.

He was furnishing Dingle Hall, and engaging servants, and receiving
the county, a free man, with Voss banished forever, and no care for
the morrow.  It was only when he thought of his visitors, and
pictured the Bishop and Hester arriving at the house of Jack's
father-in-law in solemn state, that he looked at his wife.  Then he
laughed, but gave her no clue to his mirth.

She could have struck him.  She was beginning to think of killing
him.  It seemed to be the only way.  So long as he was on the earth
he would do evil and breed misery.  She looked at him stealthily once
or twice, and wondered if it was very difficult for a woman to
strangle the life out of a man, or whether she could stab, or shoot,
and whether she would be horror-struck when she saw him lying dead at
her feet.  She even allowed herself to wonder what he would look
like--dead.

Her case was desperate.  It seemed more desperate than that of any
other woman who had ever lived in the world before.  And on the basis
that desperate ills need desperate remedies, violent death was surely
only a merciful end to a villain.




CHAPTER XVII

Aunt Caroline had a visitor.  She received him almost secretly in the
little room known as "the Upstairs Study," adjoining Jack's bedroom.

The visitor had been sent for, and came in fear and trembling.  It
was Mr. Crick.  The old lady intended to get to the bottom of the
mystery about Bannister.  The slackness of everybody else in the
matter only spurred her to greater effort.  Beatrice Carew's offhand
treatment she regarded as due to girlish ignorance and inexperience.
But her brother had no right to give his son in marriage to the
daughter of a man whose character was not spotless, and against whom
the breath of scandal was raised in something more vigorous than
whispers.  Mr. Crick was her authority; either he had grossly
deceived her, or he knew more than he had said.

The poor little man arrived in a somewhat excited state, for he had
fortified his courage with something stronger than righteous
indignation.  He was terribly afraid of Bannister.  He knew that his
enemy would not scruple to damage him in the eyes of the Bishop; so
he sneaked up to the house by a sidewalk through the park, and
inquired nervously of the footman if Mr. Bannister was in the house.
On being told that he had gone off on his motor for the afternoon,
accompanied by his daughter, Mr. Crick found courage as he strode
into Aunt Caroline's presence.  Her first glance was one of keen
scrutiny--to see if he were quite sober, She opened the interview
with a blunt question.

"Mr. Crick, were you telling me the truth when you said that Mr.
Bannister was really Dick Gordon, of Vienna, a scamp and an
adventurer?"

Mr. Crick closed the door carefully and put down his hat and stick,
and swelled out his chest like a man about to give a lecture.  "You
see, it was this way----"

"Mr. Crick, a direct answer to a direct question.  Did you not assure
me that Mr. Bannister, the father of the girl my nephew has chosen
for a wife, was a scoundrel--nay a criminal, and his real name was
Gordon?"

"Well you see, 'criminal' is rather a large word, isn't it?  Won't
you sit down, Miss Cardew?  I'll explain if you'll give me time."

Mr. Crick mopped his moist brow and ran his handkerchief over his
red, wrinkled, pimpled face.

"Yes, I'll sit down, and you can sit, too.  Don't fidget, man, and
don't prevaricate.  You've made a grave statement, and--you have said
other things--about me."

"Nonsense, Miss Cardew--never!"

"We will not discuss that at present.  Let us keep to Mr. Bannister.
You knew him in Vienna as Dick Gordon.  When was that?"

"A great many years ago--oh, yes, a great many years--nearly twenty,
I should think.  You see, I was younger then."

"Naturally."

"And more foolish."

"Impossible, Mr. Crick, judging by your recent conduct and the
dreadful state into which you had fallen before we lifted you out of
the morass----"

"Yes, yes, of course--I am deeply grateful.  I'm a different man.
But as I was saying, it was in Vienna.  I was a member of the English
Club there, and a guest of a wealthy American, who had rented a large
house.  Everybody in the English colony knew everybody else, and we
used to play cards, of course, and the stakes were rather high.  The
Americans were free with their money, and--and--well, I had more to
spend then than I have now.  There was a fellow there, devilish
handsome chap and all that, whom the women made much of; and my
friend Hyam, the millionaire, introduced him to the English Club and
made him a member.  He said he belonged to a good old Scotch family,
and as there are a good many Gordons, it was impossible to deny the
fact, wasn't it?  He singled me out for his friendship."

"Why?" asked Aunt Caroline, with disconcerting directness.

"Well--er--I was playing cards a good deal, I suppose, and I was
impressionable.  He always had one or two Polish princesses running
after him, and--one of them liked me--and turned out to be an
out-and-out swindler.  She ruined everybody she played with--except
Dick Gordon, who always won--and they played into each other's hands.
They rooked me of a thousand pounds in a fortnight."

"Who--the Polish princesses?"

"No, this Dick Gordon and his confederate.  Hyam must have lost quite
two thousand, and one night there was a row at the club.  Some of the
men agreed to watch him.  Though they didn't actually catch him
cheating--that is to say, enough to make it a criminal matter--they
were all pretty sure; and in the middle of a game Hyam lost his
temper, jumped up, and struck Gordon in the face.  They were mostly
young men, except Hyam, and they wanted to give the fellow a licking;
but he crawled out of it somehow, and next day he was gone, Polish
princess and all.  He must have cleared three or four thousand pounds
in about a week.  It was too steep, it really was."

"You will pardon my asking the question, Mr. Crick, but did you--were
you drinking at the time?"

"Well, we were all a little--er--on, don't you know, except Gordon.
But the drink didn't hurt us after Gordon had gone."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Well, I've got no proof, of course, but some of us thought our
drinks were hocussed."

Miss Cardew elevated her eyebrow and looked puzzled.

"Thought the drink was doctored, you know, especially one night when
we adjourned from the club to Gordon's swagger rooms at his hotel.
He always cut a dash and stayed at the best place.  That's where he
first struck up the acquaintance with Hyam; and that's how I came to
know him."

"And have you never met him since then?"

"I--no, not until a year ago, when I saw him--as Bannister--in
London.  He seemed to know everybody, and he had a grown-up daughter
who visited quite the best houses.  I supposed that he had married
money."

"Who was the girl's mother, Mr. Crick?  Did this Dick Gordon have no
wife in those days?"

"Never that I heard of--unless the Polish princess--the dark one--was
his wife."

"Good heavens! what terrible possibilities you suggest.  My nephew
engaged to the daughter of a swindling, Polish hussy; a girl with a
scoundrel for a father!"

"Well, you know, you mustn't say that exactly--at least, not on my
authority.  I can't prove anything against the fellow, you know,
except what other people say, don't you know.  He won too much; but
then, if they could have proved that he had cheated they would have
horsewhipped him, or put him in jail, or run him through in a duel.
But they couldn't catch him, you see."

"He was publicly insulted, you say.  That's enough, Mr. Crick.  I
suspected the man the moment I set eyes on him.  He has rascal
written in his face.  He's a hypocrite and a liar.  Oh, my poor
Jack!--my poor Jack!  What have you done?  What has my brother done?
He has been hopelessly taken in.  He always was a simpleton.  He must
revoke his consent.  And we must see him together, Mr. Crick.  You
will tell him what you have told me, and we'll see what he will do."

"Oh, no, no, I'd rather not, if you don't mind," gasped Mr. Crick,
mopping his moist forehead again, and shuffling painfully.  "It's
libel, you know.  What I've told you was in strictest confidence,
Miss Cardew.  I'd no idea when you first mentioned his name that his
daughter was engaged to your nephew.  I don't really know anything
about him.  He may have married most respectably, and have come into
money, and be able to explain his change of name, and all
that--whereas I'm nobody, and a discredited person, though I owe
every thing to you and the Bishop."

"Mr. Crick, you will show your gratitude by exposing this rascal.  It
is a quarter to four, and the carriage has gone down to the station
to meet my brother.  Ah, there it is, returning.  We will go to him
together, and implore him----"

"I'd rather not, if you don't mind.  You see, it's beastly awkward
for a fellow, after twenty years, to rake up a scandal against
another chap who's got everybody on his side.  I shouldn't wonder if
he didn't say something beastly about me.  We were a rackety lot in
those days."

"Mr. Crick, if you have anything to hide, anything that you are
ashamed of, confess it to me now, that I may know where we stand with
this villain."

"Of course, you mustn't forget that Hyam was drunk when he struck
Gordon; and Gordon could have got him expelled from the club if he
had liked.  But you see, he cleared off.  That looked queer, didn't
it?"

"Mr. Crick, we will put this matter to the Bishop.  When he knows the
truth, he will admit that you are his son's best friend."

Mr. Crick again protested, and perspired, and stammered, and choked,
and grew quite incoherent in his nervous excitement.  When the front
door closed behind the Bishop, and his cheery voice was heard asking
where Mr. and Miss Bannister were, she dragged the poor little man
down into the hall to greet her brother, on the mat, as it were.

"Ah, Mr. Crick," cried the Bishop, "how go the preparations for the
bazaar?  You've been busy with my sister, I see.  Nothing like
it--work, work--organize, organize.  An active life is the thing for
you, Crick.  You look a different man."

"John, Mr. Crick has an important communication to make to you," said
Caroline, in sepulchral tones.  "This way to the library, Mr. Crick.
What you have to say must be said behind closed doors."

The Bishop looked annoyed.  He had been listening to important
communications all day, and had conducted a service and preached a
sermon, and performed the opening ceremony at a new mission hall,
since breakfast, and there was more to do before he could call his
soul his own and dine in peace with his wife and his guests.

"Well, Mr. Crick, what is it?" he cried brusquely, as he slammed the
door after him.

"I--I really have nothing to tell, Bishop.  Miss Cardew insists that
I should see you; but, as I have explained, it is quite unnecessary."

"Caroline, I am very busy to-day.  Why do you worry me?"

"John, the future of your son hangs in the balance.  Will you ruin
him forever?  Will you shut your eyes and ears to the truth?  Do you
know the kind of man you are harboring under your roof?"

"Caroline, I do believe you are still determined to annoy my son's
future father-in-law.  Your intentions may be good--your methods are
abominable--abominable.  Mr. Bannister and I understand one another.
Jack is engaged.  That is the end of it.  Mr. Crick, say what you
have to say, if it concerns my son, and be quick about it."

"I really--I'd rather not.  It's a beastly caddish thing of a fellow,
don't you know, to make charges against a man that he can't
substantiate.  I really know nothing definite about Mr. Bannister."

"That was not what you told me, Mr. Crick," cried Aunt Caroline, in
shrill amazement.  "Explain to my brother about the swindling in
Vienna, and the Polish princesses, and the public humiliation of Dick
Gordon, the swindler--now masquerading as Bannister--and his hasty
flight."

"Well, really, you know, all those things, when put together, did
look rather awkward, you know.  But in a court of law----"

"But we're not in a court of law.  John, Mr. Crick is still suffering
from nerves, I fear, and has lost the courage of his opinions.  He
has satisfied me that this man, this Mr. Bannister, is nothing more
than a common swindler, whose right name is Gordon.  He was a
swindler in Vienna, and narrowly escaped imprisonment."

"Are you sober--I mean, when did all this happen?" cried the Bishop
irritably.

"Well, you see, it was twenty years ago--or nearly."

"Mr. Crick, it seems to me that you have been behaving most
indiscreetly," observed the Bishop pompously.  "You probably are
confusing Mr. Bannister with some other person altogether; and, on
your own showing, you have nothing serious to urge against him.  Now
I, on the other hand, know something about Mr. Bannister's past.  I
know that he has not been all--but there, why should I reveal his
secrets to a perfect stranger?  Mr. Bannister is a most highly
esteemed person in London society.  His friends are titled, wealthy,
and intellectual people.  I myself met him at Mr. Panoli's among men
of light and leading lions of the intellectual world.  He enchanted
us all.  Far be it from me to rake up the past, and throw the
escapades of his youth in his teeth.  Jack is of the same opinion;
and for Miss Bannister's sake I think it is highly necessary that
this malicious traducing of an honorable gentleman should stop.
Should stop, Caroline, do you hear?"

"John, that man has hypnotized you."

"Caroline, prejudice has blinded you.  Let me tell you that your
behavior to Miss Bannister is cruel, and unworthy of a Christian
lady; but, there, Mr. Crick, we will not bore you with family
discussions that are more suited to the privacy of the domestic
hearth.  I wish you good afternoon, Mr. Crick.  You will excuse me, I
am sure.  I have much to do.  My sister will no doubt see that you
have tea."

"Yes, tea.  I should like a cup of tea," gasped Mr. Crick, making a
swallowing motion with his parched throat.  His shattered nervous
system had undergone a severe strain; and the Bishop always terrified
him.

Aunt Caroline was rendered helpless with impotent rage.  Her brother
had deliberately snubbed her before the miserable worm Crick, and she
could endure no more.  The whirling of Mr. Bannister's motor
announced the return of the swindler from his second journey to
Dingle Hall that day, and further discussion about his affairs was
impossible.  Aunt Caroline stalked out with as much dignity as she
could command, and passed across the hall into the drawing room,
ignoring the entry of Mr. Bannister and Mabel.  Bannister gave Crick
a withering, searching glance.  He examined him through his eyeglass
very much as he might have surveyed a half-drowned mongrel dog, or a
cat without a tail.

The Bishop came out to greet his guest in the hall.  "Well,
Bannister--well, Mabel, what do you think of Dingle Hall?"

"It's all settled, Bishop," replied Bannister gaily.  "I am charmed.
The place is so good and so cheap, that I almost feel there must be
some hideous drawback to it which I have not yet discovered.  You,
Mabel, what do you think of it?"

"Oh, I think it's a pretty place," replied Mabel coldly,

"She thinks I'm rash and extravagant, Bishop.  She wonders what I
shall do all alone, in such a big house.  But I tell her that she
must regard it as her home when I'm under ground.  After all, it is
only money invested, not spent.  What is seven thousand pounds?"

"What, indeed!" murmured the Bishop, who really thought that seven
thousand pounds was an immense sum of money.  He had never been able
to handle such an amount at one time in his life.  He felt sure that
Bannister must be much richer than he had admitted.

"My coachman tells me you drove the wife over, this morning--and, by
the way, I haven't seen her yet.  I suppose her head is better."

"I motored her over after breakfast, and she was delighted.  In fact,
I showed her the room which I intend to call the Bishop's Room, for
it is always to be at your disposal and hers."

"Ah, a quaint idea, and very nice of you, Bannister.  But it is
rather near home.  You shall reserve it for Caroline."  The Bishop
chuckled at his little joke, for he believed that she could hear him
through the half-open drawing room door.

"Miss Cardew will ever be a welcome guest at my house, Bishop--my
son-in-law's mother, as it were; he has told me what a wonderful lady
she is, and how much he is indebted to her.  Mabel, my dear, I've
left my cigar case on the front seat of the motor.  You might get it
before Roche drives away."  Then, as soon as she had departed, he
approached the Bishop, and, laying a hand gently upon his arm,
murmured, "Miss Cardew is not quite nice to me, Bishop; but I take no
notice of it.  She regards me as an interloper; and I can quite
understand it.  But it is worrying my daughter, I fear; so that if
you notice she looks distressed, please ignore it.  It will all come
right presently."

"Jealousy, my dear Bannister, jealousy--a fond woman's jealousy.  I
apologize for my sister.  I am shocked."

"Oh no, no, on no account take up that attitude, but make allowances
for my daughter.  And Lady Hester is troubled about it as well.  I
don't want to give the good lady pain.  Her overwrought feelings are
carrying her away.  Only natural, only natural.  She is losing her
boy, as she expresses it, and it is a wrench.  Let us all decide to
take no notice."

"I quite agree with you, Bannister, quite agree with you.  It is very
generous and considerate of you.  My sister's intentions are the best
in the world, but at times she is a little jealous, that's all."

The Bishop looked at Mabel admiringly, as she entered with the cigar
case.  He was very fond of his future daughter-in-law.  He loved her
as he loved all pretty things, and was always correspondingly genial.
"I'm afraid you are finding it dull while Jack is away, Mabel.  We
must do something to amuse you.  I must speak to Hester about it.
I'm afraid there isn't much here to interest a girl.  What do girls
like, now?  Dresses, jewels?  By the bye, have you seen the emeralds?"

Mabel's hands clenched, and she held herself in control with
difficulty.  She could not answer.

"Hester must show them to you.  Hester, my dear," he exclaimed, as
his wife descended the staircase, pale and calm, "I've just been
telling Mabel that you must show her the emeralds."

"Oh, yes," murmured Hester huskily.  "They are in the safe."

Mr. Bannister appeared to be utterly oblivious of the conversation.
He had turned to the hall table where the afternoon post was spread
out, and he was running over his letters.

"We must have the emeralds down, Hester.  I wonder you have never
shown them to Mabel before.  Are you quite sure your head is better,
my dear?  You look very pale."  The Bishop rose and took his wife's
hand tenderly, and looked anxiously into her face.  But her eyes were
downcast, and her hand trembled.

"A little shaky," she murmured, "a little shaky."

"Mabel, you must look after Hester, and insist upon her showing you
the emeralds.  They're worth seeing.  They're always stowed away in
the safe, and nobody ever has a look at them.  I had them put in a
glass case, so that they could be displayed with greater ease.  I am
very proud of them.  They've been in the family for generations, and
I'm told they're very valuable--more valuable than ever."

"Father is a collector of precious stones," observed Mabel icily,
giving her father a glance that startled him.  He darted one sharp
look at her, then laughed.

"Yes, but I keep mine at the bank."

"Indeed!" murmured the Bishop, who saw here further evidence of
Bannister's wealth.  "Mabel must be well stocked with trinkets then,
and may perhaps take less interest in our emeralds--her emeralds some
day--than most girls."

"I got a mania for collecting precious stones years ago," explained
Bannister, addressing Hester, who was cold and calm.  "I could never
resist a fine diamond, and I once bought some immense emeralds, too.
I believe they have doubled or trebled in value.  I should like to
compare them with yours, Lady Hester; it would be some guide.  Yes,
Mabel will have jewelry enough.  My collection will be hers some day;
but if she were to wear all the stones I have bought at various
times, she would make a sensation."

"Lucky girl," murmured the Bishop.

"Many of the stones are not mounted; but now that Mabel is to be
married I suppose I shall have to have some of them made up for her.
Lady Hester must advise us.  I have only to look around this house to
see that her taste in design is excellent.  By the bye, I quite
forgot to say that many of them belonged to my family," continued
Bannister airily, keeping an eye on the half-open door of the
library, where Aunt Caroline was, and speaking in a loud voice.  "My
father was a Yorkshire squire of the old school with a long pedigree,
of which he was very proud, and he never let the family jewels go
away from the male line.  Being the last of my race I have benefited
by his wisdom, and Mabel will have the advantage of them."

The two women looked at one another, and in Mabel's eyes there was a
piteous appeal for guidance.  If the elder woman had given half a
hint of encouragement she would have blazed out there and then, and
denounced her father as a fraud, without any real evidence to
substantiate the allegation.




CHAPTER XVIII

Mabel had spent most of the day watching Voss.  The man had become a
terror to her.  Under plea of a headache she had stayed in her room
with the door ajar.  Three or four times she had gone in the
direction of Lady Hester's boudoir, and each time Voss was hovering
somewhere near, chatting to a servant--especially to Harriet.
Harriet Banks was neither young nor foolish, but she believed that
Mr. Voss's interest in her was purely spontaneous and disinterested.
As the valet and confidential servant of Mr. Bannister, who was to be
one of the family, he seemed entitled to special privileges and
confidences.  The artful rascal's loud praise of her mistress' beauty
and goodness went straight to Banks' heart.  Mr. Voss was a man of
discernment, and his devotion to his young mistress--according to his
own account--was chivalrous to a fault.

From the gallery over the hall Voss heard Bannister's brag about the
family jewels, and did not hesitate to make capital out of it with
Harriet.  He had never seen these jewels, he declared, but he had
heard wonderful stories about them.  Harriet, not to be outdone,
refused to admit that anybody's gems could be so fine as the hallowed
heirlooms of the Cardews, which her mistress wore on certain special
occasions--memorable days to Harriet, whose point of view had not
widened one little bit with the expansion of her master's fortunes;
she was still the impecunious vicar's housekeeper of the old days,
and she never ceased to wonder at the beauty and gorgeousness of Lady
Hester on festive occasions.  She was proud of the fact that she was
often trusted with the key of the safe by her mistress.  At this Voss
marvelled, yet shook his head deprecatingly.  He personally would
never undertake such a responsibility, and would refuse to touch the
key of his master's safe.  He thought it argued great courage on
Harriet's part, and wonderful trust on the side of Harriet's mistress.

He asked what precautions were taken to safeguard the heirlooms, and
gathered that there were none, beyond the fact that the safe was let
into the wall of Lady Hester's bedroom, and that she kept the key in
the same apartment.  The house was well guarded below, and Chubb, the
Bishop's pet mastiff in the stable yard, was always let loose in the
night.  She mentioned that poor Chubb--he was jocularly called Chubb
by the Bishop because he was a safe dog--was ailing at the present
time from some unknown cause, and did not seem at all himself.  He
was probably sickening for mange, or what seemed more likely, had
been kicked in the stable, and was going about with all the life
knocked out of him.

At this information Voss smiled behind his hand and stroked his chin,
and when he passed had another peep into Lady Hester's room--and ran
into Mabel.

That evening, when the household was dressing for dinner, there was a
gentle knock at Lady Hester's door.  Mabel begged to come in.  Her
eyes were dilated with excitement, and she was shaking with fright.
She was afraid to be alone.  While her father and the Bishop were
chatting, and Lady Hester and Aunt Caroline were upon the scene,
things seemed real, and it was hard to believe that a fateful crisis
was approaching.  Yet it must be drawing nearer and nearer.  The
conviction that her father was a thief, and that Voss was clearing
the way for deliberate robbery, grew with every hour.  The man's
movements, seen from behind her bedroom door, were certainly
mysterious; and on several occasions she had surprised him examining
window fastenings and staircases where he had no business to be.

So far there had been no opportunity of making fuller confession to
Lady Hester; and she was terrified now by the Bishop's suggestion
that his wife should bring down the emeralds to-night for Mr.
Bannister's benefit.

Her unhappy mother was torn by worse fears; yet she was glad to see
her daughter.  She opened her arms and folded her to her heart, and
took her face in her hands and looked into the tear-stained eyes.

"My poor Mabel, you are making yourself ill."

"Oh, Lady Hester, I haven't been able to explain.  You are in danger.
You won't wear the emeralds to-night?"

"Of course not.  I should never dream of such a thing."

"You know what I mean?  It is true--true, I'm sure of it.  That man
is watching your room, and has been gossiping with your maid about
jewels.  I heard them laughing and talking; I heard them mention
emeralds.  It is all my father has come down here for.  He doesn't
think I'm married to Jack, and his brag about money and jewelry is
all lies--lies."

"I know it, my dear, I know it, to my cost."

"Do you understand, Lady Hester--do you realize that the Bishop is
treating him as an honored guest?  He must be told.  I myself will
tell him if you do not.  I can't bear it.  It is wicked.  Oh, I have
ruined Jack."

"Hush, hush, child, silence is best.  You mustn't anger your father.
We are both in his power.  We are helpless."

"I am, but you are not, Lady Hester.  He is my father; but you have
met him before.  You know what he is, and can warn the Bishop.  It is
your duty.  Don't consider me--because I am Jack's wife.  If Jack
knew, he wouldn't keep silence."

"My dear, your father knows that you are married to Jack."

"Knows?" cried Mabel incredulously.

"So you see, Mabel, we are utterly at his mercy.  He can snap his
fingers at us."

"At me, but not at you.  You're not obliged to have him in your
house.  Oh, send him away--send him away!  I'll go too, and Jack
shall never see me again.  It's all my fault.  If I had taken your
advice we should never have been married; and you would have been
spared the humiliation of having a girl brought into the family whose
relations decent people would shudder to meet.  My father has come
here to rob you, to rob you of thousands, and he will do it."

"No, he will not," cried Lady Hester fiercely.  "If it is the
emeralds he wants, they can be removed.  I can hide them.  See here,
the key of the safe is in this drawer.  I'll take them out now.
They'll pack into a very small space."

"No, no, surely they will be more secure in that iron cupboard,"
exclaimed Mabel, as Lady Hester threw open the door of the safe.

"No, my child.  They must be put where he will never dream of looking
for them.  Ah, I know him better than you do.  If I could only tell
you--no, no, I must not.  We are in the power of an unscrupulous man
who will not hesitate to ruin us all to gain his own end--to
sacrifice me, and you, and laugh at our sufferings.  But he shan't
have the emeralds.  If I must deceive my husband I won't rob him as
well.  I am not utterly helpless--oh no.  I know things about him
that would send him to jail.  But, alas! he knows things about me--he
can tell a secret--oh, my God! a secret--oh, give me strength to keep
my brain steady and my tongue still!"

She beat her forehead with her hands, and walked up and down while
Mabel stood by the open door of the safe.

"Why should you be so afraid of my father, Lady Hester?  If he is a
bad man he must be told that you know it and be sent away.  He
mustn't be allowed to deceive the Bishop.  It is your duty as a wife
to tell your husband and take counsel with him.  He can help you.  He
is powerful.  My father would not dare to show his face here if the
Bishop knew."

"Ah, if the Bishop knew--if he knew!" echoed Lady Hester
mechanically, wringing her hands and breaking down hopelessly before
the girl.  "Can't you see, Mabel, can't you understand, that your
father has met me before?  He holds a secret of mine.  You remember
that I told you I had secrets which I kept too well when I married
again?"

"You mean that you were married before, and did not tell the Bishop?"

"Was that not bad enough?"

"Do you mean that my father knows that?"

"Yes, child, he knows it only too well, and he would use it against
me.  Oh, my child--my child--my daughter, my daughter!" cried the
agonized woman, flinging herself into Mabel's arms and sobbing
piteously.  "Ruin stares us in the face.  I have sinned enough; I
must sin no more.  I can keep it to myself no longer."

She seized the girl by the shoulders and held her at arms' length.

"Mabel, look into my face--look into my eyes.  Can you not read my
awful yet wonderful secret there?  Your father has done me one good
turn.  Have you not noticed my strange emotion whenever I look upon
you?"

"You have been very sweet and kind to me.  I thought you were sorry
for me."

"It is more than that.  Look again, child, look again.  Does no
instinct within you speak?  Think--question your soul.  Am I not more
to you than other women are?  Does not my voice ring in your ears
with a familiar note, as yours does in mine--as it ever did from the
moment we met?  Are we not alike--so alike that people say you are
the very image of what I was at your age?"

Mabel still had no glimmering of the other's meaning.  She saw that
something was coming, and waited for more light.

"Mabel, when I told you the secret of those dark days of my girlhood
I little dreamed that you were soon to be linked with me in the
network of lies that I had woven about myself.  I told you of a man
who lured me away by plausible words and made me his wife.  I told
you that he died.  God knows, I thought he did.  But he lives--he
lives."

"Ah, yes, and the man you told me of was a thief, too, was he not?"

"Yes, child, a plausible rogue who played for high stakes and spent
money with both hands; who pretended always to be wealthy, and preyed
upon fools--a swindler, but yet my husband.  He is not dead.  Now do
you understand, child?  Think--think--don't force me to tell you.
You must guess it, for I can never confess all.  My first husband is
not dead.  He lives."

"Your first husband lives?" murmured Mabel.  "Then the Bishop----"

"Yes, yes--don't look at me like that!  Of course, the Bishop isn't
my husband now."

"My father knows this, then?  Oh, how dreadful!"

"I was deceived.  The man tricked me.  I thought he was dead, but he
has come back to terrify me."

"When did you learn of his existence?" whispered Mabel, forgetting
her own troubles and trembling for her friend.

"I learnt it the moment I met your father."

The words were said with impressive deliberation; the two women stood
eye to eye, the elder appealing as if for mercy, for forgiveness, for
pity.  Mabel screamed and started back.  She understood, but not all.
Lady Hester covered her face.

"My father--my father--you mean my father?  He--your husband?"

"Hush, hush, not so loud, girl.  The secret must still be kept,
hidden forever.  When I am dead--when I am dead----"

"What do you mean, Lady Hester--what do you mean?  My father?"

"If the worst comes to the worst I shall kill myself.  He will be
powerless then.  But I don't want to die, Mabel, I don't want to
die--now that I know--oh, my child, can't you understand the other
part of my secret?  You don't realize all yet.  In that miserable
year of married life I had a child--a daughter, who was taken from
me--and they told me she was dead.  My little girl did not die."

"Who told you she was alive still--my father?"

"Yes."

There was a pause.  Mabel's mind was quite incapable of grasping what
the other intended to convey.  The fact that Lady Hester was her
father's wife was more than she could absorb at present.  At last the
chain of ideas formed in her brain, and she murmured wonderingly, "My
father's wife?  Then whose child am I?  Who was my mother?"

"Mabel, my darling--my daughter--think, think--and understand--and
forgive!"

Lady Hester flung herself sobbing into her daughter's arms, and her
meaning was plain at last.  Mabel screamed, and pushed her away,
staring like one demented.

"Mabel, forgive! forgive!" cried the other, dropping to her knees,
and appealing passionately with outstretched arms.  "I am your
mother.  Love me--come to me--I did not know."

Mabel still held off, and looked at the appealing woman with
wonderment only in her eyes.  For a few moments she doubted the
other's sanity.  The things she was asked to understand were too vast
and amazing to be grasped within the space of a minute.  Lady
Hester's supreme agitation left her quite unmoved, and she regarded
her with cold, hard eyes; but her brain was working rapidly.  She
recalled all the things that had been said, and tried to piece
together the broken mosaic of circumstance and relationship.  Yet
still the only real thing to her was the fact that Lady Hester and
her father had met before, and had known one another intimately.
Then the truth gradually took shape--the simple possible fact,
fraught with unknown terrors and suggestions of deadly sin, flashed
out with hideous distinctness.  She was Lady Hester's child.

The wretched mother mistook the wild, questioning gaze of the
startled girl for loathing and condemnation.  She covered her face
and wept, still kneeling, and for a long time there was silence,
broken at last by Mabel.

"Explain to me--tell me again," she murmured.  "You mean that you are
my mother?"

Lady Hester nodded, without uncovering her face.

"Then you were never married to my father?"

Lady Hester bowed her head still lower.  "I was married, indeed,
yes--and I have never ceased to curse the hour that linked me to him
forever."

"I don't understand you yet," said the girl quietly, nervously
fingering the gold chain at her throat.  "You are married to--the
Bishop.  How could you be married to my father?  Besides, my mother
died when I was a child."

Lady Hester shook her head and made no further sign.  She had said
enough--almost too much--and she let it sink in.  Mabel's eyes were
drawn with pain, her lips paled to bloodlessness, and she swayed with
faintness.  She put out one hand and tottered helplessly to a chair.

Lady Hester rose wearily, almost afraid to look her daughter in the
eyes.  She, too, dropped into a chair, the one that was opposite her
mirror, and, resting her elbows upon the table, sobbed piteously.

After a pause, Mabel spoke again, this time in a strained, unnatural
voice.  "Tell me again," she urged.  "What you have stated is so
amazing, so impossible."

"It is all very simple.  I told you the story of my early married
life, of my secret marriage with a man who turned out to be a rogue."

"But he died."

"He led me to believe so, in order to be rid of me, or--as he swears
now--to free me from the bonds I regretted.  I really believed that
he was dead.  But there was a child which he had already taken from
me in order that our secret might be kept; and that died, too, so he
declared at the time.  I heard of your supposed death first; then of
the death of my husband, and I thought I was free to hide my sorrow
and my shame, and begin life afresh."

"But if the child died," murmured Mabel, "how was it you knew nothing
about it until he told you?"

"The child did not die.  Can't you understand, Mabel?--you are the
child--he took you from me--he robbed me of you.  I am your mother,
girl--don't look at me like that.  Oh, why are you not glad, Mabel?"

"But you are married to the Bishop--you are respected, and admired by
all--yet you say my father was your husband.  Were you divorced?"

"He was not so merciful as that.  Have I not told you that he led me
to believe that he was dead?"

"Dead!  Did you not make inquiries?"

"What inquiries could I make?  A clergyman came to me with a lie on
his lips and declared that he was with him in his last hours, and
brought me dying messages.  You were supposed to have died a little
while before, and I had mourned you deeply."

"Really, I am very stupid," murmured Mabel, passing her hand across
her brow as if to clear away the cobwebs of stupefaction; "but where
was the child--was I--at the time?"

"You were put out to nurse, taken from me the day you were born.  I
was then Lady Hester Lennox, you must remember.  I never used my
husband's name."

"You mean that you were never really married?"

"Oh, yes, we were married.  That was the only thing about which there
was no doubt."

"And yet you let them take away your child."

"My dear girl, you know your father.  Have you ever seen him turned
from his purpose by the pleading of a woman?  Besides, I thought I
was only losing you for a little time.  In the interval between your
birth and my recovery, I learned your father's true character, and
grew to wish that you had never been born.  When they told me you
were dead I wept, but I was almost glad that you were spared a life
of humiliation, of suffering--perhaps of infamy."

"And you accepted the news of your baby's death without question?
You never went to see it, or to look at the place where it was
buried?"

"No, no, child.  It was little more than a name to me.  I had borne
it, but scarce held it in my arms for an hour.  I was very ill when
they took you away; that was all I ever saw of you.  But fate has
brought us together again, Mabel; and now you will love me, and I
shall realize my dearest ambition.  I have a daughter--ah! and such a
beautiful daughter, too!  Mabel----"

She came over impulsively, and dropped on one knee before the girl,
seizing her hand.  Mabel drew away as if shocked--she could not have
explained why.  It was all unreal and baffling.  She had suffered
much already from the realization of her father's true character; now
her best friend was suddenly transformed into a guilty mother.

Mother!  A thing possessed by other girls, a being who belonged to
the tender period of infancy and childhood, a sympathetic guide who
led tottering footsteps in wise and gentle paths.  But to her, mother
was only a name.  She had never known such guidance; and now that she
had grown to womanhood, and her whole heart was absorbed in the one
great love of a husband, she did not seem to want a mother.

Women rarely judge women justly.  They are ever ready to suspect a
fault, to believe that there is worse behind.

"I can't really believe or understand what you have told me yet
awhile," she murmured faintly, rising and moving blindly towards the
door.  "I must think about it."

"Mabel, don't go--don't go like that, without a word of love for me,
your mother.  I am your mother.  Think--think--understand!  Believe
me.  You don't doubt the truth of what I have told you?"

"I don't doubt anything you say; but I--I seem to have been deceived
ever since I was born, to have been in the way, and to have belonged
to nobody.  Now you say that you are my mother.  I can't tell you why
I am not pleased.  I thought you were just my friend, Lady Hester
Cardew.  I often wished that you were my mother.  Once or twice,
while I was here, and you were very kind to me, I wept, thinking that
I had no mother like you, but now I have no tears.  We women seem
only to be the curse of men.  Poor Jack knows nothing of this.  What
will he do when he finds out?  What will he do?"

"He must never know--he must never know," cried the wretched mother.
"Oh, Mabel," again appealing to her on her knees, "Mabel, don't drive
me to kill myself.  I'm a wretched sinful woman; but I have sinned
without real wickedness.  My motives were never evil.  I've always
done what I thought best, and I struggled hard--oh, so hard--to atone
for that foolishness of marrying your father.  I loved him well
enough then; but love dies when respect is gone.  He has us both at
his mercy, Mabel.  We must stand and fall together, you and I--Mabel,
don't leave me like that!"

But the girl had gone.  She fled from her guilty mother's presence,
maddened by the piteous cries which were beginning to find a dull
echo in her heart.  She dared not stay.  She wanted to be alone, to
think over the things that she had heard, and sort out the evil from
the good.  This peaceful old house had become a hot-bed of intrigue
and infamy, in which everybody seemed to be conspiring to deceive the
one good and noble person in it--the Bishop.

Lady Hester was disappointed to the verge of despair.  Her confession
had cost much, and she had expected great things from it--a friend, a
daughter, an ally, a confidante.  Instead, she was left alone in the
middle of an appeal, shunned, deserted, spurned.

Mabel had not intended to convey that impression.  She was simply
overwhelmed, and fled for solitude; but when she had gone, the
unhappy mother collapsed, and fell prone upon the floor, sobbing as
though her heart would break.

She was recalled to the urgent need of self-control by the slamming
of a door near by.  The Bishop had come up to dress for dinner.  He
had just parted from Bannister in the corridor, where they had been
laughing hugely over some joke.

There was no time to be lost; she struggled to her feet, and moved
rapidly to the mirror, where she saw a white-faced, haggard woman;
but the eyes were very little tear-stained; they had grown accustomed
to the salt flow of sorrow's balm, and showed scarce a trace of
weeping.  She mastered herself with a great effort, smoothed her
disarranged hair and dabbed some eau de cologne on her throbbing
temples.

She was dressed in a plain black satin gown, a frock chosen with
feminine instinct, in the hope that it would not inflame Dick
Gordon's admiration.  He had praised her gown of the night before and
talked of it on their motor ride, showing an intimate knowledge of
its every detail.  But the simple black gown, instead of concealing
the voluptuous lines of her generously-moulded figure, only
intensified them.

There were still fifteen minutes before dinner, fifteen minutes in
which to get herself in hand, and face her two husbands at the dinner
table--and Mabel.  The ordeal was more dreaded for Mabel's sake than
her own.  She had been well schooled in suffering, and had become
accustomed to the hard usage of fate, as revealed in the last few
hours; but the girl was young and tender, impressionable and
bewildered.  She began to understand her daughter's brusque
departure, when she critically reviewed the situation, and grew
calmer, herself.

The Bishop was tramping about heavily in the next room humming as he
dressed.  She hoped that he would not call her, or come in, as he
often did, to chat about the day's doings while he dressed.  Her one
idea now was to avoid him until other people were present.

She was afraid to go down stairs for fear of encountering
Bannister--and afraid of going outside her room for fear of meeting
Aunt Caroline, and having to listen to the old lady's tirades against
the proposed marriage.  Besides, she was conscious that the Bishop's
sister was a woman with sharp eyes, who could see things where the
Bishop was blind.

"Hester, my darling," cried a voice in the next room.  The Bishop
walked across the resounding parquet to her bedroom door.  She choked
down a lump in her throat, and answered with assumed indifference.
He stopped at the door, and did not come in.

"Hester, my dear, don't forget the emeralds."

"What about them?" she asked, remembering in a flash Mabel's warning.

"I want you to wear them to-night, my dear.  It would please
Bannister.  He is a collector of gems, a judge, an enthusiast.  You
never wear jewels now.  Put them on--just to please me."

"Oh, not to wear them, dear," she murmured wearily.  "They really are
so heavy; besides, they are locked away, and I can't get at them."

He tried the handle of the door.  "May I come in?"

She attempted to say no, but only a gasping sound escaped her lips.
He entered in his shirt sleeves, fastening his collar round his red
fat throat.  He never before seemed so big and unwieldy, or so
unprepossessing.  His face was deeply lined, his nose was big, and
his eyes were large and prominent--a fine face in a photograph or in
a pulpit; but a great contrast to her own delicate, flower-like
personality.

With feminine inconsistency she caught herself vaguely comparing him
with the graceful and handsome Dick Gordon down stairs, and there was
no comparison possible.  The great-hearted, clumsy old man and the
polished, dandified idler were totally dissimilar.

"You are still looking pale, my dear," murmured the Bishop, thrusting
her gently aside from the mirror, and with characteristic egotism
adjusting his collar to a nice finish.  "Why can't you wear the
emeralds, my dear?  I wish it."

"They are so hideous."

"I'm sure I don't see why.  I remember my grandmother wore them with
great pride, and looked well in them.  Sir Thomas Lawrence painted
her with the emerald necklace; and surely he would have made her
discard it rather than paint anything that would detract from the
artistic value of his picture."

"They're in the safe, buried away."

"Then let's have them out, dear.  Why, they've been writing about
them in the papers lately.  I thought they were forgotten; but
Sinclair tells me that they have taken to paragraphing us both, in
our peculiarities and virtues, family pedigree and all, for the
benefit of servant girls and old ladies who glory in the family
affairs of the people whom they never see and cannot possibly meet.
Is this collar straight, my dear?  You might just settle it at the
back."

She adjusted the collar with shaking fingers, and he looked down at
her from his six feet with a benevolent smile of proud possession;
but when he held her by her arms and kissed her she drew away
shuddering.

"Upon my word, I believe I startled you.  There is no need to jump
away, wife, because your husband kisses you.  There is no sin in
admiring a beautiful possession.  I think you're looking lovelier
than ever.  You make me feel such an old boy--not that my pulses
don't beat as strongly as many a young man's; and I am sure I value
my darling more than a young man would.  There, there, don't look
frightened."

He pinched her cheek playfully between his big, fat finger and thumb
and laughed boisterously.  The laugh ended in a cough and a choke,
and he put his hand upon his heart, breathing heavily.

"Dear, dear, I'm always catching my breath like that lately, and it
gives me such a wrench.  The other day in the pulpit it stopped my
utterance altogether."

He thumped his chest and forgot his wife again in his concern about
Bishop Cardew, who was really the most important person in the
universe--to the Bishop of Ripley.

At the door he turned, remembering the emeralds.

"You will wear them, my dear.  I really wish it."

This was tantamount to a command.  He seldom insisted without
securing implicit, unquestioned obedience.  Having spoken, he
returned to his own room, leaving the door ajar behind him.  She
closed it with a snap and turned the key.  Then she also locked the
door leading to the corridor as well, and returned to her mirror.

No, the black was a mistake.  She had forgotten that Dick liked to
see her in black.  He had always raved about her in black velvet.  He
might remember the dress she bought in Paris--he would think of that
again, to-night.  He would be sitting opposite her, devouring her
with his eyes, watching her slyly under those long lashes, and
talking to John all the time, as though he were interested in every
word that fell from the Bishop's lips.  All the while he would be
thinking about her--in Paris in the velvet frock, and that night
when--No!

She tore at the fastenings of her bodice and began to undress.  But
the chimes of the clock over the stable warned her that there was no
time.  Wrenching open a drawer she took out some lace to veil her
charms.  This she arranged about her throat.  Then, taking a key from
her dressing case, she opened the safe.  It was full of the Bishop's
private books and a few pieces of special plate; but upon an upper
shelf was a large leather case, two feet wide, which she took out and
laid upon a chair.  On lifting the lid a glass case was disclosed.
This needed to be unlocked, and formed a second lid.  Underneath,
spread out on a velvet cushion, were the famous emeralds, a necklace,
a tiara of an old-fashioned type, heavy bracelets, heavy earrings,
and three clasp brooches, all full of immense stones.

She looked at them with disgust--and yet again with fright.  Mabel
had warned her that Bannister had come down to steal these hideous
jewels; but it was outside the range of probability, in view of the
fact that Mabel was married to the Bishop's son.  Besides, he was
obviously anxious to ingratiate himself with the family, so was it
likely that he had come to rob?  Mabel must have exaggerated what she
had heard.  Dick Gordon was too astute for clumsy work of that kind;
besides, it would put him in her power, and this alone was sufficient
to secure the safety of the jewels.

No; it was not the emeralds which had brought him here.  He meant to
use the Bishop as a surety of respectability--a medium for the
re-cloaking of his frayed and threadbare social reputation.  The
doubters--many of them discredited, being unable to produce
proof--who had suspected Richard Bannister of cheating at cards and
sharp practice generally, and were ready to give him the cold
shoulder, would change their minds when his daughter had married the
Bishop of Ripley's son.  Besides, the Bishop's set would introduce
him to a newer, simpler, and more plunderable clientele.  Lady Hester
felt a certain sense of security concerning the gems when she arrived
at this decision relating to his presence at the Palace.

She took the necklace from its bed of velvet and clasped it round her
throat, and it really did not look so ugly against the lace as when
she had tried it on before.  The real value of the stones was unknown
to her, and even if she had known it the gems would have had no more
interest for her, since a guinea jewel that pleased her artistic
sense was more precious than a ten thousand pound necklace that
lacked real beauty.

Whatever Bannister's intentions were, the necklace was safest round
her neck.  The other jewels, which contained the largest stones, she
could not possibly wear, and the safe seemed the wisest receptacle.
A moment's thought convinced her that this was not so.  The most
likely place for storing them was also the most likely place to be
attacked if common robbery were really contemplated.  Any other
hiding place was better than a marked receptacle, the situation of
which was known to the whole household.

She gathered the jewels up roughly into a double handful, and looked
round for a suitable place.  There was nothing handier than her
nightdress sachet in the adjoining room.  Under her pillow was the
last place a burglar would think of looking for valuables.  The bed
was already turned down, and no one would be likely to touch it.

She had just finished her task of concealment when the door of the
dressing room was shaken roughly.  The Bishop demanded admittance
again.

"Hester, my darling, I'm not feeling at all up to the mark this
evening; and Bannister keeps one on the stretch so.  I wish you would
apply yourself to entertaining him, so that I can get a few minutes
after dinner in the library.  And, by the bye, see that Caroline
remains with you and doesn't follow me.  I can see by her face that
she is preparing another long attack.  Ah, the emeralds!  That's
right, my dear, they look excellent.  I'm sure you ought to wear them
oftener.  What is there ugly about them?"

He examined them closely.  "The stones are large, aren't they?  I
suppose emeralds of immense size have a fancy value?"

"Yes, I wish you'd keep them at the bank, John.  Nobody ever sees
them; and nobody is interested in family heirlooms but one's own
people."

"Don't you think they're safe--not in there?" pointing to the huge
iron door which swung out into the room.

"That is really only a fireproof safe, John.  That immense thickness,
I am told, is meant to resist flames, not burglars."

"But we have never been troubled with burglars."

"All the more reason that we may be.  Think of the value of these
stones, John, and what they might mean to Jack some day.  If the
worst came to the worst, they would save him from financial ruin--if
they are of the immense value that people say in the papers."

"Tut, tut, who listens to the gossip in the papers?"

"But even if they are worth a few thousands, they represent an
income."

"Nonsense, Jack will have plenty of income by and by from Caroline."

"But he may not get it."

"He must, he must.  You'll have to talk Caroline round.  But there,
there, I can't be bothered with these things now.  I've got a meeting
to-morrow and a sermon, and my head is splitting and my heart
thumping, with excitement, or indigestion, or something.  I would
really like to escape dinner to-night."

"No, no, John.  Caroline is making herself so absolutely horrid to
Mr. Bannister that I don't know what would happen if you were away.
Besides, I don't like the man myself, and--I shouldn't know what to
say to him."

"You don't like Bannister, my dear?  You surprise me.  He's just the
sort of elegant dilettante that women like, and racy, too--splendid
story teller.  Ah, there, but my wife, I suppose, is more serious
minded.  Well, well, we've only got to be civil to him for a little
while.  We like the girl well enough; but we needn't see more of the
father than common courtesy demands when Jack is married.  In the
meantime, the laws of hospitality must be carefully observed, my
dear--every one of them."

"I wish you would fall ill, John--I mean, conveniently ill--and do
something to put an end to this visit.  It is boring me horribly."

"My dear, you would not have me practice deception in order to avoid
the fulfilment of a common civility, a family duty.  You're run down,
Hester, or you wouldn't talk like this.  You're looking a little
worn, too.  You must get into the fresh air.  Let Bannister take you
about in his motor.  I am sure it must be an exhilarating pastime,
though I can't bear fast riding myself, it gives me palpitation."

"I would rather not got out in his motor.  I would much rather go out
in our own carriage."

"Well, then, drive him round, if he'll go, and show him the
neighborhood.  Has he been over the Cathedral?"

"Not yet."

"Well, there's a mine of entertainment for you."

Lady Hester, if she had not been so wretched, could have smiled at
the idea of Dick Gordon finding a mine of entertainment in a
cathedral.

"I'll tell him to take you about a bit, and wake you up, Hester.  You
find life here rather dull.  Yes, you do, it's no good protesting.
Bannister in his motor car can take your further afield and shake you
up a little.  Yes, yes, he must.  You must know him better, and like
him better.  I wish it.  There are the chimes.  Let us go down."

He took his wife's arm, and led her to the landing.  They went out,
leaving the door of the safe wide open.

The servants were all down stairs at this hour--except Voss, and the
maid whom Lady Hester had placed at Mabel's disposal.  These two were
gossiping at the end of the corridor; but Mabel had already gone
down.  On seeing her mistress and the Bishop, the woman slipped away
to the back staircase, for she had duties below.  Voss was left alone
on the upper floor.  He, too, disappeared, apparently into his
master's room.

Lady Hester and the Bishop had reached the bottom step of the winding
stone staircase before the dazed and agitated woman remembered the
safe door.

"John, I've left the safe open."

"Oh, that'll be all right."

"No, I'd rather see to it.  You are very careless in these matters,
John."

"My servants have always been honest, thank God, and I have an
infinite faith in Providence and the force of association.  No one
would think of stealing in my house, I hope."

"Never mind, I will go up."

She ran upstairs quickly and silently, lifting her rustling skirts
high to allow a greater speed.  She was at the top of the staircase
and in her bedroom in a moment.  The intervening door between the
sleeping apartment and the dressing room was closed.  She tried the
handle; but it would not open.  She groped for the key, and it was
not there.  She remembered locking the door and unlocking it but
could not remember removing the key.  While searching for it she
heard a scuffling sound.

There was another door into the dressing room leading from the
corridor.  By going from her bedroom into the corridor she could get
in that way if the door was unlocked.  It was generally fastened
except when the maid needed ingress and egress during the hours of
dressing in the morning and evening; but it might be open.

She slipped round, and, as she left her bedroom, she was just in time
to see Voss glide out of the dressing room into the corridor.

It was not possible to accuse him of having been in the dressing
room.  He was stooping down to pick up a pin, and looking quite
unconcerned.  She stood still, rooted to the spot with fear.

He rose slowly to an upright position, examined the pin in the light
of the lamp above, and leisurely thrust it into the end of his
waistcoat.  Then, as though he saw her for the first time, he became
conscious of her ladyship's presence.  He jumped, and drew aside
submissively and respectfully.

She found her voice.  "What were you doing in my room?"

"I in your room, my lady?  I was standing here."

She made no further comment, but passed in.  The door of the safe,
which had been left wide open, was almost closed.  Voss had passed
on.  She shut the door of the room, and carried the electric lamp as
far as the wire would allow to make an examination of the interior of
the safe.  Everything was as she had left it.  The heirloom case on
the top shelf, the books untouched, the small boxes containing
ordinary trinkets and personal treasures all in their places.

"I was in time," she gasped, with her hand upon her heart, breathing
heavily.  "That was his man.  I seemed to recognize his voice.  Mabel
is right."

Then, with a sudden burst of fury, she cried aloud, "He shan't--he
shan't!" and slammed the door of the safe with a bang that shook the
house.  She turned the key in the lock, and dropped it down her bosom.

She was at bay now.  So long as it was a personal matter between
herself and Dick Gordon he had her at a disadvantage; he was able to
disarm her with a cynical smile.  But a common robbery--that was a
thing he must do by stealth, and she intended to be a match for him.




CHAPTER XIX

Dinner at the Palace was never a very ceremonious or solemn function.
The Bishop was too genial, too noisy and too talkative for that.  He
was usually full of his day's doings, and overflowing with ideas and
theories which became actual and possible as he put them into speech;
for he was a born talker, and the mere expression of words enabled
him to set the most nebulous thought into concrete and practical
form.  He had a way of saying things in public which occasionally
brought him into trouble during the early days of his career at the
Palace; but experience had taught him the wisdom of discretion.
Whenever a grievance pressed hard now he reserved its discussion
until he was at dinner with his wife, when he unburdened his soul in
forcible language.  How the newspapers would have gloried in the very
human remarks of the Bishop if they could have reported them!  Lady
Hester's impassionate judgment was, as it had always been, of immense
service to him.  She never attempted to stop the outpourings of his
indignation, for he was stubborn beyond belief, when thwarted or
heckled, but gently put forward the case for the other side, and
counselled reserve and discretion, since power was always his when he
wished to enforce it.

Whether other people were present or not mattered little to the
Bishop when he wanted to express his views, or was particularly
interested in his subject.  Everybody had to listen, and they did not
mind this, as he was a very good talker; but to-night he was not in
vein, and he looked tired.  Caroline's grim, kill-joy attitude of
watchful resentment annoyed him.  She spoke only when addressed, and
then in monosyllables, and her steady observation of Mr. Bannister
was absolutely ill-bred, for she watched him as a detective might
watch a marked criminal.

Depression had fallen on Mabel, too--depression that she could
neither fight nor disguise.  During the early part of the meal she
kept her eyes fixed upon her plate, scarcely daring to raise them to
her mother's face, in fear that they would reveal to all present the
truth, the truth that would bring ruin upon Jack's father and her
mother.  Her distress was so evident to Lady Hester that it made her
nervous; she was even clumsy, and twice during the meal overturned
her wine glass, and, to cover her confusion, blamed the servant at
her elbow in an angry voice; a proceeding so altogether unlike her
that everybody stared in amazement, and silence fell like a pall on
the guests, who were vaguely conscious that there were under currents
at work in the family circle.

Lady Hester was quick to note the chilling silence, and she began to
talk rapidly, addressing remarks to Aunt Caroline upon domestic
affairs that could not be of any interest to her guests, and only
embarrassed the old lady, who had never been allowed any real voice
in home affairs by her sister-in-law.

Bannister was apparently amused by the discomfort of everybody; at
any rate, he was quite unabashed.  He bowed his head when his host
said grace and smiled covertly.  He alone was in good form, and,
seeing how powerless Lady Hester was to entertain her party, he came
to her aid; not out of good nature, but from sheer vanity.  He told
some good stories, but nobody laughed.  He had already exhausted his
stock of yarns suitable for a clerical gathering, so he ventured upon
an amazing set of anecdotes of actors; and these quickly secured him
the attention of the table.

As he talked, his eyes roved continually, their restlessness only
checked for a moment when they fell upon Lady Hester.  He had seen
Aunt Caroline flash a glance of astonishment at Lady Hester's
necklace; astonishment that quickly gave place to indignation.  It
was evident that Caroline was annoyed at the display.  But the
annoyance was in reality caused by Lady Hester taking this
opportunity to load herself with the family jewels--which really
belonged more to Caroline than Lady Hester--for the express purpose
of attracting the attention of the odious Bannister.

Aunt Caroline watched him like a lynx as she saw his eyes go again
and again to the jewels.  It was evident that they excited him.  He
knew their value, and his eyes glittered his appreciation, while his
mind wandered to them in the middle of a story.  In the pauses he
found himself counting the number of the large stones in the pendant,
each of which was worth quite three hundred pounds.  In counting the
stones of the necklace from left to right he had reached the total of
four thousand pounds for the big stones alone.  Then he remembered
that the necklace was only part of a complete set.  If all the others
were of this size and quality, the papers were not far wrong in
estimating their original value at twenty thousand pounds--now much
increased by the rise in market price.  He longed to handle the
necklace, to take it to the light.  Any idea he might have had for
relinquishing his pursuit of the emeralds died on the instant that he
saw them.  He was a gambler by instinct, and to miss such a stroke of
luck as this was outside the range of his understanding.  Besides,
money was, after all, more important than anything else in the world,
the one real and safe thing.  Never before had he happened upon so
rich a gold mine, or one so easy to work.

During his brief stay at the Palace he had almost persuaded himself
that he had done with the old life; and now he knew that he was being
drawn back to it; that he would be powerless to resist; but he would
work upon a different plan.

The woman was his anyway.  The jewels would have to be given up as
the price of silence.  It was not a case of stealing.  Voss's vulgar
but useful methods would not apply here, and his assistance would not
be needed.  Nothing could be easier than the transfer.  With her own
fair hands she must bribe him to silence.

While the comedy of bluff and counter-bluff was being carried on
below, Voss upstairs was not idle.  His narrow escape from Lady
Hester left him in reality quite undismayed.  It sent a cold chill
down his back for a few moments, but quiet consideration assured him
that her ladyship could have no suspicion of his real object in
visiting her dressing room, and, at worst, would assume that he was
in quest of one of the maids.

He had seen the emeralds on her neck when she spoke to him, and his
heart gave a great leap of triumph.  They were in the house, after
all.  Then he thirsted for more knowledge.  He actually looked into
their hiding place.  He had seen the big leather case on the top
shelf.

It afforded him infinite satisfaction to know that they were
"available."  Like his master, he was cautious, and he had learned
many lessons from his chief.  There were two ways of getting the
plunder.  Number one was to seize it for himself when the opportunity
occurred, and fly, with all England at his heels--his master
included.  Number two, to steal artistically with his master's aid,
to remain in the house, and be the first to see a disappearing
burglar go through a window.

In spite of his master's instruction to the contrary, he had arranged
everything in his own mind: how the jewels were to be stolen, how the
alarm was to be given, how the windows were to be marked, where the
convenient rope was to be dropped down, and the number of cuts to be
made on the window sash.  He had in his bag a coil of wire for
stretching across the garden path after dark, to give the impression
that a gang had been at work taking precautions against chase by
wiring the paths to trip-up pursuers.  This "wheeze" had answered
before, long, long ago, when money had been tight with Bannister and
desperate means were necessary to repair failing fortunes.  It was
the riskiest, and at the same time the most profitable, business they
had pulled off together, and Voss could never understand why his
master had always refused to descend again to such low methods.

Here was a house full of "mugs"--from Voss's point of view--soft,
soapy, old-fashioned servants who met every day for prayers, and wept
if they could not go to church three times on Sunday.  Harriet had
already tried to convert him with a tract when he hinted at marriage.
Everybody in the house was trusted.  Silver plate was lying about day
and night.  Forks and spoons were never counted, and the wine cellar
was never locked.  It was the softest crib he had ever struck, and
yet his master preferred to philander with the Bishop's lady, who,
from all accounts, was circumspect and discreet beyond suspicion,
idolized by the servants, and incapable of a mean, ungenerous act.

How did Bannister think he was going to extract a fortune from her
under such circumstances?  Yet her ladyship was wearing the emeralds
to-night.  Perhaps that meant something.

His curiosity was roused to the highest pitch.  Some chance remark of
Bannister's had set him wondering whether the senior partner intended
to work this business "on his own," and leave his humble servant in
the lurch.  Bannister had talked occasionally of late of their coming
separation, and of retirement from business, which Voss looked upon
as all "guff."  It hurt his feelings, and suggested a waning
affection between master and man.

Two could play at that game.  Voss allowed himself occasional
consideration of method number one, which was to carry off the jewels
hare and hounds fashion.  There were many difficulties in the way,
yet he considered the matter carefully and from various points of
view, as only natural in a conscientious, thorough-going rascal.
Expediency was his only guide in things mundane, but the bolting
method did not seem expedient just now, although Lady Hester was so
careless as to leave her safe door ajar while the family were at
dinner.  Ten to one she would never miss the jewels till a week after
if they were cleverly abstracted from the safe in the daytime.

He glowed all over at the prospect of a magnificent run for his
money, but shuddered when he thought of Bannister's rage at being
cheated, and he paused to consider the possible revenge he was
certain to take.  The cleverer villain had during the passing of
years hypnotized him into obedience until it seemed impossible to
work without the master mind.

These thoughts of treachery were only dreams--but what pleasant ones
to Voss.  He had the whole of the upper corridor to himself, and
could not resist the temptation to go back to the region of that
fascinating safe.  He went to the head of the stairs and looked down.
They were just taking coffee into the dining room, and he was not
likely to be disturbed; so he turned the handle of the dressing room
door, and found it answered to his touch.

What carelessness!  What simplicity!  What trust!

He popped out again into the gallery overlooking the hall and
reconnoitred once more.  All serene!

Now right into the room, and to the door of the safe this time.  It
was locked.  Lady Hester had come up specially to lock it, when she
found him emerging from the room.  That looked awkward.  He hoped
that the safe had nothing whatever to do with her reappearance
upstairs.

It dashed his spirits considerably.  To come under the shadow of
suspicion, ever so lightly, now, was to make himself a marked man
when that sham burglary took place.  In this humiliating moment he
was compelled reluctantly to admit the superiority of his master's
mind and methods.  He, poor fellow, was but a bungler after all.  His
imaginary trip to Amsterdam with wealth ever afterwards and freedom
from the dominion of the masterful Bannister faded into the land of
dissipated dreams.

He slid out of the room as noiselessly as he had entered it--but
started back and gasped when he found himself face to face with
Mabel.  She must have flitted upstairs like a shadow the moment he
entered the dressing room.

Her face was white as death; her eyes blazed with a light that
reminded him of his master in certain moments of anger, and her lips
were drawn tight in a hard straight line.  He cringed under her gaze,
and with wonderful resource went back into the dressing room and
looked round for a moment to left and right, as if seeking some one.

"No, she's not here, miss.  I thought I should find her ladyship's
maid here.  The door was left open, and I know her ladyship doesn't
like the door standing open on the corridor, I heard her say so.  I
was just going to shut it when--when I thought the maid might be
inside."

Mabel made no answer.  She pointed a trembling finger in the
direction of her father's room, and stood quivering with passion.

Voss bowed and retreated, appearing not to notice.  There was nothing
else to be done.  He threw his head back and walked away in the most
unconcerned fashion.  Half way down the corridor he stopped, looked
at the ground, saw an imaginary pin, picked it up and put it in his
waistcoat with studied inconsequence.  That dodge of picking up a pin
had served him well for twenty years, and it never failed in its
apparent effect.

He entered his master's room.  Mabel followed him.  As soon as the
door closed she opened it again, put her hand inside, and took the
key out of the door.  Then she--locked him in, and withdrew the key.

Voss positively gasped with astonishment.  He dropped into an
arm-chair, and went green in his pallor.  Gradually he recovered and
laughed at his own consternation.  It was only his master's daughter
who suspected him; 'twas easy to silence her.

When the girl had made her escape from down stairs, Bannister
followed close upon her heels; having made a plausible excuse, for he
was growing increasingly suspicious of her.  He had been watching her
stealthily all day, and her movements were peculiarly erratic.

He arrived in the corridor just as she was coming away from locking
Voss in.  They met under a lamp which showed a white glare on both
their faces.  The girl's was transformed.  Hatred and contempt blazed
from her eyes, and the man quailed for a moment before speaking.

"What is it?  What's the matter?  What have you been doing?"

"I have locked the other thief in your room.  There is the key," she
whispered huskily, and he felt something cold thrust into his hand.

She swept past him and down the stairs without another word.  It took
him a full minute to grasp the significance of it all.  He applied
the key to his door and Voss jumped up to attention.

"What's this--locked in?"

Voss laughed the uneasy chuckle of an irritated man.

"It's your blooming daughter.  Told you you'd have trouble with her.
She's been nosing after me ever since we've been here.  Caught me in
her ladyship's dressing room, followed me here, and turned the key on
me.  P'raps you'll tell me whether it was your orders or not, 'cause
I ain't going to be treated like a kid."

"You fool!" cried Bannister, striding across towards him, and
clenching his fist as though about to strike.  "She has found us out.
By heaven, I'd like to throttle you, you blundering idiot!"

Bannister was more upset than he cared to admit.  That look in his
daughter's eyes had sent him cold from head to foot.  The word
"thief" on her lips sounded horrible.

For the first time in their long partnership anger got the better of
him against Voss.  He lost all control of himself.

"You----"

His language was not choice.  He rushed at the offender and kicked
him.  The kicks were only two in number, administered with a soft,
patent shoe, and did not hurt at all; but Voss went to the ground
sprawling.  He was too staggered at the moment to feel anything but
utter consternation and grief--grief that his immaculate,
imperturbable master should fall so low as to be human and violent.

As he lay on the floor he felt that the world was a very hollow
place.  Bannister was only a man--not a god of deviltry--just a
foolish, unreasoning man.  The idol was shattered.  In that moment of
anger, and with the toe of his patent shoe, he had toppled over "Dick
Gordon" and Richard Bannister--not Voss.  The infallible,
imperturbable mastermind hypnotized the rascal no longer.




CHAPTER XX

The Bishop had escaped alone to the library, and could not find the
news sheets, which generally arrived before dinner.  He was irritable
and worried, and Grey fled to fetch the papers from the servants'
hall, where they had a habit of being conveniently forgotten until
sent for.  He wanted to see the result of the brewery case, upon
which so much depended for Jack; and when they arrived he opened them
with more agitation than he would have cared to admit.  Jack's income
and marriage would be affected by the result of the great dispute
about the quality of beer.  Aunt Caroline's attitude was only too
clear; nothing was to be expected for Jack from that quarter.  Her
antipathy to Mr. Bannister was almost insulting and quite
disheartening.

It would have mattered less if Mr. Bannister had improved upon
acquaintance--which he did not.  The Bishop liked him less and less.
He resented the fellow's curious, possessive, ogling way with Hester;
and Mabel did not seem to have much affection for him.  He suspected
his guest of poking fun in his stories; and he was sure that Hester's
feelings toward him was not cordial.  Caroline's opposition to the
match would mean a possible loss of thousands to the boy, and he
could hardly hope to marry yet without an improvement in his finances.

The evening papers reported the brewery case at great length, and at
the end of the report were the irritating words.  "Case proceeding."
A glance at the "Stop Press" column was more satisfactory.  "Brewery
Case.  After speech for defence, verdict for defendants without
leaving box."

Jack had won.  The Bishop laughed aloud with joyous pride.

"Hester, my darling, Hester!" he cried, hurrying out into the hall,
"Jack has won.  There are three columns of it in the paper.  He's
won.  There's something in the boy, after all.  It'll mean work for
him for years, and he will be made the company's legal expert.
Caroline, Jack's fortunes are looking up.  An excellent start.
Mabel, my dear, why don't you look more pleased to hear of Jack's
good fortune?  He'll be home to-morrow, perhaps to-night."

Mabel, who had just left her father after giving him the key of
Voss's prison, met the Bishop at the foot of the stairs; but she was
moving like a sleep walker, with features turned to stone.  He spoke
to her again, and she woke up with a start, and answered
mechanically.  Her mother saved the situation by expressing
exaggerated joy, and seizing the paper boisterously.  She explained
the case to Aunt Caroline, who only sniffed her approval, and
expressed nothing in words.

The Bishop drew his wife into the library, and shut the door
carefully.

"Hester, what is the matter with Mabel?"

"Oh, nothing; a little glum and depressed without Jack, that is all."

"Then why isn't she glad to hear he is coming home?  What is going on
in the house among you women?  There's something."

She fidgeted with the paper, and took refuge in a lie.

"It is Caroline.  She is upsetting everybody, and making us all
wretched."

"Then I shall speak to Caroline.  It must stop."

"No, no.  It will pass.  She has sense enough to see that Jack
doesn't care a fig for her money, and will be quite independent of
her soon.  She will find her level presently."

"She must find it now," cried the Bishop, as he strode to the door
excitedly.  "Caroline, I shall be obliged if you will step in here a
moment."

His wife fled.  She sought her daughter, who was sitting in the
drawing room with hands clenched on her lap and a look on her face
that was alarming.  She made no answer when spoken to, but stared
like one in a trance.  She was almost at the end of her tether, and
having declared war on her father, felt that the time had come to
act.  Something must be done; she could not remain here.

Her mother gave one stealthy glance round to make sure they were
alone, then flung her arms about the girl.

"Oh, my child, my child!" she cried, as Mabel thrust her away coldly
without the slightest response.  But the woman clung close, and, in
thrusting her away, the girl's hand touched the heavy necklace.  She
drew off as if burned by the contact, and gazed at the gems in horror.

"Why did you wear them; oh, why did you wear them?  You know what he
is--you know what he is."

"Hush, hush, they are safe with me."

Meantime a lively scene was in progress in the library.  Aunt
Caroline had obeyed her brother's summons, and was listening,
apparently unmoved, to his halting complaint.

"Caroline, you are disturbing the peace of this house."

"Oh!"

"Yes, you are upsetting Hester, Mabel, and Mr. Bannister, and--and
myself.  Your unreasoning dislike of our guest is too obvious--much
too obvious.  You are aggressive, Caroline, and aggressiveness in a
woman is a--a very unpleasant thing."

"Oh!"

"You are interrupting the harmonious interchange of family
courtesies, and--and making conversation almost difficult.  You
spoiled my dinner."

"Oh!"

"Hester is placed at a considerable disadvantage, I might say a most
unfair disadvantage, and her efforts to keep peace with everybody
must be quite obvious to her guests.  It will embarrass them.  The
girl is already quite miserable, and your manner to Mr. Bannister
is--well, I should call it insulting."

"Oh!"

"Evidently the happiness of my household is no concern of yours,
Caroline, and you want to make my boy unhappy."

"Humph!"

"Don't stand there muttering--I had almost said grunting," cried the
Bishop, losing all patience.

"I'll sit down.  Have you anything more to say?"

"Anything more?  I could say a great deal, but I am desirous of
sparing your feelings in a Christian spirit and making allowances for
your absurd disapproval of the girl of Jack's choice.  It is cruel to
the poor child."

"I don't disapprove of the girl."

"Then why in heaven's name this display of antagonism?"

"I have told you--her father is a rascal."

"What have your absurd notions about Mr. Bannister got to do with
Jack, I should like to know?  Jack didn't choose his father-in-law."

"No, but you did for him."

"Caroline, you annoy me.  You irritate me beyond endurance.  I won't
have an amiable gentleman traduced in this fashion."

"Oh, an amiable gentleman!  He is a great deal too amiable.  Are you
blind, John?  Can you sit at the table and see him devouring and
ogling your wife before your very eyes?  Can't you see the glances
that pass between them?"

"Caroline, Caroline!  How dare you?  This is sheer wickedness,
engendered by hatred--malicious, unreasoning hatred.  How can you
stay under this roof and harbor such thoughts?"

"My stay under this roof is by no means pleasant.  But here I am,
John, and here I remain until I have unmasked that villain, and
solved the mystery of his influence over Hester.  She's afraid of
him.  She obeys him.  She fainted when she first saw him.  Yet she is
willing to wreck your son's happiness by bringing this smooth-voiced
villain into the family."

"Have you no more vile insinuations?"

"Yes, plenty.  What was the girl doing in Jack's chambers unattended?
What sort of bringing-up has she had?  Why is Hester in such a hurry
to marry them?"

"Caroline!"

"Oh, I don't mince matters."

"Do you dare impeach the girl's honor?"

"Oh, no, it isn't that.  But I've been thinking.  How do you know
that Jack isn't married already?"

"Caroline, you are mad."

"If I am, then Jack must be a contemptible scamp and the girl a fool,
or--worse."

"I command you to be silent, you--you foolish, wicked woman!"
thundered the Bishop, shouting at the top of his voice.

"That's right, abuse me and insult me, and refuse to hear both sides
of the case.  That's your practical Christian charity, I suppose.
Perhaps you'll explain to me why Jack was in the girl's room here at
midnight--and Hester too?"

"They are lovers.  Hester was there, too, you say?  What was there
wrong in that?  Can't a man go to his affianced wife's room in the
company of his step-mother?"

"But he didn't go in the company of his step-mother.  She went and
fetched him out of the room because his father wanted to talk to him.
I heard her."

"At midnight?"

"Or thereabouts."

"Pshaw!  These are the delusions of a jealous,
suspicious--er--evil-minded--prying--spinster.  I won't have it, I
say.  It shall stop, or I shall ask you to leave my house--do you
hear?--leave the house."

The Bishop was white with passion, and spluttered out his words.

"Can you find no worse reproach for me than 'spinster?'  Oh, I can
tell you that I know what I am talking about.  I've not lived the
life of a cloistered nun, and I've not gone through life with my eyes
shut because I happened to be a woman.  I am not such a fool that I
don't know that circumstances may arise, perfectly innocent ones,
when such unconventional doings are imperative; but the necessity is
always extraordinary; and there is something extraordinary going on
in this house now."

"Caroline, don't shock me any more.  You have tried my patience too
much--you--you--Silence!  Let me speak.  Let me tell you----"

His words died on his lips, and his eyes seemed to be starting out of
his head.

"John, what is the matter, what is the matter?  Don't gasp like that.
Get your breath, John!"

She screamed her appeal, inspired by an awful terror, and ran towards
him; but before she could put out a hand he had measured his length
upon the floor with an awful thud, and was fighting for his breath as
though choked by unseen hands.

She tried to raise him, but his great weight made it impossible, and
in her panic she rushed from the room to call for assistance.

The sudden opening of the library door disturbed two people who were
standing in the shadow of the staircase.  Lady Hester sprang away
guiltily from the man at her side, who was clasping her hand, and
would not be shaken off.  His back was to the library door, and he
had not seen it open.  Bannister, reckless and masterful, had met her
at the foot of the stairs and detained her for a few minutes in
animated conversation.

Aunt Caroline saw it all in a flash; but this was no time to notice
the details.  She screamed for help, and Lady Hester rushed in,
followed by Bannister, and later by Mabel and the servants.

The women were helpless, but Bannister raised the Bishop and placed a
cushion under his head and revived him.  A doctor was sent for, but
by the time he arrived, the old man was conscious and recovering.
His wife knelt by his side, and her deep concern was written in her
face.  Aunt Caroline sat by weeping silently in remorseful
humiliation.  When she addressed her brother he refused to answer,
and ignored her.

The doctor declared that complete rest was necessary for his patient.
All engagements must be cancelled.  Overwork, overmuch traveling, and
excitement were at the root of the mischief.  Lady Hester was able to
forget herself and her own troubles; but she burned with indignation
against Caroline, whom she regarded as the author of the mischief.
High words between the brother and sister were not uncommon; but
Caroline had been particularly trying of late.  How well the old
lady's distrust of Bannister was justified she alone knew; but the
interference was resented none the less.

At midnight, when the Bishop was put to bed, the doctor was going
away.  Miss Cardew intercepted him at the front door and put a gentle
hand upon his arm.  Her face was pale, her eyes sunken with weeping
and anxiety, and her hand trembled on his sleeve.

"Tell me--tell me the truth," she whispered.

"It is serious, madam.  But we must hope for the best.  Rest is the
only thing."

"Tell me, without reserve.  I am his sister.  It is important."

The doctor looked at his boots and shuffled uneasily, making nervous
patterns on the mat.

"Tell me, was it a stroke?"

The doctor nodded and went out, leaving her alone in the darkened
hall.

She wrung her hands above her head and appealed to heaven for
forgiveness.  She looked upon the visitation as a punishment for her
jealous and unchristian prejudice.  Then, as she turned to go
upstairs and passed the spot where, at the very moment of her
brother's physical agony, she had surprised Bannister and Lady
Hester, hand in hand, and whispering in the shadow like lovers, her
heart hardened again.

"It is her fault--it is all her fault!  If he had never married
her----"  Sobs stifled the rest.

She crept upstairs, bowed and broken.  The night's emotion had been
too much.  Like her brother, she was no longer young.  She comforted
herself with the thought that Jack would come home on the morrow, and
the Bannisters would surely be sent away now that their host was ill.

The lights down stairs were all extinguished, except in the smoking
room, where Mr. Bannister was alone, and having a final cigar before
retiring to rest.  He was a late bird, and generally the last to
retire in any house he visited.  She was half inclined to go in and
tell him bluntly that he must depart; but her courage was not equal
to it to-night.  She had caused enough havoc by her interference.

The lights were out in the upper corridor, too; but the doors of Lady
Hester's bed and dressing rooms were both open.  She saw her
brother's wife come into the dressing room from the Bishop's bedroom,
and close the door softly behind her, then walk on tiptoe to the maid
in the dressing room to tell her to move softly, because the Bishop
was asleep.  Then she came to the door of her bedroom, looking like a
ghost, and stepped out on to the darkened corridor just as Aunt
Caroline was passing.  She gave a little cry of fright.

"Oh, how you startled me!"

"Is he any better?" asked the elder woman humbly.

"He is sleeping quite peacefully now.  The doctor says that is what
is necessary."

"Shall I sit by him?"

"No, no; he is to be left quite alone.  Your presence is not likely
to soothe him, I should think."

Hester retired into her room and shut the door with more rudeness
than she had ever shown before.

The old lady stood quite still in the darkness for a few moments,
then covered her face and wept quietly.  She was willing to forgive
Hester or anybody else if only they would allow her to go to her
brother's side.  To be forbidden made her feel like a murderess.  She
paced up and down the dark corridor, wringing her hands and dropping
hot tears, and occasionally stopping and listening outside her
brother's door to catch the slightest sound.

She had been there some time, moving about in the darkness like a
shadow, when the door of Lady Hester's room opened, and the mistress
of the house appeared silhouetted against the light coming from
within.  She had changed her dress for a loose gown--a very becoming
one--and looked strangely effective in the beam streaming through the
open door.  After a moment's hesitation, she descended the stairs
into the darkened house.  This was Caroline's opportunity to slip in
and question the maid for further news of the patient, but before she
reached the door another flicker of light in the hall below reminded
her that Bannister was still down stairs.

Lady Hester sped swiftly down, making for the smoking room.  The old
lady craned her neck over the gallery above, and caught a glimpse of
Bannister in an arm chair as the door opened, then it shut, and there
was darkness and silence.  Jealousy, suspicion, prompted all sorts of
evil thoughts.  This infamous woman, who was flirting with her guest
at the very moment of her husband's seizure, was not to be deterred
even now from keeping an assignation with the rascal.

On the other hand a moment's thought told her that it was only
natural for Lady Hester to acquaint her guest with the progress of
affairs.  But why go down in that costume?

Two minutes--five--ten passed, and the door remained closed.  The
house was wrapped in silence, and the old lady, leaning over the
banisters, grew impatient.  She had interfered enough for that day,
but she was convinced that evil was afoot.  She could not tear
herself away.  Twice she tried to go to her room and close the door
and pray to God for charity.  But each time an overwhelming feeling
of responsibility took her back again to the gallery.

* * * * * * *

The scene in the smoking room was rather different to that conjured
up in Aunt Caroline's brain.

The place was a small snuggery dignified by the name of smoking room
because it was used by Jack and his father for the smoking of briar
pipes, which were forbidden elsewhere.  In reality it was a winter
sitting room largely used for writing, and as a relief for the Bishop
when he desired to escape the rather pompous surroundings of the
official study.  It contained a couple of holland-covered grandfather
chairs, a large lounge, and a writing desk stowed away in a corner.
In winter a bright fire burned in the grate; but at this time of the
year flowers filled the hearth.

Bannister rose with alacrity as his wife entered, and he flung away
his cigar.

"Well, and how is he?"

"He is better.  He is sleeping.  Please let us discuss him no more.
What have you to say to me?  You must know that I cannot stay long."

Her words came sharply; her eyes flashed.  She was in no mood for
half measures.

"It is good of you to come, Hester.  Sit down.  Please look as though
you were going to be amiable.  I want to be friends with you--not to
quarrel."

"We finished friendship and we finished quarrelling years ago."

"What is it to be now, then--fighting?  My dear Hester, you are not
equal to it.  You are agitated and excited.  Do sit down."

He drew an arm chair forward, but she chose a high chair by the round
table and sat bolt upright, watching him.

He took up a position on the hearthrug with his back to the grate,
and lighted another cigar, as though he were going to settle down to
a long interview.

"We have no time to waste.  What is it?  Tell me what you have to
say."

His eyes missed nothing, and his attention was diverted to her gown.
"A charming robe," he murmured, nodding approvingly.  "It reminds me
of the one you wore at the hotel in Marseilles--you remember, the
big, ugly, white hotel--and the big room with the hideous, red satin
panels, where we had such fun; when you mimicked the bellerina at the
local opera house--do you remember?"

"If you have brought me here to listen to reminiscences, the sooner I
go upstairs the better."

She moved towards the door, but he was too quick for her.  He caught
a flying ribbon of her robe and drew her back.  His touch seemed to
mesmerize her, for she collapsed into the chair again.  He himself
dropped down on the arm of the lounge close by.

"Business, then, my dear wife."

"Hush!"

"This illness of your husband's--is it serious?"

"I don't know.  From what I can gather, he has been quarrelling with
his sister about Mabel and the marriage."

"Well, his quarrelling won't alter the marriage.  The young people
are tied up--as tightly as we are.  Do you expect me to go like a
polite guest because my host has fallen ill?"

"Yes, of course--the sooner the better."

"I am sorry, my dear Hester, but I am not so conventional as to clear
out.  I am one of the family.  My concern for the dear Bishop's
health compels me to remain.  I could not rest at a distance.  I
should be consumed with feverish anxiety."

"How dare you jest and sneer!"

"Do you think I love the old boy?  You cannot expect me to share your
affection.  The pompous old fool----"

"How dare you!" she cried, clenching her hands, and losing all
dignity in her anger.

"There, there, I was only chaffing.  I suppose it is natural for you
to feel that you owe him some special consideration after having
deceived him all these years.  But you are still young, Hester, and
so am I--never felt younger than when I looked upon your face the
other night and saw that there were no wrinkles in it, that the eyes
remained bright and beautiful, that the hair kept its wonderful color
without scientific aid, and that the lissom waist was as supple as
ever.  Egad, Hester, it's good to live and stand opposite you--no,
not opposite, beside you.  Keep still; be quiet.  It's no good your
making a scene."

She stood petrified, and watched his approach as a rabbit watches the
oncoming of the boaconstrictor.  Her lips parted, and she fully
intended to cry out; but the house was painfully still; there was an
invalid upstairs, and Aunt Caroline was not far away.  A scene would
only make horrible complications.  She shuddered and collapsed, and
struck at him as his arm slid round her waist and he drew her to him.
She was limp and swaying like one about to faint.  But he put his
other arm about her, and her head fell back.  The color fled from her
lips, her eyes closed, and for a few seconds unconsciousness would
have supervened; but he pressed kisses on her lips, and she made a
last choking resistance.

He put one foot on the arm of the low chair to better support the
weight she had flung upon him, and with his one disengaged hand
softly caressed her hair.

"Ah, that's better, that's better.  The old Hester was never a fool,
and always ready to take the gifts the gods sent her without
complaining.  Hester, my lovely, adorable Hester, do you hear what I
say?"

She passed one hand across her eyes, and looked up into his so close
to hers.  She seemed to realize and struggled to be free; but he held
her close in a fierce, passionate embrace, till her bosom heaved with
his and their breaths mingled.

"Don't--no--I shall scream."

He let her go rather suddenly, and guided her to the lounge chair.
She dropped all in a heap and crumpled up, with her elbows on her
knees, and her face hidden in her hands.  Nothing seemed to matter
now.  Her brain was turned to cotton wool, the ground below was
swimming, and hammers were beating on her temples.

He returned to his smoking and lighted a cigar with a sigh of evident
satisfaction.  "Ah, I knew you would be sensible," he murmured
between the puffs, "I asked you to come down and talk to me that we
might come to some pleasant arrangement.  I've not the slightest
desire to wreck your eminently respectable life.  I feel to a certain
extent responsible for the present situation, and I want to assure
you that there is no immediate cause for anxiety, or hysterical
consternation, or frantic heroics.  You've got over your surprise.
You must accustom yourself to look upon me as the father-in-law of
Jack, the Squire of Dingle Hall, and--your husband's best friend."

She swayed from side to side, and seemed to be paying little
attention.

"Do you hear what I say, Hester?--your husband's best friend, with
all privileges."

"I heard.  You have said it or insinuated it before.  I am not so
vile as you imagine."

"Yet you married the Bishop, so I understand, without any whisper of
a previous husband, dead or alive."

She moaned and sobbed monotonously.

"Ah!  I see, we are not so immaculate.  My scrupulous Hester can
swallow her scruples sometimes.  Well, if you could rise to such
heights of--er--shall I say deception in the days of youth and folly,
in your more mature worldliness, surely you can see the expediency of
not raising a frightful scandal in the diocese--through all England,
in fact."

"I know, I know."

"In short, you must bow your head to circumstances--the circumstances
being my sovereign will and pleasure.  For once in a way I find
myself a husband with absolute control of his wife."

He paused, and examined the lighted end of his cigar, hugely enjoying
his sneer.

"What are your terms?" she asked coldly, and with rather
disconcerting calmness.  She dropped her hands and clasped them
before her and looked with unseeing eyes into the screen of ferns in
the grate.

"You put it crudely, Hester, as though I were a mercenary person."

"You have not come here for me.  You have another object.  You have
worse designs."

"I am glad you admit that a man can do worse than desire his own
wife."

"Enough of that!" she cried, rising to her feet again, and facing him
with passionate disdain.  "You have come here to steal, to follow
your profession to the detriment of your daughter's future.  You have
come here for my emeralds."

"And may I ask who is your informant?"

"Your own child--our child.  Oh, Dick, for God's sake, show a spark
of manhood.  Have you no moral sense, no heart, no conscience?  Must
you ruin your own child's happiness?"

He winced a little and stared at the ground, frowning and biting his
mustache savagely.  His eyeglass dropped from his eye, and he looked
really villainous.

"So my daughter was your informant.  That's a lie.  It was you who
gave me away to the child.  It was you who betrayed me.  That was
what decided me to give you no quarter when it came to fighting.  I
have kept the girl's hands free, so far, and her mind, too.  I don't
think she would lie to her husband, for instance, as you lied to
yours."

"I never lied!" she cried weakly and piteously, wringing her hands in
a manner that revealed the spot in her armor through which he could
pierce her to the very soul.

"Why have you poisoned Mabel's mind against me?"

"I did nothing of the kind.  She knows you for what you are.  She
warned me that you had come down here to steal my emeralds."

"Indeed!  I beg to doubt your word."

"It is true.  She overheard you discussing the matter with your man."

"With Voss?  The fool!"  Bannister cursed Voss below his breath, and
it was a few moments before he could recover his composure.  He
shrugged his shoulders cynically.

"Well, well, since you know why I am here, there is no further need
for warning on my part.  I did come down for your exquisite emeralds;
but I almost changed my mind when I found a jewel of my own in the
house that was more precious than a thousand gems convertible in
Amsterdam."

"What is the meaning of your elaborate fraud about Dingle Hall, and
your talk of allowing a thousand a year to Mabel?  It is all a
hideous swindle, of which you are making me and your child the
victim.  You are a devil in human shape.  You are not fit to live."

"Hush!  No hysterics, please.  I am merely contemplating an early
retirement from business, like a wealthy stock broker, or a fat
Bishop, or any other plunderer of the public.  I told you years ago
that I should weary of my adventurous life.  I have plundered almost
as successfully as--as a Bishop; but unfortunately my income is not
enough to allow me to live at Dingle Hall and keep up a position
sufficiently dignified for the father-in-law of Jack Cardew.  I
cannot allow my daughter a thousand a year without feeling the pinch.
I would willingly spare her that amount, if I had it--but I haven't.
You have, though, Hester."

"My own income is nothing," she cried.  "What can I do?"

"No, but your jewels are worth a great deal, and would supply the
deficiency--if they were turned into cash."

"What do you mean?" she exclaimed.  "What are you suggesting?  I turn
them into cash--for Mabel?"

"Not that you should pawn them--oh, dear no, that would be too risky.
But if they were stolen in the night, say--well then----"  He looked
uneasily towards the door, and came and bent over her.  "Such things
are best talked of in the open air."

He put out a hand to touch her, but she drew back as from
contamination, and gazed at him in horror.

"You expect me to do this!--to consent to rob my husband?--I would
die first.  You can't mean it?"

The look of helpless terror on her face was pitiable.  He was a
little sorry for her.

"No, Hester, I won't ask you to do it.  I'll give the whole thing up,
if you like.  I don't want the dirty emeralds.  I'd rather have you.
You are worth more than all the jewels in the world.  You're in a
hopeless position--you must see it.  You can't go on living here.
Fling it all up, and come away with me.  I'll give up the old game.
I've got enough for both of us.  We can have an easy and comfortable
time--a respectable one, too, if you wish it.  Come--you are mine.
You are the old sweet darling."

He clasped her in his arms and held her to him in an iron grip.  She
closed her eyes as if in pain, and her breath came in gasps, but she
neither resisted nor listened.

He lost all control of himself.

"Hester, Hester, I let you go once because I loved you.  I'm going to
take you back for the same reason."

"You will never take me back.  I would rather die.  I have sunk low
enough in my own estimation.  Let me go--oh, have pity--don't drive
me to suicide!"

"It will be social death, Hester, any way, as far as your life here
is concerned.  We didn't have such a bad time in the old days.  I
might have pulled round if you hadn't left me.  With your influence I
could have achieved anything.  Come, come--look up.  You are
mine--mine--and you will be to the end of the chapter.  Mine.  No,
don't struggle.  I shan't let you go.  You are in my arms now, and I
mean to exert my power.  No; take your hands from your face.  I mean
to kiss those red lips as I used to--do you remember?--till the blood
was driven out of them.  Yes, I will--you must surrender--promise me
that you will be my own sweet Hester--just for one second--and I'll
let you go."  He kissed her savagely till she gasped for breath.

"Release me, or I'll call for help."

"I tell you I won't.  I shall surrender you at my pleasure.  My God;
your body thrills me as no other woman's ever did.  No, I'll not
surrender you without one willing, answering kiss.  Hester, do you
hear what I say?  Raise your lips to mine in the old way.  Kiss me,
Hester.  Kiss or by----we are enemies, and I'll give you no more
consideration than a drunken soldier does a captive wench."

"I hate you!  Let me go, I shall strike you, you----"

"You are mine--mine.  You have come voluntarily into my snare.  The
house is asleep."

"Oh, Dick--Dick, spare me!  Have mercy--for the sake of our child.
For Mabel's sake, don't drive me to do anything rash.  Let go my
wrist, or I will rouse the house.  Help!"

The cry was half uttered; but he clapped his hand over her mouth and
forced her roughly against the table, thrusting her head back by the
fierce pressure of his hand till her white throat was strained to
choking point.

He seemed to be maddened by her beauty, for he laughed wildly, and,
flinging his arms about her, pressed kisses on the alabaster throat
till she shrank away, in groaning, shuddering fright.

"Dick--Dick--for Mabel's sake--have mercy!  You are behaving
foolishly.  Think of our child--she has a future----"

She talked at random, and he mastered himself.  He drew her from the
table towards the arm chair; but she broke away and rushed for the
door.  He made a dash to prevent her; but the door opened quickly in
ghostly fashion, and, out of the black hollow beyond, the gaunt
figure of Aunt Caroline appeared.  He drew back at the first sound,
and stood as if turned to stone, but when he saw who it was, he
laughed contemptuously and turned away with perfect composure.

Hester, wild-eyed and terror-stricken, wondered how much the old lady
had heard; but the instinct of self-preservation came to her aid, and
she pulled herself together with a great effort.

"How--how you startled us, Caroline," she murmured.

The od lady held the door wide open, and, pointing her long, lean
finger to the darkness beyond, murmured the simple command--

"To bed!"

That was all she said, and it was impossible to disobey or argue.  "I
will settle with this man," she added, as Hester crept out.

Evidently Caroline had heard a good deal.  She paid no further heed
to Hester, but fixed Bannister with her glittering eyes; her lips
were tight drawn and bloodless, and her face was grey in its cold
pallor.  The man fidgeted a little; there was no timidity in this
woman at any rate.

Hester half way up the stairs stopped and listened in an agony of
apprehension; but the door closed behind Aunt Caroline with a bang.

"Well, madam, and why am I favored by this midnight visit?" asked
Bannister, walking to the fireplace and examining a picture over the
mantelpiece with affected unconcern.

"For the same reason that Hester came here--because you are a villain
and a rascal, and because something must be done before you work
further mischief.  My brother's wife has forfeited her right to rule
in this establishment.  From this hour I take command.  Whilst my
brother lies ill I stand in his place."

"Indeed!"

"And I request that you will pack up your things and depart by the
eight o'clock train to-morrow morning."

"How extremely hospitable!  Is there not an earlier train?"

"Yes there's one at six."

"At six.  Oh, no.  I fear I must trouble you for breakfast.  The
eight o'clock is early enough.  If the mistress of the house desires
me to go--well, I will think about it.  Lady Hester did not give me
to understand that she had abdicated her position."

"You will leave this house to-morrow.  And your child will go with
you."

"There again I fear you are in error, Miss Cardew; Jack is coming
home to-morrow, and he will expect to find his affianced wife here."

"She is not his affianced wife.  She is your daughter, and--Hester's
daughter."

Bannister lost his composure for a moment, and changed color.  "I beg
your pardon, I did not understand you."

"You understood me well enough.  The child is yours and Hester's.
You two have met before.  I knew it.  You meet again, at midnight, in
secrecy, here.  But you forget that wooden doors are not as thick as
brick walls, and when you get excited your voice travels.  I've been
outside for some time.  I have solved the riddle.  I understand now
the secret of your power over my brother's wife, and I have fathomed
the mystery of Mabel's birth.  You must see yourself that the
circumstances make it impossible for you to remain under this roof."

"You have been dreaming, Miss Cardew.  Are you sure you are not
walking in your sleep?"

"Oh, you can deny what I say, but it doesn't alter the facts of the
case.  You've come down here for what you can get, and you think you
can hoodwink my poor, unsuspecting brother into allowing his son to
marry your daughter--the daughter of a penniless scamp.  You are
mistaken, and you will immediately go away."

Bannister smiled irritatingly, and surveyed Aunt Caroline with a
pitying stare.

"I don't think I shall go after all.  You are so amusing."

"You've got to go.  I expected a refusal; but I suppose you're open
to persuasion.  It is money you want, eh?  How much?"

Bannister looked shocked and astonished.

"How much is it?  Name your terms.  My brother's happiness, the peace
of this house, and the future of my nephew are all dear to me.  But
if peace has to be bought, I am willing to pay--and pay handsomely.
So name your price to leave this house, to leave England and take
your daughter with you.  Why don't you go back to Vienna, Dick
Gordon?"

Bannister did not reply.  He only smiled, and, after a long silence,
took out his watch and looked at it languidly.  Then he yawned and
stared at the ceiling, the walls, and the floor, as if patiently
waiting for more.  The old lady stood on the same spot without moving
a muscle.  Only her eyes seemed to be alive.  At last the man broke
the silence.

"This conversation would be amusing if the hour were not so late,
Miss Cardew.  I'm afraid I must go to bed.  You disturbed my
_tête-à-tête_ with Lady Hester; but your humorous sallies are not
sufficiently amusing to keep me awake."

He would have walked to the door, but she stood in his path, grim and
unrelenting.

"Oh, you don't deceive me, Mr. Dick Gordon.  What is it to be, the
police or a cheque?"

He showed signs of irritation now.  That uncomfortable word "police"
was one which he usually disdained and ignored; yet the mention of it
never fails to produce a slight uneasiness in a thief.

"Madam, I wish you would allow me to go to bed."

"You can make your price high.  I shall not wince.  I know that when
dealing with men of your type one must pay through the nose.  How
much is it to be--a thousand pounds?"

Even Dick Gordon was rather staggered at the munificence of the
offer, and in a subconscious way he considered it, and came to the
conclusion that a needy man might do worse than blackmail a Bishop's
sister.

"Madam, your money has no interest for me.  I much esteem your
brother's wife, as you doubtless suspect, and I am delighted to have
your nephew as a son-in-law.  I put myself in her ladyship's hands
entirely.  I abide by her decision, and she has decided that I should
become one of the family.  The Bishop, I understand, much resents
your interference in his affairs.  He is suffering now from the
effects of it."

The old lady listened unmoved except to exclaim sharply--

"Two thousand."

There was a pause.

"Men of your kind always have their price.  Will you go, or must I
appeal to your daughter and offer her the money?  Is she a partner in
the swindle?  You know that you have nothing, that you are nobody,
that your talk of buying Dingle Hall is empty boast, that your
promised settlements are a fraud.  I am offering you money in large
sums.  Don't be a fool.  Take it, and clear off with your child.
Hester has suffered enough in the concealment of her sin--how much, I
never guessed until to-night.  What I overheard at the door explains
many things; at the same time the knowledge makes me mistress here.
I tell you my nephew shall not marry a scamp's daughter."

"But suppose they are married already, my dear Miss Cardew."

The old lady bit her lip and faltered.  She had thought of this, but
the idea had been dismissed, and she would not entertain it now.

"I am not dealing in suppositions."

"Then let me inform you, in strictest confidence, Miss Cardew, that I
have very grave suspicions that my girl is Mrs. Jack Cardew."

"God forbid!"

"I am afraid the Deity has no jurisdiction in these matters, and you
see how foolish it is of you, Miss Cardew, to talk of preventing a
marriage that has already taken place."

"It has taken place?  You assert that?"

"I suspect it, I will say no more.  I have no first-hand knowledge.
Your obstinate brother precipitated the match by his opposition and
his inquisitiveness concerning Mabel's parentage and fortune.  You
would not like him to know that he had been deceived.  Coming on top
of his illness it would be a great shock to find that his son was
secretly married."

"No--Heaven forbid!  Oh, what a morass of infamy!--secrecy and
sin--deception on every side."

"Miss Cardew, I think I have shown you the absurdity of your
position.  As one of the family you are quite entitled to express
your opinion about me and my daughter, and say what you like
concerning my financial position.  It is beneath my dignity to argue
pounds, shillings and pence with you.  My means are sufficient for my
needs, and for keeping up Dingle Hall; and my daughter's dowry will
be larger than the miserable pittance your beggarly nephew earns at
the Bar.  Your insinuations concerning the parentage of Mabel are an
insult to the memory of my dead wife.  You misunderstood what you
heard.  Though doors may be thinner than brick walls, the
thick-headedness of eavesdroppers cannot always be estimated.  I wish
you good night."

He stepped towards the door again, but she was too quick, and,
darting backwards, barred his way by standing with her back to it.

"Three thousand pounds."

She snapped out the words and clenched her teeth on them, glaring
dangerously.  He could not thrust her from the door so he turned
back, shrugging his shoulders and laughing.

"Really, you are too amusing; and your freedom with your money
suggests an inexhaustible treasury."

"It is not inexhaustible, but it can stand that.  Is it a bargain?"

"I assure you, madam, your offers have no influence with me whatever."

"You came down here to make money, and you expected to clear a
certain sum.  I heard that much; but how you intended to do it I
didn't quite hear; but I heard you talk of clearing a big sum."

"Ah, I was talking of a little speculation, something that would
bring me much more than three thousand pounds."

"Oh, three thousand is not enough?  I expected to have to deal with a
shark.  Five thousand."

The repetition of her offers in thousands had its effect upon the
scoundrel.  He paused to think.  He had never been offered money in
such sums before; and there was every likelihood of the amount being
increased to quite a large figure if he insisted.  Would it not be
better, after all, to extract money from Aunt Caroline than to go
through the dangerous and humiliating procedure of disposing of the
emeralds.  She saw the thoughts revolving in his brain.

"Yes, think it over," she murmured, folding her arms and nodding,
"think it over.  The money is ready; and your daughter can be ready
to accompany you by the eight o'clock train.  She must never come
back--remember that Jack's wife or not, she goes.  Their secret must
be kept.  The boy will not be so foolish as to speak when he finds
how miserably he has been duped."

"My dear madam, if you offered me twenty thousand pounds I could not
do as you wish.  You are talking in the clouds."

"Oh, so twenty thousand pounds is your price?  It is too much."

Mr. Bannister went hot and cold.  It was obvious that the old lady
would consider any sum.  It was a great temptation.  If he could only
take the money--and Hester, too!

He rammed his eyeglass in his eye, and caressed his beard
thoughtfully, scratching it irritably now and then to stimulate his
confused faculties.  Why not take the bribe, anyway?  Hush money,
once paid, was rarely or never recovered, whether the services paid
for were rendered by the receiver or not.  The mere acceptance of a
bribe would not enable him to separate Mabel and Jack; and he had no
wish to do so; but if the worst came to the worst, and the old lady
exposed him, he could do very nicely with that twenty thousand pounds.

He would have closed there and then, but for his lust for Hester.  He
could not give her up.  She was a prize worth more than the whole of
Aunt Caroline's fortune.  The very thought rendered money of no
value.  All worldly considerations were as naught; the fever of the
old love was burning in his veins, and the blood raced through them
as with the return of youth.  It was a case of money be hanged.

"Madam, you are insulting me by your offer.  I beg you will stand
aside and allow me to go to bed."

"Very well," she replied calmly, "I know your terms.  I will consider
them.  Twenty thousand pounds."

"I have made no terms."

"Hester shall know what I have done; and she must understand that it
is for my brother's sake, not hers.  She has no wish to have anything
further to do with you, and if you are a man, and not a cur, you
won't pursue a helpless woman who would be glad to see you dead
rather than touch a hair of your head.  As for your daughter, I
believe that she is not tainted with your venom, though she may
inherit some of her mother's foolishness.  I shall put the case to
her; and, if she has a spark of womanhood and any regard for the man
she has tricked into marriage, she will urge you to accept my
proposition and take her abroad at once."

"You seem to be arranging things very nicely, old lady," snarled
Bannister, losing his self-command.  His sneering attitude dropped
away, and the angry ruffian burst through.  "You can talk as much as
you please; but I'll thank you to leave my daughter alone.  Say a
word to her about me, or about her mother, or her husband, and I go
straight to the Bishop and inform him of all the malicious,
libellous, idiotic delusions you have got into your poor old head.
And then, if he is wise, he'll have you put away in an asylum.  Good
night."

He strode out and left her, and she remained standing in the middle
of the room, lost in thought.

"I've won," she murmured at last.  "There's some humanity in the
rascal, after all.  He is touchy about his daughter--fond of her, no
doubt.  She doesn't know what a blackguard he is--or he thinks she
doesn't.  He'll consider it over.  Oh, Hester, Hester, you poor weak
fool!  If I had only known--if you had only told me, what trouble it
would have saved!"

* * * * * * *

When Bannister reached his room he expected to find Voss waiting
there as usual.  In this he was disappointed.  Voss was sulking.
Their quarrel had been fiercer than ever before, and the master had
gone too far; he had overreached himself; he had grown arrogant with
the near approach of his retirement from business, and made a fatal
mistake in "rounding" on his partner for too much zeal.

The emeralds were still in the safe, and recent developments seemed
to suggest that they might remain there forever.  All his nice
professional calculations were being upset by human nature in its
most aggravating form.  Voss was greedy, and he himself had lost his
head over a woman--and that woman his own wife.  Now, Aunt Caroline
had stepped on to the stage, and the play was developing along
unexpected lines.

He had hardly closed the door when a light tapping attracted his
attention.  For the moment he half expected Hester.

No, it was Mabel.  She had changed her dress for a morning frock, and
jacket and gloves; a hat completed her costume, which was evidently
intended for a journey.

She entered without apology, and did not deign to answer her father's
questioning glance.  When he had closed the door she turned and faced
him eye to eye.

He could see then that, although she was outwardly calm, a storm was
raging within; her features were hard set, and her eyes sparkled with
mental fever.

"What is the meaning of this?" he asked curtly.  "Why aren't you in
bed?"

"Because I do not intend to sleep another night in this house."

"Oho!  So you, too, are on the warpath."

"I have come to give you my reasons for going."

"And suppose I don't want to hear them?"

"You must hear--you shall hear!"

"Haven't I had enough of your insolence to-night without being
obliged to listen to more?  A pretty daughter!"

"And a pretty father, you!  Yes, I've found you out.  I know all
about you, and I don't thank you for rearing me in ignorance of my
true position.  You have not only ruined my life, but--another's."

"I'm your father, and I'll not be talked to like this," he blustered,
feeling more ill at ease than before a dozen Aunt Carolines.

"You are a fraud and a swindler, and you are here under false
pretences.  You deceived me about my mother----"

"Your mother is dead."

"My mother is alive, and in this house."

He changed color and tried to speak, but his utterance was choked by
rage.  At last he managed to blurt out: "Oh, so she has told you, has
she?  And I suppose you're going to desert your father, and take your
mother's side."

"I am going to desert both my father and my mother.  Which of you is
the greatest sinner I cannot tell at present.  My reason seems almost
unhinged.  I cannot think clearly.  I can't realize everything yet:
but this I know, I have no right in this house, and I must go."

"Oh!"

"And you will go too."

"It is kind of you to think of me, but I am old enough to take care
of myself, and you should have sense enough to mind your own
business.  Go to bed."

"Not in this house--with that poor old man lying ill, and all on my
account.  If he knew what we were he would have us driven forth with
whips."

"Look here, my girl, if you're going to talk this kind of twaddle I
shall take severe measures with you.  I'm not going to be dictated to
by a child.  You are my daughter, and----"

"And I am Jack Cardew's wife.  God forgive me for that, too!"

"Well, I knew that.  It is no news," he replied, with a laugh.
"That's just the reason why you can't go if you want to.  Your mother
has been blabbing secrets to you in a fit of sentimentality, I
suppose, and you think you've got me in a corner.  But you have made
a mistake."

"You have come down here to steal."

"And pray, how do you arrive at that amazing conclusion?"

"Deny it if you can.  Tell me how you have lived all these years,
where the money came from to educate me, feed and clothe me.  Didn't
I see you swindle poor Mr. Blunt?  I thought that was the worst.  It
was bad enough, and made me want to kill myself for very shame.  But
what I heard at the jeweler's, and in your talks with Voss, when you
thought I was in my room, showed me that you were worse than a
swindler--a thief."

He clenched his fist and raised it as though about to strike, but
controlled himself with a supreme effort.  He recovered and shrugged
his shoulders in the old way.

"Sit down," he said quietly, motioning to an arm chair, and drawing
another forward into the wide space in front of the dressing table
where the lights were.  "I didn't expect to have to justify myself or
explain my affairs to a child, but now that you are married and have
stumbled upon things you were never meant to hear, I suppose you are
entitled to know all."

She sat down and surveyed him with her keen eyes wonderingly.  He had
ceased to be her father; he was an amazing monster.  He took out a
cigarette and lighted it, for he found speech harder than he
expected.  At last he commenced briskly.

"When I was your age I was at Oxford, and my father was alive.  His
name was Bannister.  That is my right name, and yours.  He was a
moderately successful physician, with a large income, which he spent
chiefly on himself, and he gave me to understand that there was
nothing for me after my university career was finished.  He died
suddenly, and I was left penniless.  I came down from Oxford full of
enthusiasm and Socialistic notions, but eager for work.  I had a good
many friends--so had my father.  They used to talk of what they would
do for me in the future.  There were snug berths to be had, and as I
had not been trained for any particular profession the necessity of
getting a berth of some kind was the only anxiety I ever expected to
have in life.  Well, I came to London penniless, to find myself
friendless.  My father's friends fell away, and regretted they could
do nothing for me.  My own friends knew of nothing that would suit
me.  If they met me in the street they crossed the road or looked the
other way.

"I soon realized that I was unfitted for any kind of work, and that a
classical education does not help one to get even a common clerkship
at a pound a week.  I came down to my last shilling.  I starved."  He
paused and re-lighted his cigarette.  Mabel waited patiently.

"I was reduced to such extremities that my only means of getting food
was to call upon my acquaintances at an inconvenient hour and stay
for the next meal--which was not always offered me.  Fortunately, at
Oxford, I had cultivated the wealthy and most careless set, so that
the houses open to me were of the richest and most luxurious--the
most maddening places for a poor devil who was pawning his clothes,
and would soon be too shabby to be admitted by a mere footman without
suspicious scrutiny.  I had to borrow, and people were beginning to
give me the cold shoulder.  My old chums frequently denied themselves
to me when I knew they were at home.  They feared that I wanted
something, and I did: I wanted to live, to eat, to be warm, to have a
roof over my head that I could call my own.  Things got worse.  My
pride grew troublesome.  I could ask for no more.

"One day I pocketed a gold cigar case belonging to a millionaire, and
I pawned it.  That was after two days' starvation.  I could scarcely
stand when I entered the shop.  I remember it now as though it were
yesterday, and if ever I need a stimulus to brace me for dangerous
work I think of that hungry day.  I swore I would never starve again.

"I was able to secure other precious trifles, and they kept me going
for a few weeks.  But my self-respect was falling, my rage against
mankind increasing, and I scorned to be a common pilferer.  I
intended to live, and live well.  Since I must prey upon mankind I
would do it seriously and artistically, as became a gentleman of
education.  I was no common ruffian to snatch diamonds from a lady's
throat.  There are degrees in everything.  There is a wide gap
between the man who breaks the glass in a jeweler's window and
carries off gems to the value of thousands and the humble sneaking
wretch who steals for bread.  Both choose the same road, but only the
fool steals for bread.  I was no fool.

"In short, my dear daughter, I arrived early at the conclusion that
it was as easy to make a thousand pounds as a thousand shillings.  I
had no good friends on the Stock Exchange to help me rob the widow
and the orphan by finance, and I was no Robin Hood to pilfer from the
rich to feed the poor.  Still, I had some hankering after
respectability, and I mapped out a line of conduct which I have
followed ever since.  I have lived as the rich live.  I deny myself
nothing.  I take my fill of life's pleasures.  At first I wandered
round the world, moving among my old friends, who were ready enough
to receive me when I announced the death of a wealthy relative who
was supposed to have left me a fortune.  No one questioned how I
lived, so long as I could go their pace and not be poor.  They were
willing to shower hospitality upon me, and put me in the way of good
speculations now--in short, all that I needed when I was starving was
available now that I was rich.  The whole game of life is a great
swindle, only some folks swindle and persuade themselves that they
are living honorably.  They mistake respectability for honesty."

"But my mother?" queried Mabel, to whom this cynical story was full
of horror.

"Ah, I am coming to that.  I told you that I always moved among the
best.  I met your mother at a dance.  I fell in love.  I think it was
the first human emotion that I ever felt; and I got it badly.  She
knew nothing of my life, and she had no suspicion.  I was just a gay,
wealthy idler, whereas she was living in genteel poverty, bored to
death and aching for a taste of life.  We were married."

"You married her, living that awful life?" cried Mabel hoarsely.

"I married her, in secrecy; but there, no doubt she has told you the
story."

"She has given me the outline."

"Ah, the sentimental side of it, no doubt.  I soon found that I could
not live my roving, dangerous life with a woman out of sympathy,
ready to betray me at any moment; so I resolved to let her go--to
give up the only thing I ever really wanted--and I did it.  But you
had been born to complicate things.  You were taken away and put into
gentle hands.  I had no fancy for your being brought up to despise
your father, and your mother couldn't take you to her home and keep
up the fiction of spinsterhood.  My next step was a mistake.  I led
her to imagine that both you and I were dead, and she believed it--on
the flimsiest evidence.  I never suspected that we should meet again,
nor did I think that she would marry.  I made no allowances for
effect of time on the sentimental temperament.  Until I came down
here I hadn't the slightest idea who Lady Hester Cardew was.  So, you
see, my dear Mabel, we are all the victims of circumstance.  I am
what my circumstances made me--you----"

"Circumstances did not make you what you are," cried the girl,
starting up.  "You were always bad--bad to the core.  I am ashamed to
live when I hear you excusing yourself for the lowest and vilest
acts.  I am going away.  As soon as the house is quiet I mean to
leave it, and you, forever."

"Mabel, my child, you are joking.  You are indulging in your mother's
favorite heroics."

His voice broke a little, for his surprise that she should blame him
after hearing his pathetic case was quite genuine.  With all his
vanity and cynical philosophy, he was horribly deficient in moral
sense.  He was quite persuaded that his experience of the difficulty
of living was uncommon, and that his early struggles quite justified
his present mode of life.  To bare his heart and explain the motives
which dominated his supreme egotism, and be misunderstood, was very
galling.  Yet he saw that he was losing his child forever, as he had
lost his wife.  The gulf between them was widening every moment, and
he was losing something of which he was very fond.  For, in his way,
he was devoted to his beautiful daughter.  He had looked upon her as
his--all that he had, in fact, in the way of kith or kin.  His
peculiar mode of life had kept him at war with the whole world, but
this one fair flower had been always his, untainted, trusting,
devoted, an everlasting credit to his good taste and shrewd sense.

Well, he could spare her better now--now that he had discovered
Hester.  But he would not have her interfering with his plans and
upsetting his last great coup by disappearing from the Palace, and
from her husband.  He had practically purchased Dingle Hall, and had
built up a picturesque and interesting future.  If she deserted him
now there would be a crash in his affairs.  Voss was in open mutiny;
Hester had fallen under the dominion of Aunt Caroline; and now his
child was up in arms.  It only needed Hester to have an hysterical
attack, and fling herself upon the Bishop's mercy with a dramatic
confession, to complete the confusion of his plans.

He played his last card with his daughter.  Speaking with a voice
apparently broken with emotion, he put a gentle hand upon her arm.

"Mabel, my darling, your father has been an unfortunate man.  He
tried to do his best for you, even to shutting his eyes to your
follies--but you must not leave your husband."

She drew away with a little sob, and tried in vain to recover
herself.  He had touched the tenderest chord.

"You have married Jack Cardew.  There is no putting aside bonds of
that kind.  You must do your duty by him.  I'll have no child of mine
wrecking a man's life.  He knows nothing of our secret.  What right
have you to spoil his career at the very outset--just when he has
made his first success.  He has won his big case, and he may make
five thousand a year at the Bar some day.  But if his wife plunges
him into misery and leaves him--as my wife left me--what will be the
result?  Come, come, Mabel, don't cry like that.  Pull yourself
together.  There is no sense in ruining your own happiness because
your father is--well, a wrong 'un from your point of view.  I am not
going to be a burden and a disgrace to you as many a man would under
the circumstances.  I am a rich man, Mabel.  I can fulfil all my
obligations and make the allowance I promised when I settled matters
with the Bishop.  You will have no reason to be ashamed of your
father.  As the Squire of Dingle Hall I shall be a figure in the
county."

"Oh, what would Jack say if he knew?"

"You need not tell Jack anything.  Henceforth my extremely
respectable existence will be a credit to you."

"I don't believe you--I don't believe you," she cried.  "You came
down here to steal.  You came down here for the emeralds."

"Ah, there you put your finger upon a flaw in my case, and since you
seem bent on being brutally frank, we will be both quite frank.  Then
we shall know exactly where we stand.  I admit that, in making my
calculations for your future, I decided that you mother's beautiful
emeralds should be converted into cash solely for your benefit.  They
will come to you some day, when you will never want them.  In the
meantime I prefer that their value should be added to our common
exchequer.  Your mother, thank goodness, has learned discretion, and
has seen my point of view.  Her marriage with the Bishop cannot
possibly be upset, and in return for silence on my part she will hand
over the emeralds--a matter of twenty or thirty thousand pounds."

"She will steal for you--steal--and continue to live with the Bishop?"

"I am sure she will.  If you think it out, my child, you will see
that she must do so.  It is her duty to atone for the wrong done the
Bishop in marrying without confessing that she had married before.
She knows now that she has a daughter.  The dearest wish of her life
has apparently been gratified in this knowledge.  There will be no
public exposure, no scandal.  You will be one of the family, her own
daughter almost in the sight of the world, because your marriage with
the Bishop's son ties you forever to the Cardew family--and to that
particularly shrewd and dangerous person, Aunt Caroline, who knows
nothing worse against me than that I played cards for heavy stakes
and quarrelled over them in Vienna.  She learned that from Mr. Crick,
the reformed inebriate.  When I say nothing worse, I mean on the
moral side.  She has, unfortunately, discovered that you are Hester's
child."

"Aunt Caroline has discovered that!" gasped Mabel, clasping her hands
on her bosom and gazing at him with eyes starting out of her head.

"Yes, she has been eavesdropping.  Your mother, with characteristic
folly, betrayed herself by screaming out the truth while the old lady
was within hearing.  So, you see, you had better resign yourself to
things as they are.  You can't right them by running away.  It may
ruin us all, your mother included--and most certainly your husband."

"Oh, if I could only face Jack and explain," sobbed Mabel, dropping
back into her chair and covering her face.  She wept from sheer
helplessness, and swayed from side to side.  Her father saw his
advantage, and pressed it home.

"You could not possibly explain.  He would never understand.  You
haven't done anything that you need be ashamed of, and the less he
knows the better."

"But his aunt knows," moans the girl.

"Have no fear of Aunt Caroline.  She fears scandal more than the
devil.  I shall be able to manage her.  I happen to know a good deal
about the old lady.  I had a friend at Oxford, who was afterwards
very useful--I didn't know at the time how useful.  He did dirty work
for me occasionally, and I lent him money.  He married a baker's
daughter at Oxford while he was undergrad, and deserted her.  After
that his specialty was preying upon rich women.  He was a parson, but
a gambler and a fool, and he did everything clumsily.  He made love
to the sister of a vicar in the East End--a woman old enough to know
better--and he was going to marry her.  They got as far as Dover, but
they were never married.  He was afraid of bigamy.  I am morally
certain that the lady was Miss Cardew.  I heard the whole business.
I needn't go into details.  The facts are sufficiently commonplace to
make it indistinguishable from thousands of such cases--with one
slight difference: the lady was rich enough to hide the consequences
of her folly.  That was dear Aunt Caroline at thirty.  She wants to
get me out of the house, and offers me very handsome terms.  But they
are not good enough.  I'm going to live my life in my own way
henceforth--and that way is going to be the straight way.  I'm going
to give up the crooked path, and you, my child, must help me, if you
desire happiness in the future.  No, you're not going to leave this
house.  I forbid it.  I'll raise an alarm if you do.  You will go
back to your room now, at once, and I shall lock you in."

He took her arm gently and persuasively.

"No, no; don't touch me," she cried, recoiling.  "I'll go back to my
room.  Don't come--leave me alone.  I've heard enough.  You are
turning my brain.  You have utterly broken my heart.  I only want to
die."

She crept from the room, and he followed to the adjoining apartment.
He tried to comfort and caress her, but she shrank away as from red
hot iron.

He laughed harshly, and shrugged his annoyance, but he took the key
out of her door and locked her in ere he departed.

She flung herself face downward upon the bed and collapsed from sheer
mental and physical exhaustion.




CHAPTER XXI

Miss Cardew was up betimes and wandering about the house.  She was as
alert as ever, despite a night with never a wink of sleep or a
moment's rest.  She waited expectantly for Mr. Bannister, fully
believing that he would have come to the conclusion that it was
better to go by the early train and accept her offer.  But there was
no sign of the guest stirring, and his man was not to be seen.  This
was at seven o'clock.  She was both disappointed and astonished.
That the fellow should scorn her offer of thousands was
inconceivable.  The only thing that could prevent him going would be
the obstinacy of his daughter, who might not be prepared to abandon
her husband at such short notice.  The old lady supposed that Mabel
would be open to bribery: but if the girl had a conscience, her
father; might finally exercise paramount influence.

If Bannister himself held out she must, as a last resort, appeal to
Mabel.  With this end in view she knocked softly at the girl's
bedroom door.

Some one was stirring within, but there was no answer at first.  She
knocked more loudly.

"Who it is?" asked a husky voice.

"It is I, Miss Cardew.  I want to speak to you."

Mabel came to the door and turned the handle; but, of course, it
would not open; her father had the key.

"I can't let you in."

"Why not, my child?" asked the old lady, in as kindly a tone as she
could manage.

"I am very sorry, Miss Cardew, but I am locked in."

"Locked in?"

There was a pause, during which Mabel felt extremely foolish, and
Miss Cardew pondered deeply.  "Who locked you in, my dear?"

Mabel tried to say, "My father," but the words choked her, and she
took refuge in a lie.

"I don't know."

"I'll soon put that right.  There are duplicate keys of the house
down stairs.  I'll let you out."

Aunt Caroline hurried away, and presently returned with a jingling
bunch of keys, to every one of which a label had been attached by her
own hands.  The door was flung open, and she entered, to find Mabel
up and dressed, but with her hair all tumbled and her eyes red with
weeping.  She looked at the old lady in a scared fashion, then became
conscious of her dishevelment.  Her bed had not been slept in, but
there was a deep indentation where she had lain during a few hours'
sleep.

Aunt Caroline took all this in at a glance.  "Not been to bed, Miss
Bannister?"

"No."

"Why were you locked in?"

Mabel walked to the mirror and re-arranged her hair, more as an
excuse to turn her back and avoid the penetrating scrutiny than
because she cared about her appearance.  Aunt Caroline carefully shut
the door after her, and slipped the top catch--which could not be
turned from the outside.  This made her secure from any chance
surprise by Mr. Bannister.

Mabel looked round in some alarm, and put out her hand for her hat.

"You seem to be preparing for a journey.  I see your things are
packed."

"Yes, I'm going away," replied Mabel sulkily.  She put on her hat
very calmly.  "The Bishop is ill.  I can do nothing, and guests are
only in the way at such a time."

The old lady felt sorry for the girl.  Her bitter jealousy vanished
now that she had Jack's wife utterly at her mercy.

"I cannot help thinking that you are wise to go, my dear.  I presume
your father had a talk with you after my interview with him last
night."

"What interview?"

"We had a little business conversation.  I want him to go away too."

Mabel flashed round a frightened glance; a piteous, hunted look came
into her eyes; but the old lady reassured her by placing a hand on
her shoulder.  "I am very sorry for you, my child.  I know your
secret--and your mother's."

Mabel drew away in shame.

"Your father cannot remain in this house; my brother is ill, and you
both have a very good excuse for going."

"Oh, you needn't think I want driving away," cried Mabel desperately.
"I should have gone last night, but I was prevented."

"There is one question I want to ask you, my child.  Was your
marriage with Jack--ah, yes, you see I know that you are married to
Jack--purely a love affair between you two, or was it a planned
conspiracy between you and your father?"

"How dare you insult me by such a question?" cried Mabel, white with
anger.

"I don't wish to insult you, my child, but I must be frank.  The
circumstances with which we are dealing are very unusual, remember.
I have told you I am sorry.  If anything could be done to straighten
things out you would find a friend in me.  But there is only one
way--for you to go.  Your marriage must be forgotten.  My brother has
no suspicion of it, and some reasonable excuse must be made to
explain your separation from Jack.  A lovers' quarrel will always
account for a broken engagement."

Mabel showed signs of collapse.  She rested one hand upon the
dressing table and swayed badly.  Her agony was apparent in her face.

"Sit down, my child, sit down.  I am interested in you: first as
Jack's wife, secondly on your own account.  As a Christian woman I
must do my duty by you.  You shall not want for the necessaries of
life--so long as you disassociate yourself from your father."

"You are offering me money?" demanded the girl proudly.

"I am not offering anything.  I am insisting.  It is your right.  As
a nephew's wife, you must be supported; as Hester's daughter you are
entitled to consideration from your unhappy mother.  Come, come, now,
no nonsense!  It is no good your frowning at me like that.  How much
money have you, where are you going, and what explanation are you
going to give to Jack?"

"I have written him a letter."

"Explaining everything?"

"No, not everything."

"May I see it?"

"No."

Aunt Caroline folded her arms and walked up and down a few paces,
then came to a standstill, staring out of the window, rigid as a
statue--a favorite trick when thinking earnestly.  "I must know what
you have said to the boy.  I cannot have his life ruined.  I want to
know the nature of the blow you have dealt him."

The awfulness of Jack's position had not really dawned on Aunt
Caroline until now.  It was all very well to plan a life of celibacy
for her nephew, but she knew that Jack would have something to say
upon the point.

"Jack ought to be able to get a divorce from me," sobbed Mabel.

"Not unless you gave him a pretext--and that would be sinful, anyway.
It would be a dreadful scandal as well.  The whole story of the
marriage would have to come out.  Those whom God has joined let no
man put asunder."

"You don't seem to be acting in the spirit of that yourself."

Aunt Caroline started guiltily.  This again was a new point of view
that had not presented itself to her.

"It is no good your blaming me.  It is not I who caused the trouble.
You yourself admit that you must go away.  Where are you going?"

"I--I don't know.  I think I shall go to Beatrice Carew first, and
ask her advice.  I must tell some one."

"What--tell Beatrice of your marriage!  Child, are you mad?"

"I have no other friend in the world."

"Child, child, think of your mother's and my brother's reputations.
You mustn't breathe a word to a living soul."

"Then I shall go away to Italy--to the convent.  I was happy enough
there.  Perhaps they'll take me back when they know all."

"That sounds very wise.  But I hope it isn't a Roman Catholic
convent."

"It is."

"Child, you cannot go there.  You are of our faith, and you must not
imperil your immortal soul----"

"Don't talk to me of your faith.  I do not want such a faith.  You
have no Christian charity, and you only come here to torture me.  You
know what you are trying to do--to drive me to kill myself so that
Jack will be rid of me and be free to marry Beatrice as you intended."

"My poor child, you don't know what you are saying.  You are talking
wildly, and you do me an injustice--a terrible injustice."

"You've never been anything but rude and insulting to me," cried the
girl, standing with clenched hands and flaming eyes before the gaunt
old lady.  "You're a scheming, cruel, wicked woman.  You don't care
anything for Jack's happiness so long as he does what you want, and
marries whom you wish.  Do you think Beatrice would be happy with him
if she knew all about me?"

"Tut-tut, girl, calm yourself and lower your voice."

"I have written my letter to Jack, and I am going to London by the
first train.  If Jack should try to follow me--as he is sure to
do--he mustn't know anything of my movements.  So I shan't tell you
or anybody else.  All I ask of you is that you will spare my mother
now that you know her secret, and not vent your miserable spite by
plotting her ruin.  It's easy to see how you hate her.  You show it
every time you look at her."

Mabel could not bring herself to say more for fear that she would
reveal too much.  Aunt Caroline knew the secret of her birth, and she
dreaded what would happen if the old lady were to discover, or even
suspect, the real relationship between her father and Lady Hester.
She busied herself with packing into a handbag the last few personal
articles from the dressing table.  She was brisk in her movements,
and found relief in action.  Aunt Caroline stood and watched her.

"What time does the first train go to London?" Mabel asked curtly, as
she closed her hand-bag with a snap and reached out for her gloves.

"What place are you going to in London?"

"I have told you--I don't know."

"I cannot allow you to go in that fashion, Mabel."

The use of the Christian name had its effect.  It was the first sign
of amity that the old lady had put forth.

"It is no business of yours."

"How much money have you?"

"About eighteen shillings.  But if you think I'd touch a penny from
you----"

"It is not my money.  It is Jack's.  I hold it in trust for him, and
you are entitled to all you need.  My child, I regard you as more
sinned against than sinning."

"It is very kind of you.  If it hadn't been for you and your absurd
opposition, and your money, and the necessity for our engagement
being quashed at the outset because you were in Switzerland and
hadn't been consulted, Jack and I wouldn't have been married
secretly.  We should have been properly engaged, and this upset would
have only ended in a broken engagement--not two lives joined, then
severed forever."  The girl broke down again, and sobbed with her
face in her hands.

"Forever!" echoed the old lady, as if talking to herself, and
standing with arms crossed, and staring out of the window.  "A
woman's life is long and dreary.  Who should know it better than I?"

Mabel paid no heed; and the old lady seemed to forget her existence;
she was looking back over the years of her own barren existence.  The
bright eyes grew dim, the muscles of her face became strained, and
the hard lines of the mouth were tense and drawn.  When next Mabel
looked up, a great tear was rolling down Aunt Caroline's cheek.  The
thin, bony hands had dropped to her sides, and the fingers worked
convulsively.  Her breath was labored, and the haughty carriage of
the head had given place to a weary droop.  Her chin rested on her
breast.  The excitement and anxiety of the night were telling upon
her, and she looked like fainting.

"You are not ill?"

The old lady beckoned for a chair, and, when the girl brought it,
sank down, limp and ashen.  Mabel put on her gloves slowly, wondering
how soon she could escape.  This miserable interview had become
meaningless.  It altered nothing; it only made the obvious more
inevitable.  She looked at her watch.  It had stopped--it was
symbolical of everything that belonged to the hitherto.  With the
winding of her watch began a new life.  The clicking of the cogs as
her shaking fingers turned the little gold knob seemed to arouse Aunt
Caroline.

"It's no good your thinking of going yet awhile.  The train doesn't
leave till eight.  You must have some breakfast, child, and--and I
think I had better see Lady Hester first.  Your mother surely has
some right to demand the information you refuse me.  I'll not be
responsible for driving you away in your present frame of mind.  I
have no animosity against you; and you must try and realize that.  If
you cannot be generous, at least be just.  I was prepared to dislike
you in the beginning; but when I saw you I was only angry because you
were not what I expected, and I--I couldn't hate you.  You were too
young, and fresh, and innocent.  Please understand that.  I absolve
you from all blame.  You are a child of sin, but you are not like
your father.  I want to be friends with you."

She held out two trembling hands, but Mabel drew back.

"Jack will hate you all his life for this.  He will guess that you
were at the bottom of it.  If it hadn't been for you I could have
faced him."

"No, don't say that, Mabel, don't say that," cried the old woman
piteously.  "You shan't set him against me."

"He'll never forgive you, and he'll search the world until he finds
me.  I feel it, I know it.  That's what paralyzes me.  I don't know
where to go.  He knows all about my life and my friends.  If I go to
the convent that is the first place he would think of.  Oh, what am I
to do?"

"Child, I'm afraid we may both be wrong.  Jack will certainly feel
that he had a right to be consulted.  He mustn't imagine that I had
any hand in ruining his life."

"No, you want to stand well with him and injure me at the same time.
But you can't do it.  I told him how impossible it would be for us to
declare our folly to the world--how it would rob him of your fortune
and make bad blood between you and his father.  I know my own father
is impossible.  I am only a thief's daughter."

"Hush, my child.  Not so bad as that, I hope.  It is an ugly term for
a daughter to use."

"It is true, nevertheless," cried Mabel recklessly.  "The clothes I
wear don't belong to me.  The jewelry I am taking away to sell
probably belongs to somebody else.  A nice wife for a lawyer!  Why,
some day my own husband may be called upon to prosecute my father in
the felon's dock!  What does it matter what becomes of me--whether I
die in the gutter, or in the workhouse--or in the Thames?"

Mabel gave way to her passion, and frightened the elder woman, who
put a gentle hand on her shoulder; but she flung her off, almost
striking her.

"I am going.  Don't touch me.  You need not thrust me out.  I shan't
make a scene.  I shall be obliged if you will order a servant to take
those two bags to the station.  I shall walk down at once and wait
for the train."

"Surely it would be better if you waited for your father.  I fancy he
will be going early this morning."

"My father!" cried the girl contemptuously.  "He will not stir till
eleven.  If you were to send in word that I was leaving him forever,
he would only turn over and curse you for awakening him."

"I have offered him money to go away."

"Oh! perhaps you came here to offer me money, too!  Thank you.  I
understand your generous instincts.  Hush money they call it, don't
they?  Well, you need not pay any money to keep me quiet.  My father
will take all you want to give away, and I shall be as silent as--the
dead.  And now there is nothing more we want to say to each other
except good-bye.  And will you please send my things to the station?
If they don't come, I shall go without them."

Mabel tugged at her glove, and finished the last buttons in a most
determined fashion.  She swept the room with one comprehensive,
despairing glance and saw Aunt Caroline in tears, with outstretched
hands; but she hardened her heart and almost rushed from the room.

The old lady followed, but her legs were shaking beneath her.  Mabel
was round the bend in the gallery and going down stairs before Aunt
Caroline could reach the banister and call down to her.

"Mabel, my child--stop, stop!  I've changed my mind."  It was
useless.  The old voice might have been the chiming of the clock for
Cinderella; Mabel looked neither to left nor right, but made for the
front door, which was just being opened to let in the morning
sunlight.  Without a word of explanation for her early appearance she
brushed past the servant, and began to descend the stone steps,
walking in a mist of tears.  Her foot rested securely upon the top
step, but the second sank, and the third faded into mist and was
swallowed up by the earth.  She dropped like a stone in a dead faint
at the bottom, and rolled over on her back, with one arm
outstretched, palm upwards, and the other doubled painfully beneath
her.

The footman at the top gasped and faltered, and was for a moment
rendered helpless.  At the same instant there was a whiz and a whir,
and a motor car turned the bend of the drive, and dashed up to the
steps.

It was Jack, who had left town at five in the morning, burning with
impatience to get to his father, brought down post haste by a message
from the doctor sent over night.

The driver of the hired car did not see the dark thing lying in the
drive at the foot of the steps until the footman rushed forward with
upraised arms and pointed warningly.  Then Jack saw and understood.

He leaped out before the car came to a standstill, and raised his
wife in his arms.

"Mabel, my darling, what is it?  Look up!  What has happened to her?"

"She just fell down the steps, sir, I think.  Going down in a hurry,
and tripped, and came down all of a heap."

Jack was terrified for a few moments; but the girl's heavy breathing
reassured him.  At least she was alive.  Aunt Caroline arrived at the
door in time to see the young man dismount, and hurried down the
steps to help him.

All efforts to restore the girl were unavailing.  Jack was alarmed;
but his aunt assured him that it was only a faint.  But she spoke so
falteringly and apologetically that her nephew seemed to suspect that
something was wrong.

"Why was she going out at this hour--before breakfast?" he asked.

"I--I suppose she expected you," faltered Aunt Caroline, taking
refuge in a lie, and feeling shockingly guilty.

They carried Mabel indoors and applied the usual restoratives, but
without avail.  She breathed more easily, but her eyes would not
open.  Jack instinctively guessed that she had sustained some serious
injury, and resolved to carry her upstairs to her room to await the
coming of the doctor.  His aunt led the way, and by the time she
reached the top of the stairs remembered Mabel's letter left for
Jack.  She hurried on in advance, and entered the room just in time
to snatch up the missive and hide it.  Never before had she been
afraid of Jack.  If she had dealt Mabel a blow with her own hand she
could not have felt more guilty.

They had not long to wait before the arrival of the doctor.  A
servant met him coming up to the Palace to see the Bishop.  He
settled Mabel's fate in a few moments, and located the trouble.  She
had struck the sharp edge of the stone step, and there was slight
concussion, necessitating quiet and careful nursing for days--perhaps
weeks.

"Trouble comes not in single spies but in battalions," he muttered to
Jack, as he took him by the arm and led him out of the room.  "I must
now go and see your father.  I'll let you know what I think about him
in ten minutes.  I hear he is almost himself again."

Jack walked up and down the corridor feeling very sick at heart.  It
was a miserable home-coming after his triumph of yesterday in the
courts.  He saw the doctor enter his father's room, and in a few
moments the Bishop's hearty voice could be heard greeting him
cheerily.

"Not much the matter with me this morning, doctor," he said; and the
laugh that followed removed a great load from Jack's heart.  He
returned to Mabel's room, where his aunt was in attendance.  She was
making up for past coldness by the most assiduous attention to the
sufferer.

At nine o'clock Voss appeared, and heard the news of Mabel's accident
from the other servants.  He carried the information to his master in
bed.  Bannister turned over and cursed him for the disturbance; but
with the full return of waking consciousness he recalled the scene
over night, and the locked door.  For the moment he feared that she
might have hurt herself escaping from a window.  But the narrative as
repeated by Voss was concise.  Mabel had been seen running down
stairs with Miss Cardew calling her back; she had gone out of the
house, and fell down the flight of stone steps.  On being assured
that she was receiving due attention, her loving father turned over
and went to sleep.




CHAPTER XXII

News travels fast at Ripley.  The Bishop's illness was known all over
the town, and the reports were grossly exaggerated.

Beatrice Carew arrived at the Palace at half-past nine to inquire
after the Bishop's health, on behalf of her father, and heard of the
accident to Mabel.  When she was told that a nurse had been sent for,
she volunteered to act in that capacity herself.  Her nursing
capabilities were well known, and the offer was not to be despised,
but Miss Cardew, much to her surprise, had also volunteered for the
post, and seemed so genuinely concerned that Beatrice grew suspicious.

Lady Hester had not yet appeared upon the scene.  She made the
Bishop's illness her excuse for keeping to her own apartments.  As a
matter of fact, she was afraid to face Caroline after last night's
adventure.  She was expecting a _coup de grâce_ from the Bishop's
sister.  It all depended upon how much she had heard of the quarrel
in the smoking room.

A hundred times the wretched woman had recalled the conversation as
far as she could remember it, and devoutly hoped and believed that
there was nothing said which an eavesdropper could understand as
revealing the one terrible secret of her relationship to the swindler.

What had passed between the two after she left could only be learned
from Bannister himself.

The news of Mabel's accident drove her nearly crazy; for her love for
her child was stronger than her love for the Bishop.  It had come
upon her with overwhelming intensity, dwarfing for the moment every
other passion and interest in life.  For Mabel's sake she was
prepared to go to any length--except facing Caroline.  So she
remained in her room, and begged almost piteously for news from the
servants as they passed to and fro.

The Bishop complicated matters by insisting on getting up, and
declaring that he was quite well enough to attend to several matters
that were overwhelmingly urgent.  The doctor spoke as plainly as he
dared, warning him of the danger he ran, and entreated him to remain
quiet.

Mr. Bannister joined Jack at the breakfast table.  His appearance
there was a surprise.  Such early rising was amazing, but his
appetite was poor, and he talked platitudes about the Bishop's
health.  He spoke feelingly about his daughter, but was not nearly so
concerned as Jack felt the circumstances demanded.  Consequently the
young man was rather short with his father-in-law, and ate what
little he could choke down in silence.

Mr. Bannister, with studied thoughtfulness, instructed Gray to take
up breakfast to Miss Cardew, with his compliments, and request that
she would not overtire herself in waiting on his daughter.  He
desired her also to accept his most heartfelt gratitude for her
prompt and efficient assistance, and hoped that after breakfast he
would be allowed to see his child.

The message arrived, with the tray, in Mabel's room, but it had
become rather garbled in transition.  Beatrice, who was sitting on
one side of the bed, opposite the old lady, watched the play of her
features with some curiosity.

"My compliments to Mr. Bannister," was Aunt Caroline's reply, "and
I'll bring him the time table in the library after breakfast."

As the servant was leaving the room, she called her back.

"Has her ladyship been down stairs yet?"

"Not that I'm aware of, ma'am."

"Let me know if she goes down stairs."

"Aunt Caroline is suspicious," thought Beatrice.  "I wonder what is
afoot."

Miss Cardew's pointed message reached Bannister while Jack was
present, and he, too, drew deductions.  Bannister only smiled; but
Jack loudly protested that his father-in-law could not go away with
Mabel ill in the house.

"Your aunt thought it would be better," Bannister explained.  "But I
am entirely at your disposal, my dear boy.  I naturally feel very
anxiously about my daughter, and could not possibly think of going
until there was a turn for the better.  At best, concussion of the
brain is a very serious and dangerous thing.  She may never recover
consciousness again."

Jack groaned, and paced the breakfast room in misery.  He could not
eat; he could not rest; and they would not allow him to go up to his
wife.  He marvelled at Bannister's calmness, and wondered how he
could possibly read his morning paper while his child lingered
between life and death upstairs.

As a matter of fact, Bannister's calmness was assumed.  He was
anxious and secretly excited.  Things were at a crisis.  The Bishop's
sister was evidently sincere in her desire to buy him off, and his
fingers were itching to handle her money.  If she were willing to pay
handsomely now, more might be expected from her presently.  It was
unfortunate that Mabel was _hors de combat_.

Jack left his father-in-law walking on the terrace, and crept up to
his wife's room.  Beatrice answered his gentle knock, and came out
onto the corridor.

"How is she, Beatrice?"

"She is better.  She has been muttering.  I don't think it's so very
bad, Jack.  She opened her eyes just now."

"Thank God for that!"

Then, laying her hand on his arm, Beatrice looked Jack full in the
eyes.  "Jack, I know!"

"What, has she been wandering?"

"Yes, she has been going over the marriage service, and talking to
Tom Nestor."

"With Aunt Caroline there?"

"Yes; but she wasn't one little bit surprised, nor was I--much."

"Phew!"  Jack wiped the perspiration from his brow, and walked up and
down in some agitation.  Not a thought did he give to Beatrice, nor
did he realize what an effort it had cost to warn him.  Any wild hope
she may have had of becoming Jack's wife was dashed forever.  She had
been loyal in championing the girl of his choice; and now she knew
everything.  Aunt Caroline's vigorous prophecies and threats that the
marriage would never come off had raised just one gleam of hope; but
it was all over now, and she was calm and resigned.  Her heart ached
and throbbed with leaden strokes.

"How did Aunt Caroline take it?"

"I told you.  She didn't seem in the least surprised."

"Perhaps she didn't understand," whispered Jack anxiously.

"She understood right enough.  She looked across at me, and said, 'Do
you hear?' and I nodded, and then Mabel talked of something else."

Beatrice did not add that she bit her lip till the blood came to
stifle the sob that had risen in her throat.  Nor did she add that
Aunt Caroline had put out a hand to her across the bed, and clasped
her fingers in a silent embrace of sympathy.

The secret was out.  Everybody knew it but the Bishop, and the
situation was trying in the extreme.

The doctor came again at eleven o'clock, and insisted on the Bishop
going back to bed.  He brought a nurse with him, ostensibly for
Mabel, but in reality for the Bishop, because his professional eye
saw signs of strain in Lady Hester, who was well nigh useless, and
suffering sadly.  She could hardly listen to three consecutive
sentences without her mind wandering, her lips moving, and her eyes
roving restlessly, as if in imaginary argument with some person not
present.

"We shall have you ill next, Lady Hester," said the doctor, taking
her hand in professional fashion, and feeling her pulse.  "The best
thing you can do is to take a little exercise in the open air.  Get
out of doors--get away from the sick room--and, above all, don't
worry."

"Don't worry!" she echoed, passing her white hand across her aching
brow.  "It is easier said than done."

"It is easier accomplished out of doors.  Come, now, promise that you
will go out.  Go down stairs.  Don't remain up here."

The wretched woman was really afraid to go down.  She must face
Bannister, but she did not mind that; there was Aunt Caroline to be
reckoned with, and she had no means of knowing how much the old lady
had overheard.

"I will take your advice, doctor, and go down."

"I saw a motor car in the stable yard.  Can't you go for a drive,
now?"

"There is no immediate danger?"

"No danger at all.  Miss Bannister is progressing most favorably, and
all your husband needs is quiet.  He will rest better when he cannot
talk to you and there is a comparative stranger attending upon him."

"I will try--I will try," murmured Lady Hester, and she left the
room, full of a new idea.  It was necessary to see Dick, to ask what
had transpired between him and Aunt Caroline.  Until she knew that
there was no hope of peace.

She found the lower rooms empty, but met Beatrice Carew at the foot
of the stairs, coming up with a bag of ice for her patient.

"Have you seen Mr. Bannister?" asked Lady Hester, without so much as
a good morning, or a word of surprise at finding her in the house.

"He was walking on the terrace just now, and I heard Jack say he
would take him round to look at the hired car.  You don't ask how
Mabel is?"

"Ah, how is she?"--this eagerly.

"She is better--much."

"Thank God!" murmured the wretched mother fervently, and Beatrice
stared to see her friend's agitation.  "Is Miss Cardew with her?"

Beatrice nodded.  At this moment Bannister entered from the garden,
smoking a cigar.

"Oh, Mr. Bannister, the doctor says I must get out into the air, and
recommends a drive in your motor car."

"I should esteem it an honor, Lady Hester.  My own car is not here;
but the one Jack came from town in is a very respectable vehicle, and
the chauffeur seems intelligent.  I will go and put on my things."

Voss passed along the gallery above.  Bannister's eyes shifted
quickly, and he suffered a momentary anxiety.  Voss's behavior had
been abominable since their quarrel, and he was afraid of what the
fellow might do.  Beatrice was quick to notice everything.  She saw
glances passing between Lady Hester and her guest, and was rather
disgusted at her ladyship's eagerness to get away in the motor.  But
she was not by nature uncharitable, and, taking into account her
knowledge of the real state of affairs between Jack and
Mabel--knowledge that was doubtless shared by her ladyship--she tried
to think that there was nothing very unusual in the close friendship
between Lady Hester and Jack's father-in-law.

Bannister had run upstairs after her ladyship, and whispered a few
sentences that were inaudible to the girl, passing on her way to the
sick room.  But she caught the word "emeralds."  It conveyed no
meaning, but it stuck in her memory, and she overheard Bannister
warning Lady Hester to beware of Voss.

* * * * * * *

Mr. Richard Bannister and Lady Cardew took the air in the hired motor
car.  They sat in the tonneau as far away from the chauffeur as
possible, and there was a glass screen behind the man, which made it
difficult for him to overhear the conversation.  They talked rapidly.

"What happened last night after I left?"

"The old woman burst in on me and told me that she had overheard."

"Overheard what!  For God's sake, tell me!  What does she know?"

"She knows that Mabel is our daughter, for one thing."

The wretched mother groaned and hid her face in her hands.  "What
else?" she asked hoarsely.

"Nothing more of importance.  She supposes our relationship was of
the usual order.  She did not credit you with so much virtue in your
youth that you insisted on being married before you ran away with me."

"Then she has no idea who you really are?"

"Not the slightest--except what she has learned from Mr. Crick.  But
she has formed a shrewd estimate on her own account, and has offered
me a very handsome sum of money to go away and take Mabel with me."

"Offered you money to take Mabel away?"

"Of course.  Could you expect so virtuous a spinster to countenance
the presence of a supposed child of sin in her brother's palace?"

"What did you say?"

"I startled her with the news that Jack and Mabel could not be so
easily separated, because they were married already; and she did not
seem much surprised, nor did she regard it as an unanswerable
argument.  She thrust her offer of money upon me again, on the
assumption that Jack and Mabel must part, in any case."

"Why?"

"Because of her parentage, first of all.  Secondly, because Aunt
Caroline does not approve of Jack's father-in-law.  She's a queer old
stick; but she's rich, and I could get what I liked out of her."

"You won't, Dick--oh, promise me you won't.  She is right in her way.
She does it for the best.  She hates me like poison, and now she
knows--oh, God help me!  What will happen?"

"She won't tell the Bishop."

"How do you know?"

"Her first anxiety is to stifle scandal and keep all worry from her
brother's ears.  To that end she offered me twenty thousand pounds to
go away."

"Twenty thousand pounds!" cried Hester incredulously.

"Well, not exactly so much, but she would spring that if I agreed to
her terms.  But it does not suit my convenience.  She wants me and
Mabel to go away abroad, and supposes that Jack would take the
business lying down."

"You won't take her money, Dick--you can't!"

"No, my darling.  But money I must have--to make me thoroughly
respectable.  You see, I have practically bought Dingle Hall, Jack
and Mabel are married, and--you and I are beginning to understand one
another."

He took her hand and held it.

"Don't--don't, Dick!  You make me sick when you say such things.
Can't you see that I am nearly crazy--that you terrify me?"

"Not so bad as that, surely," he laughed, and changed his seat that
he might come closer to her.  She tried to draw her fingers free, but
he held her fast.

"I think you have realized, my dear wife, that you must do as I say,
that I hold the balance of power, and can dictate my own terms.  We
can snap our fingers at Aunt Caroline.  She is crazy about Jack, and
the boy will give her a bad quarter of an hour if he gets an inkling
of what she's at.  He will pulverize her and break her silly old
heart.  No, it is purely a question of money; and you will find my
plan best, Hester.  Leave the window of your dressing room
unfastened, and the door of your safe unlocked.  There will be a
burglary, and the emeralds will be stolen.  I shall be fast asleep in
my room, and Voss will catch sight of a burglar disappearing down the
ivy outside the house.  It is his own plan, and a good one.  You have
no use for the jewels, whereas I have great need of the money they
will fetch.  It will be my last coup--the end of my Satanic career.
Ever after I shall live happy and good, and as content as Little Jack
Horner."

"Is that all you want?" she asked sarcastically.  But he mistook her
meaning, and looked earnestly into her eyes.  He gripped her fingers
more fiercely.

"No, by heaven, no!  You know that isn't all.  I regard the Bishop's
emeralds as ransom and hush money.  He has had my wife too long.  I
want her now to come back and be--friends with me."

"Do you think me so vile that I could live on in deceit?  You are
mad."

"My dear Hester, you have no option.  You are utterly at my mercy.
Don't drive me too far.  Do you want me to cry aloud your sin from
the house tops, and tell everybody that you hoodwinked the Bishop of
Ripley into marrying you by posing as a spinster when you were a
widow--and not even a widow?"

"Don't, don't!" she pleaded pitifully.

"Mabel and her husband will have to live on undisturbed, and Jack
must be kept in complete ignorance of her relationship to you."

"I shall tell my husband everything," cried the woman recklessly, and
wringing her hands in that weak, hysterical fashion that had become
common to her of late.

"I am your husband, darling.  Don't get misled.  You wouldn't like me
to sue for divorce and make your Bishop the co-respondent."

This was a new terror, which she had not contemplated.  She stared at
him in wild horror.  He laughed callously, because the idea was
manifestly absurd on the face of it.

"A Bishop in a divorce court!  How do you like the idea?"

"You are not a man--you are a fiend."

"I am very much a man, my darling.  It is just that which troubles
me."  He drew closer to her side, and spoke so softly that his words
were almost drowned in the whirl of the motor.  "If I were less of
the man and more of the monster I should insist on your handing over
the emeralds at once, on pain of my going straight to the Bishop and
demanding hush money.  But I want more than money.  I want you, my
sweet flower."

He glanced swiftly from left to right to see that they were not
observed.  They were passing through flat, open, deserted country.
He put his arm about her waist.

"Don't, don't!" she gasped, shrinking from him.  "We might be seen.
Keep away.  I can stand no more.  If you touch me I shall jump out of
the car and kill myself."

"No, my dear Hester, you are not of that sort.  If you were inclined
to do harm to your beautiful person you would have done it long ago.
No, you make a great fuss, you pose to yourself as a heroine, and
then you climb down and crawl round corners, and present a fair face
to the world.  You must come round my corner now.  I love you,
Hester.  Upon my soul, I do.  I have never forgotten--but I can
forgive."

"Take your arm away; for God's sake, leave me alone!  I'll do
anything you like--only, don't touch me, I beg."

"You were not so shy once upon a time, my dear Hester.  You knew how
to cling and to kiss.  You shall kiss me now."

He put his arm behind her.  She instinctively raised her hand to
protect her face, but he grasped her wrist, and drew her all the
closer.  She moaned like a thing in pain as he crushed her back
against the soft cushions and pressed kisses on her lips.  She tried
to call out, even to the driver, but the car roared on ahead, and her
cries were stifled in his beard.

"Ah, you are getting used to me again now.  It is quite like old
times, is it not?"

"Yes," she hissed.  "It is hell again."

He dropped her suddenly, but his hand closed upon her wrist like an
ever-tightening chain.  The intensity of his anger and his passion
were expressed in that grip, and a sense of powerlessness overcame
her.  She was frightened.  She knew that when he was angered and hurt
he could be cruel and brutal as the veriest ruffian.  He would be
sorry for it afterwards, perhaps, for, personally, he regarded all
ruffians as fools, and any outbreak of vigorous, natural feeling, was
contrary to his nature; but he was vindictive, and she prepared for
the worst.

He dropped her wrist, and rested back in his seat with affected
unconcern until the fit was passed and he could master his speech.

"The ways of heaven are sometimes dull, my dear Hester," he observed,
after a pause, "and a taste of hell will do you good after so much
sanctity in the shadow of a cathedral.  According to your religious
code, you are running a great risk of going to that most unpleasant
place hereafter by breaking an important commandment and living in
sin with a church dignitary.  You are my wife.  I claim.  I'll have
you back."

"No, no!" she pleaded; "I didn't mean what I said, Dick.  You must
know perfectly well that my life for the last twenty years has not
been all that I could have wished.  If we could have lived
happily--and you could have been a good man--it would have been
different.  You would have been different, too, Dick.  You had some
good in you in those days.  You had mercy, at any rate, and you were
never really brutal to me.  You are trying to drive me to kill
myself."

"Indeed, no; that is the last thing I desire.  I want you to
live--for a little while, at any rate, while the Bishop remains on
earth, which cannot be for very long after his stroke."

She said nothing, and schooled herself to make no reply to his
callous heart thrusts.

"There is only one difficulty in the way, that I see.  That infernal
old Caroline.  But I think I can manage her.  I haven't played my
last card yet.  The Rev. Judd--you remember the gentleman----"

She shuddered.

"Was a fine rascal, and I know pretty well the whole of his life.  It
was lucky he confided to me the story of his elopement with Miss
Cardew.  It gives me a hold over her."

"There is nothing in it that will give you a 'hold over her,' as you
call it."

"That is where you are wrong, my dear.  Her brother did not hear the
true facts of the case.  He heard the lady's statement, to the effect
that she ran away with the man as far as Dover, but, discovering his
vile intentions, returned by the next train.  She found the
explanation smug and appropriate, and it reflected credit upon the
lady.  If you were to go back over the years and follow the lady's
movements, you would find that, after recovering from the first shock
of her disillusionment, she found it necessary to travel and recover
her equilibrium.  She went to Switzerland----"

"She always goes to Switzerland."

"Just so--just so.  She went to Switzerland and traveled for a year.
She returned a grim, sullen, merciless woman."

"She goes to Switzerland every year."

"Yes; she goes to visit a little grave."

"A grave?"

"My dear Hester, you are very obtuse.  The grave of her dead child."

"Good heavens!--Caroline?" cried Hester, startled into momentary
forgetfulness of her own troubles by the revelation.  "I don't
believe it."

"Neither do I."

"Then why tell me such a hideous story?"

"Because I shall tell it to the Bishop if the old lady compels me to
use the weapon against her.  I have no other."

"She would deny it."

"To deny such a story is difficult.  The assertion once made sticks
forever.  It is so plausible.  Oh, you needn't look at me like that.
I'm not going to wreck the old lady's career just because, when she
was thirty, she ran away with a man ten years younger than herself.
I admire her pluck.  But in playing a bold game, my dear Hester, one
cannot be too particular about the weapons one uses."

"You horrify me.  You were not like this once.  You have changed
miserably.  No weapon is too unclean, no lie too foul."

"I have no mercy for silly women, especially those who interfere in
other people's affairs.  I never felt real tenderness for any woman
except you.  If you had not deserted me perhaps I should have come to
look upon life more from your point of view.  But you soured me, and
I quickly realized that great fundamental truth which was recently
crystallized in a remarkably clever music hall song, 'What's the good
of anythink?--nothink.'  That is my philosophy.  I made one
reservation, however, to the universal rule.  There is one good thing
that a man must have, and that is comfort.  Money is a means for that
end.  I once thought there was one good woman in the world, but it
seems I was mistaken even there, so you cannot blame me.  But the
woman, who was once good in heart, is still beautiful to look upon,
and delicious in her sweet influence over the pulses of the heart,
and is still able to provoke madness in man.  She also provides a
possibility of sport of the rarest and most amusing order--the
Bishop's lady and the Squire of Dingle Hall meeting by stealth,
loving in secret, and conducting a liaison! when all the time it is
make-believe, and the lady's conscience is quite clear, because her
lover will be her own husband, and the Bishop the cuckold left out in
the cold!  Your married life at the Palace has ended, my dear Hester.
You may remain there if you like.  I think it would be rather unkind
to the Bishop if you continued your present relationship--now that
you know your husband is alive.  Indeed, it would be wicked, and
contrary to the commandments."

She had collapsed, and lay back, pale and still, listening to his
cynical dissertation without the power of feeling.  She had reached
the end of her tether.  Misery held nothing worse for her than this
cold, calculating villainy.

He watched her with changing expression.  First, keen anger--for she
had bitterly stung him--then softening, and finally a troubled kind
of admiration.  Her physical influence over him was more than he
could bear.  All his cynicism and callous brutality melted under the
influence of that sweet personality.  He wanted to say that he was
sorry, to take her hand and kiss it, and beg for forgiveness, and
pray for a little kindness--a little of the old love--a flash of the
old gay, reckless Hester, who ran away with him and cried "Go hang!"
to the world.

She was quiet for such a long time that he feared she had fainted.
He put his hand upon her gently.  She drew away with a shudder, and
looked at him as at a monster.

His good resolutions died, strangled at their birth.  He laughed
bitterly and lighted a cigar.  She regarded this as a signal that he
had finished, and they were free to return.

For one wild moment she thought of denouncing him at the Palace as a
swindler and a rascal.  She could, at least, deny any outrageous
assertions he might make concerning her past, and the police would
take him away if she gave them certain information--at least, she
supposed they would.

But, then, there was Mabel, a girl pure and innocent, Jack's wife,
who would go down in the ruin of her father's reputation.

Only the miserable emeralds seemed to be standing in the way--for she
did not think his passion for herself would be greater than his
cupidity, or that he would press her far if she gave up the jewels
and made it a condition that he should never cross her path again.
Yet, of what use were conditions with such a man!  He would promise
anything and break his word at the first opportunity.

His caresses had produced a revulsion of feeling amounting to
positive hatred.  She looked at him out of the corners of her eyes,
as he lolled there smoking, and apparently enjoying the scenery, and
wondered if she could summon courage enough to kill him.  The blood
lust was on her for a few moments.  She could have opened a door and
thrust him out while the car.  was going at top speed if she could
have been certain that it would kill him.

"Shall we return now?" he asked.  "We have come a good many miles.  I
am sure you must be anxious to know how the dear Bishop is
progressing."

She nodded acquiescence.  He gave the order to the chauffeur, and for
a long time there was silence, broken at last by the man.

"Have you decided?"

"About the emeralds?"

"Yes."

"You shall have them--if you must."

"Ah, I thought your rigid morality was more elastic than you
pretended.  When shall they be--stolen?"

"Whenever you like.  But I make my conditions."

"Indeed!  I was not aware that you were in a position to make terms."

"I make them, nevertheless.  When the emeralds go, you go too."

"That would be most impolitic, even suspicious.  I shall remain to
advise you and the Bishop, and help in the hue and cry."

"If I let you have the emeralds you must go abroad.  You must abandon
Mabel to me, and you must never set foot in England again."

He laughed derisively.  "My dear Hester, you are humorous.  You are
as despotic as Aunt Caroline."

"Then, what am I to do?" she cried, weakly; "what am I to do?"

"Do, my dear Hester? accept the situation in its inevitableness.
Leave your safe door unlocked.  You need not hand over the jewels at
all.  Surely that will be a balm to your feminine conscience.  Leave
things alone and don't worry.  Jack must tell his father of the
marriage--when the old gentleman is better--and you, my wife, must be
the Bishop's wife in name only, until such a time as it pleases
Heaven to make you an ecclesiastical widow--when you will fall under
the fascination of the Squire of Dingle Hall and marry again.  It
will be a pretty comedy, and it will all end happily.  I am
positively yearning for that sort of respectability, and aching for
the services of a nice smug valet, a good chef, and a smart, amiable
household of servants devoted to my needs.  I want rest--and love.
There is no stimulant for a man like an honest passion for a
beautiful woman.  If she happens to be his wife, and he has to pursue
her over again and enslave her afresh, so much the better."

He talked on in this strain with all the egotism of the criminal, and
thoroughly believed what he said.  The woman endured it, and felt
like a condemned wretch listening to the monotonous sentences of the
Burial Service on her way to execution.  The conviction was forced
upon her that she was weak as water.  She was already subdued and
conquered, and quite incapable of battling with the remorseless
threatenings of this unscrupulous, masterful man.




CHAPTER XXIII

Bannister found Aunt Caroline waiting for him in the library with the
time table, as she had threatened.  She was amazed and scandalized to
find that her ladyship had gone in the motor with her guest while her
husband lay ill upstairs.  The fact that the doctor had prescribed
fresh air had no bearing upon the case, from her point of view,
knowing what she knew.

She sat in her high-backed chair by the library table, gazing out of
the window, seeing nothing, and muttering to herself.  Any wavering
in her resolution was over now.  This shameless intimacy between her
brother's wife and the rascal Dick Gordon made it more than ever
imperative that he should be got out of the way.

Bannister returned from the drive in good humor.  The report of
Mabel's progress was a great relief to him--greater than he would
have cared to admit--and contributed not a little to his pleasant
frame of mind.  He was winning all along the line.  Hester was
yielding.  He could afford to snap his fingers at the Bishop's sister.

The footman divested him of his coat--Voss did not appear--and gave
the information that Miss Cardew awaited him in the library.  He
sauntered in with an amused smile, and the old lady rose to greet
him.  She held in her hand the ominous time table.  He put up his
eyeglass and surveyed it with a quizzical smile.

"I said I should see that you went, and I am here."

"And so am I, Miss Cardew.  You surely do not suppose that I am going
away when my daughter lies ill upstairs?"

"My brother lies ill as well."

"The coincidence is unfortunate, but my hostess expects me to stay;
and, indeed, I believe the Bishop himself desires it.  My son-in-law
endorses their commands.  I could not possibly go away now."

"But I am willing to pay you."

"Miss Cardew, you insult me."

She laughed a harsh, bitter laugh, and sank down into a seat by the
table, motioning him to the lounge in front of her.  He dropped down
into a comfortable seat, still smiling that irritating smile of
amused contempt.

"You cannot deceive me.  You are extortionate, and this is your
method of fencing with me.  I mentioned a figure last night which was
not high enough for you.  How much do you want to go, and take your
child with you?  I will undertake to explain matters to my nephew."

"My dear Miss Cardew, I told you that if you offered me twenty
thousand pounds--an outrageous sum--it would have no effect."

"I shall tell my brother everything."

"It will kill him if you do.  I presume you have no financial
interest in his death."

She paled and faltered, but rage came to her assistance.  "You know
where to stab.  You are a coward, but you can't deceive me.  The
money I offer you is the greatest inducement.  I have not offered
enough.  You shall have ten thousand pounds; and I will provide for
your daughter's reception in some religious institution, where she
can be quiet and secure for the present, until she is ready to
consider what is best for the future."

Mr. Bannister burst out laughing, as though he were hugely tickled.
She watched him without moving a muscle.

"It is very pretty play.  You are a clever actor, Mr. Gordon.  I have
here bonds to the extent of four thousand pounds in this little bag."
She patted a velvet satchel that lay upon the table.  "The rest will
be sent to your bank--if you have one."

His mirth died down; and seeing her advantage, she took out the bonds
and spread them on the table.  The first thought that flashed through
his brain was a professional one--"I wonder where she keeps them--in
her brother's safe?"

"It is very unwise of you, Miss Cardew, to keep so much convertible
money in the house."

"Yes, when men like you are under the same roof."

"Madam, you are insulting."  He swung round and glared at her
angrily; then rose to his feet in virtuous indignation excellently
assumed.  "I don't want your money, and I think you would be well
advised to leave your nephew's and my affairs alone.  The past cannot
be undone, and good people like you with a past of your own should be
very careful how you jeopardize the future--especially when the
future concerns young people whose lives lie before them."

"I am thinking of my brother and my brother's wife, and of the secret
she carries in her heart, and of the tyranny that you exercise over
her."

"Are you sure, my dear Miss Cardew, that you are not thinking of the
secret that lies hidden in your own heart?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean the little grave in Switzerland."

"What little grave?"

"Do not force me to be more explicit.  Judd was an old friend of
mine, and I knew all the secrets of his life.  I am referring to the
journey to Switzerland after the fiasco of the elopement, and the
subsequent visits there every year.  The little grave in the
mountains, you know."

"What on earth are you talking about?"'

"Must I speak more plainly?  I mean your child's grave."

The old lady's face dropped in sheer astonishment, and she gazed at
him with glassy eyes.

"You wouldn't like the Bishop to know all Mr. Judd's secrets any more
than I should like him to know the unfortunate accident of Mabel's
parentage."

"You infamous scoundrel!" cried the old lady, starting up, and
clenching her bonds in her long, bony fingers as though she would use
them to strike him.

"Madam, I need say no more.  If you expose our secret we shall expose
yours.  You would never survive the scandal."

He bowed and left her speechless with rage, taking the newspaper with
him.  In the hall he discovered the easiest lounge in the sunniest
corner, and was soon deep in the morning's news.

Aunt Caroline was utterly astounded.  She seemed to be stunned, and
stood for a long time in one position, clenching the bonds she had
brought for Bannister, and staring into space.

* * * * * * *

The Bishop lay in bed and tossed restlessly.  He asked for his wife.
The nurse commanded him to silence--a difficult thing for the Bishop
of Ripley--and as he could not be pacified it was explained to him
that the doctor had ordered her to take the air.

He asked for his son, and Jack was sent for.  The old man grasped his
hand and shook it silently.  Then tears came to his eyes--he was
strangely weak.

"I'm so glad about the brewery, my boy--so glad," he murmured at
last.  "You've made a beginning."

"Yes, father.  The brewery company are going to retain me for all
their work.  They are tremendously pleased."

"That will mean an income, won't it, my boy?"

"Yes, father."

"And you'll be able to get married at once?"

"Yes, father."

This seemed the moment for confession, but the doctor had forbidden
excitement; Jack cursed his ill-luck.  It was possible to speak now.

"I hear that Mabel has had a fall, but the doctor thinks it won't be
much--poor girl, poor girl!"

"Yes; but you mustn't worry about that, and I mustn't stay with you
long.  The doctor's orders, you know, father."

"Doctor's orders--nonsense!  I am as well as anything.  Your aunt
angered me last night, and I was saying something heated, and
fainted.  I've got lots to do--lots to do.  But if I must stay at
home, I'll attend to home affairs.  When do you think you'll get
married?  We'll have the ceremony in the cathedral, of course.
You'll have to set things straight with your Aunt Caroline.  She has
a bee in her bonnet, and nothing I can say will alter her.  She has
taken an absurd prejudice to Mr. Bannister and a dislike to Mabel."

"No, father, I don't think she dislikes Mabel; she couldn't.  She has
been sitting with her this morning--nursing her, in fact."

"Oh, come, come!--that's better.  Well, then, we can consider
everything as settled.  You can write to our lawyers and arrange with
them to see Mr. Bannister about the settlements."

"It's rather an awkward thing for us to move in the matter, isn't it?
You see, he is making a settlement."

"Well, hurry on the wedding, anyway.  I suppose Hester will see to
Mabel's frocks, and all that sort of thing.  The girl has no mother.
I'll speak to her about it.  Let her come up to me directly she comes
in."

"Very well; you'll settle details with her.  I know nothing about
these things."

Thus Jack evaded the main issue and secured an excuse to escape from
the sick room.

Lady Hester had returned from her motor ride.  He was surprised to
see how pale and agitated she was.  He conveyed his father's message
faithfully enough.

"You see, Mabel has no mother," he urged, in a whisper, "and if we've
got to be married publicly, of course you will see to her trousseau,
and all that, won't you?"

"Yes, of course, but I can't bother with it now."

"No, of course not.  But father is sure to broach the subject."

"Well, he must be told that the doctor forbids discussions of any
kind," she answered rather snappishly, flinging off her coat.

"Hester, my dear," cried the Bishop, in the adjoining room, "I want
you."

She responded to his call, sending Jack away impatiently, and pulled
herself together and straightened her features into their usual
placid mould, ere she approached the bedside softly and calmly.  "I'm
not allowed to talk to you, John," she whispered, taking his hand in
her cold palm.  "The doctor forbids it."

"Nonsense, nonsense!  I'll change my doctor if he is so stupid.  That
wooden-faced nurse worries me.  I shall be much more easy if you are
here, dear."

"Yes, John, I should like to be with you."  Her voice faltered, and
she bent down and kissed him on the forehead.  She was trembling
badly, and he detected her agitation at once.

"My darling, you must not worry yourself about me.  It is
nothing--nothing.  I assure you I feel quite well.  Sit down by my
side.  Ah! it is in moments like these, when everybody else worries
me, that I appreciate the stately calm and placid repose of my
beautiful Hester."  He held her hand and patted it approvingly.  "I
was asleep just now, and dreaming troubled dreams.  I fancied I was
losing you.  You were receding further and further, and you had
things in your hand which you were hiding from me.  Strange--strange
how the thoughts of yesterday creep into one's dreams.  I couldn't
see what you were hiding, but I fancied they were the emeralds."

"How ridiculous!" she murmured, and leaned back in the cane chair by
the bedside to shade her face from his gaze.  Her hand remained limp
and cold, and he stroked it fondly.  It was a trick of his when they
were discussing purely domestic affairs, and his restless body was
momentarily at ease.

"I have just been telling Jack that the marriage must be hurried on.
We shall soon be too busy to have an affair of that kind hanging over
us.  I've been thinking it out, and wondering whether we ought not to
invite a good many people here for the wedding."

"Oh, no, no; let it be a quiet affair, John.  Jack wishes it, and so
does Mabel."

The Bishop was silent for awhile, then he chuckled to himself, as if
some idea tickled him.

"Why are you laughing, dear?"

"I was thinking of Caroline.  I was very angry last night; but,
really, it is too absurd.  I was thinking of her notion that Jack and
the girl were already married.  What ideas she gets into her head.
As if the boy would be such a sneak and a fool as to deceive me and
defy my authority by underhand conduct of that sort.  Mabel is too
proud and dignified a girl to lend herself to such nonsense.  And
Caroline, if she were not so blinded by prejudice, would see it--eh,
darling?"

"Yes, John."

The Bishop retained her hand, and she lay back, breathing heavily.
He dozed a little.  There was a long pause, broken only by the old
man's muttering as he sank deeper into the slumbrous shadows.  "Most
absurd!  Most uncharitable!  Most unkind!"

"Hush!" she whispered, disengaging her hand and bending over him to
gently smooth his pillow.  "Go to sleep, dear."

He was soon sleeping peacefully.  When the nurse came Lady Hester
raised her finger warningly.  The woman frowned to find her there,
and she stole away on tiptoe, closing the bedroom door behind her.
She let the latch go into its socket very gently, but, on turning
round, uttered a short, startled cry.  Voss was standing in the
middle of the dressing room.

"Oh, how you frightened me!"

"Pardon, my lady, but I thought you called."

"I called?  Why should I call you?"

"I was passing along outside, my lady, and somebody called.  I
thought it was my name I heard.  Sorry, my lady."

He backed out of the room, and not until he closed the door did she
remember the safe!  She ran to the wall and examined the door.  It
was securely locked, and the key was in her bosom.  She shut herself
in her own room, and locked the door on the corridor.  Then she
returned to the dressing room and turned the key in the door leading
to the passage also, but remembered as she did it that it must be
left open for the nurse to come and go, to avoid the necessity of the
woman passing directly into the Bishop's bedroom from the corridor
and disturbing him.  By leaving the door of the dressing room ajar
she was able to watch if he were sleeping without entering.

The wretched wife returned to her bedroom.  It was her only place of
refuge now.  She was driven from her husband's bedside, and she knew
that she had no right there.  That right, which had been hers for so
many years, suddenly became very precious.  The vigorous, kindly old
man, who made her his confidant in every thought and consulted her in
every act, was a tower of strength compared with the cynical,
calculating rascal down stairs who claimed her as his lawful wife.
She wanted to drop down by the Bishop's bedside and implore his
forgiveness and confess all.  But such an act was impossible in his
present state of health.  The web of falsehood and deception which
she had weaved about herself was closing tighter and tighter.  She
had no right to enter the holy man's presence.  She was vile and
unclean.  As he lay sleeping in the middle of the stately old bed,
with his arms straight down on the coverlet, he looked like a
recumbent saint; yet she, his well beloved and honored wife, had been
planning to rob him only an hour ago.  She had listened to the
arguments of a villain and hearkened greedily to the cry of
expediency.

She, too, was to become a thief--a thief's wife in reality, stealing
for her husband.

"No, no!" she cried, beating her throbbing temples.  "It is for
John's sake.  I am doing it for him.  He must be saved at all costs.
Mabel must be saved.  Jack's happiness must be considered.  I am but
a low, unclean thing, crawling at his feet, but I must not ruin him.
What does it matter what I do?"  Bannister's threat of the Divorce
Court was hideous to the woman accustomed to the preaching of a
Bishop who denied the right of the civil power to put asunder those
whom God has joined.  What an awful scandal?  He would put her away,
and she would be at the mercy of the man down-stairs, who made no
secret of his desires, and boldly proposed the most abominable
treachery.

Miss Cardew sent her a message requesting a talk in the up-stairs
study.

This was the thing she dreaded most of all.  She was up in arms in a
moment, ready to fight with the old weapons--denial and evasion.  She
had no excuse for avoiding the inevitable meeting, and braced herself
for the struggle.  She assumed an outward calm, and even straightened
her ruffled hair at the mirror, and used a little artifice to hide
the traces of recent weeping.  She entered the up-stairs study with
as much dignity as she could command, and Aunt Caroline was somewhat
surprised at the calm hauteur of her sister-in-law, whom she expected
to come before her trembling and humbled.  The old lady closed the
door and plunged into the thick of the matter at once.

"Hester, you know what I overheard last night."

"How should I know what you overheard?"

"I have no doubt you have taken means to discover from the man
downstairs."

"You mean Mr. Bannister," she replied loftily, and in a tone of the
greatest indifference.

"Hester, Hester, it is no good your treating me like this.  I know
your secret, and Mabel's.  It must be kept from my brother at all
costs.  You must get rid of that man somehow.  I've offered him
money, but he won't go.  How on earth could you ever have fallen
under the sway of such a rascal?"

"Did you not once fall under the sway of a rascal, Caroline?"

The old lady winced, and her voice shook when she next spoke.

"We are in the same plight, Hester, and women must stand by women.  I
have offered the fellow ten thousand pounds to go away, and he will
not.  What is the attraction?  He is a nobody, a scamp, and a
swindler, living by his wits.  What is it keeps him here?"

"I'm sure I don't know."

"Hester, I've been thinking things over, and I've come to the
conclusion that perhaps, after all, it would be better if Mabel
remained and the man went.  She is married to Jack, and nothing can
alter that.  She's a good girl, so far as I can understand, and knew
nothing of her father's history until quite recently.  If we can get
him to go away things might be patched up--or, rather, covered up.
It would break my brother's heart if he knew the kind of girl his son
had married; and it would enrage him fearfully if he knew that Jack
was already married.  It is miserable to have to stoop to such
deceptions, but we must keep their secret."

"I am glad you are taking a sane point of view at last," observed
Hester sneeringly.  "Whom God hath joined let no man put asunder."

"Yes, yes; that is agreed, then.  Jack need not know anything.  His
father need not know.  The marriage must take place in all its
mockery.  So far, so good.  What inducement can you give the man to
make him go?"

"I have done my best."

"Something is keeping him here.  Is it you?"

Lady Hester almost broke down.  She started and looked scared, but
recovered her self-possession quickly and replied foolishly, "Is it
remarkable that he should find some fascination in the woman he was
once crazy about?  Oh, don't look alarmed--don't be frightened.  I
hate him.  I loathe the sight of him.  I wish he were dead.  God
forgive me for the thought; but I sometimes wish I had the power to
kill him."

The elder woman was silent for a time, lost in thought.  Lady Hester
fidgeted uneasily, and wondered what was coming next.  It was a long
time before the other spoke.

"I'll offer him twenty thousand pounds; and the girl must remain,"
she exclaimed at last.  "You must add your entreaties, Hester--go on
your knees if necessary.  He must have his price--he must have his
price!"

Hester echoed the words as if they were a prophecy and a
pronouncement of doom.

The old lady left her, apparently to seek Bannister and make fresh
offers, and she roamed about the upper part of the house in a fever
of misery and doubt.

He must have his price.  The price was a base and horrible surrender
of her womanhood and the robbery of her husband.  Caroline Cardew
would be able to do nothing.  It was herself he wanted.  She had seen
the passion in his eyes, heard the old thrill in his voice, and knew
that he would forsake the old adventurous paths for softer, easier,
pleasures, and greedier lust.

She passed the door of her daughter's room, which adjoined
Bannister's, and stopped to listen outside.  She could not trust
herself to go in, not knowing what reception her daughter would give
her, or whether, if she were too ill to speak, her presence might not
agitate the patient.  She longed to fling herself in Mabel's arms and
sob out her misery.

While she stood there the door of the adjoining room opened, and
Bannister walked out.  He had taken refuge upstairs from the
importunity of Aunt Caroline, for one reason, and, for another, to
keep an eye on Voss, who was strangely evasive.  He stepped out
almost into his wife's arms.  She uttered a little cry, and drew
away; but he greeted her with a whisper, and, after a stealthy look
round, approached her swiftly, and slipped his arm about her waist.

"Don't--don't!" she cried, as loudly as she dared.  He drew her to
him and kissed her on the lips.  She protected her face with her hand
and hissed her annoyance; but he attacked her more savagely, and with
a soft laugh of triumph put his face closer and kissed the soft white
neck below the pink shell-like ear.  She moaned her disgust, and
tried to strike him; but he only caught her wrist, and laughed.

She begged piteously to be released, for the door of Mabel's room
behind him had opened, and Beatrice Carew stood in the opening.  She
must have seen everything.  She was about to step out on to the
corridor, but, finding that she was spoiling "sport," stepped back
again, blazing with contempt and indignation.

"I shan't have a shred of reputation left," cried the wretched woman
in agony.  "This is the end.  You can do your worst.  It is over.  If
you touch me again I shall kill you."

He laughed and shrugged his shoulders.  "You will feel better
presently.  I apologize for my idiotic lack of caution--it is unlike
me.  But--but, there, Hester, you always rouse me out of myself and
make a different man of me."

"It is finished; do you understand?  I have done!" she cried,
standing in the doorway of her dressing-room.

"No, my dear Hester, I shall come to you to-night for that little
transfer that we discussed.  When everybody is asleep you can hand me
the small parcel, and I will arrange that to-morrow--while the
household are at dinner--but you know the rest.  You must pay your
ransom.  After that I shall rely upon persuasion, not force.  Oh, we
shall become great friends."

"Never!  If you drive me too far--you know how I shall end it.  And
if the spirits of the dead haunt the living, I shall haunt you to
your dying day."

"Mere melodramatic heroics, my dear Hester.  Don't talk so loudly.
Let us say half-past twelve, The house will be asleep then.  Lock the
door of the room adjoining the Bishop's bedroom in case that infernal
nurse sleeps lightly."

She made no reply, and he descended the stairs, as if the matter were
settled.




CHAPTER XXIV

Midnight.  A deep stillness at the Palace; but lights burned in some
of the windows.  The nurse, by the doctor's orders, slept on a couch
in the Bishop's bedroom.  The patient was not feeling nearly so well
as in the morning, and realized at last that he was very ill.  He was
slumbering heavily, and the nurse was deep in her first doze.  A
shaded lamp burned in the dressing room adjoining, and to the left,
in Lady Hester's bedroom, a light showed under the door.

The unhappy woman had prepared for rest, but a great terror was upon
her, and she dared not sleep until after half-past twelve.  Her
husband had threatened to come for the emeralds, and she believed
that he would keep his word--though how he intended to communicate
with her at such an hour was not clear.

The key of the safe nestled in her bosom, tied round her neck with a
stout ribbon.  She wore a dressing-gown, and resolved that the key
should not leave her keeping under any circumstances whatever.  She
was bold with a desperate courage now, and determined to defy him,
but weary to the verge of exhaustion.  The worst that might happen
could bring no more pain than the agony of suspense in which she had
lived for the last few days.

The conviction was forcing itself upon her that it would be
impossible to keep her secret for ever.  To be in Bannister's power
would make life a hell; and to rob her husband of his cherished
heirlooms in this hour of sickness was equally impossible.  She saw
her way clearly enough now.  Her only anxiety was to tide over the
crisis till the Bishop should recover, and be able to face the
truth--the ghastly, humiliating truth.  She had no right to expect
that he would forgive her.  But if she paid hush-money in the form
that Bannister suggested, in order to shield him from shame, he would
condemn her sevenfold for adding sin to sin, deception to deception,
treachery to treachery.

The door of the dressing room leading out on to the corridor was of
necessity left unlocked for the convenience of the nurse, but the
iron cupboard in the wall was quite secure.  No person could enter
without being heard in the bedrooms.  Lady Hester had ceased to use
that way out since the nurse required it, and communicated with the
corridor by her own bedroom door.

She sat in a luxurious chair by the dressing-table, trying to read by
the light of the candles, and force her mind to work coherently and
surrender to discipline.  She hardly expected to sleep at all that
night, but she had been awake for so many hours that slumber would
surely come if she could only bend her faculties to the scanning of
print.

She perused many pages without understanding a line; but still she
persevered, and the paragraphs were beginning to sort themselves out,
and the sentences conveyed a few extraneous ideas.

She was startled by a rustling behind her, and looked round
nervously.  The door had been opened noiselessly, and a dark shadow
in the corner of the room was closing it again.  She saw a man's
black coat and the gleam of a white shirt-front, and leapt up with a
little scream.

Bannister raised a warning finger, and she was cowed into silence at
once.  The breath oozed out of her body, and she could not speak, but
stood, resting one hand on the back of the chair.  The book fell from
her fingers to the floor with a thud.  She tried to address him, but
he raised his finger again, and turned the key in the door with a
soft click.  This audacity was amazing; yet she could not cry out,
nor demand any explanation.  She knew why he had come.

With cat-like tread he crossed to the other door, the one leading to
the dressing room, and locked that too.  She had recovered a little
by this time.  Her anger, was rising, and she stood glaring
reproachfully.  His cool insolence in entering without knocking and
the quiet deliberation of his movements, turned her anger into fear.
She pointed with outstretched finger to the door by which he had
entered, and stood waiting for him to go, knowing perfectly well that
he would do nothing of the kind.

He put out his hand in silence, and looked round the room with keen
scrutiny, as much as to say, "Where are they?  Give them to me."  His
eyes roamed over the dressing-table, but he saw no emeralds, and,
coming close to her, he looked into her white face.

"You know why I have come," he whispered.  "You should have been
ready for me.  Ah, I see you were ready.  You have put on a charming
gown, and that lace peeping through suggests--shall we say coquetry?"

"Leave this room!  If you don't I shall raise an alarm."

"What, and compromise yourself in the eyes of your own servants?  You
must be hungering for scandal, my dear wife.  Surely there is danger
enough of that without silly scenes at midnight.  Where are the
emeralds?"

"In the safe."

"Then you will get them for me?"

"No.  I will die first!"

"That will be quite unnecessary, my dear Hester.  But if you don't
give them to me I shall take the other course, and demand you instead
of the gems.  You are looking ravishly.  Kiss me, my dear wife."

He came quite close, and looked into her eyes with more tenderness
than was to be expected from a disappointed thief; but she drew away,
and clasped her hands appealing for mercy.  She was terrified by the
light in his eyes.

He took one step forward and clasped her in his arms.  She breathed
heavily, and groaned as though he had struck her, but the next moment
he clapped a hand over her mouth to stifle her screams.

"Steady, my dear Hester, steady.  I'm not trying to throttle you.  I
only want to hold you in my arms for a few moments.  Thus does
sentiment interfere with business.  Instead of hectoring, and being
angry with you, and threatening, I just hold you in my arms--so.
You'll have to be friends with me, and stifle that tender conscience
of yours.  You'll find it pleasant enough.  The loss of the gems
won't hurt anybody; and, as for you, you will gain a new lease of
life.  Things will hum once more.  The dreary dullness of this stupid
place has deadened your spirits.  You will live again--in my arms."

"Let me go--let me go!  For pity's sake--no, no!  Don't force me to
scream and raise an alarm, and bring the whole house here.  There's a
woman in the next room----"

"No, my dear, there is not.  I looked in, and the room was empty."

"Hush!  I heard some one."

There was certainly a slight rattling sound.  They listened together
intently--but he did not release her from his arms.  He was
magnetized by love, she paralyzed by fright.

"I'm sure I heard some one.  Oh, let me go!  We shall be heard."

He released her arms, but she was more absorbed in listening than in
troubling about his embrace.  He dropped away, and crept to the door
leading to the dressing-room.  This he unlocked with extreme caution,
then beckoned to her to come and look out, while he opened it and
stood behind.  There was a light there, nothing else.  It was fancy.

She drew back again and closed the door, lest the nurse should
appear, and turned the key.

"Ah, you are getting sensible already, and appreciate the advantages
of privacy.  But we shall have to unlock the door again, because I
want you to go to the safe."

He grasped her arm in a kindly way, and tried to draw her to him, but
she flung him off and retreated to the other side of the room.

"No--no--no!  I'll denounce you.  I'll denounce you to all the world
for what you are.  You shall go to jail with the other thieves who
have not been so successful in evading justice."

"And you, my dear, what will you do when your real husband stands in
the dock and the Bishop is in the divorce court?" he asked
laughingly.  His eyes were sparkling, and his pale cheeks crimsoned.
There was a red flush beneath the eyes--strangely like the old Dick
Gordon.

"Stand away!" she cried, speaking so loudly that he faltered
apprehensively.  "You will leave this room at once.  You will go
straight out, and I shall lock the door after you."

He shook his head and smiled.

"Then I shall call for assistance and seek the protection of my
husband."

"But I am your husband, darling.  You can't go to the Bishop and give
him a shock that might kill him.  You will alarm the nurse and
agitate the old man."

"I shall scream."

"If you do he'll think you're being murdered, whereas you're only
being--loved."

He leapt at her and took her in his arms again.  She collapsed with a
sob, and covered her face with her hands.  But he pressed kisses on
her lips and fought with her savagely; kissing her eyes when her lips
were behind her clenched hands--her cheeks, her soft white neck, and
last her hair, her beautiful hair, which had only been loosely looped
up and fell in fiery flames about her head.  He spread it over his
palms and put it to his lips, giving way to a frenzy of adoration,
and sweeping all before him with his passion, while she gasped in
fright, not knowing what to do, his movements were so rapid.

Now her two hands were in his, and her fingers pressed to his lips;
now he dropped upon one knee, and flung his arms about her waist.
His movements, though passionate and hasty, were gentle and reverent
when she was passive.  His tenderness disarmed her opposition, and
only left her dazed and stupefied.  There was no brutal ferocity.  It
was the old Dick who loved her, the old passion, the old wild
admiration and ecstasy provoked by her strange, luminous beauty,
which dazzled, bewildered, overpowered him, and rendered him, for the
moment, powerless and abject in his adoration.

He was ripe at that moment for any folly that she demanded of him.
If she had beseeched, and used her woman's weapons, or vouchsafed him
a little tenderness, he would have abandoned everything--the
emeralds, the persecution, the terrifying threats, and the brutal
caresses that her opposition provoked.  This was the nobler Dick
Gordon, who had surrendered her years ago when she was utterly in his
power--because he loved her.  This was the Dick Gordon who was always
kind to women--who were beautiful.  This was the man with an infinite
capacity for folly, whom she could have twisted round her little
finger if she had descended to employ the ancient wiles and subtle
artifices of her sex.

But she was too terrified.  The room swam round, the lights on the
table blinked, and there was only a yellow haze between them, through
which her husband's melting eyes loomed bright and near.  She was
horrified at her own powerlessness.  His lavish caresses provoked no
further rage.  She wanted to cry, to sob, and fight no more.  With a
supreme effort she mastered herself and closed her eyes, and
clenching both her fists, struck him full in the face.  He retreated
a step or two, and recovered himself with an effort.

She was glaring like a wild cat, and ready to strike again; the man
was still as stone, pale as death, recovering himself.  He stood
watching her contemplatively, and she was frightened.  She could read
the thoughts flying in his brain.

"What shall I do with her?  How shall I punish her?  She shall have
no mercy."  His fingers clenched and unclenched, as though they were
coming at hen throat.  His jaw moved as he positively ground his
teeth with suppressed fury.

"Dick--Dick--I didn't mean to do that.  You went too far--I told you
that it was all finished.  Dick--Dick--leave me--go away; I can see
what you're thinking.  Let me go!"

She tried to pass him, and rushed for the dressing room door.  But he
seized one wrist and swung her round.  She was about to scream, but
he covered her mouth.  She bit his hand as he pressed her head back
and slipped an arm about her waist, so that she was bent double
backward, choking.  He held her thus in a grip of steel till the
screaming fit left her, and by the signs she made with her hands he
understood that she promised to keep quiet.

"No sound, do you hear--do you understand?" he whispered in her ear,
and he released her by degrees, until she fell into a chair, limp and
exhausted.  He bent over her and thrust out his left hand.  "The
key--the key of the safe!  Give it to me!"

She recovered slowly, and clenched her hands obstinately; but she
dared not meet his gaze, and stared at the floor.  The neck of her
dressing-gown had been torn open, and the lace of her _robe de nuit_
as well.  The ribbon round her neck showed distinctly over the edge
of the lace.  His sharp eyes saw it, and he instantly divined its
purpose.  Without a word he suddenly slipped his fingers inside the
ribbon.  She shrank away, ready to protest again that she must not be
touched, but the ribbon was snapped, and he whipped it out, key and
all, before she realized what had happened.

"Thank you; I have helped myself," he said coldly, as he wound the
ribbon round the key and put it in his pocket.  "To-morrow it will be
used.  And to-morrow night there will be a burglary.  You understand?"

She held out her hands for the key imploringly, but he walked towards
the door.  "Not a word of this, and no opposition, if you please.  If
you balk me--I'll kill you."

He looked as though he meant it.  His face was colorless, except at
one spot where she had struck him on the cheek, which glowed in a
significant patch.

While this scene had been in progress, carried on _sotto voce_, with
whisperings and sobs, there had been a listener outside the door on
the corridor.  He was not much wiser than when he took up his station
at the keyhole.  The faithful Voss had followed his master like a
cat, and was at the door the moment it closed.  He heard
expostulations and appeals, and guessed that the gems were changing
hands.  Indeed, Bannister had warned him to be ready with his wire
and chisel on the morrow, because a burglar might "at any moment
enter the house."  Although the two men were not on speaking terms,
yet business was business, and Bannister had vouchsafed this
necessary information, partly in the hope that it would cheer Voss
and enable him to recover from his amazing sulks.

The fellow, however, was not recovering.  The crushed worm had
turned.  He had been trodden upon too brusquely, and, unfortunately,
retained no respect for the misapplied boot.

When Bannister approached the door to unlock it was the signal for
Voss to leap away and hide himself flat against the wall further down
the corridor.  But his master did not come out for a few moments.  He
stood with the handle of the door in his hand, looking back at his
wife, smiling in cynical triumph, but not yet recovered from his
rebuff.  He surveyed her callously and cruelly, and with a leering,
lustful admiration.

She read his thoughts.  He was meditating the worst of all
brutalities.  She flung up her hands as if to ward him off, and
dashed for the door of the dressing room again before he could
prevent her, turning the key and standing ready to escape if he
showed the slightest sign of advancing.  He shrugged his shoulders
and laughed sneeringly as he let himself out on to the corridor, and
bowed sarcastically to his trembling wife.  In his own room the
lights were burning; but he looked round in vain for Voss.  The
fellow had put everything ready for the night, and had apparently
gone to bed without permission, and contrary to the usual custom.

The victorious rascal laughed at this also, muttering, "He'll get
over it when it really comes to business.  I've got the key--but I've
lost--bah! away with sentiment!  It has been the ruin of too many
clever men."

He secured his door, and took the key of the safe to the light and
examined it.  "She'll want it back in the morning.  Its absence might
excite comment," he thought.  Then he ransacked his portmanteau for a
little box of wax.  This he softened in hot water, and took a
"squeeze" of the key.

He examined the pattern, and laughed contemptuously.  "Why, it is a
common, ordinary key--not a burglar-proof safe after all.  Just a
thing for holding books.  Voss will be able to match this with one of
his skeletons without going to the trouble of using a file."

He dropped the key into his cigar-case, and pocketed it.  Then he
undressed, smoking several cigarettes during the process, which was
always a lengthy and very deliberate one.  Once or twice he sighed as
he thought of the scene in his wife's room, which had ended rather
tamely.  He alternated between sentimental disappointment, wounded
vanity, and rage.  The conviction was forced upon him that Hester
would never go back to the old love, the old subjection.  She was
stronger, more desperate, and courageous than the timid, horrified
girl of years ago, who flung herself upon his mercy, and exacted the
great sacrifice upon her knees.

The present, made Dingle Hall and the respectable future seem a dull,
unlovely, prosy prospect.  He had not even Mabel's love now.  The
girl regarded him as a monster.  That was his own fault for rearing
her in honesty and innocence.

All the good he had ever done in life seemed to have recoiled upon
him, to bring misery for his declining years.

Voss, after seeing his master safely in his room, wandered like an
uneasy spirit about the corridors, listening at doors and looking out
of windows.  He turned his attention to those doors which showed, by
the light through the crack underneath, that the occupants were not
yet asleep.

One by one the lights went out, until only the sick-room, the
dressing room, and Lady Hester's own apartment showed signs of life
within.  Bannister's own door was dark, and a full twenty minutes
elapsed before Voss paid any attention to that room.  Then he knelt
upon the mat and put his ear to a panel in a vain endeavor to listen
to the sleeper's breathing.  He was dissatisfied with his want of
success, and afraid to enter.  He stole down the corridor again to
Lady Hester's room.  The light here was extinguished at last, from
which he assumed that her ladyship had retired for the night.  All
was still in the sick-room.  Apparently everybody was in that first
strong sleep which is generally the deepest.

He returned to his master's door and listened again.  He could hear
nothing, but the clock below chimed the half-hour, and impatience got
the better of him.  Again kneeling on the mat, he turned the handle
ever so slowly--a scarcely perceptible movement--until the door moved
inwards, and opened far enough for him to thrust his head through and
peer in.

An uneasy sigh and a deep-drawn breath told him that troubled sleep
had settled on his master, and that it was safe to enter cautiously
on his hands and knees.

Voss was "on his own" to-night, and bent upon a treacherous
undertaking.  He was staking all upon one hazard.  He moved so slowly
and patiently that even if the sleeper had not been deep in the
slumber pit and dreaming of other things, he would not have heard him.

Now he was at the dressing-table, with one stealthy hand creeping at
the exact spot where Bannister was accustomed to put his watch and
chain and the contents of his pockets.  With methodical precision
Bannister had followed his usual custom; everything was there, even
to the purse containing the key of the safe, and some loose gold.  He
had supposed his belongings to be quite safe, and the idea of Voss
rebelling and taking such an audacious step never entered his head
for one moment.  Voss knew exactly where his master would put the
precious key, and located it in a few moments.  The watch and the
chain and the coins were transferred silently as well.

He crawled swiftly away now, but just as silently, and at last stood
upright in the corridor; closing the door behind him, but first
taking the precaution to remove the key and insert it outside.

To lock Mr. Bannister in was the next step, and it was accomplished
noiselessly.  After that he turned his attention to the other rooms.
Locked doors were not the rule in the Palace.  The keys were big and
old-fashioned, and small bolts above the locks answered all the needs
of the occupants.  Consequently, when, earlier in the day, Voss had
put the keys outside, no one noticed the change.  The locks worked
smoothly, thanks to a preliminary oiling, and Miss Cardew, Beatrice
and Mabel, and lastly Jack, in his little room at the other side of
the house, were all locked in by the cautious thief.  Access to the
Bishop's corridor from the servants' quarters could only be had from
the back stairs through a green baize door, which was never
locked--indeed, it had no lock.  He could not fasten this, but he was
equal to this emergency.  He screwed a stout gimlet through the
woodwork into the frame, and nothing short of a sledge hammer or a
jimmy would have opened it.

These preparations complete, he turned his attention to his personal
appearance.  He was wearing a short dust coat, and from a capacious
inner pocket drew out a large cricket cap, a size too big for him,
and drew it down over his eyes till the peak touched the tip of his
nose.  It was as effective as a mask.  Over his shoes he drew a pair
of thick woollen stockings.  Thus attired he was ready to tackle the
dressing room and the safe.

He listened outside Lady Hester's and the Bishop's room as well, and
stopped upon the mat of the dressing room.  He was shaking with tense
excitement, and his fingers played eagerly upon the key of the safe.
Ere he turned the handle he remembered a weapon of defence in an
inner pocket, and brought it to a convenient outer one.  It was a
knuckle duster.  He also carried a revolver, which he thrust into his
waistcoat, below his tie, after loosening the top button.  It was
uncomfortable, but handy, and the little black stock was ready to be
gripped at a moment's notice.

The dressing room door opened easily enough.  A dim lamp burned
within, and the room was empty.  The door of the Bishop's bedroom was
closed--this was a stroke of luck, for he had fully expected to have
to crawl past the open door on his stomach, and run the risk of being
seen by a wakeful invalid.  His exultation was so intense that he
stepped into the room with a bound, and his woollen covered boots
slid on the polished parquet.  The stockings, which were noiseless
and gave a steady foothold on carpet, slid away on the polished wood
and nearly sent him sprawling.

He recovered, breathless and palpitating, ready to retreat at the
first sound; but after a few moments of anxious listening, with every
nerve strained to such a tension that his brain threatened to snap,
while the light of the lamp blinked in his eyes in a yellow haze that
blotted out his sight, he made a dash on tiptoe for the door of the
safe.

The key fitted easily, worked without complications, and the contents
were at his mercy.  He could not resist dragging open the door with a
mighty pull, ready to make a blind grab at the contents and defy all
the world, if necessary, now that the die was cast.

The safe opened with a great sob, as such things do when a vacuum is
suddenly created by the moving bulk of the iron door, and the latch
of Lady Hester's door rattled ever so slightly as though from the
sudden displacement of air.  She was not asleep, but was far enough
away from immediate surroundings to be brought back to consciousness
of her position by the rattling of the lock and that strange, dull
"pouf" of the opening safe.  It was more fanciful than real, and all
was quiet enough; yet she leaped out of bed, quaking with terror.
Bannister's assertion that the robbery would take place to-morrow had
given her a respite: now she realized, in a rush, that the jewels
were at his mercy to-night if he chose to take them.

With stealthy, shaking fingers she slipped on a dressing gown,
intending to light her candles and sit up for the rest of the night
with the door of her dressing room open.

The light through the keyhole of the dressing room door gleamed like
a golden bead, then went out, and flashed alight again.  Some one was
passing to and fro in the next room.

"He has deceived me--he has deceived me--he is rifling the safe."

Her first impulse was to rush out and denounce him, but dread of
exposure and amazement at his audacity held her spellbound.  She
dared not raise an alarm.  If she interfered with him now, there was
no knowing what violence he might do.  But to allow the robbery
without a protest she would not.

Not pausing to put on anything more than her dressing gown, and with
bare feet, she stepped out onto the dark corridor, intending to
waylay the thief after he left the dressing room, and threaten, and
frighten him--if that were possible.

The door of the dressing room was standing open.  She waited.  The
stillness within was so intense that, for a moment, her fears died
down, and she imagined that she had been needlessly alarmed by the
movements of the nurse.  She took one step within the room and stood
paralyzed with fear.

The door of the safe was open, and the contents of the upper shelf
were strewn about the floor.  A hunched-up figure was stooping, half
in and half out of the safe, and groping excitedly--so eagerly that
he forgot to muffle his heavy breathing, which made a considerable
noise.

This was not her husband.  The squat figure in the hideous cap
suggested a ruffian at first.  But he did not look large or powerful,
and she mastered her fear.  One cry would raise an alarm, and the
nurse was at hand.  She drew back until the door hid her, and peeped
round.

In lightning fashion she reviewed the situation, and in those
watching moments found time to wonder whether her husband would be
driven to a frenzy of revenge if she balked this rascal, who was
doing his dirty work, and what would happen to herself.

A sudden gasp of excitement from the crouching figure.

He had alighted upon the treasure.  The jewels clicked as he gathered
them in handfuls and slipped them into the inside pockets of his coat.

This was more than flesh and blood could stand.  She raised her hand,
and held it poised one moment--only for one moment--then thrust the
door open noisily and entered.

"What are you doing here?  You are a thief!  Help!"

She screamed the last word, and Voss, who was down on one knee,
almost fell over backwards in his confusion and amazement.  She rose
white and tall in front of him, like an apparition, with arms
extended, as if about to pounce upon him.  Her eyes blazed in the
light of the lamp, and her wonderful hair streamed about her
colorless face, red as blood.  She recognized him when he stood up.

"Oh, it's you, you rascal!" she cried.  "Help!"

His two hands went for her throat.  She backed away from him, alert
and courageous, with desperation; but in her retreat she struck the
open door and closed it behind her inadvertently.  Thus she
effectually barred his way of escape.

"Help!" she screamed again, and the nurse in the Bishop's room began
wrenching at the handle of the carefully locked door.  Voss leaped at
the disturber again, and seized her throat and flung her round, but
she clung to his coat in falling, and held on to him like a wild cat,
and he could not shake her off.

"Leave go!--do you hear?--or it'll be the worse for you," he hissed,
thrusting her away with his left hand and groping in his pocket with
the right for a weapon.

She divined his intention and seized his wrist, and at the same
moment struggled to her feet again.  He made another dash at her, and
caught her as she was tottering.  He swung her round and dashed her
across the room, so that she fell backwards on the sharp edge of the
latch of the open safe door with a horrible thud, and went down like
lead, sprawling her length upon the polished floor.  He stumbled and
slipped as he recovered his balance, and cursed, and was about to
raise his weapon to strike her into silence, when his eyes fell upon
her white, upturned face, parted lips, and rolling eyes.  He stayed
his hand.  He was only half a ruffian, and preferred quiet methods.
She no longer impeded his flight, and was incapable of rising.  By
her side lay the magnificent necklace which had dropped from his hand
in the struggle.  He grabbed at it, and stuffed it inside his coat
with the other gems and fled.  It was now that he reaped to the full
the benefit of his policy of locked doors.

The nurse could not get into the dressing room in response to Lady
Hester's appeal, and rattled helplessly at the lock.  The thief was
down the stairs and out of a window, by a route previously prepared,
before her cry found an echo in the house.  The other occupied rooms
were far away; so she resorted to the window.

The Bishop had started up in bed, and sank back helpless.  In answer
to his inquiries she explained in a few words that something had
happened to Lady Hester in the next room, and she had heard cries for
help, but could do nothing.

The locked door at once suggested treachery and a burglary.

"The safe is in that room," gasped the Bishop, as he struggled with
the thumping of his heart.  The nurse screamed out of the window, and
presently other windows opened, and the men servants were alarmed.
Jack himself at the other side of the house was one of the first to
answer.  He dashed for his door, but, finding it locked, turned to
the window and let himself down that way on to the leads of the
library below.

Yet nearly half an hour elapsed before any one could get to the
dressing room, so artfully had Voss laid his plans.  Bannister
himself was the last to hear the commotion.  He listened to the
patter of feet and talk of excited voices, and at first supposed that
the Bishop had had a relapse--or perhaps Mabel had succumbed.  For
the first time for many years he went sick with agonized suspense.
His child was more to him than he had ever imagined.  He almost
resented his womanish weakness; his hands shook and his teeth
chattered, as he groped for a light.  When he lit a candle he noticed
nothing unusual.  His dressing gown was where he had thrown it, and
he slipped it on and tried to go out onto the corridor.  The locked
door angered him, but at first he supposed it to be an accident, and
groped for the key.

The sounds in the house grew louder.  Men's voices could be heard
shouting from outside.  From the window he saw lanterns waving.  It
was either a burglary or a fire, but as there were no flames the idea
of fire was ruled out.  It must be a burglary.  For a few moments he
stood ready to laugh at the amazing coincidence of a real thief's
attack upon the house just at the time when he was planning a sham
affair of the same kind.  When he remembered the stupid, insecure
safe he quaked for his emeralds.  He gave one glance at the dressing
table, where the key rested safely in his purse--and lo! the purse
was gone.  His watch and chain--his money--everything of value--even
the gold cigar case.

Voss!--it was Voss!

He almost yelled with rage.  He cursed and swore.

"The scoundrel--the traitor!"  He made another futile attempt upon
the locked door, and beat upon it with his fists.

The servants on the corridor called out that they were unable to
relieve him.  All the doors were locked, and the keys were missing.
The gardener had gone for a hammer to break them in.

Jack was the first person to reach the Bishop's corridor.  He gained
entrance to the house by the very window through which Voss had made
his escape, and came rushing upstairs just as the servants reached
the lower portion of the house by the back staircases and the
servants' wing.  He ran to the dressing room, and the sight that met
his gaze made him gasp for a few moments.

The safe stood open and its contents were strewn about the floor.  In
front of it Lady Hester lay upon her back, senseless and still as
death.  From her forehead a thin stream of blood had started, and the
crimson stream had trickled to the floor.

"What has happened--what is it?" he asked of the motionless form, and
bent over it.  Ere he touched her limp and lifeless fingers an
impatient demand from the nurse at the door of his father's room drew
him away.

He turned the key, which Voss had left in the lock, and the woman
came out, white and scared.

"What is it, sir--what has happened?"

"For God's sake, tell me what has happened, Jack?" cried the Bishop
piteously.

The nurse gave one glance down, and looked at the young master in
speechless horror.  He raised one finger warningly.  "You mustn't
tell him," and with admirable promptness replied--

"Burglars, father.  They've been at the safe."

"But your mother.  I thought I heard a cry."

"Yes, she's fainted, father.  The nurse is bringing her round."

"No worse?" murmured the Bishop.  "I feared it might have
been--ah--thank God."  He sank back on his pillow.

Jack closed the door and shut him in, then ran out onto the corridor
and hushed the loud voices of the excited servants who were hurrying
up the stairs.

"Remember my father is ill.  Go quietly.  Her ladyship is hurt.  One
of you go for the doctor, and let some one fetch the police.  Where's
the chauffeur who came down with me from town?"

"Here I am, sir," cried the man, who was among those crowding in the
darkness at the bottom of the stairs.

"Get the car round.  Bring me a big coat.  I'll go myself."

His attention was drawn away by a violent beating on the panels of a
door lower down the corridor, and he thought of his wife.  He dashed
that way, only to find Beatrice inside Mabel's room calling for
release.

"Is all well with you?" he cried.

"Yes," she replied, "but we are locked in."

"But Mabel; is she all right?"

"Yes.  Mabel, speak to him yourself."

A tremulous voice reassured him, but further sounds were drowned by
the banging on Bannister's door.

"Who's there?" cried Jack, not knowing exactly where he was in the
darkness.

"It is I, Bannister.  Let me out, I'm locked in."

"Pull the handle, then, and I'll go for the door with my shoulder."

In a few moments the old latch gave way, and Bannister appeared.
"What is it?" he asked eagerly.

"A burglary.  And my mother--God knows what's happened to her?"

"Fright?"

"No--worse.  I'm afraid--attacked--and----"

"Don't tell me he's hurt her," cried Bannister hoarsely.  "Where is
she?"

Bannister followed Jack into the dressing room and saw Hester lying
pale and still in the nurse's arms.  On her forehead was a thin red
line, where the sharp corner of the safe latch, sharp as a knife, had
struck her temple.

The nurse released her burden and laid her gently down, shaking her
head ominously.

"Is it----?" Jack's question stuck in his throat.

The nurse did not answer.

"Hester, Hester!" cried her husband hoarsely, dropping down beside
her, and overcome for the first time in his life by real,
heart-stabbing sorrow.  She looked so white and young and calm, like
the Hester of the old days.  The room swam round; he saw nothing but
the dull, fixed, sightless eyes.

When he recovered he found himself being supported by Jack, who
gripped his arm.

"This is horrible, Bannister--the work of some murderous thief.  She
evidently surprised him at the safe."

"Yes, yes."

"We must catch him.  Keep the other door shut.  Don't let my father
know--you understand, nurse?"

"I understand."

"You must tell him lies.  If he were to receive such a shock now,
there's no knowing what might happen."

"I'll do all I can, sir, but----" she shook her head.  "Let some one
fetch the doctor."

The whole household by this time had assembled.  Everybody was there
except Aunt Caroline, and nobody thought of her.  She, too, was
locked in, in another part of the house where the sounds of the alarm
had not penetrated, and was sleeping peacefully.  Jack took Bannister
with him round the house when the lamps were lighted, and the guest
was forced to attend to the young man's excited explanations and
discoveries.  It did not take long to see that the robbery was the
work of some one in the house.

"Let all the servants be assembled in the hall," cried Jack.  "Every
single soul in the house must come before me.  And lock every door."

Bannister followed dumbly, like a man in a dream.  His senses were
gradually returning; and his wild rage against Voss helped him to
forget the still form upstairs.

Everybody came with alacrity to face the young master.

"Are all here?" he asked.

"Yes, sir.  All but the chauffeur, and he's coming round with the car
now."

"Where's my man, Voss?" exclaimed Bannister, controlling himself with
an effort.

"I've been to his room, sir," said the footman.  "But he's not there,
and his bed hasn't been slept in.  His bags were sent away yesterday."

"Then he must be the thief," cried Jack, turning upon Bannister.
"Was he honest?"

"Yes, twenty years' service to his record.  But I'll have him.  I
know where to run him to earth.  I can give a shrewd guess where he
will go first.  It's a question of my getting there before him.  Keep
the car for a few moments while I dress.  You can go to the police
and to the doctor and back.  I'll go on with the car."

"Go on where?"

"To London.  He is making across country to the other railway and
will arrive before you can set the wires working.  But the car may
race the train, and if I get there first--by God----"

The rest of the threat was lost as Bannister ran to his room.

Set a thief to catch a thief.  He knew that Voss's secret hoard of
money was hidden at the flat in town, and he would be certain to be
there first and ransack the place before making off for Amsterdam.




CHAPTER XXV

The car sped swiftly through the night with its great white lights
gleaming on road and tree and ditch and cottage wall.  The man at the
wheel bent forward, straining his eyes till all was blurred in front
of him, and his heart would thump in terror.  That grey patch
shivering ahead was perhaps a wall and not the level highway, and
next moment the car would crash into it.

"What are you slowing for?" cried Bannister at his elbow, as he
scanned the grey gap in the darkness and saw the hedge rows at even
distances to right and left, and a clear path.

"The pace is too hot.  A yard too much to the left, and we shall go
up the bank and into Kingdom Come.  Is that water?"

"No, no, only a damp patch beneath the trees.  Get on, man.  Faster!"

Bannister bent down to scan the speedometer, and grumbled that the
last twenty miles had consumed nearly half an hour of time.

"Very well, I'll let her go if you like.  But don't blame me if----"

The car swerved so badly that Bannister was nearly thrown into the
road.  A triangular patch of green and a signpost whizzed by them,
and he understood that the chauffeur had just avoided going straight
to destruction by sharply swerving at the bend.

"Never mind, Foster, I'll make it worth your while.  Smash the rotten
old car when it's over, but you must get there by the time I said."

The heavy trees were left behind.  The hedge rows stood out clearly
again, and the highway presented no difficulties.  The chauffeur
sighed with relief, and leaned back.  His passenger, unable to keep
still, urged him to fresh effort.

"No, no, the water is steaming," protested the driver.  "We're doing
pretty well now.  We're going at forty miles an hour.  Can't you feel
her leap?--There! that bump was when we left the ground for a yard."

In another second there was an awful crunching--but the car continued
its advance.  The road was laid with loose granite, and they rocked
and rolled over it, Bannister clinging to the back of his seat and
the chauffeur to the wheel.

On again.  They saw a constable leap out of the road for safety into
the footway, and stare at them in amazement.  Houses whizzed by, all
blurred and dancing, and the car leaped over the hollows in the
macadam worn by the market carts.  Bannister leaned forward and
peered ahead--always ahead.  He forced himself to think of the
journey and his errand, not to look back and remember the lighted
room at the Palace, the gaping safe door, and the pale, still woman
stretched out upon the shining parquet.  He remembered the color of
her gown and the curve of every gleaming tress, the bare feet, and
the limp hands lying palm upward.  Little more than an hour before he
had held her in his arms, sobbing, appealing, warm and pulsating,
with her fine eyes flashing anger, and her lips yielding protestingly.

And Voss had perhaps killed her.  Voss, the servile, docile
scoundrel, who for years had been his slave and never disobeyed an
order.  The fellow had often protested, and even advised, but never
rebelled before.  He certainly had never snatched a prize intended
for his master's hand.  The emeralds seemed to have turned his brain.
The quarrel, the foolish outbreak of temper and the contemptuous kick
had undone the work of years.  The spell broken, the harness removed,
the natural ruffian emerged from behind the mask of imperturbable
serenity which he usually presented to the world as Mr. Bannister's
servant.  With all the recklessness of a greedy criminal he had
grabbed at a fortune, and was trusting to luck for a successful issue
to his venture.  But Dame Fortune is a smug goddess, and looks
askance at criminals.  She is niggardly in dealing out her
prizes--and always gives the honest man ten chances to the villain's
one.

The fugitive's path was beset with a hundred difficulties.  He had
chosen to shut his eyes to half of them, and was satisfied to get his
hands upon the jewels.  The rest was in the lap of the future, and
depended upon that same fickle Luck by which all gamblers, prodigals
and thieves exist.

Voss had mapped out his line of escape as far as the flat at Stratton
Street, where his money was.  Bannister knew that he would not leave
that; and the servant flattered himself that Bannister dared not
communicate with the police and set them on his track.  Further, his
master could not arrive at Stratton Street first.  Therefore, it was
an easy race, with a long start for himself.

But Voss had reckoned without Jack's hired motor in the stable
yard--an unforeseen element in the game.  If he thought about a motor
at all, he probably congratulated himself that Bannister's vehicle
was not at the Palace, and it would be a long time before the police
could be set in motion.

"We can't go through the town at this pace," said the chauffeur, as
the London street lamps appeared ahead blinking in the summer dawn.

They stood on the wood pavement now, and though the pace was as fast
as ever, it seemed to be slower because it was so smooth.

"Now is your opportunity," urged Bannister.  "There are only a few
market carts, with a level road all the way.  You must risk it.  Let
her go full tear."

"The first policeman'll stop me."

"Let him try.  Ride him down."

"Yes, and get six months, or seven years."

"If you don't, I'll take the wheel myself.  There's an open stretch
now.  Let her go again--hurry, man--hurry!  We've been an age coming
those last few miles."

The chauffeur tried to please by indulging in terrific spurts, then
slowing whenever pedestrians or traffic appeared.  To his companion
the car seemed to be creeping horribly.  The radiator was steaming,
and something was leaking.  But they trusted to Providence, and hoped
that the petrol would hold out as far as Bond Street.

What interminable rows of houses!  What miles on miles of streets!
London never seemed so huge before.  The dawn had broken, and
Bannister was able to see the time by his watch, although it was
still black overhead.  A faint purple tinged the sky line above the
houses, and the number of market carts and early workmen and electric
trams increased.  A dozen times they were shouted at by startled
wayfarers, who leaped aside for their lives.

At last the trees of Kensington Gardens and the open expanse of park
loomed in the purple haze.  The street lamps were less bright and the
roads were more thronged than ever.

"I can't go any faster here."

"You must--you must risk it.  Blow your horn.  Shout to that crawling
cab to get out of the way, or smash it up."

As the first motor omnibuses were overtaken, Bannister was consumed
with a new anxiety.  He realized the number of ways of getting into
London that were open to Voss besides the railway; but at last
Piccadilly was reached, and the car swung round into Stratton Street.
He seized the chauffeur's arm.

"Stop here--no further--don't go up to the house.  Back a little."

His latchkey was in his hand, and he entered the flat noiselessly.
All was dark and still.  He stood inside the door and closed it,
shooting the bolts, and turning the key twice in the lock.  If Voss
was there he could not get out now except by the window.

He made a rapid survey of the rooms.  They were exactly as when left
for the visit to the Palace.

He had arrived first.

The car was still throbbing in the street below.  If Voss came, it
might scare him off.  He hurried down stairs and went out hatless to
the driver.

"Wait for me, out of sight, round the corner.  Here's part of the
money I promised you," and he thrust a bank note into the fellow's
hand.

The car went creeping and groaning into Piccadilly, and Bannister
returned to the flat to wait.

He was only just in time; but he had a few moments in which to think
out his plan.

It would never do to leave lights burning.  Voss must come into the
trap unsuspectingly.  The latch was set to give admittance in the
ordinary way; the bolts were withdrawn, and the lights switched out.
He took up a position in the sitting room behind the door, and
prepared to wait.  He had no idea what form his vengeance would take.
At present he only longed to get his fingers upon Voss's throat, to
batter his head, to hear him shriek for mercy and forgiveness.  The
emeralds did not matter.  They were in the reckoning, of course, for
he must have them now at all costs; his hold over the Bishop of
Ripley was gone if Hester were dead.  Miss Cardew with her thousands
was a thing of the past.

These things did not shape themselves coherently in his mind at
present.  Waiting there in the darkness he saw weird shadows move and
change their shape as the grey light of dawn crept in through the
drawn blinds.  He had time to calm down and to remember, and to
recall that white face.  He gave rein to a choking emotion which
threatened to flood his eyes with tears for the first time for many,
many years.

If Hester were dead, Mabel was also lost utterly.  Jack Cardew would
claim her, and he, her father, would be denied the right to touch the
hem of her garment.  There would be nothing left.  Dingle Hall and
proud respectability seemed ludicrous.  A country mansion would only
be a lonely, gaunt prison which he had purchased for himself to live
and die in, neglected and scorned by his own flesh and blood.  What a
bungle he had made of it all!  If only he had throttled Voss at the
first sign of insubordination he would not have been here, waiting in
the darkness.  Even Voss had thrown him over.  But if the rascal had
killed Hester--killed the only thing he loved, no punishment was too
horrible.

The old notion of Voss as docile and subservient lingered still, in
spite of this outbreak.  It was so strong that the idea of arming
himself against the fellow never occurred to him.  His itching
fingers were empty, and he fully believed that when he came face to
face with the traitor Voss would crumple up, and cringe, and whine
for mercy.

A step on the stone stair--a heavy breathing--and a scratching of a
key in the lock.  Bannister shook with eager rage, and choked for
breath.  His hands clenched and unclenched, his teeth ground one upon
the other, his jaw locked ready for action, and he could scarcely
wait for the door to close behind the traitor.

Voss stopped and listened intently before switching on the light.  It
all appeared to him as it did to Bannister when he arrived, grim,
dark, deserted, and with that queer musty odor which greets the
nostrils on entering a place that has been shut up for some time.

As a precaution against sudden surprise from pursuit he shot the
bolts of the front door.  Then he flung down his cap and loosened his
coat, and hurried to the little room at the back, where his hoard was
hidden.  Bannister remained in the dark sitting room, ready to
pounce; but his victim went by too quickly.  He heard cupboard doors
being unlocked and furniture moved, and a little cry of triumph as
jingling coins were shovelled into a capacious pocket.

Voss was not going to be satisfied easily.  The whole place was at
his mercy.  He made more noise now, and banged into Bannister's
bedroom, and began flinging about jewel cases and breaking open
drawers.  Bannister allowed him full rein, but there was not much to
take.  Every time his hand closed upon a valuable article it was too
bulky or too heavy to carry away.  He picked things up and dropped
them, and picked them up again, then thought of a bag.  He seized the
first to hand, and flung it on the floor.

He fancied he heard a sound, and the bag was kicked aside.  It was
madness to stay to carry off things worth a few ten pound notes when
a fortune in jeopardy was in his pockets.  Perhaps there was
something in the other room which he could carry more easily.  There
was one picture which he had heard his master say would fetch seven
thousand pounds in Munich, a little thing that would go in a small
bag and be no impediment to his flight.

He blundered into the dark sitting room, and forgot the switch which
was at the door; but on turning back with outstretched arm to touch
the familiar knob, he felt a gust of wind.  The door was closed by
some unseen agency; there was a step and a click, and he jumped back
with a hoarse cry.  Bannister had flooded the room with light, and
stood with his back to the door.  They were face to face.

Voss backed away, and almost fell down in his astonishment.

"I'm here first, you see," hissed Bannister, breathing heavily.

"You'd better not get in my way," cried Voss, clenching his fist and
looking dangerous.  "I've finished here.  I've done enough of your
dirty work, and what did I ever get for it?  Yes, I'm on my own now.
So stand aside, or you'll be sorry for it."

"You're a murderer!"

"Rats!  You can't kid me."

"I tell you you have killed Lady Hester Cardew----"

"Well, what if I have?  She shouldn't have got in my way."

"She was my wife."

"Eh?"

"My wife, I say.  You have killed her, and I'm going to kill you.
Empty your pockets, you dirty traitor."

"Empty my pockets, eh, and fill yours?  Not if I know it."

Bannister's eyes flashed lightning.  His rage was terrible.  He
leaped at the fellow, and his hand was on the other's throat before
Voss knew what was happening.

"Yes--kill you!"

Voss went down to the floor on his back.  Bannister's slim white hand
closed tighter and tighter.  "So you'd rob me, would you--you
miserable, crawling worm!  You dirty cunning dog!"

Bannister raised one hand to strike his prostrate victim in the face,
and gave Voss his opportunity.  He wriggled, turned half over, and
dragged his assailant down.  They came to grips lying side by side on
the floor in a fearful struggle.  Voss's right hand was free, and he
thrust it into his pocket.  Bannister clutched him again, and
embedded his thin fingers in his throat with unerring precision, Voss
struck out and swung round his free arm, and--fired.

The shot seemed to have no effect.  The flaming eyes came closer to
his; two hands closed upon his throat tighter and tighter, and the
room began to swim round.

The revolver dropped; he began to choke, and clawed at the wrists of
his infuriated master; but gradually the clutch of the long fingers
relaxed; a heavy weight bore down upon him, and Bannister rolled
over--quite still and dead.

Voss was terrified.  He scrambled to his feet, and looked down in
fear.  He had some spark of affection for his master, germinated
during long years of intimate association, and it was horrible to see
him lying there.  He attempted to lift the limp, lifeless body--then
he gave a great sob, which was half fright, and realized the
overpowering necessity for flight.

He seized a cap which was lying on the floor, and rushed out of the
flat.  He turned up his coat collar about his neck and glided away,
chased by a hundred phantoms.  He had not gone far before he became
aware that the cap on his head was his master's.  He drew it down
over his eyes, but it would not come low enough; and every man he
passed seemed to be staring into his guilty face.

He had left his own cap behind in the flat.  The thought added fresh
terror.  It was a clue, simple and direct.  A hue and cry for the
murderer would be raised, and all England would be searching for him.

He paused on his way to Victoria Station, and staggered at the
thought.  He swayed like a drunken man, and his brain reeled.  He
wanted to go back, but dared not.  Yet if he did not return, the
damning evidence of the cap would hang him.  He believed now what
Bannister had said about Lady Hester.  He had leaped at a bound from
a greedy thief to a violent criminal--a murderer--perhaps a double
murderer.

It was dangerous to go back.  He hurried blindly on, actuated by one
crude, reckless idea of getting to the coast and out of the country
before the wires were at work, and the slow moving police were fully
aroused.

It was rather staggering to find that Bannister had arrived before
him; and there was no knowing how many more were behind close upon
his heels.  The flat would be the first place they would go to.

He had an idea that the chase for a murderer never really got well
under way until two or three days had elapsed--after the inquest at
any rate.  The notion was stupid; but his brain was refusing to act,
and throbbed and danced as in midnight dreams.  He stood still in the
street, and clasped his brow with his hot hand, and almost swooned
with the stress of conflicting emotions.  He was not accustomed to
independent action of any kind.  Even in traveling from place to
place Bannister's directions had dominated every step.  No murderer,
ever felt less of a ruffian than this poor, miserable, distracted
wretch.  He had run amuck; he had committed the foulest of crimes,
and it did not seem to matter which way he went so long as he
hastened.

At Victoria Station he remembered that the ports were the first place
to be watched for escaping criminals.  Astute criminals always took a
ticket to Dover, and got out at some intermediate station.  He
followed this plan, and started off by train unmolested.  The rest
gave him time to recover from his first fright, and think things out
more carefully.

At the first junction he got out, and escaped from the station
without giving up his ticket by climbing over a palisade and striking
blindly across country.  He travelled all that day until it was
necessary to find food and drink, and resolved to sell his life
dearly if he were seized.  He felt in all his pockets for his
revolver.  He had left that behind, too.

What folly!  What blind madness!  And he dared not purchase another.

* * * * * * *

The excitement at Ripley when it became known that a robbery had
taken place at the Palace was acute.  The wildest rumors were afloat.
First it was the Bishop himself who had been killed, then the
Bishop's wife.  Both these stories were pronounced to be incorrect.
It was Lady Hester who had been attacked, and, thanks to the
perseverance of the doctor, she had recovered sufficiently to
describe the villain and set the police on his track.

The Bishop's emeralds were gone, but it was confidently hoped that
the thief would not long be at large.  Later, an ugly rumor gained
ground that the Bishop, whose condition was critical before the
burglary, had been much distressed by the attack upon his wife, which
occurred within his hearing while he lay helpless listening to her
screams, and showed signs of collapse.

The doctor was besieged by reporters, but he refused to say
anything--in itself a sign that what there was to say had better be
left unsaid.  From these indications the people of Ripley drew their
own conclusions, and prepared for the worst.  Things reached a climax
when, at afternoon service in the cathedral, prayers were offered up
for the Bishop's life.  He was _in extremis_.

At the Palace a deathly calm prevailed.  After Bannister's departure
for London, Jack felt that there was nothing further to be done.  He
took the reins of management, and his first difficulty was with Aunt
Caroline, who amazed him by a strange outburst of abuse and
accusation against Bannister himself, whom she declared to be a
villain and a swindler; it was he who had stolen the gems; the man
Voss was only his tool.

Jack was furiously indignant; but her concern for the emeralds soon
gave place to the deepest anxiety for her brother.  The Bishop, in a
brief spell of consciousness, had signified that he wished to see his
sister.  He desired to make his peace.  Some inkling of the real
truth about Bannister and the justice of his sister's opposition must
have come to him in those last fleeting moments.  He knew that Voss
was the culprit, and they had told him that Bannister was in pursuit
of the villain; but that did not satisfy him.

Caroline was summoned to the sufferer's bedside by the doctor, who
stood aside during the interview, watch in hand.  He gave her five
minutes.

She fell upon her knees by her brother's side, weeping bitterly, and
he signed to her to come closer.

"Take care of--Hester--and Jack.  If you were right----"  There was a
long pause, and she waited with beating heart until his speech came
again.  "Be kind to the child--Jack knows best."

The strong old man died hard.  He wrestled with the pain in his
breast, which had been so frequent of late and which was now closing
about his heart, and the doctor signed to her to come away.  He drew
her almost forcibly into the next room.  In the open door of Lady
Hester's bedroom he was astonished to see the pale, tottering figure
of the Bishop's wife.

"I am better," she murmured, as she leaned upon the lintel for
support.

She waved the doctor on one side and walked unsteadily into the
Bishop's room.  The doctor closed the door behind her and left them
alone.

He dispatched the nurse to fetch Jack, who was busy downstairs with
the detectives, unaware of the extreme seriousness of his father's
position; but when he came up he understood that the worst was to be
feared.  His aunt, who had dropped into a chair near the safe in the
dressing room, sat rigid, as if turned to stone, and read his
thoughts.  He gave her an appealing glance.

"Ought I to tell him?  Is it too late?"

"It is too late," she murmured.

A shrill scream from the inner room startled them all.  The doctor
burst in with Jack.  The end had come.  The last spasm was past, and
Bishop Cardew was gone to his eternal rest.  After the last agony,
when his life was ebbing, he gently clasped his wife's hand between
his two palms, and gazed up into the face he loved so well with a
beatific smile.

His features were composed and placid when they all looked upon him
for the last time.

Lady Hester's grief was as poignant as Aunt Caroline's, but the elder
woman seemed less able to bear the shock.  Her wonted sternness and
self-control deserted her; and she raved wildly against Bannister, as
though he were the direct cause of her brother's death.  The doctor
explained that the Bishop had long suffered from heart trouble,
which, intensified by the stress of onerous public duties, and
complicated by the stroke, had carried him off, irrespective of
anything that had happened in the last few days.  Jack, however,
listened patiently to his aunt, and drew her aside into the privacy
of another room, where she continued her tirade against Bannister
with facts and details that were quite amazing.  She spared him
nothing of the story of Mabel's birth--as she knew it--down to the
last financial bargaining with Bannister.

Jack understood now the reason for Mabel's strange behavior and
threats of flight.  He trembled to think how nearly he had lost her.
Whatever Bannister might have been in the past, he was sure that the
man was in deadly earnest when he went out in pursuit of Voss, and
was not going to join the thief for the purpose of sharing the booty
as the old lady suggested.  But he was resolved to set things
straight at once, and know the worst; and the best way was to follow
Bannister, and go to the flat with the police officers.

Burning with shame, and racked by doubt and grief, he set out at
once.  On the top of the stairs Beatrice Carew stopped him with a
restraining gesture.

"Jack--I've heard--I'm sorry."

She put out a hand, and he replied with a silent handshake.

"Mabel is much better, and wants to see you.  She knows all now."

He was astonished to find his wife sitting up in a chair.  She was
pale and wan, but her eyes lighted up at the sight of him, and she
opened her arms.

"My poor Mabel," he cried, dropping down on one knee beside her and
taking her in his arms, while the tears flowed for the first time.
"I understand how you have been suffering."

She found her voice with an effort.  "Your aunt told you everything?"

"She has told me a good deal which I find it hard to believe."

"You must believe her, Jack; but she doesn't know all.  I can tell
her everything now."

"I am going to London to find your father--to find out the truth."

"Yes, go--go, Jack.  Go up to the flat.  Save him if you can--from
himself--When he knows what has happened here he surely----"

Words failed her.  Emotion and shame choked her utterance, and she
sobbed in her husband's arms.

"Is she--Lady Hester--my mother--better?" she asked at last.

"Hush!  Don't breathe it even in a whisper.  It is not true."

"It is true.  My father was her husband, but she thought he was dead.
She was never your father's wife at all."

"Thank God he never knew."

Mabel recovered, and pointed to her purse upon the table.  "I have a
key of the flat there.  It will admit you.  If you see father, tell
him I sent you, and that I implore him by all that's holy to--to give
them up."

"What do the emeralds matter now?" groaned Jack, who was utterly
unstrung by the death of his father, and heartsick at the revelations.

"Go, Jack, go.  Don't think of me.  I'm all right.  I'm much better.
I feel that there is something for me to do now.  I shall be up and
dressed when you come back.  I shall be waiting for you.  And I will
look after my mother."

The detectives below added their entreaties, and sent up word that
they must depart for London, and make that the base of operations.
If Jack would accompany them to the flat where Voss had resided, it
would assist them.  It would also put them in touch with Mr.
Bannister, and hasten matters all round.

He left the Palace with a heavy heart, and forced his brain to think
of the business in hand.  He told himself that he owed it to his
father's memory to rescue the heirlooms upon which the Bishop set
such store; and he listened intently to the detective's description
of the steps that would be taken to intercept Voss at all the ports.

They arrived in Stratton Street some hours after the news of the
robbery at the Palace had reached London.  The police were already on
the move, and a visit to Bannister's chambers was the first step.
The place was locked, and they could obtain no admittance.  No one
had seen the occupants for days.  But as it was imperative that
Voss's personal belongings at the flat should be rifled and examined,
the breaking down of the door was resolved upon as a matter of
course.  Jack and the detectives arrived on the steps just as the
operations were about to commence.  Jack remembered the key given him
by Mabel, and, after demanding entrance in formal fashion by ringing
the bell, admitted them into the flat.

An officer entered the first room, and after a glance round pulled up
a blind.  The others at the door beheld a dark figure lying on the
ground with clothes all torn, hair dishevelled, and eyes fixed in
death, and they cried out excitedly.

"It is Mr. Bannister," exclaimed Jack.

"The thief has been here," cried the detective, dropping down on one
knee beside the dead man.  "He must have surprised him, and a fearful
struggle ensued.  Poor chap!  He went for him, I suppose, and got a
bullet for his pains.  There are the marks."

"Is he dead?" asked Jack, faint with horror.

"Yes.  He must have been a good plucked 'un too, sir, to have tackled
the rascal without a weapon.  He might have known the chap would be
armed.  I wish he had consulted me first.  I'd have warned him and
prevented this."

News of the robbery spread through London like wildfire.  The first
story was garbled and subsequently corrected by the Press.  A version
was issued which had a great semblance of truth.  There had been a
burglary at the Palace, said the papers, and Bishop Cardew's wife had
surprised the burglar and been savagely attacked.  The shock had
killed the Bishop, who was ill at the time in the next room, sinking
from a mortal malady.  An investigation proved that the thief was the
confidential servant of a gentleman staying in the house, who
immediately chased the absconding rascal in his motor car, and
surprised him at his flat in Stratton Street.  A desperate struggle
ensued, in which the courageous pursuer was worsted and shot.  So
murder was added to the lesser crime of theft, and the police were
displaying greater activity in their pursuit of the criminal.
Additional zest was added by the fact that the emeralds, which the
thief had carried off, were of a kind not easily convertible into
money, although worth some thousands of pounds.  And Mr. Jack Cardew,
the Bishop's son, had offered a very large reward for their recovery.

Later accounts were fuller and more glowing.  They described in
sensational terms the imaginary scene that had taken place at the
flat between the rascally thief and his noble and courageous master,
who lost his life in the attempt to recover the jewels of his host
the Bishop.  An imaginary biographical obituary of Bannister was also
supplied to the inquisitive public, who were told that he was a very
wealthy widower, moving in the best circles, and highly esteemed in
the West End clubs.  It was surprising how many people were
interviewed and came forward and claimed an acquaintance with the
dead man.  They all had something good to say.  He was a sportsman, a
linguist, a great traveler, and heaven knows what besides.

The deepest sympathy was expressed for the sorrowing daughter, who
was described as very beautiful, and a friend of Royalty.

Voss was everything that was bad, with a miserable record; and poor
Mr. Bannister must have been duped by the villain, who probably used
his position as valet to a gentleman moving in the best circles to
pilfer in country houses.  Former hosts of Mr. Bannister began to
remember strange things that had happened at their houses at times
when Voss was unobtrusively sheltered beneath their roofs.  Oh, yes,
there was no doubt that the murderer was a dangerous ruffian of more
than ordinary ability, and, of course, the public hoped that he would
never be captured.

Jack drew his own conclusions, and gave no more information than he
could help.  He returned to the Palace with a heavy heart, dreading
the ordeal of breaking the news of Bannister's death to Mabel and his
step-mother.

On his arrival home he found that the news had preceded him--Mabel
already knew.  The story of the tragedy in the flat had been told to
Lady Hester by Aunt Caroline herself; but she appeared to be dead to
all feeling, and numbed by the shock of the Bishop's death.  Nothing
seemed to matter, and she was shut up in her own room with the nurse
in attendance, sleeping and weeping by turns, and occasionally
lapsing into long periods of quiet, when she was like one stunned.

The pursuit of Voss by the police was keen and swift.  A close
scrutiny of his belongings at the flat proved him to be an
accomplished criminal of long standing, whom Mr. Bannister had
unconsciously harbored under his roof for years.  The lesser rascal
had not been so cautious as his master.

A search of the flat revealed nothing that would obviously
incriminate Mr. Bannister, except a drawer full of cards, which very
much puzzled the detective inspector.  They were in the sitting room,
and at first glance only suggested that Mr. Bannister might have had
a weakness for bridge; but a closer examination suggested a weakness
for cheating, which was surely unworthy of a man in Mr. Bannister's
position.  They also found a number of unmounted gems neatly arranged
in leather cases.  These provoked some speculation, and it required
all Jack's persuasive powers to convince the inspector that Mr.
Bannister was a well known collector of gems.  The young husband was
naturally eager to shield his wife's father and stifle scandal
wherever possible.  He showed remarkable resource in this, and,
guided by Mabel, who told him all that she knew, he introduced the
inspector to Mr. Bowman, the Bond Street jeweler, who gladly
testified that Mr. Bannister was a collector of precious stones.

The inspector was convinced--or at least he pretended to be--and as
Mr. Cardew's handsome reward for the recovery of the emeralds seemed
likely to come his way he was willing to suspect nothing.  He
understood that Miss Bannister was really Mrs. Cardew, and gallantly
worked on the lady's behalf.  He was also sharp enough to realize
that the interest of the public would soon subside if it became known
that the murder was only a case of one rascal killing another.  The
public at large have a sneaking regard for a villain who kills a
villain; but a servant who murders his master is a marked man, and
everybody's hand is against him.  If they guessed the truth behind
Mr. Bannister's death their sporting instinct would be aroused, and
Voss was more likely to escape than be handed over to justice.

The police made one error in their calculations.  They reckoned upon
Voss being without means, and circulated elaborate descriptions of
the emeralds, fully believing that he would try to sell them sooner
or later.  But Voss was not without money.  Indeed, he carried such a
large sum upon his person that it was difficult to conceal.  The
fugitive found that it was impossible to get out of the country, so
he gravitated by instinct to the nearest congregation of rascals in
the neighborhood, to wit, a race course.  Here he mingled with the
throng until nightfall, and drank a good deal of spirits.  He managed
to get rid of his master's cap in a ditch, and under plea of having
lost it in a scrimmage, bought another of a stable boy for a
substantial sum.  He gave five shillings for the new cap, explaining
that he was in luck that day and could afford to be generous.

He took no pains to alter his appearance.  It was obvious that the
police would not look for a man exactly coinciding with the
description given of Bannister's servant: a hunted man generally
makes himself as unlike the police description as possible: but Voss
made no change.  His clothes were of a nondescript order, with an
inclination towards the horsey, which the new cap intensified.

He was fast recovering his mental balance, and the tragedy of the
early morning seemed a long way off by nightfall.  He was calm enough
to remember many conversations held with Bannister on the subject of
evading the police.  Bannister used to follow all criminal cases with
the keenest interest, and he had frequently regaled Voss with his
views thereon.  He had a contempt for the absurd methods of the
ordinary criminal, who follows a stereotyped course and does the very
thing the police expect him to do.

"If you are ever compelled to hide in lodgings," Bannister had often
said, "choose them as near Scotland Yard as possible.  Don't rush up
to Aberdeen or try to get to Dover.  If you want a really comfortable
refuge take one in the house of a night policeman and make a friend
of him.  Tell him your family history from birth, and be very
interested in the pursuit of yourself by his comrades."

It was easy to talk upon these matters, but hard to follow the
counsel.  Bannister himself might have done it, but Voss was not
equal to the strain.  He was inclined to fall back upon an old and
tried imposture--the distinguished foreigner traveling in England and
imposing upon hotel keepers--but that was not possible until he could
effect a change of costume without exciting suspicion.  It would be
easier to follow the racing crowd from one race course to another!
That would give him an apparent object in life, and explain his
erratic movements without exciting suspicion.

The police and public were looking for a man who was slinking about
the country with only one object in view, to escape observation.  The
open method was best; and nobody would expect a thief loaded with
jewels to the value of thousands of pounds to spend his days on
racecourses.

The popular notion of a murderer is a man weighed down by conscience
and terrified by the recollection of his crime and its consequences.
This description fitted Voss well enough in the beginning; but he had
so little conscience that he would have been quite easy in mind if
those wretched newspapers would only leave him alone.  He bought an
evening paper on the course, and returned to London with the racing
crowd, making friends with some sharpers in the railway carriage.  He
got one of them to put him up for the night on the plea that he was
dodging the police, who were after him for having worked the three
card trick at Hurst Park.  He pleaded poverty and bad luck at betting
as well, but counted up the money in his pocket and declared himself
able to pay for his lodgings for a few days until his luck changed.

For a week he pursued the vocation of a common sharper, living
apparently from hand to mouth upon his earnings, and dodging the
police by the aid of kind friends of the same kidney.  Business was
slack and the profits small, and he informed his friends that he
intended finding another "lay."  They were astonished at his
audacity, but applauded his scheme, which was to pose as a foreign
count visiting racing towns and swindling hotel keepers.  They
assisted him to make the necessary alterations in his appearance, and
one wealthy ruffian actually offered to provide a portion of the
capital to start with.  Voss accepted the gift without turning a
hair, and promised the donor a share in the profits.

He duly appeared in a northern town with a foreign accent, a loud,
showy costume, and a good deal of battered luggage.  He could only
speak a few words of English, but could understand anything said to
him in French.  He made his wants known without much difficulty, and
was boarded and lodged at the very best establishments.  The friends
of the racing days, who had helped him in adversity, were recompensed
handsomely for their trouble; but they could not quite understand how
the enterprising swindler made his money.  They acknowledged him as a
master, and respectfully and sadly left him soaring in higher realms.
They supposed the French count to be cashing spurious cheques and
flitting; but as a matter of fact Voss was paying all his bills like
an honest man, and making a little money by betting.  He won enough
to pay a portion of his expenses, and did not grudge the balance
taken from his hoard of gold.

He was able now to read the daily papers with amusement, and laughed
at the absurd clues that were discovered every few days.  Now he was
seen at Plymouth, now at Portsmouth, now at Dover, and at last he was
supposed to have reached Paris.  The space given to the Bannister
murder in the papers grew less and less.  At last only an occasional
paragraph appeared to keep the ugly business green in the public mind.

But one morning, as the French count was lolling at his ease in a
dressing gown and smoking half crown cigars after the fashion of his
late master, he was startled to see a short paragraph announcing the
fact that Voss's antecedents had been traced back by means of a
photograph, and he was strongly suspected of being the same person as
a criminal who once hoodwinked hotel keepers as a French count and
never paid his bills.  Hotel keepers were warned to look out for a
person of this description.

Voss went cold all over, and when the door opened he expected the
police to rush in.  He bitterly regretted now that he had not used
his disguise to reach Dover, where he might have sailed by any boat
as a French subject.

He received another horrid shock an hour later when the hotel keeper
appeared, and, with many apologies and sidelong glances, presented
his bill, explaining that he always adopted this policy with
foreigners, because they were apt to get wrong ideas into their heads
and make a fuss when leaving.  Obviously the hotel keeper had seen
the newspaper paragraph.  Voss thanked his lucky stars that he was
not "on the crook" at the present time.  He paid the bill without a
murmur and flourished handfuls of gold before the reassured hotel
keeper.

The danger was averted for the present.  He had established
confidence here, but was afraid to stay.  He swaggered down into the
public room to revive his courage, but he was shaking terribly.  The
barmaids watched him and whispered to the German waiters, one of whom
addressed him in French without getting any reply.

Another notice about the French count appeared in the papers next
day.  It was stated that such a person had been seen at Chester.
Then followed a description which fitted Voss at Chester, but did not
quite apply just now, for he had made many changes of costume.
Instead of his side whiskers being shaved off, as the police
suggested, he had allowed them to join up with a scrubby young beard.

Special emphasis was laid upon the fact that the reward for the
recovery of the emeralds had been doubled.  Voss bitterly regretted
ever touching them.  They had dazzled him, and he had given little
thought to the question of turning them into cash.  Bannister always
found that sort of thing easy, but with Voss it was different.  He
had never tackled the gem business before, and did not know how to
begin.  The emeralds were concealed upon his person close to his
skin, and he grew to hate them.  He longed to pluck them out and
throw them away.  In his panic he regarded them as the source of all
his trouble and his sole danger.  The police would leave him alone
fast enough if there were no jewels to be recovered.  His neck was in
danger, and he valued his life more than the emeralds.  He could live
without them.  His recent association with sharpers and swindlers had
shown him that he could earn a very fair living "on the crook." Freed
from the hypnotic influence of Bannister he might do very well "on
his own" by imitating his master's methods and taking all the
profits; but the emeralds were worth a fortune, and the very
immensity of the fortune they represented made them an added danger.

The interest of the hotel servants in the French count grew and grew;
but nobody sent for the police, because the landlord was quite
convinced that the gentleman upstairs was the genuine thing.  He
threatened to sack anybody who dared to drive him away; for he had
grossly overcharged the count, and hoped to continue to do so for
some time to come.

A night of racking terror reduced Voss to a rag.  The emeralds burned
like hot coals at his breast.  He meditated hiding them in the
chimney, but that would not stop the hue and cry after them, which
was the stumbling block at present.  He began to weigh in the balance
the definite value of his neck and the possible value of the gems,
and came to the conclusion that it would be better to send them back
to the Palace by post, and lift a great load from his heart, than be
chased all over Europe and be hanged at last.  It was a wrench, but
it had to be done.

The French count presently sallied forth to the post office with a
small parcel addressed to Mr. Jack Cardew.  The girl who received the
parcel read the address, and looked hard at the sender.  He fled; but
he did not return to the hotel.  He bought fresh clothes in the town,
and took train to Liverpool.

He was only just in time, for the German waiter at the hotel, unable
to withstand the temptation of a great reward, and convinced that the
count was not a foreigner at all, had taken French leave and gone to
the police station.  An inspector of police returned with him, and
hid himself behind the bar to wait for the French count's return.
The landlord protested that the waiter had made a shocking blunder;
but the inspector explained that an arrest would not hurt a
foreigner, and would at least show that the police were arresting
somebody.

It was a long wait, and the inspector grew weary.  His quarry was on
the way to Liverpool before it occurred to him that a search of the
count's rooms was advisable.  When the search was over, and the count
had disappeared, he cursed his ill luck, and the German waiter wept.
The notorious Voss had slipped through their fingers, and to-morrow
the world would be laughing at them.

A recrudescence of interest in the Bannister murder now occurred
throughout the country.  The thief in panic had returned the gems,
and the clues provided by the parcel and the hotel servants gave the
detectives a new starting point from which to begin the hunt.  They
tracked the murderer to Liverpool, but there all traces ended.

Nor did they ever catch him.

It is weary work playing a losing game, and the inducement of the
reward being no longer a factor in the situation, the hue and cry
subsided in a very short time.  Voss had calculated wisely and acted
discreetly in returning the emeralds.  After all, their recovery was
more important than vengeance on the murderer of a person of doubtful
character.




CHAPTER XXVI

It was winter.  February was drearier than usual, and Caroline Cardew
sat in her town house alone.  It was a gaunt, old fashioned place,
severely furnished in the early Victorian style, but with many
articles of furniture belonging to previous generations of
respectable Georgian ancestors.  The afternoon was bleak and grey,
and she sat knitting before the fire.  Outside the rain was drizzling
and the sky was darkening.

She seemed to have aged very much in the last few months, and her eye
had lost its keenness.  She had sunk into insignificance in public
affairs since the death of her brother the Bishop, and in family
affairs she had chosen to hold herself aloof.  She missed the Palace
at Ripley, and the excitement of going to and fro, and the occasional
visits which her brother used to make to her in town, where he used
her house as his headquarters.  She missed Jack most of all.

Her visitors were surprisingly few; but the house was run as
heretofore, and she sat in solitary state.

A visitor!  She sighed with relief and put down her knitting,
expecting the maid to announce the newcomer.  Instead she heard the
swish of silken skirts on the stairs and some one running up, talking
all the time.  Beatrice!

The girl entered unceremoniously, and greeted her friend with her
usual brusqueness.

"Afternoon, aunt.  Didn't expect to see me, did you?  Was in town, so
thought I'd come."

Beatrice was dressed in a costume which was half country and half
town, and carried a walking stick; her; jacket glistened with rain,
and she looked rather draggled.

"Why didn't you tell me you were coming to town, child, then I could
have sent the carriage?"

"Oh, just ran up on the spur of the moment--to see Jack and Mabel."
Aunt Caroline retired into her shell and took up her knitting.  "But
before I went, thought I'd come and see you.  Mabel is living with
Jack at his chambers, you know, and they are still keeping the
marriage dark.  Lady Hester came back yesterday, and she's staying at
a hotel close by, and making their place her headquarters."

Grim silence from Aunt Caroline, and a pause.

"Fancy money's rather tight there."  Beatrice took off her gloves,
and flung them on the table with her stick.  Then she thrust her
hands into the side pockets of her jacket and walked up and down, as
she talked, like a man.

"I think it was very mean of the Bishop to squander everything and
live beyond his income, so that when he died there was nothing left
for Jack and his wife but debts."

"I object to your referring to my dear brother in those terms."

"And you are mean, too," cried Beatrice, wheeling round
remorselessly.  "You always said that your father left his money to
you, so that the Bishop shouldn't spend it.  The fact is, your money
is as much Jack's as anybody's."

"I don't allow you to dictate to me on questions of finance."

"Finance--fiddlesticks!" cried Beatrice, with a laugh.  "You know you
are only sulking.  You're behaving very shabbily, auntie--yes, you
are, and it's no good denying it.  Jack's income stopped with his
father's death, and Lady Hester only had her own allowance, which was
just enough to keep body and soul together.  She went away to travel
and recover herself a little; but she hadn't money enough to keep her
going, and was obliged to come back to settle down in some obscure
retreat.  The irony of it all is that Mabel is a rich woman."

"Mabel?  How?  What do you mean by rich woman?"

"Why, her father left her quite a little fortune--not that she means
to touch it."

"Ah, she has told you all her miserable family history?"

"Yes, every word.  But it has come to this, that Jack isn't making as
much money as he expected, and they're finding it very hard to make
both ends meet and keep their marriage dark.  People are whispering
things about the lady living in the Temple--it's _infra dig._, you
know, for a barrister to keep his wife there--it isn't the thing.
Now that Lady Hester has come back they'll have to go through a
mockery of marriage just to satisfy the Bishop's old friends and
those who were deceived by the announcement of the engagement.  Then
they must go into a suburb."

"Why do you tell me all this?"

"Because Jack is too proud.  I've heard it all from Mabel; and I want
to know if you wish Jack to live upon his wife's money--her father's
ill-gotten money?"

"God forbid!" exclaimed Aunt Caroline in horror.  "I'd no idea the
man had anything.  I thought he was a penniless scamp."

"You see he wasn't.  He was rich.  What are you going to do?"

"I tell you I won't be questioned in this fashion.  Beatrice, your
manners are abominable.  You don't treat me with proper respect."

"Oh, la--la--that for respect!" and she snapped her fingers.  "You
don't deserve any.  You are behaving too shabbily, auntie."

"I--I deny that!" faltered Aunt Caroline.

"Well, as soon as I leave here I am going to the Temple to see Lady
Hester.  I hear she is very much broken up, and Mabel has arranged
with Jack for her to come and live with them when they get their
miserable villa in the country."

"Mabel recognizes her mother then?"

"What do you expect?  Why shouldn't she?  Don't you think poor Lady
Hester has suffered enough?  Wasn't she more sinned against than
sinning?"

"She deceived my brother."

"Well, and he never knew anything about it.  So what does that
matter?" replied matter-of-fact Beatrice.

"And do you expect me to know her?"

"Of course, if you don't want the world to talk and ask questions.
Why shouldn't you know your brother's widow?  They know that you've
got all your brother's money tied up in a horrid bank, or consols, or
something of that sort.  They'll say you ought to be ashamed of
yourself to let her pinch and screw in poverty."

"Her daughter has money.  Let her live on that."

"What! and you a Christian woman?  I'm shocked.  You don't mean it,
auntie.  Mabel oughtn't to touch a penny of that money.  It should go
to hospitals, or something of that sort.  But if you're going to play
the skinflint, it can't.  She can't see her husband wearing himself
to a shadow and working night and day for fees that never arrive.
The brewery people can't always be at law; and he must live."

"Beatrice, I'm surprised at you talking like this.  If he had married
you he would have had a handsome income; but he didn't."

"What--you offered him a bribe to marry me?" cried the girl, starting
up with flaming cheeks.  "How dared you?  You horrid old woman!"

"Beatrice!  You are insulting as well as ungrateful.  Jack preferred
to marry without consulting me----"

"And quite right, too.  Haven't you eyes in your head?  You've known
me since I was a girl in short frocks--and you know what a fright
I've always been--and you've seen Mabel.  If I don't complain, why
should you?  You used to profess some regard for Jack.  Now--well, I
seem to be the only one left to look after his interests, and bully
his mean old aunt.  They're all afraid of you--goodness knows
why--but I'm not."

"Beatrice, you are presuming.  I will not listen."

"You needn't be in such a hurry to cut me short, because I've done
with you, auntie, after to-day.  You're no fit friend for a Christian
girl, and I won't know you."

Aunt Caroline choked with a mixture of emotions--anger at the girl's
impudence, fear that there was truth in her threat, and a tender
feeling that was always provoked by the familiar term "auntie" from
Beatrice's lips.  These two angular women were intensely devoted to
one another, and bound by an invisible tie.  No other woman, not even
in Beatrice's own family, was as much to the girl as Caroline Cardew;
and nobody of late years had voluntarily sought the grim old lady's
friendship on frank, honest terms.  She was feeling very old and
conscious that the race was to the young.  The old were forgotten and
left behind if they tried to retard the pace of the vigorous and
strong, who jostled joyfully along life's crowded path in their
eagerness to drink to the full of the fountain of life and desire.

"It's no good your trying to bully me, Beatrice.  Hester has made her
bed, and she must lie upon it.  Jack is a man, and if he chooses to
be independent of me and my advice, let him work.  It'll do him good.
I don't mind telling you, in confidence, that in my will I shall take
care that his interests are properly looked after."

"Oh, yes, after you have given the bulk of your fortune to the Home
for Lost Dogs, and the tabbies' nursing quarters.  Look here, auntie;
you're very miserable in this house.  The place bears the stamp of
wretchedness and loneliness everywhere.  It's nearly dark now, and
there's isn't a lamp going.  There's positively a smell of mildew;
and the man who opened the door to me had been asleep, and looked
wretched and ill-tempered.  You've no business to live alone,
demoralizing servants by idleness.  They'll murder you some day, just
for a little excitement.  If you go on like this you'll be driven by
sheer misery to wander round the country and seek distraction in
seaside boarding houses."

"I am quite content," replied the old lady doggedly, as she resumed
her knitting.

"Glad to hear it.  As for Jack and Mabel, they're just insanely
happy.  Her letters reek of it.  She has been looking forward to her
mother coming home as to some great treat.  It'll be good to see them
together.  That's why I am going there to-day."

Aunt Caroline gave a sniff of contempt; but her eyes filled with
tears, and the fire in front of her became a blinking haze.  Beatrice
proceeded to put on her gloves in leisurely fashion, and re-arranged
her hat in a mirror.

"Nice fright I look.  At any rate, they'll be glad to see me, which
is more than you could say, auntie."

"I--I--I won't listen to your impertinence.  I don't allow girls to
teach me my proper duty.  I know what is right and what is wrong.
I--I----"

The old lady had risen to her feet, and was stammering and stuttering
between her choking sobs.

"Tut, tut, tut," replied Beatrice, calmly smoothing out a feather
before the glass, and scorning the outburst.  "It's waste of time
getting angry with me.  You can be as mad as you like when I am gone,
auntie.  But I don't think it nice of you to say goodbye like this."

"Good-bye?"

"Yes; in future I shall cut you if I meet you in the street.  But
I'll shake you by the hand now.  Good-bye."

Caroline gripped the back of her chair for support, and made a
valiant effort to be stern.  Her cold fingers closed on Beatrice's
outstretched hand, but she got no further than that.  She bowed her
head and wept.

"Don't, don't!" murmured Beatrice, with a gulp; "you'll make me cry
too.  You know I was only fooling."

She assisted the old lady to a chair, where she sank back and gave
rein to her grief--the first real tears since her brother's death.

"I knew I should bring you round."  Beatrice sat on the arm of the
chair and patted the old lady's hand gently.  "I'll tell you what,
auntie; the best way is not to have any explanations, or make any
apologies, or create any fuss.  Just sit down and write a note for me
to take to Mabel and Lady Hester, and invite them all up to dinner."

Aunt Caroline made no protest now.  She sat and stared meditatively
into the fire, and considered Beatrice's plan.  After a long silence
she spoke.

"No--she can't touch her father's money.  She's a good girl.  I never
really objected to her--it was only the way it was done--only----"

"And now that it can't be helped, just invite them to dinner,
auntie."  Beatrice walked across to a writing desk and took out note
paper and envelopes, and made everything ready.  She led the old lady
to the writing table, and saw her settled.  Then she sat by the fire
and dried her eyes, and set her teeth firmly.  The task before her
was as hard as Aunt Caroline's--to visit Mabel in her happiness and
see Jack in his little home with his wife.

* * * * * * *

"Why, it's Beatrice!"

Jack opened the door of his chambers and shook the visitor warmly by
the hand.  She trembled a little, but returned his greeting cheerily,
and walked into Mabel's outstretched arms.  The place was warm and
cosy, and utterly transformed by new furniture, flowers, and
draperies.  The girls hugged one another silently for a few moments,
then Lady Hester came forward to give greeting also.  She was much
changed, paler and thinner, but very dignified in her widow's black;
and there was a new light in her face, a tenderness and graciousness
which was novel to Beatrice, who had always found Lady Hester a
little stiff and impatient of her rough ways.

"Mother, Beatrice must take off her hat and stay."

"Of course, of course," cried Jack.

"No, no, I've only just called.  I've got to catch a train; and I've
brought you a letter."

Mabel extended her hand wonderingly, but Beatrice stuffed the letter
in her muff.  "No, no; not now.  When I go."

They drew her to the fire and made much of her, and she melted and
became almost tender.  Perhaps Jack understood her feelings, for he
kept in the background, and left her to Mabel and Lady Hester.  When
she talked of going he entreated her to stay longer.

"No, no; I'm busy.  Been doing good Samaritan work this afternoon.
Got to get home to-night.  Only a spinster, and not allowed out alone
after dark, you know."

She thrust her hand into Jack's gauchely in her worst manner; but
Jack understood.

"Here's the letter, Mabel.  Good-bye!  Good-bye!"

She was gone quickly, and Mabel opened the envelope wonderingly.

"What can Beatrice have to write to us about?"

She read with a grave face, then passed the note to Jack.  He read it
aloud.

"Miss Cardew presents her compliments, and would be glad of the
company of Mr. and Mrs. Cardew and Lady Hester Cardew to dinner on
Wednesday.  Usual time."

"Hooray!" cried Jack.  Then he roared with laughter.

"This is Beatrice's doing," murmured Lady Hester, after a pause.
"She escaped so that we should not thank her."

"It's just like her," murmured Mabel.

"You see, Caroline refers to me as Lady Hester Cardew," observed her
mother.  "I take it that she means me to continue the name?"

"Of course, mother.  What can't be explained had better be left
alone.  Aunt Caroline is going to do the right thing for Jack after
all."

"And when auntie turns up trumps she does it handsomely," cried Jack.
"It has taken a great weight off my mind.  Now that I know where we
are, I feel like work at once.  I've heaps of stuff to cram into my
head before eleven o'clock to-morrow morning.  You two must sit over
the fire here, and I'll shut myself in the next room."

He seized his brief bag and left mother and daughter together.

They had nothing to say.  They comforted one another in a long and
tender embrace.









*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BISHOP'S EMERALDS ***


    

Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will
be renamed.

Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright
law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works,
so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United
States without permission and without paying copyright
royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part
of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project
Gutenberg™ electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™
concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark,
and may not be used if you charge for an eBook, except by following
the terms of the trademark license, including paying royalties for use
of the Project Gutenberg trademark. If you do not charge anything for
copies of this eBook, complying with the trademark license is very
easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as creation
of derivative works, reports, performances and research. Project
Gutenberg eBooks may be modified and printed and given away—you may
do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks not protected
by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the trademark
license, especially commercial redistribution.


START: FULL LICENSE

THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG™ LICENSE

PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK

To protect the Project Gutenberg™ mission of promoting the free
distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg”), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full
Project Gutenberg License available with this file or online at
www.gutenberg.org/license.

Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg
electronic works

1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg
electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all
the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or
destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg electronic works in your
possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a
Project Gutenberg electronic work and you do not agree to be bound
by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person
or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.

1.B. “Project Gutenberg” is a registered trademark. It may only be
used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few
things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg electronic works
even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See
paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project
Gutenberg electronic works if you follow the terms of this
agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg
electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below.

1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (“the
Foundation” or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection
of Project Gutenberg electronic works. Nearly all the individual
works in the collection are in the public domain in the United
States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the
United States and you are located in the United States, we do not
claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing,
displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as
all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope
that you will support the Project Gutenberg mission of promoting
free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg
works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the
Project Gutenberg name associated with the work. You can easily
comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the
same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg License when
you share it without charge with others.

1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are
in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States,
check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this
agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing,
distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any
other Project Gutenberg work. The Foundation makes no
representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any
country other than the United States.

1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:

1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other
immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg License must appear
prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg work (any work
on which the phrase “Project Gutenberg” appears, or with which the
phrase “Project Gutenberg” is associated) is accessed, displayed,
performed, viewed, copied or distributed:

    This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
    other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
    whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
    of the Project Gutenberg™ License included with this eBook or online
    at www.gutenberg.org. If you
    are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws
    of the country where you are located before using this eBook.
  
1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg electronic work is
derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not
contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the
copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in
the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are
redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg” associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply
either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or
obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg
trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.

1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg electronic work is posted
with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any
additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms
will be linked to the Project Gutenberg License for all works
posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the
beginning of this work.

1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg
License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg.

1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
Gutenberg License.

1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including
any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access
to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg work in a format
other than “Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other format used in the official
version posted on the official Project Gutenberg website
(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense
to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means
of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original “Plain
Vanilla ASCII” or other form. Any alternate format must include the
full Project Gutenberg License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.

1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg works
unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.

1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
access to or distributing Project Gutenberg electronic works
provided that:

    • You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
        the use of Project Gutenberg works calculated using the method
        you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed
        to the owner of the Project Gutenberg trademark, but he has
        agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project
        Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid
        within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are
        legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty
        payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project
        Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in
        Section 4, “Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg
        Literary Archive Foundation.”
    
    • You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
        you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
        does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg™
        License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all
        copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue
        all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg™
        works.
    
    • You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of
        any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
        electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of
        receipt of the work.
    
    • You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
        distribution of Project Gutenberg™ works.
    

1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project
Gutenberg™ electronic work or group of works on different terms than
are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing
from the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the manager of
the Project Gutenberg™ trademark. Contact the Foundation as set
forth in Section 3 below.

1.F.

1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project
Gutenberg™ collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg™
electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may
contain “Defects,” such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate
or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other
intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or
other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or
cannot be read by your equipment.

1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the “Right
of Replacement or Refund” described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
Gutenberg™ trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
Gutenberg™ electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
DAMAGE.

1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you
received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium
with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you
with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in
lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person
or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second
opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If
the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing
without further opportunities to fix the problem.

1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you ‘AS-IS’, WITH NO
OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT
LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.

1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of
damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement
violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the
agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or
limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or
unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the
remaining provisions.

1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
providing copies of Project Gutenberg™ electronic works in
accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the
production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg™
electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses,
including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of
the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this
or any Project Gutenberg work, (b) alteration, modification, or
additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg work, and (c) any
Defect you cause.

Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg

Project Gutenberg is synonymous with the free distribution of
electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of
computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It
exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations
from people in all walks of life.

Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg’s
goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg collection will
remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
and permanent future for Project Gutenberg and future
generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see
Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at www.gutenberg.org.

Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation

The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non-profit
501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
Revenue Service. The Foundation’s EIN or federal tax identification
number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by
U.S. federal laws and your state’s laws.

The Foundation’s business office is located at 41 Watchung Plaza #516,
Montclair NJ 07042, USA, +1 (862) 621-9288. Email contact links and up
to date contact information can be found at the Foundation’s website
and official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact

Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
Literary Archive Foundation

Project Gutenberg™ depends upon and cannot survive without widespread
public support and donations to carry out its mission of
increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
freely distributed in machine-readable form accessible by the widest
array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations
($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
status with the IRS.

The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations
where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND
DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular state
visit www.gutenberg.org/donate.

While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
approach us with offers to donate.

International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.

Please check the Project Gutenberg web pages for current donation
methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other
ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To
donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate.

Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg electronic works

Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project
Gutenberg concept of a library of electronic works that could be
freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and
distributed Project Gutenberg eBooks with only a loose network of
volunteer support.

Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed
editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in
the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not
necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper
edition.

Most people start at our website which has the main PG search
facility: www.gutenberg.org.

This website includes information about Project Gutenberg,
including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.