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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Blind Love, by Wilkie Collins
+#30 in our series by Wilkie Collins
+
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+
+Title: Blind Love
+
+Author: Wilkie Collins
+
+Release Date: April, 2005 [EBook #7890]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on May 31, 2003]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BLIND LOVE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by James Rusk
+
+
+
+
+Blind Love
+
+by Wilkie Collins (completed by Walter Besant)
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+IN the month of August 1889, and in the middle of the seaside holiday,
+a message came to me from Wilkie Collins, then, though we hoped
+otherwise, on his death-bed.
+
+It was conveyed to me by Mr. A. P. Watt. He told me that his son had
+just come from Wilkie Collins: that they had been speaking of his
+novel, "Blind Love," then running in the _Illustrated London News_:
+that the novel was, unfortunately, unfinished: that he himself could
+not possibly finish it: and that he would be very glad, if I would
+finish it if I could find the time. And that if I could undertake this
+work he would send me his notes of the remainder. Wilkie Collins added
+these words: "If he has the time I think he will do it: we are both old
+hands at this work, and understand it, and he knows that I would do the
+same for him if he were in my place."
+
+Under the circumstances of the case, it was impossible to decline this
+request. I wrote to say that time should be made, and the notes were
+forwarded to me at Robin Hood's Bay. I began by reading carefully and
+twice over, so as to get a grip of the story and the novelist's
+intention, the part that had already appeared, and the proofs so far as
+the author had gone. I then turned to the notes. I found that these
+were not merely notes such as I expected--simple indications of the
+plot and the development of events, but an actual detailed scenario, in
+which every incident, however trivial, was carefully laid down: there
+were also fragments of dialogue inserted at those places where dialogue
+was wanted to emphasise the situation and make it real. I was much
+struck with the writer's perception of the vast importance of dialogue
+in making the reader seize the scene. Description requires attention:
+dialogue rivets attention.
+
+It is not an easy task, nor is it pleasant, to carry on another man's
+work: but the possession of this scenario lightened the work
+enormously. I have been careful to adhere faithfully and exactly to the
+plot, scene by scene, down to the smallest detail as it was laid down
+by the author in this book. I have altered nothing. I have preserved
+and incorporated every fragment of dialogue. I have used the very
+language wherever that was written so carefully as to show that it was
+meant to be used. I think that there is only one trivial detail where I
+had to choose because it was not clear from the notes what the author
+had intended. The plot of the novel, every scene, every situation, from
+beginning to end, is the work of Wilkie Collins. The actual writing is
+entirely his up to a certain point: from that point to the end it is
+partly his, but mainly mine. Where his writing ends and mine begins, I
+need not point out. The practised critic will, no doubt, at once lay
+his finger on the spot.
+
+I have therefore carried out the author's wishes to the best of my
+ability. I would that he were living still, if only to regret that he
+had not been allowed to finish his last work with his own hand!
+
+WALTER BESANT.
+
+
+BLIND LOVE
+
+THE PROLOGUE
+
+I
+
+SOON after sunrise, on a cloudy morning in the year 1881, a special
+messenger disturbed the repose of Dennis Howmore, at his place of
+residence in the pleasant Irish town of Ardoon.
+
+Well acquainted apparently with the way upstairs, the man thumped on a
+bed-room door, and shouted his message through it: "The master wants
+you, and mind you don't keep him waiting."
+
+The person sending this peremptory message was Sir Giles Mountjoy of
+Ardoon, knight and banker. The person receiving the message was Sir
+Giles's head clerk. As a matter of course, Dennis Howmore dressed
+himself at full speed, and hastened to his employer's private house on
+the outskirts of the town.
+
+He found Sir Giles in an irritable and anxious state of mind. A letter
+lay open on the banker's bed, his night-cap was crumpled crookedly on
+his head, he was in too great a hurry to remember the claims of
+politeness, when the clerk said "Good morning."
+
+"Dennis, I have got something for you to do. It must be kept a secret,
+and it allows of no delay."
+
+"Is it anything connected with business, sir?"
+
+The banker lost his temper. "How can you be such an infernal fool as to
+suppose that anything connected with business could happen at this time
+in the morning? Do you know the first milestone on the road to Garvan?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"Very well. Go to the milestone, and take care that nobody sees you
+when you get there. Look at the back of the stone. If you discover an
+Object which appears to have been left in that situation on the ground,
+bring it to me; and don't forget that the most impatient man in all
+Ireland is waiting for you."
+
+Not a word of explanation followed these extraordinary instructions.
+
+The head clerk set forth on his errand, with his mind dwelling on the
+national tendencies to conspiracy and assassination. His employer was
+not a popular person. Sir Giles had paid rent when he owed it; and,
+worse still, was disposed to remember in a friendly spirit what England
+had done for Ireland, in the course of the last fifty years. If
+anything appeared to justify distrust of the mysterious Object of which
+he was in search, Dennis resolved to be vigilantly on the look-out for
+a gun-barrel, whenever he passed a hedge on his return journey to the
+town.
+
+Arrived at the milestone, he discovered on the ground behind it one
+Object only--a fragment of a broken tea-cup.
+
+Naturally enough, Dennis hesitated. It seemed to be impossible that the
+earnest and careful instructions which he had received could relate to
+such a trifle as this. At the same time, he was acting under orders
+which were as positive as tone, manner, and language could make them.
+Passive obedience appeared to be the one safe course to take--at the
+risk of a reception, irritating to any man's self-respect, when he
+returned to his employer with a broken teacup in his hand.
+
+The event entirely failed to justify his misgivings. There could be no
+doubt that Sir Giles attached serious importance to the contemptible
+discovery made at the milestone. After having examined and re-examined
+the fragment, he announced his intention of sending the clerk on a
+second errand--still without troubling himself to explain what his
+incomprehensible instructions meant.
+
+"If I am not mistaken," he began, "the Reading Rooms, in our town, open
+as early as nine. Very well. Go to the Rooms this morning, on the
+stroke of the clock." He stopped, and consulted the letter which lay
+open on his bed. "Ask the librarian," he continued, "for the third
+volume of Gibbon's 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.' Open the
+book at pages seventy-eight and seventy-nine. If you find a piece of
+paper between those two leaves, take possession of it when nobody is
+looking at you, and bring it to me. That's all, Dennis. And bear in
+mind that I shall not recover the use of my patience till I see you
+again."
+
+On ordinary occasions, the head clerk was not a man accustomed to
+insist on what was due to his dignity. At the same time he was a
+sensible human being, conscious of the consideration to which his
+responsible place in the office entitled him. Sir Giles's irritating
+reserve, not even excused by a word of apology, reached the limits of
+his endurance. He respectfully protested.
+
+"I regret to find, sir," he said, "that I have lost my place in my
+employer's estimation. The man to whom you confide the superintendence
+of your clerks and the transaction of your business has, I venture to
+think, some claim (under the present circumstances) to be trusted."
+
+The banker was now offended on his side.
+
+"I readily admit your claim," he answered, "when you are sitting at
+your desk in my office. But, even in these days of strikes,
+co-operations, and bank holidays, an employer has one privilege
+left--he has not ceased to be a Man, and he has not forfeited a man's
+right to keep his own secrets. I fail to see anything in my conduct
+which has given you just reason to complain."
+
+Dennis, rebuked, made his bow in silence, and withdrew.
+
+Did these acts of humility mean that he submitted? They meant exactly
+the contrary. He had made up his mind that Sir Giles Mountjoy's motives
+should, sooner or later, cease to be mysteries to Sir Giles Mountjoy's
+clerk.
+
+II
+
+CAREFULLY following his instructions, he consulted the third volume of
+Gibbon's great History, and found, between the seventy-eighth and
+seventy-ninth pages, something remarkable this time.
+
+It was a sheet of delicately-made paper, pierced with a number of
+little holes, infinitely varied in size, and cut with the smoothest
+precision. Having secured this curious object, while the librarian's
+back was turned, Dennis Howmore reflected.
+
+A page of paper, unintelligibly perforated for some purpose unknown,
+was in itself a suspicious thing. And what did suspicion suggest to the
+inquiring mind in South-Western Ireland, before the suppression of the
+Land League? Unquestionably---Police!
+
+On the way back to his employer, the banker's clerk paid a visit to an
+old friend--a journalist by profession, and a man of varied learning
+and experience as well. Invited to inspect the remarkable morsel of
+paper, and to discover the object with which the perforations had been
+made, the authority consulted proved to be worthy of the trust reposed
+in him. Dennis left the newspaper office an enlightened man--with
+information at the disposal of Sir Giles, and with a sense of relief
+which expressed itself irreverently in these words: "Now I have got
+him!"
+
+The bewildered banker looked backwards and forwards from the paper to
+the clerk, and from the clerk to the paper. "I don't understand it," he
+said. "Do you?"
+
+Still preserving the appearance of humility, Dennis asked leave to
+venture on a guess. The perforated paper looked, as he thought, like a
+Puzzle. "If we wait for a day or two," he suggested, "the Key to it may
+possibly reach us."
+
+On the next day, nothing happened. On the day after, a second letter
+made another audacious demand on the fast failing patience of Sir Giles
+Mountjoy.
+
+Even the envelope proved to be a Puzzle on this occasion; the postmark
+was "Ardoon." In other words, the writer had used the postman as a
+messenger, while he or his accomplice was actually in the town, posting
+the letter within half-a-minute's walk of the bank! The contents
+presented an impenetrable mystery, the writing looked worthy of a
+madman. Sentences appeared in the wildest state of confusion, and words
+were so mutilated as to be unintelligible. This time the force of
+circumstances was more than Sir Giles could resist. He took the clerk
+into his confidence at last.
+
+"Let us begin at the beginning," he said. "There is the letter you saw
+on my bed, when I first sent for you. I found it waiting on my table
+when I woke; and I don't know who put it there. Read it."
+
+Dennis read as follows:
+
+"Sir Giles Mountjoy,--I have a disclosure to make, in which one of the
+members of your family is seriously interested. Before I can venture to
+explain myself, I must be assured that I can trust to your good faith.
+As a test of this, I require you to fulfil the two conditions that
+follow--and to do it without the slightest loss of time. I dare not
+trust you yet with my address, or my signature. Any act of
+carelessness, on my part, might end fatally for the true friend who
+writes these lines. If you neglect this warning, you will regret it to
+the end of your life."
+
+To the conditions on which the letter insisted there is no need to
+allude. They had been complied with when the discoveries were made at
+the back of the milestone, and between the pages of Gibson's history.
+Sir Giles had already arrived at the conclusion that a conspiracy was
+in progress to assassinate him, and perhaps to rob the bank. The wiser
+head clerk pointed to the perforated paper and the incomprehensible
+writing received that morning. "If we can find out what these mean," he
+said, "you may be better able, sir, to form a correct opinion."
+
+"And who is to do that?" the banker asked.
+
+"I can but try, sir," was the modest reply, "if you see no objection to
+my making the attempt."
+
+Sir Giles approved of the proposed experiment, silently and
+satirically, by a bend of his head.
+
+Too discreet a man to make a suspiciously ready use of the information
+which he had privately obtained, Dennis took care that his first
+attempt should not be successful. After modestly asking permission to
+try again, he ventured on the second occasion to arrive at a happy
+discovery. Lifting the perforated paper, he placed it delicately over
+the page which contained the unintelligible writing. Words and
+sentences now appeared (through the holes in the paper) in their right
+spelling and arrangement, and addressed Sir Giles in these terms:
+
+"I beg to thank you, sir, for complying with my conditions. You have
+satisfied me of your good faith. At the same time, it is possible that
+you may hesitate to trust a man who is not yet able to admit you to his
+confidence. The perilous position in which I stand obliges me to ask
+for two or three days more of delay, before I can safely make an
+appointment with you. Pray be patient--and on no account apply for
+advice or protection to the police."
+
+"Those last words," Sir Giles declared, "are conclusive! The sooner I
+am under the care of the law the better. Take my card to the
+police-office."
+
+"May I say a word first, sir?"
+
+"Do you mean that you don't agree with me?"
+
+"I mean that."
+
+"You were always an obstinate man Dennis; and it grows on you as you
+get older. Never mind! Let's have it out. Who do _you_ say is the
+person pointed at in these rascally letters?"
+
+The head clerk took up the first letter of the two and pointed to the
+opening sentence: "Sir Giles Mountjoy, I have a disclosure to make in
+which one of the members of your family is seriously interested."
+Dennis emphatically repeated the words: "one of the members of your
+family." His employer regarded him with a broad stare of astonishment.
+
+"One of the members of my family?" Sir Giles repeated, on his side.
+"Why, man alive, what are you thinking of? I'm an old bachelor, and I
+haven't got a family."
+
+"There is your brother, sir."
+
+"My brother is in France--out of the way of the wretches who are
+threatening me. I wish I was with him!"
+
+"There are your brother's two sons, Sir Giles."
+
+"Well? And what is there to be afraid of? My nephew, Hugh, is in
+London--and, mind! not on a political errand. I hope, before long, to
+hear that he is going to be married--if the strangest and nicest girl
+in England will have him. What's wrong now?"
+
+Dennis explained. "I only wished to say, sir, that I was thinking of
+your other nephew."
+
+Sir Giles laughed. "Arthur in danger!" he exclaimed. "As harmless a
+young man as ever lived. The worst one can say of him is that he is
+throwing away his money--farming in Kerry."
+
+"Excuse me, Sir Giles; there's not much chance of his throwing away his
+money, where he is now. Nobody will venture to take his money. I met
+with one of Mr. Arthur's neighbours at the market yesterday. Your
+nephew is boycotted."
+
+"So much the better," the obstinate banker declared. "He will be cured
+of his craze for farming; and he will come back to the place I am
+keeping for him in the office."
+
+"God grant it!" the clerk said fervently.
+
+For the moment, Sir Giles was staggered. "Have you heard something that
+you haven't told me yet?" he asked.
+
+"No, sir. I am only bearing in mind something which--with all
+respect--I think you have forgotten. The last tenant on that bit of
+land in Kerry refused to pay his rent. Mr. Arthur has taken what they
+call an evicted farm. It's my firm belief," said the head clerk, rising
+and speaking earnestly, "that the person who has addressed those
+letters to you knows Mr. Arthur, and knows he is in danger--and is
+trying to save your nephew (by means of your influence), at the risk of
+his own life."
+
+Sir Giles shook his head. "I call that a far-fetched interpretation,
+Dennis. If what you say is true, why didn't the writer of those
+anonymous letters address himself to Arthur, instead of to me?"
+
+"I gave it as my opinion just now, sir, that the writer of the letter
+knew Mr. Arthur."
+
+"So you did. And what of that?"
+
+Dennis stood to his guns.
+
+"Anybody who is acquainted with Mr. Arthur," he persisted, "knows that
+(with all sorts of good qualities) the young gentleman is headstrong
+and rash. If a friend told him he was in danger on the farm, that would
+be enough of itself to make him stop where he is, and brave it out.
+Whereas you, sir, are known to be cautious and careful, and farseeing
+and discreet." He might have added: And cowardly and obstinate, and
+narrow-minded and inflated by stupid self-esteem. But respect for his
+employer had blindfolded the clerk's observation for many a long year
+past. If one man may be born with the heart of a lion, another man may
+be born with the mind of a mule. Dennis's master was one of the other
+men.
+
+"Very well put," Sir Giles answered indulgently. "Time will show, if
+such an entirely unimportant person as my nephew Arthur is likely to be
+assassinated. That allusion to one of the members of my family is a
+mere equivocation, designed to throw me off my guard. Rank, money,
+social influence, unswerving principles, mark ME out as a public
+character. Go to the police-office, and let the best man who happens to
+be off duty come here directly."
+
+Good Dennis Howmore approached the door very unwillingly. It was
+opened, from the outer side, before he had reached that end of the
+room. One of the bank porters announced a visitor.
+
+"Miss Henley wishes to know, sir, if you can see her."
+
+Sir Giles looked agreeably surprised. He rose with alacrity to receive
+the lady.
+
+III
+
+WHEN Iris Henley dies there will, in all probability, be friends left
+who remember her and talk of her--and there may be strangers present at
+the time (women for the most part), whose curiosity will put questions
+relating to her personal appearance. No replies will reward them with
+trustworthy information. Miss Henley's chief claim to admiration lay in
+a remarkable mobility of expression, which reflected every change of
+feeling peculiar to the nature of a sweet and sensitive woman. For this
+reason, probably, no descriptions of her will agree with each other. No
+existing likenesses will represent her. The one portrait that was
+painted of Iris is only recognisable by partial friends of the artist.
+In and out of London, photographic likenesses were taken of her. They
+have the honour of resembling the portraits of Shakespeare in this
+respect--compared with one another, it is not possible to discover that
+they present the same person. As for the evidence offered by the loving
+memory of her friends, it is sure to be contradictory in the last
+degree. She had a charming face, a commonplace face, an intelligent
+face--a poor complexion, a delicate complexion, no complexion at
+all--eyes that were expressive of a hot temper, of a bright intellect,
+of a firm character, of an affectionate disposition, of a truthful
+nature, of hysterical sensibility, of inveterate obstinacy--a figure
+too short; no, just the right height; no, neither one thing nor the
+other; elegant, if you like--dress shabby: oh, surely not; dress quiet
+and simple; no, something more than that; ostentatiously quiet,
+theatrically simple, worn with the object of looking unlike other
+people. In one last word, was this mass of contradictions generally
+popular, in the time when it was a living creature? Yes--among the men.
+No--not invariably. The man of all others who ought to have been
+fondest of her was the man who behaved cruelly to Iris--her own father.
+And, when the poor creature married (if she did marry), how many of you
+attended the wedding? Not one of us! And when she died, how many of you
+were sorry for her? All of us! What? no difference of opinion in that
+one particular? On the contrary, perfect concord, thank God.
+
+Let the years roll back, and let Iris speak for herself, at the
+memorable time when she was in the prime of her life, and when a stormy
+career was before her.
+
+IV
+
+BEING Miss Henley's godfather, Sir Giles was a privileged person. He
+laid his hairy hands on her shoulders, and kissed her on either cheek.
+After that prefatory act of endearment, he made his inquiries. What
+extraordinary combination of events had led Iris to leave London, and
+had brought her to visit him in his banking-house at Ardoon?
+
+"I wanted to get away from home," she answered; "and having nobody to
+go to but my godfather, I thought I should like to see You."
+
+"Alone!" cried Sir Giles.
+
+"No--with my maid to keep me company."
+
+"Only your maid, Iris? Surely you have acquaintances among young ladies
+like yourself?"
+
+"Acquaintances--yes. No friends."
+
+"Does your father approve of what you have done?"
+
+"Will you grant me a favour, godpapa?"
+
+"Yes--if I can."
+
+"Don't insist on my answering your last question."
+
+The faint colour that had risen in her face, when she entered the room,
+left it. At the same time, the expression of her mouth altered. The
+lips closed firmly; revealing that strongest of all resolutions which
+is founded on a keen sense of wrong. She looked older than her age:
+what she might be ten years hence, she was now. Sir Giles understood
+her. He got up, and took a turn in the room. An old habit, of which he
+had cured himself with infinite difficulty when he was made a Knight,
+showed itself again. He put his hands in his pockets.
+
+"You and your father have had another quarrel," he said, stopping
+opposite Iris.
+
+"I don't deny it," she replied.
+
+"Who is to blame?"
+
+She smiled bitterly. "The woman is always to blame."
+
+"Did your father tell you that?"
+
+"My father reminded me that I was twenty-one years old, last
+birthday--and told me that I could do as I liked. I understood him, and
+I left the house."
+
+"You will go back again, I suppose?"
+
+"I don't know."
+
+Sir Giles began pacing the room once more. His rugged face, telling its
+story of disaster and struggle in early life, showed signs of
+disappointment and distress.
+
+"Hugh promised to write to me," he said, "and he has not written. I
+know what that means; I know what you have done to offend your father.
+My nephew has asked you to marry him for the second time. And for the
+second time you have refused."
+
+Her face softened; its better and younger aspect revived. "Yes," she
+said, sadly and submissively; "I have refused him again."
+
+Sir Giles lost his temper. "What the devil is your objection to Hugh?"
+he burst out.
+
+"My father said the same thing to me," she replied, "almost in the same
+words. I made him angry when I tried to give my reason. I don't want to
+make you angry, too."
+
+He took no notice of this. "Isn't Hugh a good fellow?" he went on.
+"Isn't he affectionate? and kindhearted? and honourable?--aye, and a
+handsome man too, if you come to that."
+
+"Hugh is all that you say. I like him; I admire him; I owe to his
+kindness some of the happiest days of my sad life, and I am
+grateful--oh, with all my heart, I am grateful to Hugh!"
+
+"If that's true, Iris----"
+
+"Every word of it is true."
+
+"I say, if that's true--there's no excuse for you. I hate perversity in
+a young woman! Why don't you marry him?"
+
+"Try to feel for me," she said gently; "I can't love him."
+
+Her tone said more to the banker than her words had expressed. The
+secret sorrow of her life, which was known to her father, was known
+also to Sir Giles.
+
+"Now we have come to it at last!" he said. "You can't love my nephew
+Hugh. And you won't tell me the reason why, because your sweet temper
+shrinks from making me angry. Shall I mention the reason for you, my
+dear? I can do it in two words--Lord Harry."
+
+She made no reply; she showed no sign of feeling at what he had just
+said. Her head sank a little; her hands clasped themselves on her lap;
+the obstinate resignation which can submit to anything hardened her
+face, stiffened her figure--and that was all.
+
+The banker was determined not to spare her.
+
+"It's easy to see," he resumed, "that you have not got over your
+infatuation for that vagabond yet. Go where he may, into the vilest
+places and among the lowest people, he carries your heart along with
+him. I wonder you are not ashamed of such an attachment as that."
+
+He had stung her at last. She roused herself, and answered him.
+
+"Harry has led a wild life," she said; "he has committed serious
+faults, and he may live to do worse than he has done yet. To what
+degradation, bad company, and a bad bringing-up may yet lead him, I
+leave his enemies to foresee. But I tell you this, he has redeeming
+qualities which you, and people like you, are not good Christians
+enough to discover. He has friends who can still appreciate him--your
+nephew, Arthur Mountjoy, is one of them. Oh, I know it by Arthur's
+letters to me! Blame Lord Harry as you may, I tell you he has the
+capacity for repentance in him, and one day--when it is too late, I
+dare say--he will show it. I can never be his wife. We are parted,
+never in all likelihood to meet again. Well, he is the only man whom I
+have ever loved; and he is the only man whom I ever shall love. If you
+think this state of mind proves that I am as bad as he is, I won't
+contradict you. Do we any of us know how bad we are----? Have you heard
+of Harry lately?"
+
+The sudden transition, from an earnest and devoted defence of the man,
+to an easy and familiar inquiry about him, startled Sir Giles.
+
+For the moment, he had nothing to say; Iris had made him think. She had
+shown a capacity for mastering her strongest feelings, at the moment
+when they threatened to overcome her, which is very rarely found in a
+young woman. How to manage her was a problem for patient resolution to
+solve. The banker's obstinacy, rather than his conviction, had
+encouraged him to hold to the hope of Hugh's marriage, even after his
+nephew had been refused for the second time. His headstrong goddaughter
+had come to visit him of her own accord. She had not forgotten the days
+of her childhood, when he had some influence over her--when she had
+found him kinder to her than her father had ever been. Sir Giles saw
+that he had taken the wrong tone with Iris. His anger had not alarmed
+her; his opinion had not influenced her. In Hugh's interests, he
+determined to try what consideration and indulgence would do towards
+cultivating the growth of her regard for him. Finding that she had left
+her maid and her luggage at the hotel, he hospitably insisted on their
+removal to his own house.
+
+"While you are in Ardoon, Iris, you are my guest," he said.
+
+She pleased him by readily accepting the invitation--and then annoyed
+him by asking again if he had heard anything of Lord Harry.
+
+He answered shortly and sharply: "I have heard nothing. What is _your_
+last news of him?"
+
+"News," she said, "which I sincerely hope is not true. An Irish paper
+has been sent to me, which reports that he has joined the secret
+society--nothing better than a society of assassins, I am afraid--which
+is known by the name of the Invincibles."
+
+As she mentioned that formidable brotherhood, Dennis Howmore returned
+from the police-office. He announced that a Sergeant was then waiting
+to receive instructions from Sir Giles.
+
+V
+
+IRIS rose to go. Her godfather courteously stopped her.
+
+"Wait here," he said, "until I have spoken to the Sergeant, and I will
+escort you to my house. My clerk will do what is necessary at the
+hotel. You don't look quite satisfied. Is the arrangement that I have
+proposed not agreeable to you?"
+
+Iris assured him that she gratefully acceded to the arrangement. At the
+same time, she confessed to having been a little startled, on
+discovering that he was in consultation with the police. "I remember
+that we are in Ireland," she explained, "and I am foolish enough to
+fear that you may be in some danger. May I hope that it is only a
+trifle?"
+
+Only a trifle! Among ether deficient sensibilities in the strange
+nature of Iris, Sir Giles had observed an imperfect appreciation of the
+dignity of his social position. Here was a new proof of it! The
+temptation to inspire sentiments of alarm--not unmingled with
+admiration--in the mind of his insensible goddaughter, by exhibiting
+himself as a public character threatened by a conspiracy, was more than
+the banker's vanity could resist. Before he left the room, he
+instructed Dennis to tell Miss Henley what had happened, and to let her
+judge for herself whether he had been needlessly alarmed by, what she
+was pleased to call, "a mere trifle."
+
+Dennis Howmore must have been more than mortal, if he could have
+related his narrative of events without being influenced by his own
+point of view. On the first occasion when he mentioned Arthur
+Mountjoy's name, Iris showed a sudden interest in his strange story
+which took him by surprise.
+
+"You know Mr. Arthur?" he said.
+
+"Knew him!" Iris repeated. "He was my playfellow when we were both
+children. He is as dear to me as if he was my brother. Tell me at
+once--is he really in danger?"
+
+Dennis honestly repeated what he had already said, on that subject, to
+his master. Miss Henley, entirely agreeing with him, was eager to warn
+Arthur of his position. There was no telegraphic communication with the
+village which was near his farm. She could only write to him, and she
+did write to him, by that day's post--having reasons of her own for
+anxiety, which forbade her to show her letter to Dennis. Well aware of
+the devoted friendship which united Lord Harry and Arthur Mountjoy--and
+bearing in mind the newspaper report of the Irish lord's rash
+association with the Invincibles--her fears now identified the noble
+vagabond as the writer of the anonymous letters, which had so seriously
+excited her godfather's doubts of his own safety.
+
+When Sir Giles returned, and took her with him to his house, he spoke
+of his consultation with the Sergeant in terms which increased her
+dread of what might happen in the future. She was a dull and silent
+guest, during the interval that elapsed before it would be possible to
+receive Arthur's reply. The day arrived--and the post brought no relief
+to her anxieties. The next day passed without a letter. On the morning
+of the fourth day, Sir Giles rose later than usual. His correspondence
+was sent to him from the office, at breakfast-time. After opening one
+of the letters, he dispatched a messenger in hot haste to the police.
+
+"Look at that," he said, handing the letter to Iris. "Does the assassin
+take me for a fool?"
+
+She read the lines that follow:
+
+"Unforeseen events force me, Sir Giles, to run a serious risk. I must
+speak to you, and it must not be by daylight. My one hope of safety is
+in darkness. Meet me at the first milestone, on the road to Garvan,
+when the moon sets at ten o'clock to-night. No need to mention your
+name. The password is: _Fidelity."_
+
+"Do you mean to go?" Iris asked.
+
+"Do I mean to be murdered!" Sir Giles broke out. "My dear child, do
+pray try to think before you speak. The Sergeant will represent me, of
+course."
+
+"And take the man prisoner?" Iris added.
+
+"Certainly!"
+
+With that startling reply, the banker hurried away to receive the
+police in another room. Iris dropped into the nearest chair. The turn
+that the affair had now taken filled her with unutterable dismay.
+
+Sir Giles came back, after no very long absence, composed and smiling.
+The course of proceeding had been settled to his complete satisfaction.
+
+Dressed in private clothes, the Sergeant was to go to the milestone at
+the appointed time, representing the banker in the darkness, and giving
+the password. He was to be followed by two of his men who would wait in
+concealment, within hearing of his whistle, if their services were
+required. "I want to see the ruffian when he is safely handcuffed," Sir
+Giles explained; "and I have arranged to wait for the police, to-night,
+at my office."
+
+There was but one desperate way that Iris could now discern of saving
+the man who had confided in her godfather's honour, and whose trust had
+already been betrayed. Never had she loved the outlawed Irish lord--the
+man whom she was forbidden, and rightly forbidden, to marry--as she
+loved him at that moment. Let the risk be what it might, this resolute
+woman had determined that the Sergeant should not be the only person
+who arrived at the milestone, and gave the password. There was one
+devoted friend to Lord Harry, whom she could always trust--and that
+friend was herself.
+
+Sir Giles withdrew, to look after his business at the bank. She waited
+until the clock had struck the servants' dinner hour, and then ascended
+the stairs to her godfather's dressing-room. Opening his wardrobe, she
+discovered in one part of it a large Spanish cloak, and, in another
+part, a high-crowned felt hat which he wore on his country excursions.
+In the dark, here was disguise enough for her purpose.
+
+As she left the dressing-room, a measure of precaution occurred to her,
+which she put in action at once. Telling her maid that she had some
+purchases to make in the town, she went out, and asked her way to
+Garvan of the first respectable stranger whom she met in the street.
+Her object was to walk as far as the first milestone, in daylight, so
+as to be sure of finding it again by night. She had made herself
+familiar with the different objects on the road, when she returned to
+the banker's house.
+
+As the time for the arrest drew nearer, Sir Giles became too restless
+to wait patiently at home. He went away to the police-office, eager to
+hear if any new counter-conspiracy had occurred to the authorities.
+
+It was dark soon after eight o'clock, at that time of the year. At nine
+the servants assembled at the supper-table. They were all downstairs
+together, talking, and waiting for their meal.
+
+Feeling the necessity of arriving at the place of meeting, in time to
+keep out of the Sergeant's way, Iris assumed her disguise as the clock
+struck nine. She left the house without a living creature to notice
+her, indoors or out. Clouds were gathering over the sky. The waning
+moon was only to be seen at intervals, as she set forth on her way to
+the milestone.
+
+VI
+
+THE wind rose a little, and the rifts in the clouds began to grow
+broader as Iris gained the high road.
+
+For a while, the glimmer of the misty moonlight lit the way before her.
+As well as she could guess, she had passed over more than half of the
+distance between the town and the milestone before the sky darkened
+again. Objects by the wayside grew shadowy and dim. A few drops of rain
+began to fall. The milestone, as she knew--thanks to the discovery of
+it made by daylight--was on the right-hand side of the road. But the
+dull-grey colour of the stone was not easy to see in the dark.
+
+A doubt troubled her whether she might not have passed the milestone.
+She stopped and looked at the sky.
+
+The threatening of rain had passed away: signs showed themselves which
+seemed to promise another break in the clouds. She waited. Low and
+faint, the sinking moonlight looked its last at the dull earth. In
+front of her, there was nothing to be seen but the road. She looked
+back--and discovered the milestone.
+
+A rough stone wall protected the land on either side of the road.
+Nearly behind the milestone there was a gap in this fence, partially
+closed by a hurdle. A half-ruined culvert, arching a ditch that had run
+dry, formed a bridge leading from the road to the field. Had the field
+been already chosen as a place of concealment by the police? Nothing
+was to be seen but a footpath, and the dusky line of a plantation
+beyond it. As she made these discoveries, the rain began to fall again;
+the clouds gathered once more; the moonlight vanished.
+
+At the same moment an obstacle presented itself to her mind, which Iris
+had thus far failed to foresee.
+
+Lord Harry might approach the milestone by three different ways: that
+is to say--by the road from the town, or by the road from the open
+country, or by way of the field and the culvert. How could she so place
+herself as to be sure of warning him, before he fell into the hands of
+the police? To watch the three means of approach in the obscurity of
+the night, and at one and the same time, was impossible.
+
+A man in this position, guided by reason, would in all probability have
+wasted precious time in trying to arrive at the right decision. A
+woman, aided by love, conquered the difficulty that confronted her in a
+moment.
+
+Iris decided on returning to the milestone, and on waiting there to be
+discovered and taken prisoner by the police. Supposing Lord Harry to be
+punctual to his appointment, he would hear voices and movements, as a
+necessary consequence of the arrest, in time to make his escape.
+Supposing him on the other hand to be late, the police would be on the
+way back to the town with their prisoner: he would find no one at the
+milestone, and would leave it again in safety.
+
+She was on the point of turning, to get back to the road, when
+something on the dark surface of the field, which looked like a darker
+shadow, became dimly visible. In another moment it seemed to be a
+shadow that moved. She ran towards it. It looked like a man as she drew
+nearer. The man stopped.
+
+"The password," he said, in tones cautiously lowered.
+
+"Fidelity," she answered in a whisper.
+
+It was too dark for a recognition of his features; but Iris knew him by
+his tall stature--knew him by the accent in which he had asked for the
+password. Erroneously judging of her, on his side, as a man, he drew
+back again. Sir Giles Mountjoy was above the middle height; the
+stranger in a cloak, who had whispered to him, was below it. "You are
+not the person I expected to meet," he said. "Who are you?"
+
+Her faithful heart was longing to tell him the truth. The temptation to
+reveal herself, and to make the sweet confession of her happiness at
+having saved him, would have overpowered her discretion, but for a
+sound that was audible on the road behind them. In the deep silence of
+the time and place mistake was impossible. It was the sound of
+footsteps.
+
+There was just time to whisper to him: "Sir Giles has betrayed you.
+Save yourself."
+
+"Thank you, whoever you are!"
+
+With that reply, he suddenly and swiftly disappeared. Iris remembered
+the culvert, and turned towards it. There was a hiding-place under the
+arch, if she could only get down into the dry ditch in time. She was
+feeling her way to the slope of it with her feet, when a heavy hand
+seized her by the arm; and a resolute voice said: "You are my
+prisoner."
+
+She was led back into the road. The man who had got her blew a whistle.
+Two other men joined him.
+
+"Show a light," he said; "and let's see who the fellow is."
+
+The shade was slipped aside from a lantern: the light fell full on the
+prisoner's face. Amazement petrified the two attendant policemen. The
+pious Catholic Sergeant burst into speech: "Holy Mary! it's a woman!"
+
+Did the secret societies of Ireland enrol women? Was this a modern
+Judith, expressing herself by anonymous letters, and bent on
+assassinating a financial Holofernes who kept a bank? What account had
+she to give of herself? How came she to be alone in a desolate field on
+a rainy night? Instead of answering these questions, the inscrutable
+stranger preferred a bold and brief request. "Take me to Sir
+Giles"--was all she said to the police.
+
+The Sergeant had the handcuffs ready. After looking at the prisoner's
+delicate wrists by the lantern-light, he put his fetters back in his
+pocket. "A lady--and no doubt about it," he said to one of his
+assistants.
+
+The two men waited, with a mischievous interest in seeing what he would
+do next. The list of their pious officer's virtues included a
+constitutional partiality for women, which exhibited the merciful side
+of justice when a criminal wore a petticoat. "We will take you to Sir
+Giles, Miss," he said--and offered his arm, instead of offering his
+handcuffs. Iris understood him, and took his arm.
+
+
+She was silent--unaccountably silent as the men thought--on the way to
+the town. They heard her sigh: and, once, the sigh sounded more like a
+sob; little did they suspect what was in that silent woman's mind at
+the time.
+
+The one object which had absorbed the attention of Iris had been the
+saving of Lord Harry. This accomplished, the free exercise of her
+memory had now reminded her of Arthur Mountjoy.
+
+It was impossible to doubt that the object of the proposed meeting at
+the milestone had been to take measures for the preservation of the
+young man's life. A coward is always more or less cruel. The
+proceedings (equally treacherous and merciless) by which Sir Giles had
+provided for his own safety, had delayed--perhaps actually
+prevented--the execution of Lord Harry's humane design. It was
+possible, horribly possible, that a prompt employment of time might
+have been necessary to the rescue of Arthur from impending death by
+murder. In the agitation that overpowered her, Iris actually hurried
+the police on their return to the town.
+
+Sir Giles had arranged to wait for news in his private room at the
+office--and there he was, with Dennis Howmore in attendance to receive
+visitors.
+
+The Sergeant went into the banker's room alone, to make his report. He
+left the door ajar; Iris could hear what passed.
+
+"Have you got your prisoner?" Sir Giles began.
+
+"Yes, your honour."
+
+"Is the wretch securely handcuffed?"
+
+"I beg your pardon, sir, it isn't a man."
+
+"Nonsense, Sergeant; it can't be a boy."
+
+The Sergeant confessed that it was not a boy. "It's a woman," he said.
+
+"What!!!"
+
+"A woman," the patient officer repeated--"and a young one. She asked
+for You."
+
+"Bring her in."
+
+Iris was not the sort of person who waits to be brought in. She walked
+in, of her own accord.
+
+VII
+
+"GOOD Heavens!" cried Sir Giles. "Iris! With my cloak on!! With my hat
+in her hand!!! Sergeant, there has been some dreadful mistake. This is
+my god-daughter--Miss Henley."
+
+"We found her at the milestone, your honour. The young lady and nobody
+else."
+
+Sir Giles appealed helplessly to his god-daughter. "What does this
+mean?" Instead of answering, she looked at the Sergeant. The Sergeant,
+conscious of responsibility, stood his ground and looked at Sir Giles.
+His face confessed that the Irish sense of humour was tickled: but he
+showed no intention of leaving the room. Sir Giles saw that Iris would
+enter into no explanation in the man's presence. "You needn't wait any
+longer," he said.
+
+"What am I to do, if you please, with the prisoner?" the Sergeant
+inquired.
+
+Sir Giles waived that unnecessary question away with his hand. He was
+trebly responsible--as knight, banker, and magistrate into the bargain.
+"I will be answerable," he replied, "for producing Miss Henley, if
+called upon. Good night."
+
+The Sergeant's sense of duty was satisfied. He made the military
+salute. His gallantry added homage to the young lady under the form of
+a bow. Then, and then only, he walked with dignity out of the room.
+
+"Now," Sir Giles resumed, "I presume I may expect to receive an
+explanation. What does this impropriety mean? What were you doing at
+the milestone?"
+
+"I was saving the person who made the appointment with you," Iris said;
+"the poor fellow had no ill-will towards you--who had risked everything
+to save your nephew's life. Oh, sir, you committed a terrible mistake
+when you refused to trust that man!"
+
+Sir Giles had anticipated the appearance of fear, and the reality of
+humble apologies. She had answered him indignantly, with a heightened
+colour, and with tears in her eyes. His sense of his own social
+importance was wounded to the quick. "Who is the man you are speaking
+of?" he asked loftily. "And what is your excuse for having gone to the
+milestone to save him--hidden under my cloak, disguised in my hat?"
+
+"Don't waste precious time in asking questions!" was the desperate
+reply. "Undo the harm that you have done already. Your help--oh, I mean
+what I say!--may yet preserve Arthur's life. Go to the farm, and save
+him."
+
+Sir Giles's anger assumed a new form, it indulged in an elaborate
+mockery of respect. He took his watch from his pocket, and consulted it
+satirically. "Must I make an excuse?" he asked with a clumsy assumption
+of humility.
+
+"No! you must go."
+
+"Permit me to inform you, Miss Henley, that the last train started more
+than two hours since."
+
+"What does that matter? You are rich enough to hire a train."
+
+Sir Giles, the actor, could endure it no longer; he dropped the mask,
+and revealed Sir Giles, the man. His clerk was summoned by a peremptory
+ring of the bell. "Attend Miss Henley to the house," he said. "You may
+come to your senses after a night's rest," he continued, turning
+sternly to Iris. "I will receive your excuses in the morning."
+
+
+In the morning, the breakfast was ready as usual at nine o'clock. Sir
+Giles found himself alone at the table.
+
+He sent an order to one of the women-servants to knock at Miss Henley's
+door. There was a long delay. The housekeeper presented herself in a
+state of alarm; she had gone upstairs to make the necessary
+investigation in her own person. Miss Henley was not in her room; the
+maid was not in her room; the beds had not been slept in; the heavy
+luggage was labelled--"To be called for from the hotel." And there was
+an end of the evidence which the absent Iris had left behind her.
+
+Inquiries were made at the hotel. The young lady had called there, with
+her maid, early on that morning. They had their travelling-bags with
+them; and Miss Henley had left directions that the luggage was to be
+placed under care of the landlord until her return. To what destination
+she had betaken herself nobody knew.
+
+Sir Giles was too angry to remember what she had said to him on the
+previous night, or he might have guessed at the motive which had led to
+her departure. "Her father has done with her already," he said; "and I
+have done with her now." The servants received orders not to admit Miss
+Henley, if her audacity contemplated a return to her godfather's house.
+
+VIII
+
+ON the afternoon of the same day, Iris arrived at the village situated
+in the near neighbourhood of Arthur Mountjoy's farm.
+
+The infection of political excitement (otherwise the hatred of England)
+had spread even to this remote place. On the steps of his little
+chapel, the priest, a peasant himself, was haranguing his brethren of
+the soil. An Irishman who paid his landlord was a traitor to his
+country; an Irishman who asserted his free birthright in the land that
+he walked on was an enlightened patriot. Such was the new law which the
+reverend gentleman expounded to his attentive audience. If his brethren
+there would like him to tell them how they might apply the law, this
+exemplary Christian would point to the faithless Irishman, Arthur
+Mountjoy. "Buy not of him, sell not to him; avoid him if he approaches
+you; starve him out of the place. I might say more, boys--you know what
+I mean."
+
+To hear the latter part of this effort of oratory, without uttering a
+word of protest, was a trial of endurance under which Iris trembled.
+The secondary effect of the priest's address was to root the conviction
+of Arthur's danger with tenfold tenacity in her mind. After what she
+had just heard, even the slightest delay in securing his safety might
+be productive of deplorable results. She astonished a barefooted boy,
+on the outskirts of the crowd, by a gift of sixpence, and asked her way
+to the farm. The little Irishman ran on before her, eager to show the
+generous lady how useful he could be. In less than half an hour, Iris
+and her maid were at the door of the farm-house. No such civilsed
+inventions appeared as a knocker or a bell. The boy used his knuckles
+instead--and ran away when he heard the lock of the door turned on the
+inner side. He was afraid to be seen speaking to any living creature
+who inhabited the "evicted farm."
+
+A decent old woman appeared, and inquired suspiciously "what the ladies
+wanted." The accent in which she spoke was unmistakably English. When
+Iris asked for Mr. Arthur Mountjoy the reply was: "Not at home." The
+housekeeper inhospitably attempted to close the door. "Wait one
+moment," Iris said. "Years have changed you; but there is something in
+your face which is not quite strange to me. Are you Mrs. Lewson?"
+
+The woman admitted that this was her name. "But how is it that you are
+a stranger to me?" she asked distrustfully.
+
+"If you have been long in Mr. Mountjoy's service," Iris replied, "you
+may perhaps have heard him speak of Miss Henley?"
+
+Mrs. Lewson's face brightened in an instant; she threw the door wide
+open with a glad cry of recognition.
+
+"Come in, Miss, come in! Who would have thought of seeing you in this
+horrible place? Yes; I was the nurse who looked after you all
+three--when you and Mr. Arthur and Mr. Hugh were playfellows together."
+Her eyes rested longingly on her favourite of bygone days. The
+sensitive sympathies of Iris interpreted that look. She prettily
+touched her cheek, inviting the nurse to kiss her. At this act of
+kindness the poor old woman broke down; she apologised quaintly for her
+tears: "Think, Miss, how _I_ must remember that happy time--when _you_
+have not forgotten it."
+
+Shown into the parlour, the first object which the visitor noticed was
+the letter that she had written to Arthur lying unopened on the table.
+
+"Then he is really out of the house?" she said with a feeling of
+relief.
+
+He had been away from the farm for a week or more. Had he received a
+warning from some other quarter? and had he wisely sought refuge in
+flight? The amazement in the housekeeper's face, when she heard these
+questions, pleaded for a word of explanation. Iris acknowledged without
+reserve the motives which had suggested her journey, and asked eagerly
+if she had been mistaken in assuming that Arthur was in danger of
+assassination.
+
+Mrs. Lewson shook her head. Beyond all doubt the young master was in
+danger. But Miss Iris ought to have known his nature better than to
+suppose that he would beat a retreat, if all the land-leaguers in
+Ireland threatened him together. No! It was his bold way to laugh at
+danger. He had left his farm to visit a friend in the next county; and
+it was shrewdly guessed that a young lady who was staying in the house
+was the attraction which had kept him so long away. "Anyhow, he means
+to come back to-morrow," Mrs. Lewson said. "I wish he would think
+better of it, and make his escape to England while he has the chance.
+If the savages in these parts must shoot somebody, I'm here--an old
+woman that can't last much longer. Let them shoot me."
+
+Iris asked if Arthur's safety was assured in the next county, and in
+the house of his friend.
+
+"I can't say, Miss; I have never been to the house. He is in danger if
+he persists in coming back to the farm. There are chances of shooting
+him all along his road home. Oh, yes; he knows it, poor dear, as well
+as I do. But, there!--men like him are such perverse creatures. He
+takes his rides just as usual. No; he won't listen to an old woman like
+me; and, as for friends to advise him, the only one of them that has
+darkened our doors is a scamp who had better have kept away. You may
+have heard tell of him. The old Earl, his wicked father, used to be
+called by a bad name. And the wild young lord is his father's true
+son."
+
+"Not Lord Harry?" Iris exclaimed.
+
+The outbreak of agitation in her tone and manner was silently noticed
+by her maid. The housekeeper did not attempt to conceal the impression
+that had been produced upon her. "I hope you don't know such a vagabond
+as that?" she said very seriously. "Perhaps you are thinking of his
+brother--the eldest son--a respectable man, as I have been told?"
+
+Miss Henley passed over these questions without notice. Urged by the
+interest in her lover, which was now more than ever an interest beyond
+her control, she said: "Is Lord Harry in danger, on account of his
+friend?"
+
+"He has nothing to fear from the wretches who infest our part of the
+country," Mrs. Lewson replied. "Report says he's one of themselves. The
+police--there's what his young lordship has to be afraid of, if all's
+true that is said about him. Anyhow, when he paid his visit to my
+master, he came secretly like a thief in the night. And I heard Mr.
+Arthur, while they were together here in the parlour, loud in blaming
+him for something that he had done. No more, Miss, of Lord Harry! I
+have something particular to say to you. Suppose I promise to make you
+comfortable--will you please wait here till to-morrow, and see Mr.
+Arthur and speak to him? If there's a person living who can persuade
+him to take better care of himself, I do believe it will be you."
+
+Iris readily consented to wait for Arthur Mountjoy's return. Left
+together, while Mrs. Lewson was attending to her domestic duties, the
+mistress noticed an appearance of pre-occupation in the maid's face.
+
+"Are you beginning to wish, Rhoda," she said, "that I had not brought
+you to this strange place, among these wild people?"
+
+The maid was a quiet amiable girl, evidently in delicate health. She
+smiled faintly. "I was thinking, Miss, of another nobleman besides the
+one Mrs. Lewson mentioned just now, who seems to have led a reckless
+life. It was printed in a newspaper that I read before we left London."
+
+"Was his name mentioned?" Iris asked.
+
+"No, Miss; I suppose they were afraid of giving offence. He tried so
+many strange ways of getting a living--it was almost like reading a
+story-book."
+
+The suppression of the name suggested a suspicion from which Iris
+recoiled. Was it possible that her maid could be ignorantly alluding to
+Lord Harry?
+
+"Do you remember this hero's adventures?" she said.
+
+"I can try, Miss, if you wish to hear about him."
+
+The newspaper narrative appeared to have produced a vivid impression on
+Rhoda's mind. Making allowance for natural hesitations and mistakes,
+and difficulties in expressing herself correctly, she repeated with a
+singularly clear recollection the substance of what she had read.
+
+IX
+
+THE principal characters in the story were an old Irish nobleman, who
+was called the Earl, and the youngest of his two sons, mysteriously
+distinguished as "the wild lord."
+
+It was said of the Earl that he had not been a good father; he had
+cruelly neglected both his sons. The younger one, badly treated at
+school, and left to himself in the holidays, began his adventurous
+career by running away. He got employment (under an assumed name) as a
+ship's boy. At the outset, he did well; learning his work, and being
+liked by the Captain and the crew. But the chief mate was a brutal man,
+and the young runaway's quick temper resented the disgraceful
+infliction of blows. He made up his mind to try his luck on shore, and
+attached himself to a company of strolling players. Being a handsome
+lad, with a good figure and a fine clear voice, he did very well for a
+while on the country stage. Hard times came; salaries were reduced; the
+adventurer wearied of the society of actors and actresses. His next
+change of life presented him in North Britain as a journalist, employed
+on a Scotch newspaper. An unfortunate love affair was the means of
+depriving him of this new occupation. He was recognised, soon
+afterwards, serving as assistant steward in one of the passenger
+steamers voyaging between Liverpool and New York. Arrived in this last
+city, he obtained notoriety, of no very respectable kind, as a "medium"
+claiming powers of supernatural communication with the world of
+spirits. When the imposture was ultimately discovered, he had gained
+money by his unworthy appeal to the meanly prosaic superstition of
+modern times. A long interval had then elapsed, and nothing had been
+heard of him, when a starving man was discovered by a traveller, lost
+on a Western prairie. The ill-fated Irish lord had associated himself
+with an Indian tribe--had committed some offence against their
+laws--and had been deliberately deserted and left to die. On his
+recovery, he wrote to his elder brother (who had inherited the title
+and estates on the death of the old Earl) to say that he was ashamed of
+the life that he had led, and eager to make amendment by accepting any
+honest employment that could be offered to him. The traveller who had
+saved his life, and whose opinion was to be trusted, declared that the
+letter represented a sincerely penitent state of mind. There were good
+qualities in the vagabond, which only wanted a little merciful
+encouragement to assert themselves. The reply that he received from
+England came from the lawyers employed by the new Earl. They had
+arranged with their agents in New York to pay to the younger brother a
+legacy of a thousand pounds, which represented all that had been left
+to him by his father's will. If he wrote again his letters would not be
+answered; his brother had done with him. Treated in this inhuman
+manner, the wild lord became once more worthy of his name. He tried a
+new life as a betting man at races and trotting-matches. Fortune
+favoured him at the outset, and he considerably increased his legacy.
+With the customary infatuation of men who gain money by risking the
+loss of it, he presumed on his good luck. One pecuniary disaster
+followed another, and left him literally penniless. He was found again,
+in England, exhibiting an open boat in which he and a companion had
+made one of those foolhardy voyages across the Atlantic, which have now
+happily ceased to interest the public. To a friend who remonstrated
+with him, he answered that he reckoned on being lost at sea, and on so
+committing a suicide worthy of the desperate life that he had led. The
+last accounts of him, after this, were too vague and too contradictory
+to be depended on. At one time it was reported that he had returned to
+the United States. Not long afterwards unaccountable paragraphs
+appeared in newspapers declaring, at one and the same time, that he was
+living among bad company in Paris, and that he was hiding disreputably
+in an ill famed quarter of the city of Dublin, called "the Liberties."
+In any case there was good reason to fear that Irish-American
+desperadoes had entangled the wild lord in the network of political
+conspiracy.
+
+
+The maid noticed a change in the mistress which surprised her, when she
+had reached the end of the newspaper story. Of Miss Henley's customary
+good spirits not a trace remained. "Few people, Rhoda, remember what
+they read as well as you do." She said it kindly and sadly--and she
+said no more.
+
+There was a reason for this.
+
+Now at one time, and now at another, Iris had heard of Lord Harry's
+faults and failings in fragments of family history. The complete record
+of his degraded life, presented in an uninterrupted succession of
+events, had now forced itself on her attention for the first time. It
+naturally shocked her. She felt, as she had never felt before, how
+entirely right her father had been in insisting on her resistance to an
+attachment which was unworthy of her. So far, but no farther, her
+conscience yielded to its own conviction of what was just. But the one
+unassailable vital force in this world is the force of love. It may
+submit to the hard necessities of life; it may acknowledge the
+imperative claims of duty; it may be silent under reproach, and
+submissive to privation--but, suffer what it may, it is the
+master-passion still; subject to no artificial influences, owning no
+supremacy but the law of its own being. Iris was above the reach of
+self-reproach, when her memory recalled the daring action which had
+saved Lord Harry at the milestone. Her better sense acknowledged Hugh
+Mountjoy's superiority over the other man--but her heart, her perverse
+heart, remained true to its first choice in spite of her. She made an
+impatient excuse and went out alone to recover her composure in the
+farm-house garden.
+
+The hours of the evening passed slowly.
+
+There was a pack of cards in the house; the women tried to amuse
+themselves, and failed. Anxiety about Arthur preyed on the spirits of
+Miss Henley and Mrs. Lewson. Even the maid, who had only seen him
+during his last visit to London, said she wished to-morrow had come and
+gone. His sweet temper, his handsome face, his lively talk had made
+Arthur a favourite everywhere. Mrs. Lewson had left her comfortable
+English home to be his housekeeper, when he tried his rash experiment
+of farming in Ireland. And, more wonderful still, even wearisome Sir
+Giles became an agreeable person in his nephew's company.
+
+Iris set the example of retiring at an early hour to her room.
+
+There was something terrible in the pastoral silence of the place. It
+associated itself mysteriously with her fears for Arthur; it suggested
+armed treachery on tiptoe, taking its murderous stand in hiding; the
+whistling passage of bullets through the air; the piercing cry of a man
+mortally wounded, and that man, perhaps----? Iris shrank from her own
+horrid thought. A momentary faintness overcame her; she opened the
+window. As she put her head out to breathe the cool night-air, a man on
+horseback rode up to the house. Was it Arthur? No: the light-coloured
+groom's livery that he wore was just visible.
+
+Before he could dismount to knock at the door, a tall man walked up to
+him out of the darkness.
+
+"Is that Miles?" the tall man asked.
+
+The groom knew the voice. Iris was even better acquainted with it. She,
+too, recognised Lord Harry.
+
+X
+
+THERE was the Irish lord at the very time when Iris was most patiently
+resigned never to see him more, never to think of him as her husband
+again--reminding her of the first days of their love, and of their
+mutual confession of it! Fear of herself kept her behind the curtain;
+while interest in Lord Harry detained her at the window in hiding.
+
+"All well at Rathco?" he asked--mentioning the name of the house in
+which Arthur was one of the guests.
+
+"Yes, my lord. Mr. Mountjoy leaves us to-morrow."
+
+"Does he mean to return to the farm?"
+
+"Sorry I am to say it; he does mean that."
+
+"Has he fixed any time, Miles, for starting on his journey?"
+
+Miles instituted a search through his pockets, and accompanied it by an
+explanation. Yes, indeed, Master Arthur had fixed a time; he had
+written a note to say so to Mistress Lewson, the housekeeper; he had
+said, "Drop the note at the farm, on your way to the village." And what
+might Miles want at the village, in the dark? Medicine, in a hurry, for
+one of his master's horses that was sick and sinking. And, speaking of
+that, here, thank God, was the note!
+
+Iris, listening and watching alternately, saw to her surprise the note
+intended for Mrs. Lewson handed to Lord Harry. "Am I expected," he
+asked jocosely, "to read writing without a light?" Miles produced a
+small lantern which was strapped to his groom's belt. "There's parts of
+the road not over safe in the dark," he said as he raised the shade
+which guarded the light. The wild lord coolly opened the letter, and
+read the few careless words which it contained. "To Mrs. Lewson:--Dear
+old girl, expect me back to-morrow to dinner at three o'clock. Yours,
+ARTHUR."
+
+There was a pause.
+
+"Are there any strangers at Rathco?" Lord Harry asked.
+
+"Two new men," Miles replied, "at work in the grounds."
+
+There was another pause. "How can I protect him?" the young lord said,
+partly to himself, partly to Miles. He suspected the two new
+men---spies probably who knew of Arthur's proposed journey home, and
+who had already reported to their employers the hour at which he would
+set out.
+
+Miles ventured to say a word: "I hope you won't be angry with me, my
+lord"----
+
+"Stuff and nonsense! Was I ever angry with you, when I was rich enough
+to keep a servant, and when you were the man?"
+
+The Irish groom answered in a voice that trembled with strong feeling.
+"You were the best and kindest master that ever lived on this earth. I
+can't see you putting your precious life in peril"----
+
+"My precious life?" Lord Harry repeated lightly. "You're thinking of
+Mr. Mountjoy, when you say that. _His_ life is worth saving. As for my
+life"---- He ended the sentence by a whistle, as the best way he could
+hit on of expressing his contempt for his own existence.
+
+"My lord! my lord!" Miles persisted; "the Invincibles are beginning to
+doubt you. If any of them find you hanging about Mr. Mountjoy's farm,
+they'll try a shot at you first, and ask afterwards whether it was
+right to kill you or not."
+
+To hear this said--and said seriously--after the saving of him at the
+milestone, was a trial of her firmness which Iris was unable to resist.
+Love got the better of prudence. She drew back the window-curtain. In
+another moment, she would have added her persuasion to the servant's
+warning, if Lord Harry himself had not accidentally checked her by a
+proceeding, on his part, for which she was not prepared.
+
+"Show the light," he said; "I'll write a line to Mr. Mountjoy."
+
+He tore off the blank page from the note to the housekeeper, and wrote
+to Arthur, entreating him to change the time of his departure from
+Rathco, and to tell no creature in the house, or out of the house, at
+what new hour he had arranged to go. "Saddle your horse yourself," the
+letter concluded. It was written in a feigned hand, without a
+signature.
+
+"Give that to Mr. Mountjoy," Lord Harry said. "If he asks who wrote it,
+don't frighten him about me by telling the truth. Lie, Miles! Say you
+don't know." He next returned the note for Mrs. Lewson. "If she notices
+that it has been opened," he resumed, "and asks who has done it, lie
+again. Good-night, Miles--and mind those dangerous places on your road
+home."
+
+The groom darkened his lantern; and the wild lord was lost to view,
+round the side of the house.
+
+Left by himself, Miles rapped at the door with the handle of his whip.
+"A letter from Mr. Arthur," he called out. Mrs. Lewson at once took the
+note, and examined it by the light of the candle on the hall-table.
+"Somebody has been reading this!" she exclaimed, stepping out to the
+groom, and showing him the torn envelope. Miles, promptly obeying his
+instructions, declared that he knew nothing about it, and rode away.
+
+Iris descended the stairs, and joined Mrs. Lewson in the hall before
+she had closed the door. The housekeeper at once produced Arthur's
+letter.
+
+"It's on my mind, Miss," she said, "to write an answer, and say
+something to Mr. Arthur which will persuade him to take care of
+himself, on his way back to the farm. The difficulty is, how am I to
+express it? You would be doing a kind thing if you would give me a word
+of advice."
+
+Iris willingly complied. A second note, from the anxious housekeeper,
+might help the effect of the few lines which Lord Harry had written.
+
+Arthur's letter informed Iris that he had arranged to return at three
+o'clock. Lord Harry's question to the groom, and the man's reply,
+instantly recurred to her memory: "Are there any strangers at
+Rathco?"--"Two new men at work in the grounds." Arriving at the same
+conclusion which had already occurred to Lord Harry, Iris advised the
+housekeeper, in writing to Arthur, to entreat him to change the hour,
+secretly, at which he left his friend's house on the next day. Warmly
+approving of this idea, Mrs. Lewson hurried into the parlour to write
+her letter. "Don't go to bed yet, Miss," she said; "I want you to read
+it before I send it away the first thing to-morrow morning."
+
+Left alone in the hall, with the door open before her, Iris looked out
+on the night, thinking.
+
+The lives of the two men in whom she was interested--in widely
+different ways--were now both threatened; and the imminent danger, at
+that moment, was the danger of Lord Harry. He was an outlaw whose
+character would not bear investigation; but, to give him his due, there
+was no risk which he was not ready to confront for Arthur's sake. If he
+was still recklessly lingering, on the watch for assassins in the
+dangerous neighbourhood of the farm, who but herself possessed the
+influence which would prevail on him to leave the place? She had joined
+Mrs. Lewson at the door with that conviction in her mind. In another
+instant, she was out of the house, and beginning her search in the
+dark.
+
+Iris made the round of the building; sometimes feeling her way in
+obscure places; sometimes calling to Lord Harry cautiously by his name.
+No living creature appeared; no sound of a movement disturbed the
+stillness of the night. The discovery of his absence, which she had not
+dared to hope for, was the cheering discovery which she had now made.
+
+On her way back to the house, she became conscious of the rashness of
+the act into which her own generous impulse had betrayed her.
+
+If she and Lord Harry had met, could she have denied the tender
+interest in him which her own conduct would then have revealed? Would
+he not have been justified in concluding that she had pardoned the
+errors and the vices of his life, and that he might without impropriety
+remind her of their engagement, and claim her hand in marriage? She
+trembled as she thought of the concessions which he might have wrung
+from her. "Never more," she determined, "shall my own folly be
+answerable for it, if he and I meet again."
+
+She had returned to Mrs. Lewson, and had read over the letter to
+Arthur, when the farm clock, striking the hour, reminded them that it
+was time to retire. They slept badly that night.
+
+At six in the morning, one of the two labourers who had remained
+faithful to Arthur was sent away on horseback with the housekeeper's
+reply, and with orders to wait for an answer. Allowing time for giving
+the horse a rest, the man might be expected to return before noon.
+
+IX
+
+IT was a fine sunshiny day; Mrs. Lewson's spirits began to improve. "I
+have always held the belief," the worthy old woman confessed, "that
+bright weather brings good luck--of course provided the day is not a
+Friday. This is Wednesday. Cheer up, Miss."
+
+The messenger returned with good news. Mr. Arthur had been as merry as
+usual. He had made fun of another letter of good advice, received
+without a signature. "But Mrs. Lewson must have her way," he said. "My
+love to the old dear--I'll start two hours later, and be back to dinner
+at five."
+
+"Where did Mr. Arthur give you that message?" Iris inquired.
+
+"At the stables, Miss, while I was putting up the horse. The men about
+were all on the broad grin when they heard Mr. Arthur's message."
+
+Still in a morbid state of mind, Iris silently regretted that the
+message had not been written, instead of being delivered by word of
+mouth. Here, again, she (like the wild lord) had been afraid of
+listeners.
+
+The hours wore slowly on until it was past four o'clock. Iris could
+endure the suspense no longer. "It's a lovely afternoon," she said to
+Mrs. Lewson. "Let us take a walk along the road, and meet Arthur." To
+this proposal the housekeeper readily agreed.
+
+It was nearly five o'clock when they reached a place at which a by-road
+branched off, through a wood, from the highway which they had hitherto
+followed. Mrs. Lewson found a seat on a felled tree. "We had better not
+go any farther," she said.
+
+Iris asked if there was any reason for this.
+
+There was an excellent reason. A few yards farther on, the high road
+had been diverted from the straight line (in the interest of a large
+agricultural village), and was then directed again into its former
+course. The by-road through the wood served as a short cut, for
+horsemen and pedestrians, from one divergent point to the other. It was
+next to a certainty that Arthur would return by the short cut. But if
+accident or caprice led to his preferring the highway, it was clearly
+necessary to wait for him within view of both the roads.
+
+Too restless to submit to a state of passive expectation, Iris proposed
+to follow the bridle path through the wood for a little way, and to
+return if she failed to see anything of Arthur. "You are tired," she
+said kindly to her companion: "pray don't move."
+
+Mrs. Lewson looked needlessly uneasy: "You might lose yourself, Miss.
+Mind you keep to the path!"
+
+Iris followed the pleasant windings of the woodland track. In the hope
+of meeting Arthur she considerably extended the length of her walk. The
+white line of the high road, as it passed the farther end of the wood,
+showed itself through the trees. She turned at once to rejoin Mrs.
+Lewson.
+
+On her way back she made a discovery. A ruin which she had not
+previously noticed showed itself among the trees on her left hand. Her
+curiosity was excited; she strayed aside to examine it more closely.
+The crumbling walls, as she approached them, looked like the remains of
+an ordinary dwelling-house. Age is essential to the picturesque effect
+of decay: a modern ruin is an unnatural and depressing object--and here
+the horrid thing was.
+
+As she turned to retrace her steps to the road, a man walked out of the
+inner space enclosed by all that was left of the dismantled house. A
+cry of alarm escaped her. Was she the victim of destiny, or the sport
+of chance? There was the wild lord whom she had vowed never to see
+again: the master of her heart--perhaps the master of her fate!
+
+Any other man would have been amazed to see her, and would have asked
+how it had happened that the English lady presented herself to him in
+an Irish wood. This man enjoyed the delight of seeing her, and accepted
+it as a blessing that was not to be questioned. "My angel has dropped
+from Heaven," he said. "May Heaven be praised!"
+
+He approached her; his arms closed round her. She struggled to free
+herself from his embrace. At that moment they both heard the crackle of
+breaking uuderwood among the trees behind them. Lord Harry looked
+round. "This is a dangerous place," he whispered; "I'm waiting to see
+Arthur pass safely. Submit to be kissed, or I am a dead man." His eyes
+told her that he was truly and fearfully in earnest. Her head sank on
+his bosom. As he bent down and kissed her, three men approached from
+their hiding-place among the trees. They had no doubt been watching
+him, under orders from the murderous brotherhood to which they
+belonged. Their pistols were ready in their hands--and what discovery
+had they made? There was the brother who had been denounced as having
+betrayed them, guilty of no worse treason than meeting his sweetheart
+in a wood! "We beg your pardon, my lord," they cried, with a thoroughly
+Irish enjoyment of their own discomfiture--and burst into a roar of
+laughter--and left the lovers together. For the second time, Iris had
+saved Lord Harry at a crisis in his life.
+
+"Let me go!" she pleaded faintly, trembling with superstitious fear for
+the first time in her experience of herself.
+
+He held her to him as if he would never let her go again. "Oh, my
+Sweet, give me a last chance. Help me to be a better man! You have only
+to will it, Iris, and to make me worthy of you."
+
+His arms suddenly trembled round her, and dropped. The silence was
+broken by a distant sound, like the report of a shot. He looked towards
+the farther end of the wood. In a minute more, the thump of a horse's
+hoofs at a gallop was audible, where the bridlepath was hidden among
+the trees. It came nearer--nearer---the creature burst into view, wild
+with fright, and carrying an empty saddle. Lord Harry rushed into the
+path and seized the horse as it swerved at the sight of him. There was
+a leather pocket attached to the front of the saddle. "Search it!" he
+cried to Iris, forcing the terrified animal back on its haunches. She
+drew out a silver travelling-flask. One glance at the name engraved on
+it told him the terrible truth. His trembling hands lost their hold.
+The horse escaped; the words burst from his lips:
+
+"Oh, God, they've killed him!"
+
+THE END OF THE PROLOGUE
+
+
+THE STORY
+
+FIRST PERIOD
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+THE SOUR FRENCH WINE
+
+WHILE the line to be taken by the new railway between Culm and Everill
+was still under discussion, the engineer caused some difference of
+opinion among the moneyed men who were the first Directors of the
+Company, by asking if they proposed to include among their Stations the
+little old town of Honeybuzzard.
+
+For years past, commerce had declined, and population had decreased in
+this ancient and curious place. Painters knew it well, and prized its
+mediaeval houses as a mine of valuable material for their art. Persons
+of cultivated tastes, who were interested in church architecture of the
+fourteenth century, sometimes pleased and flattered the Rector by
+subscribing to his fund for the restoration of the tower, and the
+removal of the accumulated rubbish of hundreds of years from the crypt.
+Small speculators, not otherwise in a state of insanity, settled
+themselves in the town, and tried the desperate experiment of opening a
+shop; spent their little capital, put up the shutters, and disappeared.
+The old market-place still showed its list of market-law's, issued by
+the Mayor and Corporation in the prosperous bygone times; and every
+week there were fewer and fewer people to obey the laws. The great
+empty enclosure looked more cheerful, when there was no market held,
+and when the boys of the town played in the deserted place. In the last
+warehouse left in a state of repair, the crane was generally idle; the
+windows were mostly shut up; and a solitary man represented languishing
+trade, idling at a half-opened door. The muddy river rose and fell with
+the distant tide. At rare intervals a collier discharged its cargo on
+the mouldering quay, or an empty barge took in a load of hay. One bold
+house advertised, in a dirty window, apartments to let. There was a
+lawyer in the town, who had no occasion to keep a clerk; and there was
+a doctor who hoped to sell his practice for anything that it would
+fetch. The directors of the new railway, after a stormy meeting,
+decided on offering (by means of a Station) a last chance of revival to
+the dying town. The town had not vitality enough left to be grateful;
+the railway stimulant produced no effect. Of all his colleagues in
+Great Britain and Ireland, the station-master at Honeybuzzard was the
+idlest man--and this, as he said to the unemployed porter, through no
+want of energy on his own part.
+
+Late on a rainy autumn afternoon, the slow train left one traveller at
+the Station. He got out of a first-class carriage; he carried an
+umbrella and a travelling-bag; and he asked his way to the best inn.
+The station-master and the porter compared notes. One of them said:
+"Evidently a gentleman." The other added: "What can he possibly want
+here?"
+
+The stranger twice lost his way in the tortuous old streets of the town
+before he reached the inn. On giving his orders, it appeared that he
+wanted three things: a private room, something to eat, and, while the
+dinner was being cooked, materials for writing a letter.
+
+Answering her daughter's questions downstairs, the landlady described
+her guest as a nice-looking man dressed in deep mourning. "Young, my
+dear, with beautiful dark brown hair, and a grand beard, and a sweet
+sorrowful look. Ah, his eyes would tell anybody that his black clothes
+are not a mere sham. Whether married or single, of course I can't say.
+But I noticed the name on his travelling-bag. A distinguished name in
+my opinion--Hugh Mountjoy. I wonder what he'll order to drink when he
+has his dinner? What a mercy it will be if we can get rid of another
+bottle of the sour French wine!"
+
+The bell in the private room rang at that moment; and the landlady's
+daughter, it is needless to say, took the opportunity of forming her
+own opinion of Mr. Hugh Mountjoy.
+
+She returned with a letter in her hand, consumed by a vain longing for
+the advantages of gentle birth. "Ah, mother, if I was a young lady of
+the higher classes, I know whose wife I should like to be!" Not
+particularly interested in sentimental aspirations, the landlady asked
+to see Mr. Mountjoy's letter. The messenger who delivered it was to
+wait for an answer. It was addressed to: "Miss Henley, care of Clarence
+Vimpany, Esquire, Honeybuzzard." Urged by an excited imagination, the
+daughter longed to see Miss Henley. The mother was at a loss to
+understand why Mr. Mountjoy should have troubled himself to write the
+letter at all. "If he knows the young lady who is staying at the
+doctor's house," she said, "why doesn't he call on Miss Henley?" She
+handed the letter back to her daughter. "There! let the ostler take it;
+he's got nothing to do."
+
+"No, mother. The ostler's dirty hands mustn't touch it--I'll take the
+letter myself. Perhaps I may see Miss Henley." Such was the impression
+which Mr. Hugh Mountjoy had innocently produced on a sensitive young
+person, condemned by destiny to the barren sphere of action afforded by
+a country inn!
+
+The landlady herself took the dinner upstairs--a first course of mutton
+chops and potatoes, cooked to a degree of imperfection only attained in
+an English kitchen. The sour French wine was still on the good woman's
+mind. "What would you choose to drink, sir?" she asked. Mr. Mountjoy
+seemed to feel no interest in what he might have to drink. "We have
+some French wine, sir."
+
+"Thank you, ma'am; that will do."
+
+When the bell rang again, and the time came to produce the second
+course of cheese and celery, the landlady allowed the waiter to take
+her place. Her experience of the farmers who frequented the inn, and
+who had in some few cases been induced to taste the wine, warned her to
+anticipate an outbreak of just anger from Mr. Mountjoy. He, like the
+others, would probably ask what she "meant by poisoning him with such
+stuff as that." On the return of the waiter, she put the question: "Did
+the gentleman complain of the French wine?"
+
+"He wants to see you about it, ma'am."
+
+The landlady turned pale. The expression of Mr. Mountjoy's indignation
+was evidently reserved for the mistress of the house. "Did he swear,"
+she asked, "when he tasted it?"
+
+"Lord bless you, ma'am, no! Drank it out of a tumbler, and--if you will
+believe me--actually seemed to like it."
+
+The landlady recovered her colour. Gratitude to Providence for having
+sent a customer to the inn, who could drink sour wine without
+discovering it, was the uppermost feeling in her ample bosom as she
+entered the private room. Mr. Mountjoy justified her anticipations. He
+was simple enough--with his tumbler before him, and the wine as it were
+under his nose--to begin with an apology.
+
+"I am sorry to trouble you, ma'am. May I ask where you got this wine?"
+
+"The wine, sir, was one of my late husband's bad debts. It was all he
+could get from a Frenchman who owed him money."
+
+"It's worth money, ma'am."
+
+"Indeed, sir?"
+
+"Yes, indeed. This is some of the finest and purest claret that I have
+tasted for many a long day past."
+
+An alarming suspicion disturbed the serenity of the landlady's mind.
+Was his extraordinary opinion of the wine sincere? Or was it Mr.
+Mountjoy's wicked design to entrap her into praising her claret and
+then to imply that she was a cheat by declaring what he really thought
+of it? She took refuge in a cautious reply:
+
+"You are the first gentleman, sir, who has not found fault with it."
+
+"In that case, perhaps you would like to get rid of the wine?" Mr.
+Mountjoy suggested.
+
+The landlady was still cautious. "Who will buy it of me, sir?"
+
+"I will. How much do you charge for it by the bottle?"
+
+It was, by this time, clear that he was not mischievous--only a little
+crazy. The worldly-wise hostess took advantage of that circumstance to
+double the price. Without hesitation, she said: "Five shillings a
+bottle, sir."
+
+Often, too often, the irony of circumstances brings together, on this
+earthly scene, the opposite types of vice and virtue. A lying landlady
+and a guest incapable of deceit were looking at each other across a
+narrow table; equally unconscious of the immeasurable moral gulf that
+lay between them, Influenced by honourable feeling, innocent Hugh
+Mountjoy lashed the landlady's greed for money to the full-gallop of
+human cupidity.
+
+"I don't think you are aware of the value of your wine," he said. "I
+have claret in my cellar which is not so good as this, and which costs
+more than you have asked. It is only fair to offer you seven-and-
+sixpence a bottle."
+
+When an eccentric traveller is asked to pay a price, and deliberately
+raises that price against himself, where is the sensible
+woman--especially if she happens to be a widow conducting an
+unprofitable business--who would hesitate to improve the opportunity?
+The greedy landlady raised her terms.
+
+"On reflection, sir, I think I ought to have ten shillings a bottle, if
+you please."
+
+"The wine may be worth it," Mountjoy answered quietly; "but it is more
+than I can afford to pay. No, ma'am; I will leave you to find some
+lover of good claret with a longer purse than mine."
+
+It was in this man's character, when he said No, to mean No. Mr.
+Mountjoy's hostess perceived that her crazy customer was not to be
+trifled with. She lowered her terms again with the headlong hurry of
+terror. "You shall have it, Sir, at your own price," said this entirely
+shameless and perfectly respectable woman.
+
+The bargain having been closed under these circumstances, the
+landlady's daughter knocked at the door. "I took your letter myself,
+sir," she said modestly; "and here is the answer." (She had seen Miss
+Henley, and did not think much of her.) Mountjoy offered the expression
+of his thanks, in words never to be forgotten by a sensitive young
+person, and opened his letter. It was short enough to be read in a
+moment; but it was evidently a favourable reply. He took his hat in a
+hurry, and asked to be shown the way to Mr. Vimpany's house.
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+THE MAN SHE REFUSED
+
+MOUNTJOY had decided on travelling to Honeybuzzard, as soon as he heard
+that Miss Henley was staying with strangers in that town. Having had no
+earlier opportunity of preparing her to see him, he had considerately
+written to her from the inn, in preference to presenting himself
+unexpectedly at the doctor's house. How would she receive the devoted
+friend, whose proposal of marriage she had refused for the second time,
+when they had last met in London?
+
+The doctor's place of residence, situated in a solitary by-street,
+commanded a view, not perhaps encouraging to a gentleman who followed
+the medical profession: it was a view of the churchyard. The door was
+opened by a woman-servant, who looked suspiciously at the stranger.
+Without waiting to be questioned, she said her master was out. Mountjoy
+mentioned his name, and asked for Miss Henley.
+
+The servant's manner altered at once for the better; she showed him
+into a small drawing-room, scantily and cheaply furnished. Some
+poorly-framed prints on the walls (a little out of place perhaps in a
+doctor's house) represented portraits of famous actresses, who had been
+queens of the stage in the early part of the present century. The few
+books, too, collected on a little shelf above the chimney-piece, were
+in every case specimens of dramatic literature. "Who reads these
+plays?" Mountjoy asked himself. "And how did Iris find her way into
+this house?"
+
+While he was thinking of her, Miss Henley entered the room.
+
+Her face was pale and careworn; tears dimmed her eyes when Mountjoy
+advanced to meet her. In his presence, the horror of his brother's
+death by assassination shook Iris as it had not shaken her yet.
+Impulsively, she drew his head down to her, with the fond familiarity
+of a sister, and kissed his forehead. "Oh, Hugh, I know how you and
+Arthur loved each other! No words of mine can say how I feel for you."
+
+"No words are wanted, my dear," he answered tenderly. "Your sympathy
+speaks for itself."
+
+He led her to the sofa and seated himself by her side. "Your father has
+shown me what you have written to him," he resumed; "your letter from
+Dublin and your second letter from this place. I know what you have so
+nobly risked and suffered in poor Arthur's interests. It will be some
+consolation to me if I can make a return--a very poor return, Iris--for
+all that Arthur's brother owes to the truest friend that ever man had.
+No," he continued, gently interrupting the expression of her gratitude.
+"Your father has not sent me here--but he knows that I have left London
+for the express purpose of seeing you, and he knows why. You have
+written to him dutifully and affectionately; you have pleaded for
+pardon and reconciliation, when he is to blame. Shall I venture to tell
+you how he answered me, when I asked if he had no faith left in his own
+child? 'Hugh,' he said, 'you are wasting words on a man whose mind is
+made up. I will trust my daughter when that Irish lord is laid in his
+grave--not before.' That is a reflection on you, Iris, which I cannot
+permit, even when your father casts it. He is hard, he is unforgiving;
+but he must, and shall, be conquered yet. I mean to make him do you
+justice; I have come here with that purpose, and that purpose only, in
+view. May I speak to you of Lord Harry?"
+
+"How can you doubt it!"
+
+"My dear, this is a delicate subject for me to enter on."
+
+"And a shameful subject for me!" Iris broke out bitterly. "Hugh! you
+are an angel, by comparison with that man--how debased I must be to
+love him--how unworthy of your good opinion! Ask me anything you like;
+have no mercy on me. Oh," she cried, with reckless contempt for
+herself, "why don't you beat me? I deserve it!"
+
+Mountjoy was well enough acquainted with the natures of women to pass
+over that passionate outbreak, instead of fanning the flame in her by
+reasoning and remonstrance.
+
+"Your father will not listen to the expression of feeling," he
+continued; "but it is possible to rouse his sense of justice by the
+expression of facts. Help me to speak to him more plainly of Lord Harry
+than you could speak in your letters. I want to know what has happened,
+from the time when events at Ardoon brought you and the young lord
+together again, to the time when you left him in Ireland after my
+brother's death. If I seem to expect too much of you, Iris, pray
+remember that I am speaking with a true regard for your interests."
+
+In those words, he made his generous appeal to her. She proved herself
+to be worthy of it.
+
+
+Stated briefly, the retrospect began with the mysterious anonymous
+letters which had been addressed to Sir Giles.
+
+Lord Harry's explanation had been offered to Iris gratefully, but with
+some reserve, after she had told him who the stranger at the milestone
+really was. "I entreat you to pardon me, if I shrink from entering into
+particulars," he had said. "Circumstances, at the time, amply justified
+me in the attempt to use the banker's political influence as a means of
+securing Arthur's safety. I knew enough of Sir Giles's mean nature to
+be careful in trusting him; but I did hope to try what my personal
+influence might do. If he had possessed a tenth part of your courage,
+Arthur might have been alive, and safe in England, at this moment. I
+can't say any more; I daren't say any more; it maddens me when I think
+of it!" He abruptly changed the subject, and interested Iris by
+speaking of other and later events. His association with the
+Invincibles--inexcusably rash and wicked as he himself confessed it to
+be--had enabled him to penetrate, and for a time to defeat secretly,
+the murderous designs of the brotherhood. His appearances, first at the
+farmhouse and afterwards at the ruin in the wood were referable to
+changes in the plans of the assassins which had come to his knowledge.
+When Iris had met with him he was on the watch, believing that his
+friend would take the short way back through the wood, and well aware
+that his own life might pay the penalty if he succeeded in warning
+Arthur. After the terrible discovery of the murder (committed on the
+high road), and the escape of the miscreant who had been guilty of the
+crime, the parting of Lord Harry and Miss Henley had been the next
+event. She had left him, on her return to England, and had refused to
+consent to any of the future meetings between them which he besought
+her to grant.
+
+
+At this stage in the narrative, Mountjoy felt compelled to ask
+questions more searching than he had put to Iris yet. It was possible
+that she might be trusting her own impressions of Lord Harry, with the
+ill-placed confidence of a woman innocently self-deceived.
+
+"Did he submit willingly to your leaving him?" Mountjoy said.
+
+"Not at first," she replied.
+
+"Has he released you from that rash engagement, of some years since,
+which pledged you to marry him?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Did he allude to the engagement, on this occasion?"
+
+"He said he held to it as the one hope of his life."
+
+"And what did you say?"
+
+"I implored him not to distress me."
+
+"Did you say nothing more positive than that?"
+
+"I couldn't help thinking, Hugh, of all that he had tried to do to save
+Arthur. But I insisted on leaving him--and I have left him."
+
+"Do you remember what he said at parting?"
+
+"He said, 'While I live, I love you.'"
+
+As she repeated the words, there was an involuntary change to
+tenderness in her voice which was not lost on Mountjoy.
+
+"I must be sure," he said to her gravely, "of what I tell your father
+when I go back to him. Can I declare, with a safe conscience, that you
+will never see Lord Harry again?"
+
+"My mind is made up never to see him again." She had answered firmly so
+far. Her next words were spoken with hesitation, in tones that
+faltered. "But I am sometimes afraid," she said, "that the decision may
+not rest with me."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"I would rather not tell you."
+
+"That is a strange answer, Iris."
+
+"I value your good opinion, Hugh, and I am afraid of losing it."
+
+"Nothing has ever altered my opinion of you," he replied, "and nothing
+ever will."
+
+She looked at him anxiously, with the closest attention. Little by
+little, the expression of doubt in her face disappeared; she knew how
+he loved her--she resolved to trust him.
+
+"My friend," she began abruptly, "education has done nothing for me.
+Since I left Ireland, I have sunk (I don't know how or why) into a
+state of superstitious fear. Yes! I believe in a fatality which is
+leading me back to Lord Harry, in spite of myself. Twice already, since
+I left home, I have met with him; and each time I have been the means
+of saving him--once at the milestone, and once at the ruin in the wood.
+If my father still accuses me of being in love with an adventurer, you
+can say with perfect truth that I am afraid of him. I _am_ afraid of
+the third meeting. I have done my best to escape from that man; and,
+step by step, as I think I am getting away, Destiny is taking me back
+to him. I may be on my way to him here, hidden in this wretched little
+town. Oh, don't despise me! Don't be ashamed of me!"
+
+"My dear, I am interested--deeply interested in you. That there may be
+some such influence as Destiny in our poor mortal lives, I dare not
+deny. But I don't agree with your conclusion. What Destiny has to do
+with you and with me, neither you nor I can pretend to know beforehand.
+In the presence of that great mystery, humanity must submit to be
+ignorant. Wait, Iris--wait!"
+
+She answered him with the simplicity of a docile child: "I will do
+anything you tell me."
+
+Mountjoy was too fond of her to say more of Lord Harry, for that day.
+He was careful to lead the talk to a topic which might be trusted to
+provoke no agitating thoughts. Finding Iris to all appearance
+established in the doctor's house, he was naturally anxious to know
+something of the person who must have invited her--the doctor's wife.
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE REGISTERED PACKET
+
+MOUNTJOY began by alluding to the second of Miss Henley's letters to
+her father, and to a passage in it which mentioned Mrs. Vimpany with
+expressions of the sincerest gratitude.
+
+"I should like to know more," he said, "of a lady whose hospitality at
+home seems to equal her kindness as a fellow-traveller. Did you first
+meet with her on the railway?"
+
+"She travelled by the same train to Dublin, with me and my maid, but
+not in the same carriage," Iris answered; "I was so fortunate as to
+meet with her on the voyage from Dublin to Holyhead. We had a rough
+crossing; and Rhoda suffered so dreadfully from sea-sickness that she
+frightened me. The stewardess was attending to ladies who were calling
+for her in all directions; I really don't know what misfortune might
+not have happened, if Mrs. Vimpany had not come forward in the kindest
+manner, and offered help. She knew so wonderfully well what was to be
+done, that she astonished me. 'I am the wife of a doctor,' she said;
+'and I am only imitating what I have seen my husband do, when his
+assistance has been required, at sea, in weather like this.' In her
+poor state of health, Rhoda was too much exhausted to go on by the
+train, when we got to Holyhead. She is the best of good girls, and I am
+fond of her, as you know. If I had been by myself, I daresay I should
+have sent for medical help. What do you think dear Mrs. Vimpany offered
+to do? 'Your maid is only faint,' she said. 'Give her rest and some
+iced wine, and she will be well enough to go on by the slow train.
+Don't be frightened about her; I will wait with you.' And she did wait.
+Are there many strangers, Hugh, who are as unselfishly good to others
+as my chance-acquaintance in the steamboat?"
+
+"Very few, I am afraid."
+
+Mountjoy made that reply with some little embarrassment; conscious of a
+doubt of Mrs. Vimpany's disinterested kindness, which seemed to be
+unworthy of a just man.
+
+Iris went on.
+
+"Rhoda was sufficiently recovered," she said, "to travel by the next
+train, and there seemed to be no reason for feeling any more anxiety.
+But, after a time, the fatigue of the journey proved to be too much for
+her. The poor girl turned pale--and fainted. Mrs. Vimpany revived her,
+but as it turned out, only for a while. She fell into another fainting
+fit; and my travelling-companion began to look anxious. There was some
+difficulty in restoring Rhoda to her senses. In dread of another
+attack, I determined to stop at the next station. It looked such a poor
+place, when we got to it, that I hesitated. Mrs. Vimpany persuaded me
+to go on. The next station, she said, was _her_ station. 'Stop there,'
+she suggested, 'and let my husband look at the girl. I ought not
+perhaps to say it, but you will find no better medical man out of
+London.' I took the good creature's advice gratefully. What else could
+I do?"
+
+"What would you have done," Mountjoy inquired, "if Rhoda had been
+strong enough to get to the end of the journey?"
+
+"I should have gone on to London, and taken refuge in a lodging--you
+were in town, as I believed, and my father might relent in time. As it
+was, I felt my lonely position keenly. To meet with kind people, like
+Mr. Vimpany and his wife, was a real blessing to such a friendless
+creature as I am--to say nothing of the advantage to Rhoda, who is
+getting better every day. I should like you to see Mrs. Vimpany, if she
+is at home. She is a little formal and old fashioned in her manner--but
+I am sure you will be pleased with her. Ah! you look round the room!
+They are poor, miserably poor for persons in their position, these
+worthy friends of mine. I have had the greatest difficulty in
+persuading them to let me contribute my share towards the household
+expenses. They only yielded when I threatened to go to the inn. You are
+looking very serious, Hugh. Is it possible that you see some objection
+to my staying in this house?"
+
+The drawing-room door was softly opened, at the moment when Iris put
+that question. A lady appeared on the threshold. Seeing the stranger,
+she turned to Iris.
+
+"I didn't know, dear Miss Henley, that you had a visitor. Pray pardon
+my intrusion."
+
+The voice was deep; the articulation was clear; the smile presented a
+certain modest dignity which gave it a value of its own. This was a
+woman who could make such a commonplace thing as an apology worth
+listening to. Iris stopped her as she was about to leave the room. "I
+was just wishing for you," she said. "Let me introduce my old friend,
+Mr. Mountjoy. Hugh, this is the lady who has been so kind to me--Mrs.
+Vimpany."
+
+Hugh's impulse, under the circumstances, was to dispense with the
+formality of a bow, and to shake hands. Mrs. Vimpany met this friendly
+advance with a suavity of action, not often seen in these days of
+movement without ceremony. She was a tall slim woman, of a certain age.
+Art had so cleverly improved her complexion that it almost looked like
+nature. Her cheeks had lost the plumpness of youth, but her hair
+(thanks again perhaps to Art) showed no signs of turning grey. The
+expression of her large dark eyes--placed perhaps a little too near her
+high aquiline nose--claimed admiration from any person who was so
+fortunate as to come within their range of view. Her hands, long,
+yellow, and pitiably thin, were used with a grace which checked to some
+extent their cruel betrayal of her age. Her dress had seen better days,
+but it was worn with an air which forbade it to look actually shabby.
+The faded lace that encircled her neck fell in scanty folds over her
+bosom. She sank into a chair by Hugh's side. "It was a great pleasure
+to me, Mr. Mountjoy, to offer my poor services to Miss Henley; I can't
+tell you how happy her presence makes me in our little house." The
+compliment was addressed to Iris with every advantage that smiles and
+tones could offer. Oddly artificial as it undoubtedly was, Mrs.
+Vimpany's manner produced nevertheless an agreeable impression.
+Disposed to doubt her at first, Mountjoy found that she was winning her
+way to a favourable change in his opinion. She so far interested him,
+that he began to wonder what her early life might have been, when she
+was young and handsome. He looked again at the portraits of actresses
+on the walls, and the plays on the bookshelf--and then (when she was
+speaking to Iris) he stole a sly glance at the doctor's wife. Was it
+possible that this remarkable woman had once been an actress? He
+attempted to put the value of that guess to the test by means of a
+complimentary allusion to the prints.
+
+"My memory as a playgoer doesn't extend over many years," he began;
+"but I can appreciate the historical interest of your beautiful
+prints." Mrs. Vimpany bowed gracefully--and dumbly. Mountjoy tried
+again. "One doesn't often see the famous actresses of past days," he
+proceeded, "so well represented on the walls of an English house."
+
+This time, he had spoken to better purpose. Mrs. Vimpany answered him
+in words.
+
+"I have many pleasant associations with the theatre," she said, "first
+formed in the time of my girlhood."
+
+Mountjoy waited to hear something more. Nothing more was said. Perhaps
+this reticent lady disliked looking back through a long interval of
+years, or perhaps she had her reasons for leaving Mountjoy's guess at
+the truth still lost in doubt. In either case, she deliberately dropped
+the subject. Iris took it up. Sitting by the only table in the room,
+she was in a position which placed her exactly opposite to one of the
+prints--the magnificent portrait of Mrs. Siddons as The Tragic Muse.
+
+"I wonder if Mrs. Siddons was really as beautiful as that?" she said,
+pointing to the print. "Sir Joshua Reynolds is reported to have
+sometimes flattered his sitters."
+
+Mrs. Vimpany's solemn self-possessed eyes suddenly brightened; the name
+of the great actress seemed to interest her. On the point, apparently,
+of speaking, she dropped the subject of Mrs. Siddons as she had dropped
+the subject of the theatre. Mountjoy was left to answer Iris.
+
+"We are none of us old enough," he reminded her, "to decide whether Sir
+Joshua's brush has been guilty of flattery or not." He turned to Mrs.
+Vimpany, and attempted to look into her life from a new point of view.
+"When Miss Henley was so fortunate as to make your acquaintance," he
+said, "you were travelling in Ireland. Was it your first visit to that
+unhappy country?"
+
+"I have been more than once in Ireland."
+
+Having again deliberately disappointed Mountjoy, she was assisted in
+keeping clear of the subject of Ireland by a fortunate interruption. It
+was the hour of delivery by the afternoon-post. The servant came in
+with a small sealed packet, and a slip of printed paper in her hand.
+
+"It's registered, ma'am," the woman announced. "The postman says you
+are to please sign this. And he seems to be in a hurry."
+
+She placed the packet and the slip of paper on the table, near the
+inkstand. Having signed the receipt, Mrs. Vimpany took up the packet,
+and examined the address. She instantly looked at Iris, and looked away
+again. "Will you excuse me for a moment?" saying this she left the
+room, without opening the packet.
+
+The moment the door closed on her, Iris started up, and hurried to
+Mountjoy.
+
+"Oh, Hugh," she said, "I saw the address on that packet when the
+servant put it on the table!"
+
+"My dear, what is there to excite you in the address?"
+
+"Don't speak so loud! She may be listening outside the door."
+
+Not only the words, but the tone in which they were spoken, amazed
+Mountjoy. "Your friend, Mrs. Vimpany!" he exclaimed.
+
+"Mrs. Vimpany was afraid to open the packet in our presence," Iris went
+on: "you must have seen that. The handwriting is familiar to me; I am
+certain of the person who wrote the address."
+
+"Well? And who is the person?"
+
+She whispered in his ear:
+
+"Lord Harry."
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE GAME: MOUNTJOY LOSES
+
+SURPRISE silenced Hugh for the moment. Iris understood the look that he
+fixed on her, and answered it. "I am quite sure," she told him, "of
+what I say."
+
+Mountjoy's well-balanced mind hesitated at rushing to a conclusion.
+
+"I am sure you are convinced of what you tell me," he said. "But
+mistakes do sometimes happen in forming a judgment of handwriting."
+
+In the state of excitement that now possessed her, Iris was easily
+irritated; she was angry with Hugh for only supposing that she might
+have made a mistake. He had himself, as she reminded him, seen Lord
+Harry's handwriting in past days. Was it possible to be mistaken in
+those bold thickly-written characters, with some of the letters so
+quaintly formed? "Oh, Hugh, I am miserable enough as it is," she broke
+out; "don't distract me by disputing what I know! Think of a woman so
+kind, so disinterested, so charming--the very opposite of a false
+creature--think of Mrs. Vimpany having deceived me!"
+
+There was not the slightest reason, thus far, for placing that
+interpretation on what had happened. Mountjoy gently, very gently,
+remonstrated.
+
+"My dear, we really don't know yet that Mrs. Vimpany has been acting
+under Lord Harry's instructions. Wait a little before you suspect your
+fellow-traveller of offering her services for the purpose of deceiving
+you."
+
+Iris was angry with him again: "Why did Mrs. Vimpany never tell me she
+knew Lord Harry? Isn't that suspicious?"
+
+Mountjoy smiled. "Let me put a question on my side," he said. "Did
+_you_ tell Mrs. Vimpany you knew Lord Harry?" Iris made no reply; her
+face spoke for her. "Well, then," he urged, "is _your_ silence
+suspicious? I am far, mind, from saying that this may not be a very
+unpleasant discovery. Only let us be sure first that we are right."
+
+With most of a woman's merits, Miss Henley had many of a woman's
+faults. Still holding to her own conclusion, she asked how they could
+expect to be sure of anything if they addressed their inquiries to a
+person who had already deceived them.
+
+Mountjoy's inexhaustible indulgence still made allowances for her.
+"When Mrs. Vimpany comes back," he said, "I will find an opportunity of
+mentioning Lord Harry's name. If she tells us that she knows him, there
+will be good reason in that one circumstance, as it seems to me, for
+continuing to trust her."
+
+"Suppose she shams ignorance," Iris persisted, "and looks as if she had
+never heard of his name before?"
+
+"In that case, I shall own that I was wrong, and shall ask you to
+forgive me."
+
+The finer and better nature of Iris recovered its influence at these
+words. "It is I who ought to beg pardon," she said. "Oh, I wish I could
+think before I speak: how insolent and ill-tempered I have been! But
+suppose I turn out to be right, Hugh, what will you do then?"
+
+"Then, my dear, it will be my duty to take you and your maid away from
+this house, and to tell your father what serious reasons there are"----
+He abruptly checked himself. Mrs. Vimpany had returned; she was in
+perfect possession of her lofty courtesy, sweetened by the modest
+dignity of her smile.
+
+"I have left you, Miss Henley, in such good company," she said, with a
+gracious inclination of her head in the direction of Mountjoy, "that I
+need hardly repeat my apologies--unless, indeed, I am interrupting a
+confidential conversation."
+
+It was possible that Iris might have betrayed herself, when the
+doctor's wife had looked at her after examining the address on the
+packet. In this case Mrs. Vimpany's allusion to "a confidential
+conversation" would have operated as a warning to a person of
+experience in the by-ways of deceit. Mountjoy's utmost exertion of
+cunning was not capable of protecting him on such conditions as these.
+The opportunity of trying his proposed experiment with Lord Harry's
+name seemed to have presented itself already. He rashly seized on it.
+
+"You have interrupted nothing that was confidential," he hastened to
+assure Mrs. Vimpany. "We have been speaking of a reckless young
+gentleman, who is an acquaintance of ours. If what I hear is true, he
+has already become public property; his adventures have found their way
+into some of the newspapers."
+
+Here, if Mrs. Vimpany had answered Hugh's expectations, she ought to
+have asked who the young gentleman was. She merely listened in polite
+silence.
+
+With a woman's quickness of perception, Iris saw that Mountjoy had not
+only pounced on his opportunity prematurely, but had spoken with a
+downright directness of allusion which must at once have put such a
+ready-witted person as Mrs. Vimpany on her guard. In trying to prevent
+him from pursuing his unfortunate experiment in social diplomacy, Iris
+innocently repeated Mountjoy's own mistake. She, too, seized her
+opportunity prematurely. That is to say, she was rash enough to change
+the subject.
+
+"You were talking just now, Hugh, of our friend's adventures," she
+said; "I am afraid you will find yourself involved in an adventure of
+no very agreeable kind, if you engage a bed at the inn. I never saw a
+more wretched-looking place."
+
+It was one of Mrs. Vimpany's many merits that she seldom neglected an
+opportunity of setting her friends at their ease.
+
+"No, no, dear Miss Henley," she hastened to say; "the inn is really a
+more clean and comfortable place than you suppose. A hard bed and a
+scarcity of furniture are the worst evils which your friend has to
+fear. Do you know," she continued, addressing herself to Mountjoy,
+"that I was reminded of a friend of mine, when you spoke just now of
+the young gentleman whose adventures are in the newspapers. Is it
+possible that you referred to the brother of the present Earl of
+Norland? A handsome young Irishman--with whom I first became acquainted
+many years since. Am I right in supposing that you and Miss Henley know
+Lord Harry?" she asked.
+
+What more than this could an unprejudiced mind require? Mrs. Vimpany
+had set herself right with a simplicity that defied suspicion. Iris
+looked at Mountjoy. He appeared to know when he was beaten. Having
+acknowledged that Lord Harry was the young gentleman of whom he and
+Miss Henley had been speaking, he rose to take leave.
+
+After what had passed, Iris felt the necessity of speaking privately to
+Hugh. The necessary excuse presented itself in the remote situation of
+the inn. "You will never find your way back," she said, "through the
+labyrinth of crooked streets in this old town. Wait for me a minute,
+and I will be your guide."
+
+Mrs. Vimpany protested. "My dear! let the servant show the way."
+
+Iris held gaily to her resolution, and ran away to her room. Mrs.
+Vimpany yielded with her best grace. Miss Henley's motive could hardly
+have been plainer to her, if Miss Henley had confessed it herself.
+"What a charming girl!" the doctor's amiable wife said to Mountjoy,
+when they were alone. "If I were a man, Miss Iris is just the young
+lady that I should fall in love with." She looked significantly at
+Mountjoy. Nothing came of it. She went on: "Miss Henley must have had
+many opportunities of being married; but the right man has, I fear, not
+yet presented himself." Once more her eloquent eyes consulted Mountjoy,
+and once more nothing came of it. Some women are easily discouraged.
+Impenetrable Mrs. Vimpany was one of the other women; she had not done
+with Mountjoy yet--she invited him to dinner on the next day.
+
+"Our early hour is three o'clock," she said modestly. "Pray join us. I
+hope to have the pleasure of introducing my husband."
+
+Mountjoy had his reasons for wishing to see the husband. As he accepted
+the invitation, Miss Henley returned to accompany him to the inn.
+
+Iris put the inevitable question to Hugh as soon as they were out of
+the doctor's house--"What do you say of Mrs. Vimpany now?"
+
+"I say that she must have been once an actress," Mountjoy answered;
+"and that she carries her experience of the stage into private life."
+
+"What do you propose to do next?"
+
+"I propose to wait, and see Mrs. Vimpany's husband to-morrow."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Mrs. Vimpany, my dear, is too clever for me. If--observe, please, that
+I do her the justice of putting it in that way--if she is really Lord
+Harry's creature, employed to keep watch on you, and to inform him of
+your next place of residence in England, I own that she has completely
+deceived me. In that case, it is just possible that the husband is not
+such a finished and perfect humbug as the wife. I may be able to see
+through him. I can but try."
+
+Iris sighed. "I almost hope you may not succeed," she said.
+
+Mountjoy was puzzled, and made no attempt to conceal it. "I thought you
+only wanted to get at the truth," he answered.
+
+"My mind might be easier, perhaps, if I was left in doubt," she
+suggested. "A perverse way of thinking has set up my poor opinion
+against yours. But I am getting back to my better sense. I believe you
+were entirely right when you tried to prevent me from rushing to
+conclusions; it is more than likely that I have done Mrs. Vimpany an
+injustice. Oh, Hugh, I ought to keep a friend--I who have so few
+friends--when I have got one! And there is another feeling in me which
+I must not conceal from you. When I remember Lord Harry's noble conduct
+in trying to save poor Arthur, I cannot believe him capable of such
+hateful deceit as consenting to our separation, and then having me
+secretly watched by a spy. What monstrous inconsistency! Can anybody
+believe it? Can anybody account for it?"
+
+"I think I can account for it, Iris, if you will let me make the
+attempt. You are mistaken to begin with."
+
+"How am I mistaken?"
+
+"You shall see. There is no such creature as a perfectly consistent
+human being on the face of the earth--and, strange as it may seem to
+you, the human beings themselves are not aware of it. The reason for
+this curious state of things is not far to seek. How can people who are
+ignorant--as we see every day--of their own characters be capable of
+correctly estimating the characters of others? Even the influence of
+their religion fails to open their eyes to the truth. In the Prayer
+which is the most precious possession of Christendom, their lips repeat
+the entreaty that they may not be led into temptation--but their minds
+fail to draw the inference. If that pathetic petition means anything,
+it means that virtuous men and women are capable of becoming vicious
+men and women, if a powerful temptation puts them to the test. Every
+Sunday, devout members of the congregation in church--models of
+excellence in their own estimation, and in the estimation of their
+neighbours--declare that they have done those things which they ought
+not to have done, and that there is no health in them. Will you believe
+that they are encouraged by their Prayer-books to present this sad
+exposure of the frailty of their own admirable characters? How
+inconsistent--and yet how entirely true! Lord Harry, as you rightly
+say, behaved nobly in trying to save my dear lost brother. He ought, as
+you think, and as other people think, to be consistently noble, after
+that, in all his thoughts and actions, to the end of his life. Suppose
+that temptation does try him--such temptation, Iris, as you innocently
+present--why doesn't he offer a superhuman resistance? You might as
+well ask, Why is he a mortal man? How inconsistent, how improbable,
+that he should have tendencies to evil in him, as well as tendencies to
+good! Ah, I see you don't like this. It would be infinitely more
+agreeable (wouldn't it?) if Lord Harry was one of the entirely
+consistent characters which are sometimes presented in works of
+fiction. Our good English readers are charmed with the man, the woman,
+or the child, who is introduced to them by the kind novelist as a being
+without faults. Do they stop to consider whether this is a true picture
+of humanity? It would be a terrible day for the book if they ever did
+that. But the book is in no danger. The readers would even fail to
+discover the falseness of the picture, if they were presented to
+themselves as perfect characters. 'We mustn't say so, but how
+wonderfully like us!' There would be the only impression produced. I am
+not trying to dishearten you; I want to encourage you to look at
+humanity from a wider and truer point of view. Do not be too readily
+depressed, if you find your faith shaken in a person whom you have
+hitherto believed to be good. That person has been led into temptation.
+Wait till time shows you that the evil influence is not everlasting,
+and that the good influence will inconsistently renew your faith out of
+the very depths of your despair. Humanity, in general, is neither
+perfectly good nor perfectly wicked: take it as you find it. Is this a
+hard lesson to learn? Well! it's easy to do what other people do, under
+similar circumstances. Listen to the unwelcome truth to-day, my dear;
+and forget it to-morrow."
+
+They parted at the door of the inn.
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE GAME: MOUNTJOY PLAYS A NEW CARD
+
+MR. VIMPANY (of the College of Surgeons) was a burly man, heavily built
+from head to foot. His bold round eyes looked straight at his
+fellow-creatures with an expression of impudent good humour; his
+whiskers were bushy, his hands were big, his lips were thick, his legs
+were solid. Add to this a broad sunburnt face, and a grey coat with
+wide tails, a waistcoat with a check pattern, and leather
+riding-gaiters--and no stranger could have failed to mistake Mr.
+Vimpany for a farmer of the old school. He was proud of the false
+impression that he created. "Nature built me to be a farmer," he used
+to say. "But my poor foolish old mother was a lady by birth, and she
+insisted on her son being a professional man. I hadn't brains for the
+Law, or money for the Army, or morals for the Church. And here I am a
+country doctor--the one representative of slavery left in the
+nineteenth century. You may not believe me, but I never see a labourer
+at the plough that I don't envy him."
+
+This was the husband of the elegant lady with the elaborate manners.
+This was the man who received Mountjoy with a "Glad to see you, sir,"
+and a shake of the hand that hurt him.
+
+"Coarse fare," said Mr. Vimpany, carving a big joint of beef; "but I
+can't afford anything better. Only a pudding to follow, and a glass of
+glorious old sherry. Miss Henley is good enough to excuse it--and my
+wife's used to it--and you will put up with it, Mr. Mountjoy, if you
+are half as amiable as you look. I'm an old-fashioned man. The pleasure
+of a glass of wine with you, sir."
+
+Hugh's first experience of the "glorious old sherry" led him to a
+discovery, which proved to be more important than he was disposed to
+consider it at the moment. He merely observed, with some amusement,
+that Mr. Vimpany smacked his lips in hearty approval of the worst
+sherry that his guest had ever tasted. Here, plainly self-betrayed, was
+a medical man who was an exception to a general rule in the
+profession--here was a doctor ignorant of the difference between good
+wine and bad!
+
+Both the ladies were anxious to know how Mountjoy had passed the night
+at the inn. He had only time to say that there was nothing to complain
+of, when Mr. Vimpany burst into an explosion of laughter.
+
+"Oh, but you must have had something to complain of!" said the big
+doctor. "I would bet a hundred, if I could afford it, that the landlady
+tried to poison you with her sour French wine."
+
+"Do you speak of the claret at the inn, after having tasted it?"
+Mountjoy asked.
+
+"What do you take me for?" cried Mr. Vimpany. "After all I have heard
+of that claret, I am not fool enough to try it myself, I can tell you."
+Mountjoy received this answer in silence. The doctor's ignorance and
+the doctor's prejudice, in the matter of wine, had started a new train
+of thought in Hugh's mind, which threatened serious consequences to Mr.
+Vimpany himself. There was a pause at the table; nobody spoke. The
+doctor saw condemnation of his rudeness expressed in his wife's face.
+He made a rough apology to Mountjoy, who was still preoccupied. "No
+offence, I hope? It's in the nature of me, sir, to speak my mind. If I
+could fawn and flatter, I should have got on better in my profession.
+I'm what they call a rough diamond. No, offence, I say?"
+
+"None whatever, Mr. Vimpany."
+
+"That's right! Try another glass of sherry."
+
+Mountjoy took the sherry.
+
+Iris looked at him, lost in surprise. It was unlike Hugh to be
+interested in a stranger's opinion of wine. It was unlike him to drink
+wine which was evidently not to his taste. And it was especially unlike
+his customary courtesy to let himself fall into thought at dinner-time,
+when there were other persons at the table. Was he ill? Impossible to
+look at him, and not see that he was in perfect health. What did it
+mean?
+
+Finding Mountjoy inattentive, Mr. Vimpany addressed himself to Iris.
+
+"I had to ride hard, Miss Henley, to get home in time for dinner. There
+are patients, I must tell you, who send for the doctor, and then seem
+to think they know more about it than the very man whom they have
+called in to cure them. It isn't he who tells them what their illness
+is; it's they who tell him. They dispute about the medical treatment
+that's best for them, and the one thing they are never tired of doing
+is talking about their symptoms. It was an old man's gabble that kept
+me late to-day. However, the Squire, as they call him in these parts,
+is a patient with a long purse; I am obliged to submit."
+
+"A gentleman of the old school, dear Miss Henley," Mrs. Vimpany
+explained. "Immensely rich. Is he better?" she asked, turning to her
+husband.
+
+"Better?" cried the outspoken doctor. "Pooh! there's nothing the matter
+with him but gluttony. He went to London, and consulted a great man, a
+humbug with a handle to his name. The famous physician got rid of him
+in no time--sent him abroad to boil himself in foreign baths. He came
+home again worse than ever, and consulted poor Me. I found him at
+dinner--a perfect feast, I give you my word of honour!--and the old
+fool gorging himself till he was black in the face. His wine, I should
+have said, was not up to the mark; wanted body and flavour, you know.
+Ah, Mr. Mountjoy, this seems to interest you; reminds you of the
+landlady's wine--eh? Well, sir, how do you think I treated the Squire?
+Emptied his infirm old inside with an emetic--and there he was on his
+legs again. Whenever he overeats himself he sends for me; and pays
+liberally. I ought to be grateful to him, and I am. Upon my soul, I
+believe I should be in the bankruptcy court but for the Squire's
+stomach. Look at my wife! She's shocked at me. We ought to keep up
+appearances, my dear? Not I! When I am poor, I say I am poor. When I
+cure a patient, I make no mystery of it; everybody's welcome to know
+how it's done. Don't be down-hearted, Arabella; nature never meant your
+husband for a doctor, and there's the long and the short of it. Another
+glass of sherry, Mr. Mountjoy?"
+
+All social ceremonies--including the curious English custom which sends
+the ladies upstairs, after dinner, and leaves the gentlemen at the
+table--found a devoted adherent in Mrs. Vimpany. She rose as if she had
+been presiding at a banquet, and led Miss Henley affectionately to the
+drawing-room. Iris glanced at Hugh. No; his mind was not at ease yet;
+the preoccupied look had not left his face.
+
+Jovial Mr. Vimpany pushed the bottle across the table to his guest, and
+held out a handful of big black cigars.
+
+"Now for the juice of the grape," he cried, "and the best cigar in all
+England!"
+
+He had just filled his glass, and struck a light for his cigar, when
+the servant came in with a note. Some men relieve their sense of
+indignation in one way, and some in another. The doctor's form of
+relief was an oath. "Talk about slavery!" he shouted. "Find me such a
+slave in all Africa as a man in my profession. There isn't an hour of
+the day or night that he can call his own. Here's a stupid old woman
+with an asthma, who has got another spasmodic attack--and I must leave
+my dinner-table and my friend, just as we are enjoying ourselves. I
+have half a mind not to go."
+
+The inattentive guest suddenly set himself right in his host's
+estimation. Hugh remonstrated with an appearance of interest in the
+case, which the doctor interpreted as a compliment to himself: "Oh, Mr.
+Vimpany, humanity! humanity!"
+
+"Oh, Mr. Mountjoy, money! money!" the facetious doctor answered. "The
+old lady is our Mayor's mother, sir. You don't seem to be quick at
+taking a joke. Make your mind easy; I shall pocket my fee."
+
+As soon as he had closed the door, Hugh Mountjoy uttered a devout
+ejaculation. "Thank God!" he said--and walked up and down the room,
+free to think without interruption at last.
+
+The subject of his meditations was the influence of intoxication in
+disclosing the hidden weaknesses and vices of a man's character by
+exhibiting them just as they are, released from the restraint which he
+exercises over himself when he is sober. That there was a weak side,
+and probably a vicious side, in Mr. Vimpany's nature it was hardly
+possible to doubt. His blustering good humour, his audacious
+self-conceit, the tones of his voice, the expression in his eyes, all
+revealed him (to use one expressive word) as a humbug. Let drink subtly
+deprive him of his capacity for self-concealment! and the true nature
+of his wife's association with Lord Harry might sooner or later show
+itself--say, in after-dinner talk, under skilful management. The right
+method of entrapping him into a state of intoxication (which might have
+presented serious difficulties under other circumstances) was
+suggested, partly by his ignorance of the difference between good wine
+and bad, and partly by Mountjoy's knowledge of the excellent quality of
+the landlady's claret. He had recognised, as soon as he tasted it, that
+finest vintage of Bordeaux, which conceals its true strength--to a
+gross and ignorant taste--under the exquisite delicacy of its flavour.
+Encourage Mr. Vimpany by means of a dinner at the inn, to give his
+opinion as a man whose judgment in claret was to be seriously
+consulted--and permit him also to discover that Hugh was rich enough to
+have been able to buy the wine--and the attainment of the end in view
+would be simply a question of time. There was certainly the chance to
+be reckoned with, that his thick head might prove to be too strong for
+the success of the experiment. Mountjoy determined to try it, and did
+try it nevertheless.
+
+Mr. Vimpany returned from his medical errand, thoroughly well satisfied
+with himself.
+
+"The Mayor's mother has reason to thank you, sir," he announced. "If
+you hadn't hurried me away, the wretched old creature would have been
+choked. A regular stand-up fight, by Jupiter, between death and the
+doctor!--and the doctor has won! Give me the reward of merit. Pass the
+bottle."
+
+He took up the decanter, and looked at it.
+
+"Why, what have you been about?" he asked. "I made up my mind that I
+should want the key of the cellar when I came back, and I don't believe
+you have drunk a drop in my absence. What does it mean?"
+
+"It means that I am not worthy of your sherry," Mountjoy answered. "The
+Spanish wines are too strong for my weak digestion."
+
+Mr. Vimpany burst into one of his explosions of laughter. "You miss the
+landlady's vinegar--eh?"
+
+"Yes, I do! Wait a minute, doctor; I have a word to say on my
+side--and, like you, I mean what I say. The landlady's vinegar is some
+of the finest Chateau Margaux I have ever met with--thrown away on
+ignorant people who are quite unworthy of it."
+
+The doctor's natural insolence showed itself. "You have bought this
+wonderful wine, of course?" he said satirically.
+
+"That," Mountjoy answered, "is just what I have done."
+
+For once in his life, Mr. Vimpany's self-sufficient readiness of speech
+failed him. He stared at his guest in dumb amazement. On this occasion,
+Mountjoy improved the opportunity to good purpose. Mr. Vimpany accepted
+with the utmost readiness an invitation to dine on the next day at the
+inn. But he made a condition. "In case I don't agree with you about
+that Chateau--what-you-call-it," he said, "you won't mind my sending
+home for a bottle of sherry?"
+
+The next event of the day was a visit to the most interesting monument
+of antiquity in the town. In the absence of the doctor, caused by
+professional engagements, Miss Henley took Mountjoy to see the old
+church--and Mrs. Vimpany accompanied them, as a mark of respect to Miss
+Henley's friend.
+
+When there was a chance of being able to speak confidentially, Iris was
+eager in praising the doctor's wife. "You can't imagine, Hugh, how
+agreeable she has been, and how entirely she has convinced me that I
+was wrong, shamefully wrong, in thinking of her as I did. She sees that
+you dislike her, and yet she speaks so nicely of you. 'Your clever
+friend enjoys your society,' she said; 'pray accompany me when I take
+him to see the church.' How unselfish!"
+
+Mountjoy kept his own counsel. The generous impulses which sometimes
+led Iris astray were, as he well knew, beyond the reach of
+remonstrance. His own opinion of Mrs. Vimpany still pronounced steadily
+against her. Prepared for discoveries, on the next day, which might
+prove too serious to be trifled with, he now did his best to provide
+for future emergencies.
+
+After first satisfying himself that there was nothing in the present
+state of the maid's health which need detain her mistress at
+Honeybuzzard, he next completed his preparations by returning to the
+inn, and writing to Mr. Henley. With strict regard to truth, his letter
+presented the daughter's claim on the father under a new point of view.
+Whatever the end of it might be, Mr. Henley was requested to
+communicate his intentions by telegraph. Will you receive Iris? was the
+question submitted. The answer expected was: Yes or No.
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+THE GAME: MOUNTJOY WINS
+
+MR. HENLEY's telegram arrived at the inn the next morning.
+
+He was willing to receive his daughter, but not unreservedly. The
+message was characteristic of the man: "Yes--on trial." Mountjoy was
+not shocked, was not even surprised. He knew that the successful
+speculations, by means of which Mr. Henley had accumulated his wealth,
+had raised against him enemies, who had spread scandalous reports which
+had never been completely refuted. The silent secession of friends, in
+whose fidelity he trusted, had hardened the man's heart and embittered
+his nature. Strangers in distress, who appealed to the rich retired
+merchant for help, found in their excellent references to character the
+worst form of persuasion that they could have adopted. Paupers without
+a rag of reputation left to cover them, were the objects of charity
+whom Mr. Henley relieved. When he was asked to justify his conduct, he
+said: "I have a sympathy with bad characters---I am one of them
+myself."
+
+With the arrival of the dinner hour the doctor appeared, in no very
+amiable humour, at the inn.
+
+"Another hard day's work," he said; "I should sink under it, if I
+hadn't a prospect of getting rid of my practice here. London--or the
+neighbourhood of London--there's the right place for a man like Me.
+Well? Where's the wonderful wine? Mind! I'm Tom-Tell-Truth; if I don't
+like your French tipple, I shall say so."
+
+The inn possessed no claret glasses; they drank the grand wine in
+tumblers as if it had been vin ordinaire.
+
+Mr. Vimpany showed that he was acquainted with the formalities proper
+to the ceremony of tasting. He filled his makeshift glass, he held it
+up to the light, and looked at the wine severely; he moved the tumbler
+to and fro under his nose, and smelt at it again and again; he paused
+and reflected; he tasted the claret as cautiously as if he feared it
+might be poisoned; he smacked his lips, and emptied his glass at a
+draught; lastly, he showed some consideration for his host's anxiety,
+and pronounced sentence on the wine.
+
+"Not so good as you think it, sir. But nice light claret; clean and
+wholesome. I hope you haven't given too much for it?"
+
+Thus far, Hugh had played a losing game patiently. His reward had come
+at last. After what the doctor had just said to him, he saw the winning
+card safe in his own hand.
+
+The bad dinner was soon over. No soup, of course; fish, in the state of
+preservation usually presented by a decayed country town; steak that
+rivalled the toughness of india-rubber; potatoes whose aspect said,
+"stranger, don't eat us"; pudding that would have produced a sense of
+discouragement, even in the mind of a child; and the famous English
+cheese which comes to us, oddly enough, from the United States, and
+stings us vindictively when we put it into our mouths. But the wine,
+the glorious wine, would have made amends to anybody but Mr. Vimpany
+for the woeful deficiencies of the food. Tumbler-full after
+tumbler-full of that noble vintage poured down his thirsty and ignorant
+throat; and still he persisted in declaring that it was nice light
+stuff, and still he unforgivingly bore in mind the badness of the
+dinner.
+
+"The feeding here," said this candid man, "is worse if possible than
+the feeding at sea, when I served as doctor on board a passenger-
+steamer. Shall I tell you how I lost my place? Oh, say so plainly, if
+you don't think my little anecdote worth listening to!"
+
+"My dear sir, I am waiting to hear it."
+
+"Very good. No offence, I hope? That's right! Well, sir, the captain of
+the ship complained of me to the owners; I wouldn't go round, every
+morning, and knock at the ladies' cabin-doors, and ask how they felt
+after a sea-sick night. Who doesn't know what they feel, without
+knocking at their doors? Let them send for the doctor when they want
+him. That was how I understood my duty; and there was the line of
+conduct that lost me my place. Pass the wine. Talking of ladies, what
+do you think of my wife? Did you ever see such distinguished manners
+before? My dear fellow, I have taken a fancy to you. Shake hands. I'll
+tell you another little anecdote. Where do you think my wife picked up
+her fashionable airs and graces? Ho! ho! On the stage! The highest
+branch of the profession, sir--a tragic actress. If you had seen her in
+Lady Macbeth, Mrs. Vimpany would have made your flesh creep. Look at
+me, and feast your eyes on a man who is above hypocritical objections
+to the theatre. Haven't I proved it by marrying an actress? But we
+don't mention it here. The savages in this beastly place wouldn't
+employ me, if they knew I had married a stage-player. Hullo! The
+bottle's empty again. Ha! here's another bottle, full. I love a man who
+has always got a full bottle to offer his friend. Shake hands. I say,
+Mountjoy, tell me on your sacred word of honour, can you keep a secret?
+My wife's secret, sir! Stop! let me look at you again. I thought I saw
+you smile. If a man smiles at me, when I am opening my whole heart to
+him, by the living jingo, I would knock that man down at his own table!
+What? you didn't smile? I apologise. Your hand again; I drink your
+health in your own good wine. Where was I? What was I talking about?"
+
+Mountjoy carefully humoured his interesting guest.
+
+"You were about to honour me," he said, "by taking me into your
+confidence." Mr. Vimpany stared in tipsy bewilderment. Mountjoy tried
+again in plainer language: "You were going to tell me a secret."
+
+This time, the doctor grasped the idea. He looked round cunningly to
+the door. "Any eavesdroppers?" he asked. "Hush! Whisper--this is
+serious--whisper! What was it I was going to tell you? What was the
+secret, old boy?"
+
+Mountjoy answered a little too readily: "I think it related to Mrs.
+Vimpany."
+
+Mrs. Vimpany's husband threw himself back in his chair, snatched a
+dirty handkerchief out of his pocket, and began to cry.
+
+"Here's a false friend!" the creature whimpered. "Asks me to dinner,
+and takes advantage of my dependent situation to insult my wife. The
+loveliest of women, the sweetest of women, the innocentest of women.
+Oh, my wife! my wife!" He suddenly threw his handkerchief to the other
+end of the room, and burst out laughing. "Ho! ho! Mountjoy, what an
+infernal fool you must be to take me seriously. I can act, too. Do you
+think I care about my wife? She was a fine woman once: she's a bundle
+of old rags now. But she has her merits. Hush! I want to know
+something. Have you got a lord among your circle of acquaintance?"
+
+Experience made Mountjoy more careful; perhaps a little too careful. He
+only said "Yes."
+
+The doctor's dignity asserted itself. "That's a short answer, sir, to a
+man in my position. If you want me to believe you, mention your
+friend's name."
+
+Here was a chance at last! "His name;" Mountjoy began, "is Lord
+Harry--"
+
+Mr. Vimpany lost his dignity in an instant. He struck his heavy fist on
+the table, with a blow that made the tumblers jump.
+
+"Coincidence!" he cried. "How wonderful--no; that's not the
+word--providential is the word--how providential are coincidences! I
+mean, of course, to a rightly constituted mind. Let nobody contradict
+me! When I say a rightly constituted mind I speak seriously; and a
+young man like you will be all the better for it. Mountjoy! dear
+Mountjoy! jolly Mountjoy! my wife's lord is your lord--Lord Harry. No;
+none of your nonsense--I won't have any more wine. Yes, I will; it
+might hurt your feelings if I didn't drink with you. Pass the bottle.
+Ha! That's a nice ring you've got on your finger. Perhaps you think it
+valuable? It's nothing, sir; it's dross, it's dirt, compared to my
+wife's diamond pin! There's a jewel, if you like! It will be worth a
+fortune to us when we sell it. A gift, dear sir! I'm afraid I've been
+too familiar with you. Speaking as a born gentleman, I beg to present
+my respects, and I call you 'dear sir.' Did I tell you the diamond pin
+was a gift? It's nothing of the sort; we are under no obligation; my
+wife, my admirable wife, has earned that diamond pin. By registered
+post; and what I call a manly letter from Lord Harry. He is deeply
+obliged (I give you the sense of it) by what my wife has done for him;
+ready money is scarce with my lord; he sends a family jewel, with his
+love. Oh, I'm not jealous. He's welcome to love Mrs. Vimpany, in her
+old age, if he likes. Did you say that, sir? Did you say that Lord
+Harry, or any man, was welcome to love Mrs. Vimpany? I have a great
+mind to throw this bottle at your head. No, I won't; it's wasting good
+wine! How kind of you to give me good wine. Who are you? I don't like
+dining with a stranger. Do you know any friend of mine? Do you know a
+man named Mountjoy? Do you know two men named Mountjoy? No: you don't.
+One of them is dead: killed by those murdering scoundrels what do you
+call them? Eh, what?" The doctor's voice began to falter, his head
+dropped; he slumbered suddenly and woke suddenly, and began talking
+again suddenly. "Would you like to be made acquainted with Lord Harry?
+I'll give you a sketch of his character before I introduce him. Between
+ourselves, he's a desperate wretch. Do you know why he employed my
+wife, my admirable wife? You will agree with me; he ought to have
+looked after his young woman himself. We've got his young woman safe in
+our house. A nice girl. Not my style; my medical knowledge certifies
+she's cold-blooded. Lord Harry has only to come over here and find her.
+Why the devil doesn't he come? What is it keeps him in Ireland? Do you
+know? I seem to have forgotten. My own belief is I've got softening of
+the brain. What's good for softening of the brain? There isn't a doctor
+living who won't tell you the right remedy--wine. Pass the wine. If
+this claret is worth a farthing, it's worth a guinea a bottle. I ask
+you in confidence; did you ever hear of such a fool as my wife's lord?
+His name escapes me. No matter; he stops in Ireland--hunting. Hunting
+what? The fox? Nothing so noble; hunting assassins. He's got some
+grudge against one of them. Means to kill one of them. A word in your
+ear; they'll kill him. Do you ever bet? Five to one, he's a dead man
+before the end of the week. When is the end of the week? Tuesday,
+Wednesday--no, Saturday--that's the beginning of the week--no, it
+isn't--the beginning of the week isn't the Sabbath--Sunday, of
+course--we are not Christians, we are Jews--I mean we are Jews, we are
+not Christians--I mean--"
+
+The claret got the better of his tongue, at last. He mumbled and
+muttered; he sank back in his chair; he chuckled; he hiccupped; he fell
+asleep.
+
+All and more than all that Mountjoy feared, he had now discovered. In a
+state of sobriety, the doctor was probably one of those men who are
+always ready to lie. In a state of intoxication the utterances of his
+drunken delirium might unconsciously betray the truth. The reason which
+he had given for Lord Harry's continued absence in Ireland, could not
+be wisely rejected as unworthy of belief. It was in the reckless nature
+of the wild lord to put his own life in peril, in the hope of revenging
+Arthur Mountjoy on the wretch who had killed him. Taking this bad news
+for granted, was there any need to distress Iris by communicating the
+motive which detained Lord Harry in his own country? Surely not!
+
+And, again, was there any immediate advantage to be gained by revealing
+the true character of Mrs. Vimpany, as a spy, and, worse still, a spy
+who was paid? In her present state of feeling, Iris would, in all
+probability, refuse to believe it.
+
+Arriving at these conclusions, Hugh looked at the doctor snoring and
+choking in an easy-chair. He had not wasted the time and patience
+devoted to the stratagem which had now successfully reached its end.
+After what he had just heard--thanks to the claret--he could not
+hesitate to accomplish the speedy removal of Iris from Mr. Vimpany's
+house; using her father's telegram as the only means of persuasion on
+which it was possible to rely. Mountjoy left the inn without ceremony,
+and hurried away to Iris in the hope of inducing her to return to
+London with him that night.
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+DOCTORING THE DOCTOR
+
+ASKING for Miss Henley at the doctor's door, Hugh was informed that she
+had gone out, with her invalid maid, for a walk. She had left word, if
+Mr. Mountjoy called in her absence, to beg that he would kindly wait
+for her return.
+
+On his way up to the drawing-room, Mountjoy heard Mrs. Vimpany's
+sonorous voice occupied, as he supposed, in reading aloud. The door
+being opened for him, he surprised her, striding up and down the room
+with a book in her hand; grandly declaiming without anybody to applaud
+her. After what Hugh had already heard, he could only conclude that
+reminiscences of her theatrical career had tempted the solitary actress
+to make a private appearance, for her own pleasure, in one of those
+tragic characters to which her husband had alluded. She recovered her
+self-possession on Mountjoy's appearance, with the ease of a mistress
+of her art. "Pardon me," she said, holding up her book with one hand,
+and tapping it indicatively with the other: "Shakespeare carries me out
+of myself. A spark of the poet's fire burns in the poet's humble
+servant. May I hope that I have made myself understood? You look as if
+you had a fellow-feeling for me."
+
+Mountjoy did his best to fill the sympathetic part assigned to him, and
+only succeeded in showing what a bad actor he would have been, if he
+had gone on the stage. Under the sedative influence thus administered,
+Mrs. Vimpany put away her book, and descended at once from the highest
+poetry to the lowest prose.
+
+"Let us return to domestic events," she said indulgently. "Have the
+people at the inn given you a good dinner?"
+
+"The people did their best," Mountjoy answered cautiously.
+
+"Has my husband returned with you?" Mrs. Vimpany went on.
+
+Mountjoy began to regret that he had not waited for Iris in the street.
+He was obliged to acknowledge that the doctor had not returned with
+him.
+
+"Where is Mr. Vimpany?"
+
+"At the inn."
+
+"What is he doing there?"
+
+Mountjoy hesitated. Mrs. Vimpany rose again into the regions of tragic
+poetry. She stepped up to him, as if he had been Macbeth, and she was
+ready to use the daggers. "I understand but too well," she declared in
+terrible tones. "My wretched husband's vices are known to me. Mr.
+Vimpany is intoxicated."
+
+Hugh tried to make the best of it. "Only asleep," he said. Mrs. Vimpany
+looked at him once more. This time, it was Queen Katharine looking at
+Cardinal Wolsey. She bowed with lofty courtesy, and opened the door. "I
+have occasion," she said, "to go out"----and made an exit.
+
+Five minutes later, Mountjoy (standing at the window, impatiently on
+the watch for the return of Iris) saw Mrs. Vimpany in the street. She
+entered a chemist's shop, on the opposite side of the way, and came out
+again with a bottle in her hand. It was enclosed in the customary
+medical wrapping of white paper. Majestically, she passed out of sight.
+If Hugh had followed her he would have traced the doctor's wife to the
+door of the inn.
+
+The unemployed waiter was on the house-steps, looking about him--with
+nothing to see. He made his bow to Mrs. Vimpany, and informed her that
+the landlady had gone out.
+
+"You will do as well," was the reply. "Is Mr. Vimpany here?"
+
+The waiter smiled, and led the way through the passage to the foot of
+the stairs. "You can hear him, ma'am." It was quite true; Mr. Vimpany's
+snoring answered for Mr. Vimpany. His wife ascended the first two or
+three stairs, and stopped to speak again to the waiter. She asked what
+the two gentlemen had taken to drink with their dinner. They had taken
+"the French wine."
+
+"And nothing else?"
+
+The waiter ventured on a little joke. "Nothing else," he said--"and
+more than enough of it, too."
+
+"Not more than enough, I suppose, for the good of the house," Mrs.
+Vimpany remarked.
+
+"I beg your pardon, ma'am; the claret the two gentlemen drank is not
+charged for in the bill."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+The waiter explained that Mr. Mountjoy had purchased the whole stock of
+the wine. Suspicion, as well as surprise, appeared in Mrs. Vimpany's
+face. She had hitherto thought it likely that Miss Henley's
+gentleman-like friend might be secretly in love with the young lady.
+Her doubts of him, now, took a wider range of distrust. She went on up
+the stairs by herself, and banged the door of the private room as the
+easiest means of waking the sleeping man. To the utmost noise that she
+could make in this way, he was perfectly impenetrable. For a while she
+waited, looking at him across the table with unutterable contempt.
+
+There was the man to whom the religion of the land and the law of the
+land, acting together in perfect harmony, had fettered her for life!
+Some women, in her position, might have wasted time in useless
+self-reproach. Mrs. Vimpany reviewed her miserable married life with
+the finest mockery of her own misfortune. "Virtue," she said to
+herself, "is its own reward."
+
+Glancing with careless curiosity at the disorder of the dinner-table,
+she noticed some wine still left in the bottom of her husband's glass.
+Had artificial means been used to reduce him to his present condition?
+She tasted the claret. No; there was nothing in the flavour of it which
+betrayed that he had been drugged. If the waiter was to be believed, he
+had only drunk claret--and there he was, in a state of helpless
+stupefaction, nevertheless.
+
+She looked again at the dinner-table, and discovered one, among the
+many empty bottles, with some wine still left in it. After a moment of
+reflection, she took a clean tumbler from the sideboard.
+
+Here was the wine which had been an object of derision to Mr. Vimpany
+and his friends. They were gross feeders and drinkers; and it might not
+be amiss to put their opinions to the test. She was not searching for
+the taste of a drug now; her present experiment proposed to try the
+wine on its own merits.
+
+At the time of her triumphs on the country stage--before the date of
+her unlucky marriage--rich admirers had entertained the handsome
+actress at suppers, which offered every luxury that the most perfect
+table could supply. Experience had made her acquainted with the flavour
+of the finest claret--and that experience was renewed by the claret
+which she was now tasting. It was easy to understand why Mr. Mountjoy
+had purchased the wine; and, after a little thinking, his motive for
+inviting Mr. Vimpany to dinner seemed to be equally plain. Foiled in
+their first attempt at discovery by her own prudence and tact, his
+suspicions had set their trap. Her gross husband had been tempted to
+drink, and to talk at random (for Mr. Mountjoy's benefit) in a state of
+intoxication!
+
+What secrets might the helpless wretch not have betrayed before the
+wine had completely stupefied him?
+
+Urged by rage and fear, she shook him furiously. He woke; he glared at
+her with bloodshot eyes; he threatened her with his clenched fist.
+There was but one way of lifting his purblind stupidity to the light.
+She appealed to his experience of himself, on many a former occasion:
+"You fool, you have been drinking again--and there's a patient waiting
+for you." To that dilemma he was accustomed; the statement of it
+partially roused him. Mrs. Vimpany tore off the paper wrapping, and
+opened the medicine-bottle which she had brought with her.
+
+He stared at it; he muttered to himself: "Is she going to poison me?"
+She seized his head with one hand, and held the open bottle to his
+nose. "Your own prescription," she cried, "for yourself and your
+hateful friends."
+
+His nose told him what words might have tried vainly to say: he
+swallowed the mixture. "If I lose the patient," he muttered oracularly,
+"I lose the money." His resolute wife dragged him out of his chair. The
+second door in the dining-room led into an empty bed-chamber. With her
+help, he got into the room, and dropped on the bed.
+
+Mrs. Vimpany consulted her watch.
+
+On many a former occasion she had learnt what interval of repose was
+required, before the sobering influence of the mixture could
+successfully assert itself. For the present, she had only to return to
+the other room. The waiter presented himself, asking if there was
+anything he could do for her. Familiar with the defective side of her
+husband's character, he understood what it meant when she pointed to
+the bedroom door. "The old story, ma'am," he said, with an air of
+respectful sympathy. "Can I get you a cup of tea?"
+
+Mrs. Vimpany accepted the tea, and enjoyed it thoughtfully.
+
+She had two objects in view--to be revenged on Mountjoy, and to find a
+way of forcing him to leave the town before he could communicate his
+discoveries to Iris. How to reach these separate ends, by one and the
+same means, was still the problem which she was trying to solve, when
+the doctor's coarse voice was audible, calling for somebody to come to
+him.
+
+If his head was only clear enough, by this time, to understand the
+questions which she meant to put, his answers might suggest the idea of
+which she was in search. Rising with alacrity, Mrs. Vimpany returned to
+the bed-chamber.
+
+"You miserable creature," she began, "are you sober now?"
+
+"I'm as sober as you are."
+
+"Do you know," she went on, "why Mr. Mountjoy asked you to dine with
+him?"
+
+"Because he's my friend."
+
+"He is your worst enemy. Hold your tongue! I'll explain what I mean
+directly. Rouse your memory, if you have got a memory left. I want to
+know what you and Mr. Mountjoy talked about after dinner."
+
+He stared at her helplessly. She tried to find her way to his
+recollection by making suggestive inquiries. It was useless; he only
+complained of being thirsty. His wife lost her self-control. She was
+too furiously angry with him to be able to remain in the room.
+Recovering her composure when she was alone, she sent for soda-water
+and brandy. Her one chance of making him useful was to humour his vile
+temper; she waited on him herself.
+
+In some degree, the drink cleared his muddled head. Mrs. Vimpany tried
+his memory once more. Had he said this? Had he said that? Yes: he
+thought it likely. Had he, or had Mr. Mountjoy, mentioned Lord Harry's
+name? A glimmer of intelligence showed itself in his stupid eyes.
+Yes--and they had quarrelled about it: he rather thought he had thrown
+a bottle at Mr. Mountjoy's head. Had they, either of them, said
+anything about Miss Henley? Oh, of course! What was it? He was unable
+to remember. Had his wife done bothering him, now?
+
+"Not quite," she replied. "Try to understand what I am going to say to
+you. If Lord Harry comes to us while Miss Henley is in our house--"
+
+He interrupted her: "That's your business."
+
+"Wait a little. It's my business, if I hear beforehand that his
+lordship is coming. But he is quite reckless enough to take us by
+surprise. In that case, I want you to make yourself useful. If you
+happen to be at home, keep him from seeing Miss Henley until I have
+seen her first."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"I want an opportunity, my dear, of telling Miss Henley that I have
+been wicked enough to deceive her, before she finds it out for herself.
+I may hope she will forgive me, if I confess everything."
+
+The doctor laughed: "What the devil does it matter whether she forgives
+you or not?"
+
+"It matters a great deal."
+
+"Why, you talk as if you were fond of her!"
+
+"I am."
+
+The doctor's clouded intelligence was beginning to clear; he made a
+smart reply: "Fond of her, and deceiving her--aha!"
+
+"Yes," she said quietly, "that's just what it is. It has grown on me,
+little by little; I can't help liking Miss Henley."
+
+"Well," Mr. Vimpany remarked, "you _are_ a fool!" He looked at her
+cunningly. "Suppose I do make myself useful, what am I to gain by it?"
+
+"Let us get back," she suggested, "to the gentleman who invited you to
+dinner, and made you tipsy for his own purposes."
+
+"I'll break every bone in his skin!"
+
+"Don't talk nonsense! Leave Mr. Mountjoy to me."
+
+"Do _you_ take his part? I can tell you this. If I drank too much of
+that poisonous French stuff, Mountjoy set me the example. He was
+tipsy--as you call it--shamefully tipsy, I give you my word of honour.
+What's the matter now?"
+
+His wife (so impenetrably cool, thus far) had suddenly become excited.
+There was not the smallest fragment of truth in what he had just said
+of Hugh, and Mrs. Vimpany was not for a moment deceived by it. But the
+lie had, accidentally, one merit--it suggested to her the idea which
+she had vainly tried to find over her cup of tea. "Suppose I show you
+how you may be revenged on Mr. Mountjoy," she said.
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Will you remember what I asked you to do for me, if Lord Harry takes
+us by surprise?"
+
+He produced his pocket-diary, and told her to make a memorandum of it.
+She wrote as briefly as if she had been writing a telegram: "Keep Lord
+Harry from seeing Miss Henley, till I have seen her first."
+
+"Now," she said, taking a chair by the bedside, "you shall know what a
+clever wife you have got. Listen to me."
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+HER FATHER'S MESSAGE
+
+LOOKING out of the drawing-room window, for the tenth time at least,
+Mountjoy at last saw Iris in the street, returning to the house.
+
+She brought the maid with her into the drawing-room, in the gayest of
+good spirits, and presented Rhoda to Mountjoy.
+
+"What a blessing a good long walk is, if we only knew it!" she
+exclaimed. "Look at my little maid's colour! Who would suppose that she
+came here with heavy eyes and pale cheeks? Except that she loses her
+way in the town, whenever she goes out alone, we have every reason to
+congratulate ourselves on our residence at Honeybuzzard. The doctor is
+Rhoda's good genius, and the doctor's wife is her fairy godmother."
+
+Mountjoy's courtesy having offered the customary congratulations, the
+maid was permitted to retire; and Iris was free to express her
+astonishment at the friendly relations established (by means of the
+dinner-table) between the two most dissimilar men on the face of
+creation.
+
+"There is something overwhelming," she declared, "in the bare idea of
+your having asked him to dine with you--on such a short acquaintance,
+and being such a man! I should like to have peeped in, and seen you
+entertaining your guest with the luxuries of the hotel larder.
+Seriously, Hugh, your social sympathies have taken a range for which I
+was not prepared. After the example that you have set me, I feel
+ashamed of having doubted whether Mr. Vimpany was worthy of his
+charming wife. Don't suppose that I am ungrateful to the doctor! He has
+found his way to my regard, after what he has done for Rhoda. I only
+fail to understand how he has possessed himself of _your_ sympathies."
+
+So she ran on, enjoying the exercise of her own sense of humour in
+innocent ignorance of the serious interests which she was deriding.
+
+Mountjoy tried to stop her, and tried in vain.
+
+"No, no," she persisted as mischievously as ever, "the subject is too
+interesting to be dismissed. I am dying to know how you and your guest
+got through the dinner. Did he take more wine than was good for him?
+And, when he forgot his good manners, did he set it all right again by
+saying, 'No offence,' and passing the bottle?"
+
+Hugh could endure it no longer. "Pray control your high spirits for a
+moment," he said. "I have news for you from home."
+
+Those words put an end to her outbreak of gaiety, in an instant.
+
+"News from my father?" she asked.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Is he coming here?"
+
+"No; I have heard from him."
+
+"A letter?"
+
+"A telegram," Mountjoy explained, "in answer to a letter from me. I did
+my best to press your claims on him, and I am glad to say I have not
+failed."
+
+"Hugh, dear Hugh! have you succeeded in reconciling us?"
+
+Mountjoy produced the telegram. "I asked Mr. Henley," he said, "to let
+me know at once whether he would receive you, and to answer plainly Yes
+or No. The message might have been more kindly expressed--but, at any
+rate, it is a favourable reply."
+
+Iris read the telegram. "Is there another father in the world," she
+said sadly, "who would tell his daughter, when she asks to come home,
+that he will receive her on trial?"
+
+"Surely, you are not offended with him, Iris?"
+
+She shook her head. "I am like you," she said. "I know him too well to
+be offended. He shall find me dutiful, he shall find me patient. I am
+afraid I must not expect you to wait for me in Honeybuzzard. Will you
+tell my father that I hope to return to him in a week's time?"
+
+"Pardon me, Iris, I see no reason why you should waste a week in this
+town. On the contrary, the more eager you show yourself to return to
+your father, the more likely you are to recover your place in his
+estimation. I had planned to take you home by the next train."
+
+Iris looked at him in astonishment. "Is it possible that you mean what
+you say?" she asked.
+
+"My dear, I do most assuredly mean what I say. Why should you hesitate?
+What possible reason can there be for staying here any longer?"
+
+"Oh, Hugh, how you disappoint me! What has become of your kind feeling,
+your sense of justice, your consideration for others? Poor Mrs.
+Vimpany!"
+
+"What has Mrs. Vimpany to do with it?"
+
+Iris was indignant.
+
+"What has Mrs. Vimpany to do with it?" she repeated. "After all that I
+owe to that good creature's kindness; after I have promised to
+accompany her--she has so few happy days, poor soul!--on excursions to
+places of interest in the neighbourhood, do you expect me to leave
+her--no! it's worse than that--do you expect me to throw her aside like
+an old dress that I have worn out? And this after I have so unjustly,
+so ungratefully suspected her in my own thoughts? Shameful! shameful!"
+
+With some difficulty, Mountjoy controlled himself. After what she had
+just said, his lips were sealed on the subject of Mrs. Vimpany's true
+character. He could only persist in appealing to her duty to her
+father.
+
+"You are allowing your quick temper to carry you to strange
+extremities," he answered. "If I think it of more importance to hasten
+a reconciliation with your father than to encourage you to make
+excursions with a lady whom you have only known for a week or two, what
+have I done to deserve such an outbreak of anger? Hush! Not a word more
+now! Here is the lady herself."
+
+As he spoke, Mrs. Vimpany joined them; returning from her interview
+with her husband at the inn. She looked first at Iris, and at once
+perceived signs of disturbance in the young lady's face.
+
+Concealing her anxiety under that wonderful stage smile, which affords
+a refuge to so many secrets, Mrs. Vimpany said a few words excusing her
+absence. Miss Henley answered, without the slightest change in her
+friendly manner to the doctor's wife. The signs of disturbance were
+evidently attributable to some entirely unimportant cause, from Mrs.
+Vimpany's point of view. Mr. Mountjoy's discoveries had not been
+communicated yet.
+
+In Hugh's state of mind, there was some irritating influence in the
+presence of the mistress of the house, which applied the spur to his
+wits. He mischievously proposed submitting to her the question in
+dispute between Iris and himself.
+
+"It is a very simple matter," he said to Mrs. Vimpany. "Miss Henley's
+father is anxious that she should return to him, after an estrangement
+between them which is happily at an end. Do you think she ought to
+allow any accidental engagements to prevent her from going home at
+once? If she requests your indulgence, under the circumstances, has she
+any reason to anticipate a refusal?"
+
+Mrs. Vimpany's expressive eyes looked up, with saintly resignation, at
+the dirty ceiling--and asked in dumb show what she had done to deserve
+the injury implied by a doubt.
+
+"Mr. Mountjoy," she said sternly, "you insult me by asking the
+question."--"Dear Miss Henley," she continued, turning to Iris, _"you_
+will do me justice, I am sure. Am I capable of allowing my own feelings
+to stand in the way, when your filial duty is concerned? Leave me, my
+sweet friend. Go! I entreat you, go home!"
+
+She retired up the stage--no, no; she withdrew to the other end of the
+room--and burst into the most becoming of all human tears, theatrical
+tears. Impulsive Iris hastened to comfort the personification of
+self-sacrifice, the model of all that was most unselfish in female
+submission. "For shame! for shame!" she whispered, as she passed
+Mountjoy.
+
+Beaten again by Mrs. Vimpany--with no ties of relationship to justify
+resistance to Miss Henley; with two women against him, entrenched
+behind the privileges of their sex--the one last sacrifice of his own
+feelings, in the interests of Iris, that Hugh could make was to control
+the impulse which naturally urged him to leave the house. In the
+helpless position in which he had now placed himself, he could only
+wait to see what course Mrs. Vimpany might think it desirable to take.
+Would she request him, in her most politely malicious way, to bring his
+visit to an end? No: she looked at him--hesitated--directed a furtive
+glance towards the view of the street from the window--smiled
+mysteriously--and completed the sacrifice of her own feelings in these
+words:
+
+"Dear Miss Henley, let me help you to pack up."
+
+Iris positively refused.
+
+"No," she said, "I don't agree with Mr. Mountjoy. My father leaves it
+to me to name the day when we meet. I hold you, my dear, to our
+engagement--I don't leave an affectionate friend as I might leave a
+stranger."
+
+Even if Mr. Mountjoy communicated his discoveries to Miss Henley, on
+the way home, there would be no danger now of her believing him. Mrs.
+Vimpany put her powerful arm round the generous Iris, and, with
+infinite grace, thanked her by a kiss.
+
+"Your kindness will make my lonely lot in life harder than ever to
+bear," she murmured, "when you are gone."
+
+"But we may hope to meet in London," Iris reminded her; "unless Mr.
+Vimpany alters his mind about leaving this place."
+
+"My husband will not do that, dear. He is determined to try his luck,
+as he says, in London. In the meantime you will give me your address,
+won't you? Perhaps you will even promise to write to me?"
+
+Iris instantly gave her promise, and wrote down her address in London.
+
+Mountjoy made no attempt to interfere: it was needless.
+
+If the maid had not fallen ill on the journey, and if Mrs. Vimpany had
+followed Miss Henley to London, there would have been little to fear in
+the discovery of her address--and there was little to fear now. The
+danger to Iris was not in what might happen while she was living under
+her father's roof, but in what might happen if she was detained (by
+plans for excursions) in Mr. Vimpany's house, until Lord Harry might
+join her there.
+
+Rather than permit this to happen, Hugh (in sheer desperation)
+meditated charging Mrs. Vimpany, to her face, with being the Irish
+lord's spy, and proving the accusation by challenging her to produce
+the registered letter and the diamond pin.
+
+While he was still struggling with his own reluctance to inflict this
+degrading exposure on a woman, the talk between the two ladies came to
+an end. Mrs. Vimpany returned again to the window. On this occasion,
+she looked out into the street--with her handkerchief (was it used as a
+signal?) exhibited in her hand. Iris, on her side, advanced to
+Mountjoy. Easily moved to anger, her nature was incapable of sullen
+perseverance in a state of enmity. To see Hugh still patiently
+waiting--still risking the chances of insult--devoted to her, and
+forgiving her--was at once a reproach that punished Iris, and a mute
+appeal that no true woman's heart could resist.
+
+With tears in her eyes she said to him: "There must be no coolness
+between you and me. I lost my temper, and spoke shamefully to you. My
+dear, I am indeed sorry for it. You are never hard on me--you won't be
+hard on me now?"
+
+She offered her hand to him. He had just raised it to his lips--when
+the drawing-room door was roughly opened. They both looked round.
+
+The man of all others whom Hugh least desired to see was the man who
+now entered the room. The victim of "light claret"--privately directed
+to lurk in the street, until he saw a handkerchief fluttering at the
+window--had returned to the house; primed with his clever wife's
+instructions; ready and eager to be even with Mountjoy for the dinner
+at the inn.
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+MR. VIMPANY ON INTOXICATION
+
+THERE was no unsteadiness in the doctor's walk, and no flush on his
+face. He certainly did strut when he entered the room; and he held up
+his head with dignity, when he discovered Mountjoy. But he seemed to
+preserve his self-control. Was the man sober again already?
+
+His wife approached him with her set smile; the appearance of her lord
+and master filled Mrs. Vimpany with perfectly-assumed emotions of
+agreeable surprise.
+
+"This is an unexpected pleasure," she said. "You seldom favour us with
+your company, my dear, so early in the evening! Are there fewer
+patients in want of your advice than usual?"
+
+"You are mistaken, Arabella. I am here in the performance of a painful
+duty."
+
+The doctor's language, and the doctor's manner, presented him to Iris
+in a character that was new to her. What effect had he produced on Mrs.
+Vimpany? That excellent friend to travellers in distress lowered her
+eyes to the floor, and modestly preserved silence. Mr. Vimpany
+proceeded to the performance of his duty; his painful responsibility
+seemed to strike him at first from a medical point of view.
+
+"If there is a poison which undermines the sources of life," he
+remarked, "it is alcohol. If there is a vice that degrades humanity, it
+is intoxication. Mr. Mountjoy, are you aware that I am looking at you?"
+
+"Impossible not to be aware of that," Hugh answered. "May I ask why you
+are looking at me?" It was not easy to listen gravely to Mr. Vimpany's
+denunciation of intemperance, after what had taken place at the dinner
+of that day. Hugh smiled. The moral majesty of the doctor entered its
+protest.
+
+"This is really shameful," he said. "The least you can do is to take it
+seriously."
+
+"What is it?" Mountjoy asked. "And why am I to take it seriously?"
+
+Mr. Vimpany's reply was, to say the least of it, indirect. If such an
+expression may be permitted, it smelt of the stage. Viewed in
+connection with Mrs. Vimpany's persistent assumption of silent
+humility, it suggested to Mountjoy a secret understanding, of some
+kind, between husband and wife.
+
+"What has become of your conscience, sir?" Mr. Vimpany demanded. "Is
+that silent monitor dead within you? After giving me a bad dinner, do
+you demand an explanation? Ha! you shall have it."
+
+Having delivered himself to this effect, he added action to words.
+Walking grandly to the door, he threw it open, and saluted Mountjoy
+with an ironical bow. Iris observed that act of insolence; her colour
+rose, her eyes glittered. "Do you see what he has just done?" she said
+to Mrs. Vimpany.
+
+The doctor's wife answered softly: "I don't understand it." After a
+glance at her husband, she took Iris by the hand: "Dear Miss Henley,
+shall we retire to my room?"
+
+Iris drew her hand away. "Not unless Mr. Mountjoy wishes it," she said.
+
+"Certainly not!" Hugh declared. "Pray remain here; your presence will
+help me to keep my temper." He stepped up to Mr. Vimpany. "Have you any
+particular reason for opening that door?" he asked.
+
+The doctor was a rascal; but, to do him justice, he was no coward.
+"Yes," he said, "I have a reason."
+
+"What is it, if you please?"
+
+"Christian forbearance," Mr. Vimpany answered.
+
+"Forbearance towards me?" Mountjoy continued.
+
+The doctor's dignity suddenly deserted him.
+
+"Aha, my boy, you have got it at last!" he cried. "It's pleasant to
+understand each other, isn't it? You see, I'm a plain-spoken fellow; I
+don't wish to give offence. If there's one thing more than another I
+pride myself on, it's my indulgence for human frailty. But, in my
+position here, I'm obliged to be careful. Upon my soul, I can't
+continue my acquaintance with a man who--oh, come! come! don't look as
+if you didn't understand me. The circumstances are against you, sir.
+You have treated me infamously."
+
+"Under what circumstances have I treated you infamously?" Hugh asked.
+
+"Under pretence of giving me a dinner," Mr. Vimpany shouted--"the worst
+dinner I ever sat down to!"
+
+His wife signed to him to be silent. He took no notice of her. She
+insisted on being understood. "Say no more!" she warned him, in a tone
+of command.
+
+The brute side of his nature, roused by Mountjoy's contemptuous
+composure, was forcing its way outwards; he set his wife at defiance.
+
+"Then don't let him look at me as if he thought I was in a state of
+intoxication!" cried the furious doctor. "There's the man, Miss, who
+tried to make me tipsy," he went on, actually addressing himself to
+Iris. "Thanks to my habits of sobriety, he has been caught in his own
+trap. _He's_ intoxicated. Ha, friend Mountjoy, have you got the right
+explanation at last? There's the door, sir!"
+
+Mrs. Vimpany felt that this outrage was beyond endurance. If something
+was not done to atone for it, Miss Henley would be capable--her face,
+at that moment, answered for her--of leaving the house with Mr.
+Mountjoy. Mrs. Vimpany seized her husband indignantly by the arm.
+
+"You brute, you have spoilt everything!" she said to him. "Apologise
+directly to Mr. Mountjoy. You won't?"
+
+"I won't!"
+
+Experience had taught his wife how to break him to her will. "Do you
+remember my diamond pin?" she whispered.
+
+He looked startled. Perhaps he thought she had lost the pin.
+
+"Where is it?" he asked eagerly.
+
+"Gone to London to be valued. Beg Mr. Mountjoy's pardon, or I will put
+the money in the bank--and not one shilling of it do you get."
+
+In the meanwhile, Iris had justified Mrs. Vimpany's apprehensions. Her
+indignation noticed nothing but the insult offered to Hugh. She was too
+seriously agitated to be able to speak to him. Still admirably calm,
+his one anxiety was to compose her.
+
+"Don't be afraid," he said; "it is impossible that I can degrade myself
+by quarrelling with Mr. Vimpany. I only wait here to know what you
+propose to do. You have Mrs. Vimpany to think of."
+
+"I have nobody to think of but You," Iris replied. "But for me, you
+would never have been in this house. After the insult that has been
+offered to you--oh, Hugh, I feel it too!--let us return to London
+together. I have only to tell Rhoda we are going away, and to make my
+preparations for travelling. Send for me from the inn, and I will be
+ready in time for the next train."
+
+Mrs. Vimpany approached Mountjoy, leading her husband.
+
+"Sorry I have offended you," the doctor said. "Beg your pardon. It's
+only a joke. No offence, I hope?"
+
+His servility was less endurable than his insolence. Telling him that
+he need say no more, Mountjoy bowed to Mrs. Vimpany, and left the room.
+She returned his bow mechanically, in silence. Mr. Vimpany followed
+Hugh out--thinking of the diamond pin, and eager to open the house
+door, as another act of submission which might satisfy his wife.
+
+Even a clever woman will occasionally make mistakes; especially when
+her temper happens to have been roused. Mrs. Vimpany found herself in a
+false position, due entirely to her own imprudence.
+
+She had been guilty of three serious errors. In the first place she had
+taken it for granted that Mr. Vimpany's restorative mixture would
+completely revive the sober state of his brains. In the second place,
+she had trusted him with her vengeance on the man who had found his way
+to her secrets through her husband's intemperance. In the third place,
+she had rashly assumed that the doctor, in carrying out her
+instructions for insulting Mountjoy, would keep within the limits which
+she had prescribed to him, when she hit on the audacious idea of
+attributing his disgraceful conduct to the temptation offered by his
+host's example. As a consequence of these acts of imprudence, she had
+exposed herself to a misfortune that she honestly dreaded--the loss of
+the place which she had carefully maintained in Miss Henley's
+estimation. In the contradictory confusion of feelings, so often found
+in women, this deceitful and dangerous creature had been
+conquered--little by little, as she had herself described it--by that
+charm of sweetness and simplicity in Iris, of which her own depraved
+nature presented no trace. She now spoke with hesitation, almost with
+timidity, in addressing the woman whom she had so cleverly deceived, at
+the time when they first met.
+
+"Must I give up all, Miss Henley, that I most value?" she asked.
+
+"I hardly understand you, Mrs. Vimpany."
+
+"I will try to make it plainer. Do you really mean to leave me this
+evening?"
+
+"I do."
+
+"May I own that I am grieved to hear it? Your departure will deprive me
+of some happy hours, in your company."
+
+"Your husband's conduct leaves me no alternative," Iris replied.
+
+"Pray do not humiliate me by speaking of my husband! I only want to
+know if there is a harder trial of my fortitude still to come. Must I
+lose the privilege of being your friend?"
+
+"I hope I am not capable of such injustice as that," Iris declared. "It
+would be hard indeed to lay the blame of Mr. Vimpany's shameful
+behaviour on you. I don't forget that you made him offer an apology.
+Some women, married to such a man as that, might have been afraid of
+him. No, no; you have been a good friend to me--and I mean to remember
+it."
+
+Mrs. Vimpany's gratitude was too sincerely felt to be expressed with
+her customary readiness. She only said what the stupidest woman in
+existence could have said: "Thank you."
+
+In the silence that followed, the rapid movement of carriage wheels
+became audible in the street. The sound stopped at the door of the
+doctor's house.
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+THE MOCKERY OF DECEIT
+
+HAD Mountjoy arrived to take Iris away, before her preparations for
+travelling were complete? Both the ladies hurried to the window, but
+they were too late. The rapid visitor, already hidden from them under
+the portico, was knocking smartly at the door. In another minute, a
+man's voice in the hall asked for "Miss Henley." The tones--clear,
+mellow, and pleasantly varied here and there by the Irish accent--were
+not to be mistaken by any one who had already hear them. The man in the
+hall was Lord Harry.
+
+In that serious emergency, Mrs. Vimpany recovered her presence of mind.
+
+She made for the door, with the object of speaking to Lord Harry before
+he could present himself in the drawing-room. But Iris had heard him
+ask for her in the hall; and that one circumstance instantly stripped
+of its concealments the character of the woman in whose integrity she
+had believed. Her first impression of Mrs. Vimpany--so sincerely
+repented, so eagerly atoned for--had been the right impression after
+all! Younger, lighter, and quicker than the doctor's wife, Iris reached
+the door first, and laid her hand on the lock.
+
+"Wait a minute," she said.
+
+Mrs. Vimpany hesitated. For the first time in her life at a loss what
+to say, she could only sign to Iris to stand back. Iris refused to
+move. She put her terrible question in the plainest words:
+
+"How does Lord Harry know that I am in this house?"
+
+The wretched woman (listening intently for the sound of a step on the
+stairs) refused to submit to a shameful exposure, even now. To her
+perverted moral sense, any falsehood was acceptable, as a means of
+hiding herself from discovery by Iris. In the very face of detection,
+the skilled deceiver kept up the mockery of deceit.
+
+"My dear," she said, "what has come to you? Why won't you let me go to
+my room?"
+
+Iris eyed her with a look of scornful surprise. "What next?" she said.
+"Are you impudent enough to pretend that I have not found you out,
+yet?"
+
+Sheer desperation still sustained Mrs. Vimpany's courage. She played
+her assumed character against the contemptuous incredulity of Iris, as
+she had sometimes played her theatrical characters against the hissing
+and hooting of a brutal audience.
+
+"Miss Henley," she said, "you forget yourself!"
+
+"Do you think I didn't see in your face," Iris rejoined, "that you
+heard him, too? Answer my question."
+
+"What question?"
+
+"You have just heard it."
+
+"No!"
+
+"You false woman!"
+
+"Don't forget, Miss Henley, that you are speaking to a lady."
+
+"I am speaking to Lord Harry's spy!"
+
+Their voices rose loud; the excitement on either side had reached its
+climax; neither the one nor the other was composed enough to notice the
+sound of the carriage-wheels, leaving the house again. In the
+meanwhile, nobody came to the drawing-room door. Mrs. Vimpany was too
+well acquainted with the hot-headed Irish lord not to conclude that he
+would have made himself heard, and would have found his way to Iris,
+but for some obstacle, below stairs, for which he was not prepared. The
+doctor's wife did justice to the doctor at last. Another person had, in
+all probability, heard Lord Harry's voice--and that person might have
+been her husband.
+
+Was it possible that he remembered the service which she had asked of
+him; and, even if he had succeeded in calling it to mind, was his
+discretion to be trusted? As those questions occurred to her, the
+desire to obtain some positive information was more than she was able
+to resist. Mrs. Vimpany attempted to leave the drawing-room for the
+second time.
+
+But the same motive had already urged Miss Henley to action. Again, the
+younger woman outstripped the older. Iris descended the stairs,
+resolved to discover the cause of the sudden suspension of events in
+the lower part of the house.
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+MRS. VIMPANY'S FAREWELL
+
+THE doctor's wife followed Miss Henley out of the room, as far as the
+landing--and waited there.
+
+She had her reasons for placing this restraint on herself. The position
+of the landing concealed her from the view of a person in the hall. If
+she only listened for the sound of voices she might safely discover
+whether Lord Harry was, or was not, still in the house. In the first
+event, it would be easy to interrupt his interview with Iris, before
+the talk could lead to disclosures which Mrs. Vimpany had every reason
+to dread. In the second event, there would be no need to show herself.
+
+Meanwhile, Iris opened the dining-room door and looked in.
+
+Nobody was there. The one other room on the ground floor, situated at
+the back of the building, was the doctor's consulting-room. She knocked
+at the door. Mr. Vimpany's voice answered: "Come in." There he was
+alone, drinking brandy and water, and smoking his big black cigar.
+
+"Where is Lord Harry?" she said.
+
+"In Ireland, I suppose," Mr. Vimpany answered quietly.
+
+Iris wasted no time in making useless inquiries. She closed the door
+again, and left him. He, too, was undoubtedly in the conspiracy to keep
+her deceived. How had it been done? Where was the wild lord, at that
+moment?
+
+Whilst she was pursuing these reflections in the hall, Rhoda came up
+from the servants' tea-table in the kitchen. Her mistress gave her the
+necessary instructions for packing, and promised to help her before
+long. Mrs. Vimpany's audacious resolution to dispute the evidence of
+her own senses, still dwelt on Miss Henley's mind. Too angry to think
+of the embarrassment which an interview with Lord Harry would produce,
+after they had said their farewell words in Ireland. she was determined
+to prevent the doctor's wife from speaking to him first, and claiming
+him as an accomplice in her impudent denial of the truth. If he had
+been, by any chance, deluded into leaving the house, he would sooner or
+later discover the trick that had been played on him, and would
+certainly return. Iris took a chair in the hall.
+
+         * * * * * * *
+
+It is due to the doctor to relate that he had indeed justified his
+wife's confidence in him.
+
+The diamond pin, undergoing valuation in London, still represented a
+present terror in his mind. The money, the money--he was the most
+attentive husband in England when he thought of the money! At the time
+when Lord Harry's carriage stopped at his house-door, he was in the
+dining-room, taking a bottle of brandy from the cellaret in the
+sideboard. Looking instantly out of the window, he discovered who the
+visitor was, and decided on consulting his instructions in the
+pocket-diary. The attempt was rendered useless, as soon as he had
+opened the book, by the unlucky activity of the servant in answering
+the door. Her master stopped her in the hall. He was pleasantly
+conscious of the recovery of his cunning. But his memory (far from
+active under the most favourable circumstances) was slower than ever at
+helping him now. On the spur of the moment he could only call to mind
+that he had been ordered to prevent a meeting between Lord Harry and
+Iris. "Show the gentleman into my consulting-room," he said.
+
+Lord Harry found the doctor enthroned on his professional chair,
+surprised and delighted to see his distinguished friend. The impetuous
+Irishman at once asked for Miss Henley.
+
+"Gone," Mr. Vimpany answered
+
+"Gone--where?" the wild lord wanted to know next.
+
+"To London."
+
+"By herself?"
+
+"No; with Mr. Hugh Mountjoy."
+
+Lord Harry seized the doctor by the shoulders, and shook him: "You
+don't mean to tell me Mountjoy is going to marry her?"
+
+Mr. Vimpany feared nothing but the loss of money. The weaker and the
+older man of the two, he nevertheless followed the young lord's
+example, and shook him with right good-will. "Let's see how you like it
+in your turn," he said. "As for Mountjoy, I don't know whether he is
+married or single--and don't care."
+
+"The devil take your obstinacy! When did they start?"
+
+"The devil take your questions! They started not long since."
+
+"Might I catch them at the station?"
+
+"Yes; if you go at once."
+
+So the desperate doctor carried out his wife's instructions--without
+remembering the conditions which had accompanied them.
+
+The way to the station took Lord Harry past the inn. He saw Hugh
+Mountjoy through the open house door paying his bill at the bar. In an
+instant the carriage was stopped, and the two men (never on friendly
+terms) were formally bowing to each other.
+
+"I was told I should find you," Lord Harry said, "with Miss Henley, at
+the station."
+
+"Who gave you your information?"
+
+"Vimpany--the doctor."
+
+"He ought to know that the train isn't due at the station for an hour
+yet."
+
+"Has the blackguard deceived me? One word more, Mr. Mountjoy. Is Miss
+Henley at the inn?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Are you going with her to London?"
+
+"I must leave Miss Henley to answer that."
+
+"Where is she, sir?"
+
+"There is an end to everything, my lord, in the world we live in. You
+have reached the end of my readiness to answer questions." The
+Englishman and the Irishman looked at each other: the Anglo-Saxon was
+impenetrably cool; the Celt was flushed and angry. They might have been
+on the brink of a quarrel, but for Lord Harry's native quickness of
+perception, and his exercise of it at that moment. When he had called
+at Mr. Vimpany's house, and had asked for Iris, the doctor had got rid
+of him by means of a lie. After this discovery, at what conclusion
+could he arrive? The doctor was certainly keeping Iris out of his way.
+Reasoning in this rapid manner, Lord Harry let one offence pass, in his
+headlong eagerness to resent another. He instantly left Mountjoy. Again
+the carriage rattled back along the street; but it was stopped before
+it reached Mr. Vimpany's door.
+
+Lord Harry knew the people whom he had to deal with, and took measures
+to approach the house silently, on foot. The coachman received orders
+to look out for a signal, which should tell him when he was wanted
+again.
+
+Mr. Vimpany's ears, vigilantly on the watch for suspicious events,
+detected no sound of carriage wheels and no noisy use of the knocker.
+Still on his guard, however, a ring at the house-bell disturbed him in
+his consulting-room. Peeping into the hall, he saw Iris opening the
+door, and stole back to his room. "The devil take her!" he said,
+alluding to Miss Henley, and thinking of the enviable proprietor of the
+diamond pin.
+
+At the unexpected appearance of Iris, Lord Harry forgot every
+consideration which ought to have been present to his mind, at that
+critical moment.
+
+He advanced to her with both hands held out in cordial greeting. She
+signed to him contemptuously to stand back--and spoke in tones
+cautiously lowered, after a glance at the door of the consulting-room.
+
+"My only reason for consenting to see you," she said, "is to protect
+myself from further deception. Your disgraceful conduct is known to me.
+Go now," she continued, pointing to the stairs, "and consult with your
+spy, as soon as you like." The Irish lord listened--guiltily conscious
+of having deserved what she had said to him--without attempting to
+utter a word in excuse.
+
+Still posted at the head of the stairs, the doctor's wife heard Iris
+speaking; but the tone was not loud enough to make the words
+intelligible at that distance; neither was any other voice audible in
+reply. Vaguely suspicions of some act of domestic treachery, Mrs.
+Vimpany began to descend the stairs. At the turning which gave her a
+view of the hall, she stopped; thunderstruck by the discovery of Lord
+Harry and Miss Henley, together.
+
+The presence of a third person seemed, in some degree, to relieve Lord
+Harry. He ran upstairs to salute Mrs. Vimpany, and was met again by a
+cold reception and a hostile look.
+
+Strongly and strangely contrasted, the two confronted each other on the
+stairs. The faded woman, wan and ghastly under cruel stress of mental
+suffering, stood face to face with a fine, tall, lithe man, in the
+prime of his heath and strength. Here were the bright blue eyes, the
+winning smile, and the natural grace of movement, which find their own
+way to favour in the estimation of the gentler sex. This irreclaimable
+wanderer among the perilous by-ways of the earth--christened "Irish
+blackguard," among respectable members of society, when they spoke of
+him behind his back--attracted attention, even among the men. Looking
+at his daring, finely-formed face, they noticed (as an exception to a
+general rule, in these days) the total suppression, by the razor, of
+whiskers, moustache, and beard. Strangers wondered whether Lord Harry
+was an actor or a Roman Catholic priest. Among chance acquaintances,
+those few favourites of Nature who are possessed of active brains,
+guessed that his life of adventure might well have rendered disguise
+necessary to his safety, in more than one part of the world. Sometimes
+they boldly put the question to him. The hot temper of an Irishman, in
+moments of excitement, is not infrequently a sweet temper in moments of
+calm. What they called Lord Harry's good-nature owned readily that he
+had been indebted, on certain occasions, to the protection of a false
+beard, And perhaps a colouring of his face and hair to match. The same
+easy disposition now asserted itself, under the merciless enmity of
+Mrs. Vimpany's eyes. "If I have done anything to offend you," he said,
+with an air of puzzled humility, "I'm sure I am sorry for it. Don't be
+angry, Arabella, with an old friend. Why won't you shake hands?"
+
+"I have kept your secret, and done your dirty work," Mrs. Vimpany
+replied. "And what is my reward? Miss Henley can tell you how your
+Irish blundering has ruined me in a lady's estimation. Shake hands,
+indeed! You will never shake hands with Me again as long as you live!"
+
+She said those words without looking at him; her eyes were resting on
+Iris now. From the moment when she had seen the two together, she knew
+that it was all over; further denial in the face of plain proofs would
+be useless indeed! Submission was the one alternative left.
+
+"Miss Henley," she said, "if you can feel pity for another woman's
+sorrow and shame, let me have a last word with you--out of this man's
+hearing."
+
+There was nothing artificial in her tones or her looks; no acting could
+have imitated the sad sincerity with which she spoke. Touched by that
+change, Iris accompanied her as she ascended the stairs. After a little
+hesitation, Lord Harry followed them. Mrs. Vimpany turned on him when
+they reached the drawing-room landing. "Must I shut the door in your
+face?" she asked.
+
+He was as pleasantly patient as ever:
+
+"You needn't take the trouble to do that, my dear; I'll only ask your
+leave to sit down and wait on the stairs. When you have done with Miss
+Henley, just call me in. And, by the way, don't be alarmed in case of a
+little noise--say a heavy man tumbling downstairs. If the blackguard
+it's your misfortune to be married to happens to show himself, I shall
+be under the necessity of kicking him. That's all."
+
+Mrs. Vimpany closed the door. She spoke to Iris respectfully, as she
+might have addressed a stranger occupying a higher rank in life than
+herself.
+
+"There is an end, madam, to one short acquaintance; and, as we both
+know, an end to it for ever. When we first met--let me tell the truth
+at last!--I felt a malicious pleasure in deceiving you. After that
+time, I was surprised to find that you grew on my liking, Can you
+understand the wickedness that tried to resist you? It was useless;
+your good influence has been too strong for me. Strange, isn't it? I
+have lived a life of deceit, among bad people. What could you expect of
+me, after that? I heaped lies on lies--I would have denied that the sun
+was in the heavens--rather than find myself degraded in your opinion.
+Well! that is all over--useless, quite useless now. Pray don't mistake
+me. I am not attempting to excuse myself; a confession was due to you;
+the confession is made. It is too late to hope that you will forgive
+me. If you will permit it, I have only one favour to ask. Forget me."
+
+She turned away with a last hopeless look, who said as plainly as if in
+words: "I am not worth a reply."
+
+Generous Iris insisted on speaking to her.
+
+"I believe you are truly sorry for what you have done," she said; "I
+can never forget that--I can never forget You." She held out her
+pitying hand. Mrs. Vimpany was too bitterly conscious of the past to
+touch it. Even a spy is not beneath the universal reach of the
+heartache. There were tears in the miserable woman's eyes when she had
+looked her last at Iris Henley.
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+LORD HARRY's DEFENCE
+
+AFTER a short interval, the drawing-room door was opened again. Waiting
+on the threshold, the Irish lord asked if he might come in.
+
+Iris replied coldly. "This is not my house," she said; "I must leave
+you to decide for yourself."
+
+Lord Harry crossed the room to speak to her and stopped. There was no
+sign of relenting towards him in that dearly-loved face. "I wonder
+whether it would be a relief to you," he suggested with piteous
+humility, "if I went away?"
+
+If she had been true to herself, she would have said, Yes. Where is the
+woman to be found, in her place, with a heart hard enough to have set
+her that example? She pointed to a chair. He felt her indulgence
+gratefully. Following the impulse of the moment, he attempted to excuse
+his conduct.
+
+"There is only one thing I can say for myself," he confessed, "I didn't
+begin by deceiving you. While you had your eye on me, Iris, I was an
+honourable man."
+
+This extraordinary defence reduced her to silence. Was there another
+man in the world who would have pleaded for pardon in that way? "I'm
+afraid I have not made myself understood," he said. "May I try again?"
+
+"If you please."
+
+The vagabond nobleman made a resolute effort to explain himself
+intelligibly, this time:
+
+"See now! We said good-bye, over there, in the poor old island. Well,
+indeed I meant it, when I owned that I was unworthy of you. _I_ didn't
+contradict you, when you said you could never be my wife, after such a
+life as I have led. And, do remember, I submitted to your returning to
+England, without presuming to make a complaint. Ah, my sweet girl, it
+was easy to submit, while I could look at you, and hear the sound of
+your voice, and beg for that last kiss--and get it. Reverend gentlemen
+talk about the fall of Adam. What was that to the fall of Harry, when
+he was back in his own little cottage, without the hope of ever seeing
+you again? To the best of my recollection, the serpent that tempted Eve
+was up a tree. I found the serpent that tempted Me, sitting waiting in
+my own armchair, and bent on nothing worse than borrowing a trifle of
+money. Need I say who she was? I don't doubt that you think her a
+wicked woman."
+
+Never ready in speaking of acts of kindness, on her own part, Iris
+answered with some little reserve: "I have learnt to think better of
+Mrs. Vimpany than you suppose."
+
+Lord Harry began to look like a happy man, for the first time since he
+had entered the room.
+
+"I ought to have known it!" he burst out. "Yours is the well-balanced
+mind, dear, that tempers justice with mercy. Mother Vimpany has had a
+hard life of it. Just change places with her for a minute or so--and
+you'll understand what she has had to go through. Find yourself, for
+instance, in Ireland, without the means to take you back to England.
+Add to that, a husband who sends you away to make money for him at the
+theatre, and a manager (not an Irishman, thank God!) who refuses to
+engage you--after your acting has filled his dirty pockets in past
+days--because your beauty has faded with time. Doesn't your bright
+imagination see it all now? My old friend Arabella, ready and anxious
+to serve me--and a sinking at this poor fellow's heart when he knew, if
+he once lost the trace of you, he might lose it for ever--there's the
+situation, as they call it on the stage. I wish I could say for myself
+what I may say for Mrs. Vimpany. It's such a pleasure to a clever woman
+to engage in a little deceit--we can't blame her, can we?"
+
+Iris protested gently against a code of morality which included the
+right of deceit among the privileges of the sex. Lord Harry slipped
+through her fingers with the admirable Irish readiness; he agreed with
+Miss Henley that he was entirely wrong.
+
+"And don't spare me while you're about it," he suggested. "Lay all the
+blame of that shameful stratagem on my shoulders. It was a despicable
+thing to do. When I had you watched, I acted in a manner--I won't say
+unworthy of a gentleman; have I been a gentleman since I first ran away
+from home? Why, it's even been said my way of speaking is no longer the
+way of a gentleman; and small wonder, too, after the company I've kept.
+Ah, well! I'm off again, darling, on a sea voyage. Will you forgive me
+now? or will you wait till I come back, if I do come back? God knows!"
+He dropped on his knees, and kissed her hand. "Anyway," he said,
+"whether I live or whether I die, it will be some consolation to
+remember that I asked your pardon--and perhaps got it."
+
+"Take it, Harry; I can't help forgiving you!"
+
+She had done her best to resist him, and she had answered in those
+merciful words.
+
+The effect was visible, perilously visible, as he rose from his knees.
+Her one chance of keeping the distance between them, on which she had
+been too weak to insist, was not to encourage him by silence. Abruptly,
+desperately, she made a commonplace inquiry about his proposed voyage.
+"Tell me," she resumed, "where are you going when you leave England?"
+
+"Oh, to find money, dear, if I can--to pick up diamonds, or to hit on a
+mine of gold, and so forth."
+
+The fine observation of Iris detected something not quite easy in his
+manner, as he made that reply. He tried to change the subject: she
+deliberately returned to it. "Your account of your travelling plans is
+rather vague," she told him. "Do you know when you are likely to
+return?"
+
+He took her hand. One of the rings on her fingers happened to be turned
+the wrong way. He set it in the right position, and discovered an opal.
+"Ah! the unlucky stone!" he cried, and turned it back again out of
+sight. She drew away her hand. "I asked you," she persisted, "when you
+expect to return?"
+
+He laughed--not so gaily as usual.
+
+"How do I know I shall ever get back?" he answered. "Sometimes the seas
+turn traitor, and sometimes the savages. I have had so many narrow
+escapes of my life, I can't expect my luck to last for ever." He made a
+second attempt to change the subject. "I wonder whether you're likely
+to pay another visit to Ireland? My cottage is entirely at your
+disposal, Iris dear. Oh, when I'm out of the way, of course! The place
+seemed to please your fancy, when you saw it. You will find it well
+taken care of, I answer for that."
+
+Iris asked who was taking care of his cottage.
+
+The wild lord's face saddened. He hesitated; rose from his chair
+restlessly, and walked away to the window; returned, and made up his
+mind to reply.
+
+"My dear, you know her. She was the old housekeeper at--"
+
+His voice failed him. He was unable, or unwilling, to pronounce the
+name of Arthur's farm.
+
+Knowing, it is needless to say, that he had alluded to Mrs. Lewson,
+Iris warmly commended him for taking care of her old nurse. At the same
+time, she remembered the unfriendly terms in which the housekeeper had
+alluded to Lord Harry, when they had talked of him.
+
+"Did you find no difficulty," she asked, "in persuading Mrs. Lewson to
+enter your service?"
+
+"Oh, yes, plenty of difficulty; I found my bad character in my way, as
+usual." It was a relief to him, at that moment, to talk of Mrs. Lewson;
+the Irish humour and the Irish accent both asserted themselves in his
+reply. "The curious old creature told me to my face I was a scamp. I
+took leave to remind her that it was the duty of a respectable person,
+like herself, to reform scamps; I also mentioned that I was going away,
+and she would be master and mistress too on my small property. That
+softened her heart towards me. You will mostly find old women amenable,
+if you get at them by way of their dignity. Besides, there was another
+lucky circumstance that helped me. The neighbourhood of my cottage has
+some attraction for Mrs. Lewson. She didn't say particularly what it
+was--and I never asked her to tell me."
+
+"Surely you might have guessed it, without being told," Iris reminded
+him. "Mrs. Lewson's faithful heart loves poor Arthur's memory--and
+Arthur's grave is not far from your cottage."
+
+"Don't speak of him!"
+
+It was said loudly, peremptorily, passionately. He looked at her with
+angry astonishment in his face. "You loved him too!" he said. "Can you
+speak of him quietly? The noblest, truest, sweetest man that ever the
+Heavens looked on, foully assassinated. And the wretch who murdered him
+still living, free--oh, what is God's providence about?--is there no
+retribution that will follow him? no just hand that will revenge
+Arthur's death?"
+
+As those fierce words escaped him, he was no longer the easy, gentle,
+joyous creature whom Iris had known and loved. The furious passions of
+the Celtic race glittered savagely in his eyes, and changed to a grey
+horrid pallor the healthy colour that was natural to his face. "Oh, my
+temper, my temper!" he cried, as Iris shrank from him. "She hates me
+now, and no wonder." He staggered away from her, and burst into a
+convulsive fit of crying, dreadful to hear. Compassion, divine
+compassion, mastered the earthlier emotion of terror in the great heart
+of the woman who loved him. She followed him, and laid her hand
+caressingly on his shoulder. "I don't hate you, my dear," she said. "I
+am sorry for Arthur--and, oh, so sorry for You!" He caught her in his
+arms. His gratitude, his repentance, his silent farewell were all
+expressed in a last kiss. It was a moment, never to be forgotten to the
+end of their lives. Before she could speak, before she could think, he
+had left her.
+
+She called him back, through the open door. He never returned; he never
+even replied. She ran to the window, and threw it up--and was just in
+time to see him signal to the carriage and leap into it. Her horror of
+the fatal purpose that was but too plainly rooted in him--her
+conviction that he was on the track of the assassin, self devoted to
+exact the terrible penalty of blood for blood--emboldened her to insist
+on being heard. "Come back," she cried. "I must, I will, speak with
+you."
+
+He waved his hand to her with a gesture of despair. "Start your
+horses," he shouted to the coachman. Alarmed by his voice and his look,
+the man asked where he should drive to. Lord Harry pointed furiously to
+the onward road. "Drive," he answered, "to the Devil!"
+
+THE END OF THE FIRST PERIOD
+
+
+THE SECOND PERIOD
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+IRIS AT HOME
+
+A LITTLE more than four months had passed, since the return of Iris to
+her father's house.
+
+Among other events which occurred, during the earlier part of that
+interval, the course adopted by Hugh Mountjoy, when Miss Henley's
+suspicions of the Irish lord were first communicated to him, claims a
+foremost place.
+
+It was impossible that the devoted friend of Iris could look at her,
+when they met again on their way to the station, without perceiving the
+signs of serious agitation. Only waiting until they were alone in the
+railway-carriage, she opened her heart unreservedly to the man in whose
+clear intellect and true sympathy she could repose implicit trust. He
+listened to what she could repeat of Lord Harry's language with but
+little appearance of surprise. Iris had only reminded him of one, among
+the disclosures which had escaped Mr. Vimpany at the inn. Under the
+irresistible influence of good wine, the doctor had revealed the Irish
+lord's motive for remaining in his own country, after the assassination
+of Arthur Mountjoy. Hugh met the only difficulty in his way, without
+shrinking from it. He resolved to clear his mind of its natural
+prejudice against the rival who had been preferred to him, before he
+assumed the responsibility of guiding Iris by his advice.
+
+When he had in some degree recovered confidence in his own unbiased
+judgment, he entered on the question of Lord Harry's purpose in leaving
+England.
+
+Without attempting to dispute the conclusion at which Iris had arrived,
+he did his best to alleviate her distress. In his opinion, he was
+careful to tell her, a discovery of the destination to which Lord Harry
+proposed to betake himself, might be achieved. The Irish lord's
+allusion to a new adventure, which would occupy him in searching for
+diamonds or gold, might indicate a contemplated pursuit of the
+assassin, as well as a plausible excuse to satisfy Iris. It was at
+least possible that the murderer might have been warned of his danger
+if he remained in England, and that he might have contemplated
+directing his flight to a distant country, which would not only offer a
+safe refuge, but also hold out (in its mineral treasures) a hope of
+gain. Assuming that these circumstances had really happened, it was in
+Lord Harry's character to make sure of his revenge, by embarking in the
+steamship by which the assassin of Arthur Mountjoy was a passenger.
+
+Wild as this guess at the truth undoubtedly was, it had one merit: it
+might easily be put to the test.
+
+Hugh had bought the day's newspaper at the station. He proposed to
+consult the shipping advertisements relating, in the first place, to
+communication with the diamond-mines and the goldfields of South
+Africa.
+
+This course of proceeding at once informed him that the first steamer,
+bound for that destination, would sail from London in two days' time.
+The obvious precaution to take was to have the Dock watched; and
+Mountjoy's steady old servant, who knew Lord Harry by sight, was the
+man to employ.
+
+Iris naturally inquired what good end could be attained, if the
+anticipated discovery actually took place.
+
+To this Mountjoy answered, that the one hope--a faint hope, he must
+needs confess--of inducing Lord Harry to reconsider his desperate
+purpose, lay in the influence of Iris herself. She must address a
+letter to him, announcing that his secret had been betrayed by his own
+language and conduct, and declaring that she would never again see him,
+or hold any communication with him, if he persisted in his savage
+resolution of revenge. Such was the desperate experiment which
+Mountjoy's generous and unselfish devotion to Iris now proposed to try.
+
+The servant (duly entrusted with Miss Henley's letter) was placed on
+the watch--and the event which had been regarded as little better than
+a forlorn hope, proved to be the event that really took place. Lord
+Harry was a passenger by the steamship.
+
+Mountjoy's man presented the letter entrusted to him, and asked
+respectfully if there was any answer. The wild lord read it--looked (to
+use the messenger's own words) like a man cut to the heart--seemed at a
+loss what to say or do--and only gave a verbal answer: "I sincerely
+thank Miss Henley, and I promise to write when the ship touches at
+Madeira." The servant continued to watch him when he went on board the
+steamer; saw him cast a look backwards, as if suspecting that he might
+have been followed; and then lost sight of him in the cabin. The vessel
+sailed after a long interval of delay, but he never reappeared on the
+deck.
+
+The ambiguous message sent to her aroused the resentment of Iris; she
+thought it cruel. For some weeks perhaps to come, she was condemned to
+remain in doubt, and was left to endure the trial of her patience,
+without having Mountjoy at hand to encourage and console her. He had
+been called away to the south of France by the illness of his father.
+
+But the fortunes of Miss Henley, at this period of her life, had their
+brighter side. She found reason to congratulate herself on the
+reconciliation which had brought her back to her father. Mr. Henley had
+received her, not perhaps with affection, but certainly with kindness.
+"If we don't get in each other's way, we shall do very well; I am glad
+to see you again." That was all he had said to her, but it meant much
+from a soured and selfish man.
+
+Her only domestic anxiety was caused by another failure in the health
+of her maid.
+
+The Doctor declared that medical help would be of no avail, while Rhoda
+Bennet remained in London. In the country she had been born and bred,
+and to the country she must return. Mr. Henley's large landed property,
+on the north of London, happened to include a farm in the neighbourhood
+of Muswell Hill. Wisely waiting for a favourable opportunity, Iris
+alluded to the good qualities which had made Rhoda almost as much her
+friend as her servant, and asked leave to remove the invalid to the
+healthy air of the farm.
+
+Her anxiety about the recovery of a servant so astonished Mr. Henley,
+that he was hurried (as he afterwards declared) into granting his
+daughter's request. After this concession, the necessary arrangements
+were easily made. The influence of Iris won the goodwill of the farmer
+and his wife; Rhoda, as an expert and willing needlewoman, being sure
+of a welcome, for her own sake, in a family which included a number of
+young children. Miss Henley had only to order her carriage, and to be
+within reach of the farm. A week seldom passed without a meeting
+between the mistress and the maid.
+
+In the meantime, Mountjoy (absent in France) did not forget to write to
+Iris.
+
+His letters offered little hope of a speedy return. The doctors had not
+concealed from him that his father's illness would end fatally; but
+there were reserves of vital power still left, which might prolong the
+struggle. Under these melancholy circumstances, he begged that Iris
+would write to him. The oftener she could tell him of the little events
+of her life at home, the more kindly she would brighten the days of a
+dreary life.
+
+Eager to show, even in a trifling matter, how gratefully she
+appreciated Mountjoy's past kindness, Iris related the simple story of
+her life at home, in weekly letters addressed to her good friend. After
+telling Hugh (among other things) of Rhoda's establishment at the farm,
+she had some unexpected results to relate, which had followed the
+attempt to provide herself with a new maid.
+
+Two young women had been successively engaged--each recommended, by the
+lady whom she had last served, with that utter disregard of moral
+obligation which appears to be shamelessly on the increase in the
+England of our day. The first of the two maids, described as "rather
+excitable," revealed infirmities of temper which suggested a lunatic
+asylum as the only fit place for her. The second young woman, detected
+in stealing eau-de-cologne, and using it (mixed with water) as an
+intoxicating drink, claimed merciful construction of her misconduct, on
+the ground that she had been misled by the example of her last
+mistress.
+
+At the third attempt to provide herself with a servant, Iris was able
+to report the discovery of a responsible person who told the truth--an
+unmarried lady of middle age.
+
+In this case, the young woman was described as a servant thoroughly
+trained in the performance of her duties, honest, sober, industrious,
+of an even temper, and unprovided with a "follower" in the shape of a
+sweetheart. Even her name sounded favourably in the ear of a
+stranger--it was Fanny Mere. Iris asked how a servant, apparently
+possessed of a faultless character, came to be in want of a situation.
+At this question the lady sighed, and acknowledged that she had "made a
+dreadful discovery," relating to the past life of her maid. It proved
+to be the old, the miserably old, story of a broken promise of
+marriage, and of the penalty paid as usual by the unhappy woman. "I
+will say nothing of my own feelings," the maiden lady explained. "In
+justice to the other female servants, it was impossible for me to keep
+such a person in my house; and, in justice to you, I must most
+unwillingly stand in the way of Fanny Mere's prospects by mentioning my
+reason for parting with her."
+
+"If I could see the young woman and speak to her," Iris said, "I should
+like to decide the question of engaging her, for myself."
+
+The lady knew the address of her discharged servant, and--with some
+appearance of wonder--communicated it. Miss Henley wrote at once,
+telling Fanny Mere to come to her on the following day.
+
+When she woke on the next morning, later than usual, an event occurred
+which Iris had been impatiently expecting for some time past. She found
+a letter waiting on her bedside table, side by side with her cup of
+tea. Lord Harry had written to her at last.
+
+Whether he used his pen or his tongue, the Irish lord's conduct was
+always more or less in need of an apology. Here were the guilty one's
+new excuses, expressed in his customary medley of frank confession and
+flowery language:
+
+"I am fearing, my angel, that I have offended you. You have too surely
+said to yourself, This miserable Harry might have made me happy by
+writing two lines--and what does he do? He sends a message in words
+which tell me nothing.
+
+"My sweet girl, the reason why is that I was in two minds when your man
+stopped me on my way to the ship.
+
+"Whether it was best for you--I was not thinking of myself--to confess
+the plain truth, or to take refuge in affectionate equivocation, was
+more than I could decide at the time. When minutes are enough for your
+intelligence, my stupidity wants days. Well! I saw it at last. A man
+owes the truth to a true woman; and you are a true woman. There you
+find a process of reasoning--I have been five days getting hold of it.
+
+"But tell me one thing first. Brutus killed a man; Charlotte Corday
+killed a man. One of the two victims was a fine tyrant, and the other a
+mean tyrant. Nobody blames those two historical assassins. Why then
+blame me for wishing to make a third? Is a mere modern murderer beneath
+my vengeance, by comparison with two classical tyrants who did _their_
+murders by deputy? The man who killed Arthur Mountjoy is (next to Cain
+alone) the most atrocious homicide that ever trod the miry ways of this
+earth. There is my reply! I call it a crusher.
+
+"So now my mind is easy. Darling, let me make your mind easy next.
+
+"When I left you at the window of Vimpany's house, I was off to the
+other railroad to find the murderer in his hiding-place by the seaside.
+He had left it; but I got a trace, and went back to London--to the
+Docks. Some villain in Ireland, who knows my purpose, must have turned
+traitor. Anyhow, the wretch has escaped me.
+
+"Yes; I searched the ship in every corner. He was not on board. Has he
+gone on before me, by an earlier vessel? Or has he directed his flight
+to some other part of the world? I shall find out in time. His day of
+reckoning will come, and he, too, shall know a violent death! Amen. So
+be it. Amen.
+
+"Have I done now? Bear with me, gentle Iris--there is a word more to
+come.
+
+"You will wonder why I went on by the steamship--all the way to South
+Africa--when I had failed to find the man I wanted, on board. What was
+my motive? You, you alone, are always my motive. Lucky men have found
+gold, lucky men have found diamonds. Why should I not be one of them?
+My sweet, let us suppose two possible things; my own elastic
+convictions would call them two likely things, but never mind that.
+Say, I come back a reformed character; there is your only objection to
+me, at once removed! And take it for granted that I return with a
+fortune of my own finding. In that case, what becomes of Mr. Henley's
+objection to me? It melts (as Shakespeare says somewhere) into thin
+air. Now do take my advice, for once. Show this part of my letter to
+your excellent father, with my love. I answer beforehand for the
+consequences. Be happy, my Lady Harry--as happy as I am--and look for
+my return on an earlier day than you may anticipate. Yours till death,
+and after.
+
+"HARRY."
+
+
+Like the Irish lord, Miss Henley was "in two minds," while she rose,
+and dressed herself. There were parts of the letter for which she loved
+the writer, and parts of it for which she hated him.
+
+What a prospect was before that reckless man--what misery, what horror,
+might not be lying in wait in the dreadful future! If he failed in the
+act of vengeance, that violent death of which he had written so
+heedlessly might overtake him from another hand. If he succeeded, the
+law might discover his crime, and the infamy of expiation on the
+scaffold might be his dreadful end. She turned, shuddering, from the
+contemplation of those hideous possibilities, and took refuge in the
+hope of his safe, his guiltless return. Even if his visions of success,
+even if his purposes of reform (how hopeless at his age!) were actually
+realised, could she consent to marry the man who had led his life, had
+written this letter, had contemplated (and still cherished) his
+merciless resolution of revenge? No woman in her senses could let the
+bare idea of being his wife enter her mind. Iris opened her
+writing-desk, to hide the letter from all eyes but her own. As she
+secured it with the key, her heart sank under the return of a terror
+remembered but too well Once more, the superstitious belief in a
+destiny that was urging Lord Harry and herself nearer and nearer to
+each other, even when they seemed to be most widely and most surely
+separated, thrilled her under the chilling mystery of its presence. She
+dropped helplessly into a chair. Oh, for a friend who could feel for
+her, who could strengthen her, whose wise words could restore her to
+her better and calmer self! Hugh was far away; and Iris was left to
+suffer and to struggle alone.
+
+Heartfelt aspirations for help and sympathy! Oh, irony of
+circumstances, how were they answered? The housemaid entered the room,
+to announce the arrival of a discharged servant, with a lost character.
+
+"Let the young woman come in," Iris said. Was Fanny Mere the friend
+whom she had been longing for? She looked at her troubled face in the
+glass--and laughed bitterly.
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+THE LADY'S MAID
+
+IT was not easy to form a positive opinion of the young woman who now
+presented herself in Miss Henley's room.
+
+If the Turkish taste is truly reported as valuing beauty in the female
+figure more than beauty in the female face, Fanny Mere's personal
+appearance might have found, in Constantinople, the approval which she
+failed to receive in London. Slim and well balanced, firmly and neatly
+made, she interested men who met her by accident (and sometimes even
+women), if they happened to be walking behind her. When they quickened
+their steps, and, passing on, looked back at her face, they lost all
+interest in Fanny from that moment. Painters would have described the
+defect in her face as "want of colour." She was one of the whitest of
+fair female human beings. Light flaxen hair, faint blue eyes with no
+expression in them, and a complexion which looked as if it had never
+been stirred by a circulation of blood, produced an effect on her
+fellow-creatures in general which made them insensible to the beauty of
+her figure, and the grace of her movements. There was no betrayal of
+bad health in her strange pallor: on the contrary, she suggested the
+idea of rare physical strength. Her quietly respectful manner was, so
+to say, emphasised by an underlying self-possession, which looked
+capable of acting promptly and fearlessly in the critical emergencies
+of life. Otherwise, the expression of character in her face was
+essentially passive. Here was a steady, resolute young woman, possessed
+of qualities which failed to show themselves on the surface--whether
+good qualities or bad qualities experience alone could determine.
+
+Finding it impossible, judging by a first impression, to arrive at any
+immediate decision favourable or adverse to the stranger, Iris opened
+the interview with her customary frankness; leaving the consequences to
+follow as they might.
+
+"Take a seat, Fanny," she said, "and let us try if we can understand
+each other. I think you will agree with me that there must be no
+concealments between us. You ought to know that your mistress has told
+me why she parted with you. It was her duty to tell me the truth, and
+it is my duty not to be unjustly prejudiced against you after what I
+have heard. Pray believe me when I say that I don't know, and don't
+wish to know, what your temptation may have been--"
+
+"I beg your pardon, Miss, for interrupting you. My temptation was
+vanity."
+
+Whether she did or did not suffer in making that confession, it was
+impossible to discover. Her tones were quiet; her manner was
+unobtrusively respectful; the pallor of her face was not disturbed by
+the slightest change of colour. Was the new maid an insensible person?
+Iris began to fear already that she might have made a mistake.
+
+"I don't expect you to enter into particulars," she said; "I don't ask
+you here to humiliate yourself."
+
+"When I got your letter, Miss, I tried to consider how I might show
+myself worthy of your kindness," Fanny answered. "The one way I could
+see was not to let you think better of me than I deserve. When a
+person, like me, is told, for the first time, that her figure makes
+amends for her face, she is flattered by the only compliment that has
+been paid to her in all her life. My excuse, Miss (if I have an excuse)
+is a mean one---I couldn't resist a compliment. That is all I have to
+say."
+
+Iris began to alter her opinion. This was not a young woman of the
+ordinary type. It began to look possible, and more than possible, that
+she was worthy of a helping hand. The truth seemed to be in her.
+
+"I understand you, and feel for you." Having replied in those words,
+Iris wisely and delicately changed the subject. "Let me hear how you
+are situated at the present time," she continued. "Are your parents
+living?"
+
+"My father and mother are dead, Miss."
+
+"Have you any other relatives?"
+
+"They are too poor to be able to do anything for me. I have lost my
+character--and I am left to help myself."
+
+"Suppose you fail to find another situation?" Iris suggested.
+
+"Yes, Miss?"
+
+"How can you help yourself?"
+
+"I can do what other girls have done."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"Some of us starve on needlework. Some take to the streets. Some end it
+in the river. If there is no other chance for me, I think I shall try
+that way," said the poor creature, as quietly as if she was speaking of
+some customary prospect that was open to her. "There will be nobody to
+be sorry for me--and, as I have read, drowning is not a very painful
+death."
+
+"You shock me, Fanny! I, for one, should be sorry for you."
+
+"Thank you, Miss."
+
+"And try to remember," Iris continued, "that there may be chances in
+the future which you don't see yet. You speak of what you have read,
+and I have already noticed how clearly and correctly you express
+yourself. You must have been educated. Was it at home? or at school?
+
+"I was once sent to school," Fanny replied, not quite willingly.
+
+"Was it a private school?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+That short answer warned Iris to be careful.
+
+"Recollections of school," she said good-humouredly, "are not the
+pleasantest recollections in some of our lives. Perhaps I have touched
+on a subject which is disagreeable to you?"
+
+"You have touched on one of my disappointments, Miss. While my mother
+lived, she was my teacher. After her death, my father sent me to
+school. When he failed in business, I was obliged to leave, just as I
+had begun to learn and like it. Besides, the girls found out that I was
+going away, because there was no money at home to pay the fees--and
+that mortified me. There is more that I might tell you. I have a reason
+for hating my recollections of the school--but I mustn't mention that
+time in my life which your goodness to me tries to forget."
+
+All that appealed to her, so simply and so modestly, in that reply, was
+not lost on Iris. After an interval of silence, she said:
+
+"Can you guess what I am thinking of, Fanny?"
+
+"No, Miss."
+
+"I am asking myself a question. If I try you in my service shall I
+never regret it?"
+
+For the first time, strong emotion shook Fanny Mere. Her voice failed
+her, in the effort to speak. Iris considerately went on.
+
+"You will take the place," she said, "of a maid who has been with me
+for years--a good dear creature who has only left me through
+ill-health. I must not expect too much of you; I cannot hope that you
+will be to me what Rhoda Bennet has been."
+
+Fanny succeeded in controlling herself. "Is there any hope," she asked,
+"of my seeing Rhoda Bennet?"
+
+"Why do you wish to see her?"
+
+"You are fond of her, Miss---that is one reason."
+
+"And the other?"
+
+"Rhoda Bennet might help me to serve you as I want to serve you; she
+might perhaps encourage me to try if I could follow her example." Fanny
+paused, and clasped her hands fervently. The thought that was in her
+forced its way to expression. "It's so easy to feel grateful," she
+said--"and, oh, so hard to show it!"
+
+"Come to me," her new mistress answered, "and show it to-morrow."
+
+Moved by that compassionate impulse, Iris said the words which restored
+to an unfortunate creature a lost character and a forfeited place in
+the world.
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+MR. HENLEY'S TEMPER
+
+PROVIDED by nature with ironclad constitutional defences against
+illness, Mr. Henley was now and then troubled with groundless doubts of
+his own state of health. Acting under a delusion of this kind, he
+imagined symptoms which rendered a change of residence necessary from
+his town house to his country house, a few days only after his daughter
+had decided on the engagement of her new maid.
+
+Iris gladly, even eagerly, adapted her own wishes to the furtherance of
+her father's plans. Sorely tried by anxiety and suspense, she needed
+all that rest and tranquillity could do for her. The first week in the
+country produced an improvement in her health. Enjoying the serene
+beauty of woodland and field, breathing the delicious purity of the
+air--sometimes cultivating her own corner in the garden, and sometimes
+helping the women in the lighter labours of the dairy--her nerves
+recovered their tone, and her spirits rose again to their higher level.
+
+In the performance of her duties the new maid justified Miss Henley's
+confidence in her, during the residence of the household in the
+country.
+
+She showed, in her own undemonstrative way, a grateful sense of her
+mistress's kindness. Her various occupations were intelligently and
+attentively pursued; her even temper never seemed to vary; she gave the
+servants no opportunities of complaining of her. But one peculiarity in
+her behaviour excited hostile remark, below-stairs. On the occasions
+when she was free to go out for the day, she always found some excuse
+for not joining any of the other female servants, who might happen to
+be similarly favoured. The one use she made of her holiday was to
+travel by railway to some place unknown; always returning at the right
+time in the evening. Iris knew enough of the sad circumstances to be
+able to respect her motives, and to appreciate the necessity for
+keeping the object of these solitary journeys a secret from her
+fellow-servants.
+
+The pleasant life in the country house had lasted for nearly a month,
+when the announcement of Hugh's approaching return to England reached
+Iris. The fatal end of his father's long and lingering illness had
+arrived, and the funeral had taken place. Business, connected with his
+succession to the property, would detain him in London for a few days.
+Submitting to this necessity, he earnestly expressed the hope of seeing
+Iris again, the moment he was at liberty.
+
+Hearing the good news, Mr. Henley obstinately returned to his
+plans--already twice thwarted--for promoting the marriage of Mountjoy
+and Iris.
+
+He wrote to invite Hugh to his house in a tone of cordiality which
+astonished his daughter; and when the guest arrived, the genial welcome
+of the host had but one defect--Mr. Henley overacted his part. He gave
+the two young people perpetual opportunities of speaking to each other
+privately; and, on the principle that none are so blind as those who
+won't see, he failed to discover that the relations between them
+continued to be relations of friendship, do what he might. Hugh's long
+attendance on his dying father had left him depressed in spirits; Iris
+understood him, and felt for him. He was not ready with his opinion of
+the new maid, after he had seen Fanny Mere. "My inclination," he said,
+"is to trust the girl. And yet, I hesitate to follow my
+inclination--and I don't know why."
+
+When Hugh's visit came to an end, he continued his journey in a
+northerly direction. The property left to him by his father included a
+cottage, standing in its own grounds, on the Scotch shore of the Solway
+Firth. The place had been neglected during the long residence of the
+elder Mr. Mountjoy on the Continent. Hugh's present object was to
+judge, by his own investigation, of the necessity for repairs.
+
+On the departure of his guest, Mr. Henley (still obstinately hopeful of
+the marriage on which he had set his mind) assumed a jocular manner
+towards Iris, and asked if the Scotch cottage was to be put in order
+for the honeymoon. Her reply, gently as it was expressed, threw him
+into a state of fury. His vindictive temper revelled, not only in harsh
+words, but in spiteful actions. He sold one of his dogs which had
+specially attached itself to Iris; and, seeing that she still enjoyed
+the country, he decided on returning to London.
+
+She submitted in silence. But the events of that past time, when her
+father's merciless conduct had driven her out of his house, returned
+ominously to her memory. She said to herself: "Is a day coming when I
+shall leave him again?" It was coming--and she little knew how.
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+THE DOCTOR IN FULL DRESS
+
+MR. HENLEY'S household had been again established in London, when a
+servant appeared one morning with a visiting card, and announced that a
+gentleman had called who wished to see Miss Henley. She looked at the
+card. The gentleman was Mr. Vimpany.
+
+On the point of directing the man to say that she was engaged, Iris
+checked herself.
+
+Mrs. Vimpany's farewell words had produced a strong impression on her.
+There had been moments of doubt and gloom in her later life, when the
+remembrance of that unhappy woman was associated with a feeling
+(perhaps a morbid feeling) of self-reproach. It seemed to be hard on
+the poor penitent wretch not to have written to her. Was she still
+leading the same dreary life in the mouldering old town? Or had she
+made another attempt to return to the ungrateful stage? The gross
+husband, impudently presenting himself with his card and his message,
+could answer those questions if he could do nothing else. For that
+reason only Iris decided that she would receive Mr. Vimpany.
+
+On entering the room, she found two discoveries awaiting her, for which
+she was entirely unprepared.
+
+The doctor's personal appearance exhibited a striking change; he was
+dressed, in accordance with the strictest notions of professional
+propriety, entirely in black. More remarkable still, there happened to
+be a French novel among the books on the table--and that novel Mr.
+Vimpany, barbarous Mr. Vimpany, was actually reading with an appearance
+of understanding it!
+
+"I seem to surprise you," said the doctor. "Is it this?" He held up the
+French novel as he put the question.
+
+"I must own that I was not aware of the range of your accomplishments,"
+Iris answered.
+
+"Oh, don't talk of accomplishments! I learnt my profession in Paris.
+For nigh on three years I lived among the French medical students.
+Noticing this book on the table, I thought I would try whether I had
+forgotten the language--in the time that has passed (you know) since
+those days. Well, my memory isn't a good one in most things, but
+strange to say (force of habit, I suppose), some of my French sticks by
+me still. I hope I see you well, Miss Henley. Might I ask if you
+noticed the new address, when I sent up my card?"
+
+"I only noticed your name."
+
+The doctor produced his pocket-book, and took out a second card. With
+pride he pointed to the address: "5 Redburn Road, Hampstead Heath."
+With pride he looked at his black clothes. "Strictly professional,
+isn't it?" he said. "I have bought a new practice; and I have become a
+new man. It isn't easy at first. No, by jingo--I beg your pardon--I was
+about to say, my own respectability rather bothers me; I shall get used
+to it in time. If you will allow me, I'll take a liberty. No offence, I
+hope?"
+
+He produced a handful of his cards, and laid them out in a neat little
+semicircle on the table.
+
+"A word of recommendation, when you have the chance, would be a
+friendly act on your part," he explained. "Capital air in Redburn Road,
+and a fine view of the Heath out of the garret windows--but it's rather
+an out-of-the-way situation. Not that I complain; beggars mustn't be
+choosers. I should have preferred a practice in a fashionable part of
+London; but our little windfall of money--"
+
+He came to a full stop in the middle of a sentence. The sale of the
+superb diamond pin, by means of which Lord Harry had repaid Mrs.
+Vimpany's services, was, of all domestic events, the last which it
+might be wise to mention in the presence of Miss Henley. He was
+awkwardly silent. Taking advantage of that circumstance, Iris
+introduced the subject in which she felt interested.
+
+"How is Mrs. Vimpany?" she asked.
+
+"Oh, she's all right!"
+
+"Does she like your new house?"
+
+The doctor made a strange reply. "I really can't tell you," he said.
+
+"Do you mean that Mrs. Vimpany declines to express an opinion?"
+
+He laughed. "In all my experience," he said, "I never met with a woman
+who did that! No, no; the fact is, my wife and I have parted company.
+There's no need to look so serious about it! Incompatibility of temper,
+as the saying is, has led us to a friendly separation. Equally a relief
+on both sides. She goes her way, I go mine."
+
+His tone disgusted Iris--and she let him see it. "Is it of any use to
+ask you for Mrs. Vimpany's address?" she inquired.
+
+His atrocious good-humour kept its balance as steadily as ever: "Sorry
+to disappoint you. Mrs. Vimpany hasn't given me her address. Curious,
+isn't it? The fact is, she moped a good deal, after you left us; talked
+of her duty, and the care of her soul, and that sort of thing. When I
+hear where she is, I'll let you know with pleasure. To the best of my
+belief, she's doing nurse's work somewhere."
+
+"Nurse's work? What do you mean?"
+
+"Oh, the right thing--all in the fashion. She belongs to what they call
+a Sisterhood; goes about, you know, in a shabby black gown, with a poke
+bonnet. At least, so Lord Harry told me the other day."
+
+In spite of herself, Iris betrayed the agitation which those words
+instantly roused in her. "Lord Harry!" she exclaimed. "Where is he? In
+London?"
+
+"Yes--at Parker's Hotel."
+
+"When did he return?"
+
+"Oh, a few days ago; and--what do you think?--he's come back from the
+goldfields a lucky man. Damn it, I've let the cat out of the bag! I was
+to keep the thing a secret from everybody, and from you most
+particularly. He's got some surprise in store for you. Don't tell him
+what I've done! We had a little misunderstanding, in past days, at
+Honeybuzzard--and, now we are friends again, I don't want to lose his
+lordship's interest."
+
+Iris promised to be silent. But to know that the wild lord was in
+England again, and to remain in ignorance whether he had, or had not,
+returned with the stain of bloodshed on him, was more than she could
+endure.
+
+"There is one question I must ask you," she said. "I have reason to
+fear that Lord Harry left this country, with a purpose of revenge--"
+
+Mr. Vimpany wanted no further explanation. "Yes, yes; I know. You may
+be easy about that. There's been no mischief done, either one way or
+the other. The man he was after, when he landed in South Africa (he
+told me so himself) has escaped him."
+
+With that reply, the doctor got up in a hurry to bring his visit to an
+end. He proposed to take to flight, he remarked facetiously, before
+Miss Henley wheedled him into saying anything more.
+
+After opening the door, however, he suddenly returned to Iris, and
+added a last word in the strictest confidence.
+
+"If you won't forget to recommend me to your friends," he said, "I'll
+trust you with another secret. You will see his lordship in a day or
+two, when he returns from the races. Good-bye."
+
+The races! What was Lord Harry doing at the races?
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+ON HAMPSTEAD HEATH
+
+IRIS had only to remember the manner in which she and Mountjoy had
+disappointed her father, to perceive the serious necessity of
+preventing Mountjoy's rival from paying a visit at Mr. Henley's house.
+
+She wrote at once to Lord Harry, at the hotel which Mr. Vimpany had
+mentioned, entreating him not to think of calling on her. Being well
+aware that he would insist on a meeting, she engaged to write again and
+propose an appointment. In making this concession, Iris might have
+found it easier to persuade herself that she was yielding to sheer
+necessity, if she had not been guiltily conscious of a feeling of
+pleasure at the prospect of seeing Lord Harry again, returning to her
+an innocent man. There was some influence, in this train of thought,
+which led her mind back to Hugh. She regretted his absence--wondered
+whether he would have proposed throwing her letter to the Irish lord
+into the fire--sighed, closed the envelope, and sent the letter to the
+post.
+
+On the next day, she had arranged to drive to Muswell Hill, and to pay
+the customary visit to Rhoda. Heavy rain obliged her to wait for a
+fitter opportunity. It was only on the third day that the sky cleared,
+and the weather was favourable again. On a sunshiny autumn morning,
+with a fine keen air blowing, she ordered the open carriage. Noticing,
+while Fanny Mere was helping her to dress, that the girl looked even
+paler than usual, she said, with her customary kindness to persons
+dependent on her, "You look as if a drive in the fresh air would do you
+good--you shall go with me to the farm, and see Rhoda Bennet."
+
+When they stopped at the house, the farmer's wife appeared, attending a
+gentleman to the door. Iris at once recognised the local medical man.
+"You're not in attendance, I hope, on Rhoda Bennet?" she said.
+
+The doctor acknowledged that there had been some return of the nervous
+derangement from which the girl suffered. He depended mainly (he said)
+on the weather allowing her to be out as much as possible in the fresh
+air, and on keeping her free from all agitation. Rhoda was so far on
+the way to recovery, that she was now walking in the garden by his
+advice. He had no fear of her, provided she was not too readily
+encouraged, in her present state, to receive visitors. Her mistress
+would be, of course, an exception to this rule. But even Miss Henley
+would perhaps do well not to excite the girl by prolonging her visit.
+There was one other suggestion which he would venture to make, while he
+had the opportunity. Rhoda was not, as he thought, warmly enough
+clothed for the time of year; and a bad cold might be easily caught by
+a person in her condition.
+
+Iris entered the farm-house; leaving Fanny Mere, after what the doctor
+had said on the subject of visitors, to wait for her in the carriage.
+
+After an absence of barely ten minutes Miss Henley returned; personally
+changed, not at all to her own advantage, by the introduction of a
+novelty in her dress. She had gone into the farmhouse, wearing a
+handsome mantle of sealskin. When she came out again, the mantle had
+vanished, and there appeared in its place a common cloak of
+drab-coloured cloth. Noticing the expression of blank amazement in the
+maid's face, Iris burst out laughing.
+
+"How do you think I look in my new cloak?" she asked.
+
+Fanny saw nothing to laugh at in the sacrifice of a sealskin mantle. "I
+must not presume, Miss, to give an opinion," she said gravely.
+
+"At any rate," Iris continued, "you must be more than mortal if my
+change of costume doesn't excite your curiosity. I found Rhoda Bennet
+in the garden, exposed to the cold wind in this ugly flimsy thing.
+After what the doctor had told me, it was high time to assert my
+authority. I insisted on changing cloaks with Rhoda. She made an
+attempt, poor dear, to resist; but she knows me of old--and I had my
+way. I am sorry you have been prevented from seeing her; you shall not
+miss the opportunity when she is well again. Do you admire a fine view?
+Very well; we will vary the drive on our return. Go back," she said to
+the coachman, "by Highgate and Hampstead."
+
+Fanny's eyes rested on the shabby cloak with a well-founded distrust of
+it as a protection against the autumn weather. She ventured to suggest
+that her mistress might feel the loss (in an open carriage) of the warm
+mantle which she had left on Rhoda's shoulders.
+
+Iris made light of the doubt expressed by her maid. But by the time
+they had passed Highgate, and had approached the beginning of the
+straight road which crosses the high ridge of Hampstead Heath, she was
+obliged to acknowledge that she did indeed feel the cold. "You ought to
+be a good walker," she said, looking at her maid's firm well-knit
+figure. "Exercise is all I want to warm me. What do you say to going
+home on foot?" Fanny was ready and willing to accompany her mistress.
+The carriage was dismissed, and they set forth on their walk.
+
+As they passed the inn called "The Spaniards," two women who were
+standing at the garden gate stared at Iris, and smiled. A few paces
+further on, they were met by an errand-boy. He too looked at the young
+lady, and put his hand derisively to his head, with a shrill whistle
+expressive of malicious enjoyment. "I appear to amuse these people,"
+Iris said. "What do they see in me?"
+
+Fanny answered with an effort to preserve her gravity, which was not
+quite successfully disguised: "I beg your pardon, Miss; I think they
+notice the curious contrast between your beautiful bonnet and your
+shabby cloak."
+
+Persons of excitable temperament have a sense of ridicule, and a dread
+of it, unintelligible to their fellow-creatures who are made of coarser
+material. For the moment, Iris was angry. "Why didn't you tell me of
+it," she asked sharply, "before I sent away the carriage? How can I
+walk back, with everybody laughing at me?"
+
+She paused--reflected a little--and led the way off the high road, on
+the right, to the fine clump of fir-trees which commands the famous
+view in that part of the Heath.
+
+"There's but one thing to be done," she said, recovering her good
+temper; "we must make my grand bonnet suit itself to my miserable
+cloak. You will pull out the feather and rip off the lace (and keep
+them for yourself, if you like), and then I ought to look shabby enough
+from head to foot, I am sure! No; not here; they may notice us from the
+road--and what may the fools not do when they see you tearing the
+ornaments off my bonnet! Come down below the trees, where the ground
+will hide us."
+
+They had nearly descended the steep slope which leads to the valley,
+below the clump of firs, when they were stopped by a terrible
+discovery.
+
+Close at their feet, in a hollow of the ground, was stretched the
+insensible body of a man. He lay on his side, with his face turned away
+from them. An open razor had dropped close by him. Iris stooped over
+the prostate man, to examine his face. Blood flowing from a frightful
+wound in his throat, was the first thing that she saw. Her eyes closed
+instinctively, recoiling from that ghastly sight. The next instant she
+opened them again, and saw his face.
+
+Dying or dead, it was the face of Lord Harry.
+
+The shriek that burst from her, on making that horrible discovery, was
+heard by two men who were crossing the lower heath at some distance.
+They saw the women, and ran to them. One of the men was a labourer; the
+other, better dressed, looked like a foreman of works. He was the first
+who arrived on the spot.
+
+"Enough to frighten you out of your senses, ladies," he said civilly.
+"It's a case of suicide, I should say, by the look of it."
+
+"For God's sake, let us do something to help him!" Iris burst out. "I
+know him! I know him!"
+
+Fanny, equal to the emergency, asked Miss Henley for her handkerchief,
+joined her own handkerchief to it, and began to bandage the wound. "Try
+if his pulse is beating," she said quietly to her mistress. The foreman
+made himself useful by examining the suicide's pockets. Iris thought
+she could detect a faint fluttering in the pulse. "Is there no doctor
+living near?" she cried. "Is there no carriage to be found in this
+horrible place?"
+
+The foreman had discovered two letters. Iris read her own name on one
+of them. The other was addressed "To the person who may find my body."
+She tore the envelope open. It contained one of Mr. Vimpany's cards,
+with these desperate words written on it in pencil: "Take me to the
+doctor's address, and let him bury me, or dissect me, whichever he
+pleases." Iris showed the card to the foreman. "Is it near here?" she
+asked. "Yes, Miss; we might get him to that place in no time, if there
+was a conveyance of any kind to be found." Still preserving her
+presence of mind, Fanny pointed in the direction of "The Spaniards"
+inn. "We might get what we want there," she said. "Shall I go?"
+
+Iris signed to her to attend to the wounded man, and ascended the
+sloping ground. She ran on towards the road. The men, directed by
+Fanny, raised the body and slowly followed her, diverging to an easier
+ascent. As Iris reached the road, a four-wheel cab passed her. Without
+an instant's hesitation, she called to the driver to stop. He pulled up
+his horse. She confronted a solitary gentleman, staring out of the
+window of the cab, and looking as if he thought that a lady had taken a
+liberty with him. Iris allowed the outraged stranger no opportunity of
+expressing his sentiments. Breathless as she was, she spoke first.
+
+"Pray forgive me--you are alone in the cab--there is room for a
+gentleman, dangerously wounded--he will bleed to death if we don't find
+help for him--the place is close by--oh, don't refuse me!" She looked
+back, holding fast by the cab door, and saw Fanny and the men slowly
+approaching. "Bring him here!" she cried.
+
+"Do nothing of the sort!" shouted the gentleman in possession of the
+cab.
+
+But Fanny obeyed her mistress; and the men obeyed Fanny. Iris turned
+indignantly to the merciless stranger. "I ask you to do an act of
+Christian kindness," she said. "How can you, how dare you, hesitate?"
+
+"Drive on!" cried the stranger.
+
+"Drive on, at your peril," Iris added, on her side.
+
+The cabman sat, silent and stolid, on the box, waiting for events.
+
+Slowly the men came in view, bearing Lord Harry, still insensible. The
+handkerchiefs on his throat were saturated with blood. At that sight,
+the cowardly instincts of the stranger completely mastered him. "Let me
+out!" he clamoured; "let me out!"
+
+Finding the cab left at her disposal, Iris actually thanked him! He
+looked at her with an evil eye. "I have my suspicions, I can tell you,"
+he muttered. "If this comes to a trial in a court of law, I'm not going
+to be mixed up with it. Innocent people have been hanged before now,
+when appearances were against them."
+
+He walked off; and, by way of completing the revelation of his own
+meanness, forgot to pay his fare.
+
+On the point of starting the horse to pursue him, the cabman was
+effectually stopped. Iris showed him a sovereign. Upon this hint (like
+Othello) he spoke.
+
+"All right, Miss. I see your poor gentleman is a-bleeding. You'll take
+care--won't you?--that he doesn't spoil my cushions." The driver was
+not a ill-conditioned man; he put the case of his property indulgently,
+with a persuasive smile. Iris turned to the two worthy fellows, who had
+so readily given her their help, and bade them good-bye, with a solid
+expression of her gratitude which they both remembered for many a long
+day to come. Fanny was already in the cab supporting Lord Harry's body.
+Iris joined her. The cabman drove carefully to Mr. Vimpany's new house.
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+PROFESSIONAL ASSISTANCE
+
+NUMBER Five was near the centre of the row of little suburban houses
+called Redburn Road.
+
+When the cab drew up at the door Mr. Vimpany himself was visible,
+looking out of the window on the ground floor--and yawning as he
+looked. Iris beckoned to him impatiently. "Anything wrong?" he asked,
+as he approached the door of the cab. She drew back, and silently
+showed him what was wrong. The doctor received the shock with
+composure. When he happened to be sober and sad, looking for patients
+and failing to find them, Mr. Vimpany's capacity for feeling sympathy
+began and ended with himself.
+
+"This is a new scrape, even for Lord Harry," he remarked. "Let's get
+him into the house."
+
+The insensible man was carried into the nearest room on the ground
+floor. Pale and trembling, Iris related what had happened, and asked if
+there was no hope of saving him.
+
+"Patience!" Mr. Vimpany answered; "I'll tell you directly."
+
+He removed the bandages, and examined the wound. "There's been a deal
+of blood lost," he said; "I'll try and pull him through. While I am
+about it, Miss, go upstairs, if you please, and find your way to the
+drawing-room." Iris hesitated. The doctor opened a neat mahogany box.
+"The tools of my trade," he continued; "I'm going to sew up his
+lordship's throat." Shuddering as she heard those words, Iris hurried
+out of the room. Fanny followed her mistress up the stairs. In her own
+very different way, the maid was as impenetrably composed as Mr.
+Vimpany himself. "There was a second letter found in the gentleman's
+pocket, Miss," she said. "Will you excuse my reminding you that you
+have not read it yet."
+
+Iris read the lines that follow:
+
+"Forgive me, my dear, for the last time. My letter is to say that I
+shall trouble you no more in this world--and, as for the other world,
+who knows? I brought some money back with me, from the goldfields. It
+was not enough to be called a fortune--I mean the sort of fortune which
+might persuade your father to let you marry me. Well! here in England,
+I had an opportunity of making ten times more of it on the turf; and,
+let me add, with private information of the horses which I might
+certainly count on to win. I don't stop to ask by what cruel roguery I
+was tempted to my ruin. My money is lost; and, with it, my last hope of
+a happy and harmless life with you comes to an end. I die, Iris dear,
+with the death of that hope. Something in me seems to shrink from
+suicide in the ugly gloom of great overgrown London. I prefer to make
+away with myself among the fields, where the green will remind me of
+dear old Ireland. When you think of me sometimes, say to yourself the
+poor wretch loved me--and perhaps the earth will lie lighter on Harry
+for those kind words, and the flowers (if you favour me by planting a
+few) may grow prettier on my grave."
+
+There it ended.
+
+The heart of Iris sank as she read that melancholy farewell, expressed
+in language at once wild and childish. If he survived his desperate
+attempt at self-destruction, to what end would it lead? In silence, the
+woman who loved him put his letter back in her bosom. Watching her
+attentively--affected, it was impossible to say how, by that mute
+distress--Fanny Mere proposed to go downstairs, and ask once more what
+hope there might be for the wounded man. Iris knew the doctor too well
+to let the maid leave her on a useless errand.
+
+"Some men might be kindly ready to relieve my suspense," she said; "the
+man downstairs is not one of them. I must wait till he comes to me, or
+sends for me. But there is something I wish to say to you, while we are
+alone. You have been but a short time in my service, Fanny. Is it too
+soon to ask if you feel some interest in me?"
+
+"If I can comfort you or help you, Miss, be pleased to tell me how."
+She made that reply respectfully, in her usual quiet manner; her pale
+cheeks showing no change of colour, her faint blue eyes resting
+steadily on her mistress's face. Iris went on:
+
+"If I ask you to keep what has happened, on this dreadful day, a secret
+from everybody, may I trust you--little as you know of me--as I might
+have trusted Rhoda Bennet?"
+
+"I promise it, Miss." In saying those few words, the undemonstrative
+woman seemed to think that she had said enough.
+
+Iris had no alternative but to ask another favour.
+
+"And whatever curiosity you may feel, will you be content to do me a
+kindness--without wanting an explanation?"
+
+"It is my duty to respect my mistress's secrets; I will do my duty." No
+sentiment, no offer of respectful sympathy; a positive declaration of
+fidelity, left impenetrably to speak for itself. Was the girl's heart
+hardened by the disaster which had darkened her life? Or was she the
+submissive victim of that inbred reserve, which shrinks from the frank
+expression of feeling, and lives and dies self-imprisoned in its own
+secrecy? A third explanation, founded probably on a steadier basis, was
+suggested by Miss Henley's remembrance of their first interview.
+Fanny's nature had revealed a sensitive side, when she was first
+encouraged to hope for a refuge from ruin followed perhaps by
+starvation and death. Judging so far from experience, a sound
+conclusion seemed to follow. When circumstances strongly excited the
+girl, there was a dormant vitality in her that revived. At other times
+when events failed to agitate her by a direct appeal to personal
+interests, her constitutional reserve held the rule. She could be
+impenetrably honest, steadily industrious, truly grateful--but the
+intuitive expression of feeling, on ordinary occasions, was beyond her
+reach.
+
+After an interval of nearly half an hour, Mr. Vimpany made his
+appearance. Pausing in the doorway, he consulted his watch, and entered
+on a calculation which presented him favourably from a professional
+point of view.
+
+"Allow for time lost in reviving my lord when he fainted, and stringing
+him up with a drop of brandy, and washing my hands (look how clean they
+are!), I haven't been more than twenty minutes in mending his throat.
+Not bad surgery, Miss Henley."
+
+"Is his life safe, Mr. Vimpany?"
+
+"Thanks to his luck--yes."
+
+"His luck?"
+
+"To be sure! In the first place, he owes his life to your finding him
+when you did; a little later, and it would have been all over with Lord
+Harry. Second piece of luck: catching the doctor at home, just when he
+was most wanted. Third piece of luck: our friend didn't know how to cut
+his own throat properly. You needn't look black at me, Miss; I'm not
+joking. A suicide with a razor in his hand has generally one chance in
+his favour--he is ignorant of anatomy. That is my lord's case. He has
+only cut through the upper fleshy part of his throat, and has missed
+the larger blood vessels. Take my word for it, he will do well enough
+now; thanks to you, thanks to me, and thanks to his own ignorance. What
+do you say to that way of putting it? Ha! my brains are in good working
+order to-day; I haven't been drinking any of Mr. Mountjoy's claret--do
+you take the joke, Miss Henley?"
+
+Chuckling over the recollection of his own drunken audacity, he
+happened to notice Fanny Mere.
+
+"Hullo! is this another injured person in want of me? You're as white
+as a sheet, Miss. If you're going to faint, do me a favour--wait till I
+can get the brandy-bottle. Oh! it's natural to you, is it? I see. A
+thick skin and a slow circulation; you will live to be an old woman. A
+friend of yours, Miss Henley?"
+
+Fanny answered composedly for herself: "I am Miss Henley's maid, sir."
+
+"What's become of the other one?" Mr. Vimpany asked. "Aye? aye? Staying
+at a farm-house for the benefit of her health, is she? If I had been
+allowed time enough, I would have made a cure of Rhoda Bennet. There
+isn't a medical man in England who knows more than I do of the nervous
+maladies of women--and what is my reward? Is my waiting-room crammed
+with rich people coming to consult me? Do I live in a fashionable
+Square? Have I even been made a Baronet? Damn it--I beg your pardon,
+Miss Henley--but it is irritating, to a man of my capacity, to be
+completely neglected. For the last three days not a creature has
+darkened the doors of this house. Could I say a word to you?"
+
+He led Iris mysteriously into a corner of the room. "About our friend
+downstairs?" he began.
+
+"When may we hope that he will be well again, Mr. Vimpany?"
+
+"Maybe in three weeks. In a month at most. I have nobody here but a
+stupid servant girl. We ought to have a competent nurse. I can get a
+thoroughly trained person from the hospital; but there's a little
+difficulty. I am an outspoken man. When I am poor, I own I am poor. My
+lord must be well fed; the nurse must be well fed. Would you mind
+advancing a small loan, to provide beforehand for the payment of
+expenses?"
+
+Iris handed her purse to him, sick of the sight of Mr. Vimpany. "Is
+that all?" she asked, making for the door.
+
+"Much obliged. That's all."
+
+As they approached the room on the ground floor, Iris stopped: her eyes
+rested on the doctor. Even to that coarse creature, the eloquent look
+spoke for her. Fanny noticed it, and suddenly turned her head aside.
+Over the maid's white face there passed darkly an expression of
+unutterable contempt. Her mistress's weakness had revealed
+itself--weakness for one of the betrayers of women; weakness for a man!
+In the meantime, Mr. Vimpany (having got the money) was ready to humour
+the enviable young lady with a well-filled purse.
+
+"Do you want to see my lord before you go?" he asked, amused at the
+idea. "Mind! you mustn't disturb him! No talking, and no crying. Ready?
+Now look at him."
+
+There he lay on a shabby little sofa, in an ugly little room; his eyes
+closed; one helpless hand hanging down; a stillness on his ghastly
+face, horribly suggestive of the stillness of death--there he lay, the
+reckless victim of his love for the woman who had desperately renounced
+him again and again, who had now saved him for the third time. Ah, how
+her treacherous heart pleaded for him! Can you drive him away from you
+after this? You, who love him, what does your cold-blooded prudence
+say, when you look at him now?
+
+She felt herself drawn, roughly and suddenly, back into the passage.
+The door was closed; the doctor was whispering to her. "Hold up, Miss!
+I expected better things of you. Come! come!--no fainting. You'll find
+him a different man to-morrow. Pay us a visit, and judge for yourself."
+
+After what she had suffered, Iris hungered for sympathy. "Isn't it
+pitiable?" she said to her maid as they left the house.
+
+"I don't know, Miss."
+
+"You don't know? Good heavens, are you made of stone? Have you no such
+thing as a heart in you?"
+
+"Not for the men," Fanny answered. "I keep my pity for the women."
+
+Iris knew what bitter remembrances made their confession in those
+words. How she missed Rhoda Bennet at that moment!
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+MR. HENLEY AT HOME
+
+FOR a month, Mountjoy remained in his cottage on the shores of the
+Solway Firth, superintending the repairs.
+
+His correspondence with Iris was regularly continued; and, for the
+first time in his experience of her, was a cause of disappointment to
+him.
+
+Her replies revealed an incomprehensible change in her manner of
+writing, which became more and more marked in each succeeding instance.
+Notice it as he might in his own letters, no explanation followed on
+the part of his correspondent. She, who had so frankly confided her
+joys and sorrows to him in past days, now wrote with a reserve which
+seemed only to permit the most vague and guarded allusion to herself.
+The changes in the weather; the alternation of public news that was
+dull, and public news that was interesting; the absence of her father
+abroad, occasioned by doubt of the soundness of his investments in
+foreign securities; vague questions relating to Hugh's new place of
+abode, which could only have proceeded from a preoccupied mind--these
+were the topics on which Iris dwelt, in writing to her faithful old
+friend. It was hardly possible to doubt that something must have
+happened, which she had reasons--serious reasons, as it seemed only too
+natural to infer--for keeping concealed from Mountjoy. Try as he might
+to disguise it from himself, he now knew how dear, how hopelessly dear,
+she was to him by the anxiety that he suffered, and by the jealous
+sense of injury which defied his self-command. His immediate
+superintendence of the workmen at the cottage was no longer necessary.
+Leaving there a representative whom he could trust, he resolved to
+answer his last letter, received from Iris, in person.
+
+The next day he was in London.
+
+Calling at the house, he was informed that Miss Henley was not at home,
+and that it was impossible to say with certainty when she might return.
+While he was addressing his inquiries to the servant, Mr. Henley opened
+the library door. "Is that you, Mountjoy?" he asked. "Come in: I want
+to speak to you."
+
+Short and thick-set, with a thin-lipped mouth, a coarsely-florid
+complexion, and furtive greenish eyes; hard in his manner, and harsh in
+his voice; Mr. Henley was one of the few heartless men, who are
+innocent of deception on the surface: he was externally a person who
+inspired, at first sight, feelings of doubt and dislike. His manner
+failed to show even a pretence of being glad to see Hugh. What he had
+to say, he said walking up and down the room, and scratching his
+bristly iron-gray hair from time to time. Those signs of restlessness
+indicated, to those who knew him well, that he had a selfish use to
+make of a fellow-creature, and failed to see immediately how to reach
+the end in view.
+
+"I say, Mountjoy," he began, "have you any idea of what my daughter is
+about?"
+
+"I don't even understand what you mean," Hugh replied. "For the last
+month I have been in Scotland."
+
+"You and she write to each other, don't you?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Hasn't she told you--"
+
+"Excuse me for interrupting you, Mr. Henley; she has told me nothing."
+
+Mr. Henley stared absently at the superbly-bound books on his
+library-shelves (never degraded by the familiar act of reading), and
+scratched his head more restlessly than ever.
+
+"Look here, young man. When you were staying with me in the country, I
+rather hoped it might end in a marriage engagement. You and Iris
+disappointed me--not for the first time. But women do change their
+minds. Suppose she had changed her mind, after having twice refused
+you? Suppose she had given you an opportunity--"
+
+Hugh interrupted him again. "It's needless to suppose anything of the
+sort, sir; she would not have given me an opportunity."
+
+"Don't fence with me, Mountjoy! I'll put it in a milder way, if you
+prefer being humbugged. Do you feel any interest in that perverse girl
+of mine?"
+
+Hugh answered readily and warmly: "The truest interest!"
+
+Even Mr. Henley was human; his ugly face looked uglier still. It
+assumed the self-satisfied expression of a man who had carried his
+point.
+
+"Now I can go on, my friend, with what I had to say to you. I have been
+abroad on business, and only came back the other day. The moment I saw
+Iris I noticed something wrong about her. If I had been a stranger, I
+should have said: That young woman is not easy in her mind. Perfectly
+useless to speak to her about it. Quite happy and quite well--there was
+her own account of herself. I tried her maid next, a white-livered
+sulky creature, one of the steadiest liars I have ever met with. 'I
+know of nothing amiss with my mistress, sir.' There was the maid's way
+of keeping the secret, whatever it may be! I don't know whether you may
+have noticed it, in the course of your acquaintance with me--I hate to
+be beaten."
+
+"No, Mr. Henley, I have not noticed it."
+
+"Then you are informed of it now. Have you seen my housekeeper?"
+
+"Once or twice, sir."
+
+"Come! you're improving; we shall make something of you in course of
+time. Well, the housekeeper was the next person I spoke to about my
+daughter. Had she seen anything strange in Miss Iris, while I was away
+from home? There's a dash of malice in my housekeeper's composition; I
+don't object to a dash of malice. When the old woman is pleased, she
+shows her yellow fangs. She had something to tell me: 'The servants
+have been talking, sir, about Miss Iris.' 'Out with it, ma'am! what do
+they say?' 'They notice, sir, that their young lady has taken to going
+out in the forenoon, regularly every day: always by herself, and always
+in the same direction. I don't encourage the servants, Mr. Henley:
+there was something insolent in the tone of suspicion that they
+adopted. I told them that Miss Iris was merely taking her walk. They
+reminded me that it must be a cruelly long walk; Miss Iris being away
+regularly for four or five hours together, before she came back to the
+house. After that' (says the housekeeper) 'I thought it best to drop
+the subject.' What do you think of it yourself, Mountjoy? Do you call
+my daughter's conduct suspicious?"
+
+"I see nothing suspicious, Mr. Henley. When Iris goes out, she visits a
+friend."
+
+"And always goes in the same direction, and always visits the same
+friend," Mr. Henley added. "I felt a curiosity to know who that friend
+might be; and I made the discovery yesterday. When you were staying in
+my house in the country, do you remember the man who waited on you?"
+
+Mountjoy began to feel alarmed for Iris; he answered as briefly as
+possible.
+
+"Your valet," he said.
+
+"That's it! Well, I took my valet into my confidence--not for the first
+time, I can tell you: an invaluable fellow. When Iris went out
+yesterday, he tracked her to a wretched little suburban place near
+Hampstead Heath, called Redburn Road. She rang the bell at Number Five,
+and was at once let in--evidently well known there. My clever man made
+inquiries in the neighbourhood. The house belongs to a doctor, who has
+lately taken it. Name of Vimpany."
+
+Mountjoy was not only startled, but showed it plainly. Mr. Henley,
+still pacing backwards and forwards, happened by good fortune to have
+his back turned towards his visitor, at that moment.
+
+"Now I ask you, as a man of the world," Mr. Henley resumed, "what does
+this mean? If you're too cautious to speak out--and I must say it looks
+like it--shall I set you the example?"
+
+"Just as you please, sir."
+
+"Very well, then; I'll tell you what I suspect. When Iris is at home,
+and when there's something amiss in my family, I believe that scoundrel
+Lord Harry to be at the bottom of it. There's my experience, and
+there's my explanation. I was on the point of ordering my carriage, to
+go to the doctor myself, and insist on knowing what the attraction is
+that takes my daughter to his house, when I heard your voice in the
+hall. You tell me you are interested in Iris. Very well; you are just
+the man to help me."
+
+"May I ask how, Mr. Henley?"
+
+"Of course you may. You can find your way to her confidence, if you
+choose to try; she will trust you, when she won't trust her father. I
+don't care two straws about her other secrets; but I do want to know
+whether she is, or is not, plotting to marry the Irish blackguard.
+Satisfy me about that, and you needn't tell me anything more. May I
+count on you to find out how the land lies?"
+
+Mountjoy listened, hardly able to credit the evidence of his own
+senses; he was actually expected to insinuate himself into the
+confidence of Iris, and then to betray her to her father! He rose, and
+took his hat--and, without even the formality of a bow, opened the
+door.
+
+"Does that mean No?" Mr. Henley called after him.
+
+"Most assuredly," Mountjoy answered--and closed the door behind him.
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+FIRST SUSPICIONS OF IRIS
+
+FROM the last memorable day, on which Iris had declared to him that he
+might always count on her as his friend, but never as his wife, Hugh
+had resolved to subject his feelings to a rigorous control. As to
+conquering his hopeless love, he knew but too well that it would
+conquer him, on any future occasion when he and Iris happened to meet.
+
+He had been true to his resolution, at what cost of suffering he, and
+he alone knew. Sincerely, unaffectedly, he had tried to remain her
+friend. But the nature of the truest and the firmest man has its weak
+place, where the subtle influence of a woman is concerned. Deeply
+latent, beyond the reach of his own power of sounding, there was
+jealousy of the Irish lord lurking in Mountjoy, and secretly leading
+his mind when he hesitated in those emergencies of his life which were
+connected with Iris. Ignorant of the influence which was really
+directing him, he viewed with contempt Mr. Henley's suspicions of a
+secret understanding between his daughter and the man who was, by her
+own acknowledgment, unworthy of the love with which it had been her
+misfortune to regard him. At the same time, Hugh's mind was reluctantly
+in search of an explanation, which might account (without degrading
+Iris) for her having been traced to the doctor's house. In his
+recollection of events at the old country town, he found a motive for
+her renewal of intercourse with such a man as Mr. Vimpany, in the
+compassionate feeling with which she regarded the doctor's unhappy
+wife. There might well be some humiliating circumstance, recently added
+to the other trials of Mrs. Vimpany's married life, which had appealed
+to all that was generous and forgiving in the nature of Iris. Knowing
+nothing of the resolution to live apart which had latterly separated
+the doctor and his wife, Mountjoy decided on putting his idea to the
+test by applying for information to Mrs. Vimpany at her husband's
+house.
+
+In the nature of a sensitive man the bare idea of delay, under these
+circumstances, was unendurable. Hugh called the first cab that passed
+him, and drove to Hampstead.
+
+Careful--morbidly careful, perhaps--not to attract attention needlessly
+to himself, he stopped the cab at the entrance to Redburn Road, and
+approached Number Five on foot. A servant-girl answered the door.
+Mountjoy asked if Mrs. Vimpany was at home.
+
+The girl made no immediate reply. She seemed to be puzzled by
+Mountjoy's simple question. Her familiar manner, with its vulgar
+assumption of equality in the presence of a stranger, revealed the
+London-bred maid-servant of modern times. "Did you say _Mrs._ Vimpany?"
+she inquired sharply.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"There's no such person here."
+
+It was Mountjoy's turn to be puzzled. "Is this Mr. Vimpany's house?" he
+said.
+
+"Yes, to be sure it is."
+
+"And yet Mrs. Vimpany doesn't live here?"
+
+"No Mrs. Vimpany has darkened these doors," the girl declared
+positively.
+
+"Are you sure you are not making a mistake?"
+
+"Quite sure. I have been in the doctor's service since he first took
+the house."
+
+Determined to solve the mystery, if it could be done, Mountjoy asked if
+he could see the doctor. No: Mr. Vimpany had gone out.
+
+"There's a young person comes to us," the servant continued. "I wonder
+whether you mean her, when you ask for Mrs. Vimpany? The name _she_
+gives is Henley."
+
+"Is Miss Henley here, now?"
+
+"You can't see her--she's engaged."
+
+She was not engaged with Mrs. Vimpany, for no such person was known in
+the house. She was not engaged with the doctor, for the doctor had gone
+out. Mountjoy looked at the hat-stand in the passage, and discovered a
+man's hat and a man's greatcoat. To whom did they belong? Certainly not
+to Mr. Vimpany, who had gone out. Repellent as it was, Mr. Henley's
+idea that the explanation of his daughter's conduct was to be found in
+the renewed influence over her of the Irish lord, now presented itself
+to Hugh's mind under a new point of view. He tried in vain to resist
+the impression that had been produced on him. A sense of injury, which
+he was unable to justify to himself, took possession of him. Come what
+might of it, he determined to set at rest the doubts of which he was
+ashamed, by communicating with Iris. His card-case proved to be empty
+when he opened it; but there were letters in his pocket, addressed to
+him at his hotel in London. Removing the envelope from one of these, he
+handed it to the servant: "Take that to Miss Henley, and ask when I can
+see her."
+
+The girl left him in the passage, and went upstairs to the
+drawing-room.
+
+In the flimsily-built little house, he could hear the heavy step of a
+man, crossing the room above, and then the resonant tones of a man's
+voice raised as if in anger. Had she given him already the right to be
+angry with her? He thought of the time, when the betrayal of Lord
+Harry's vindictive purpose in leaving England had frightened her--when
+he had set aside his own sense of what was due to him, for her
+sake--and had helped her to communicate, by letter, with the man whose
+fatal ascendency over Iris had saddened his life. Was what he heard,
+now, the return that he had deserved?
+
+After a short absence, the servant came back with a message.
+
+"Miss Henley begs you will excuse her. She will write to you."
+
+Would this promised letter be like the other letters which he had
+received from her in Scotland? Mountjoy's gentler nature reminded him
+that he owed it to his remembrance of happier days, and truer
+friendship, to wait and see.
+
+He was just getting into the cab, on his return to London, when a
+closed carriage, with one person in it, passed him on its way to
+Redburn Road. In that person he recognised Mr. Henley. As the
+cab-driver mounted to his seat, Hugh saw the carriage stop at Number
+Five.
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+THE PARTING SCENE
+
+THE evening had advanced, and the candles had just been lit in
+Mountjoy's sitting-room at the hotel.
+
+His anxiety to hear from Iris had been doubled and trebled, since he
+had made the discovery of her father's visit to the doctor's house, at
+a time when it was impossible to doubt that Lord Harry was with her.
+Hugh's jealous sense of wrong was now mastered by the nobler emotions
+which filled him with pity and alarm, when he thought of Iris placed
+between the contending claims of two such men as the heartless Mr.
+Henley and the reckless Irish lord. He had remained at the hotel,
+through the long afternoon, on the chance that she might write to him
+speedily by the hand of a messenger--and no letter had arrived. He was
+still in expectation of news which might reach him by the evening post,
+when the waiter knocked at the door.
+
+"A letter?" Mountjoy asked.
+
+"No, sir," the man answered; "a lady."
+
+Before she could raise her veil, Hugh had recognised Iris. Her manner
+was subdued; her face was haggard; her hand lay cold and passive in his
+hand, when he advanced to bid her welcome. He placed a chair for her by
+the fire. She thanked him and declined to take it. With the air of a
+woman conscious of committing an intrusion, she seated herself apart in
+a corner of the room.
+
+"I have tried to write to you, and I have not been able to do it." She
+said that with a dogged resignation of tone and manner, so unlike
+herself that Mountjoy looked at her in dismay. "My friend," she went
+on, "your pity is all I may hope for; I am no longer worthy of the
+interest you once felt in me."
+
+Hugh saw that it would be useless to remonstrate. He asked if it had
+been his misfortune to offend her.
+
+"No," she said, "you have not offended me."
+
+"Then what in Heaven's name does this change in you mean?"
+
+"It means," she said, as coldly as ever, "that I have lost my
+self-respect; it means that my father has renounced me, and that you
+will do well to follow his example. Have I not led you to believe that
+I could never be the wife of Lord Harry? Well, I have deceived you---I
+am going to marry him."
+
+"I can't believe it, Iris! I won't believe it!"
+
+She handed him the letter, in which the Irishman had declared his
+resolution to destroy himself. Hugh read it with contempt. "Did my
+lord's heart fail him?" he asked scornfully.
+
+"He would have died by his own hand, Mr. Mountjoy----"
+
+"Oh, Iris--_'Mr.!'"_
+
+"I will say 'Hugh,' if you prefer it--but the days of our familiar
+friendship are none the less at an end. I found Lord Harry bleeding to
+death from a wound in his throat. It was in a lonely place on Hampstead
+Heath; I was the one person who happened to pass by it. For the third
+time, you see, it has been my destiny to save him. How can I forget
+that? My mind will dwell on it. I try to find happiness--oh, only
+happiness enough for me--in cheering my poor Irishman, on his way back
+to the life that I have preserved. There is my motive, if I have a
+motive. Day after day I have helped to nurse him. Day after day I have
+heard him say things to me--what is the use of repeating them? After
+years of resistance I have given way; let that be enough. My one act of
+discretion has been to prevent a quarrel between my father and Harry. I
+beg your pardon, I ought to have said Lord Harry. When my father came
+to the house, I insisted on speaking with him alone. I told him what I
+have just told you. He said: 'Think again before you make your choice
+between that man and me. If you decide to marry him, you will live and
+die without one farthing of my money to help you.' He put his watch on
+the table between us, and gave me five minutes to make up my mind. It
+was a long five minutes, but it ended at last. He asked me which he was
+to do--leave his will as it was, or go to his lawyer and make another.
+I said, 'You will do as you please, sir.' No; it was not a hasty
+reply--you can't make that excuse for me. I knew what I was saying; and
+I saw the future I was preparing for myself, as plainly as you see
+it--"
+
+Hugh could endure no longer the reckless expression of her despair.
+
+"No!" he cried, "you don't see your future as I see it. Will you hear
+what I have to say, before it is too late?"
+
+"It is too late already. But I will listen to you if you wish it."
+
+"And, while you listen," Mountjoy added, "you will acquit me of being
+influenced by a selfish motive. I have loved you dearly. Perhaps, in
+secret, I love you still. But, this I know: if you were to remain a
+single woman for the rest of your life, there would be no hope for Me.
+Do you believe that I am speaking the truth?"
+
+"You always speak the truth."
+
+"I speak in your interest, at least. You think you see your future life
+plainly--you are blind to your future life. You talk as if you were
+resigned to suffer. Are you resigned to lose your sense of right and
+wrong? Are you resigned to lead the life of an outlaw, and--worse
+still--not to feel the disgrace of it?"
+
+"Go on, Hugh."
+
+"You won't answer me?"
+
+"I won't shock you."
+
+"You don't discourage me, my dear; I am still obstinate in the hope of
+restoring you to your calmer and truer self. Let me do every justice to
+Lord Harry. I believe, sincerely believe, that his miserable life has
+not utterly destroyed in him the virtues which distinguish an
+honourable man. But he has one terrible defect. In his nature, there is
+the fatal pliability which finds companionable qualities in bad
+friends. In this aspect of his character, he is a dangerous man--and he
+may be (forgive me!) a bad husband. It is a thankless task to warn you
+to any good purpose. A wife--and a loving wife more than another--feels
+the deteriorating influence of a husband who is not worthy of her. His
+ways of thinking are apt to become, little by little, her ways of
+thinking. She makes allowances for him, which he does not deserve; her
+sense of right and wrong becomes confused; and before she is aware of
+it herself, she has sunk to his level. Are you angry with me?"
+
+"How can I be angry with you? Perhaps you are right."
+
+"Do you really mean that?"
+
+"Oh, yes."
+
+"Then, for God's sake, reconsider your decision! Let me go to your
+father."
+
+"Mere waste of time," Iris answered. "Nothing that you can say will
+have the least effect on him."
+
+"At any rate," Mountjoy persisted, "I mean to try."
+
+Had he touched her? She smiled--how bitterly Hugh failed to perceive.
+
+"Shall I tell you what happened to me when I went home to-day?" she
+said. "I found my maid waiting in the hall--with everything that
+belongs to me, packed up for my departure. The girl explained that she
+had been forced to obey my father's positive orders. I knew what that
+meant--I had to leave the house, and find a place to live in."
+
+"Not by yourself, Iris?"
+
+"No--with my maid. She is a strange creature; if she feels sympathy,
+she never expresses it. 'I am your grateful servant, Miss. Where you
+go, I go.' That was all she said; I was not disappointed--I am getting
+used to Fanny Mere already. Mine is a lonely lot--isn't it? I have
+acquaintances among the few ladies who sometimes visit at my father's
+house, but no friends. My mother's family, as I have always been told,
+cast her off when she married a man in trade, with a doubtful
+reputation. I don't even know where my relations live. Isn't Lord Harry
+good enough for me, as I am now? When I look at my prospects, is it
+wonderful if I talk like a desperate woman? There is but one
+encouraging circumstance that I can see. This misplaced love of mine
+that everybody condemns has, oddly enough, a virtue that everybody must
+admire. It offers a refuge to a woman who is alone in the world."
+
+Mountjoy denied indignantly that she was alone in the world.
+
+"Is there any protection that a man can offer to a woman," he asked,
+"which I am not ready and eager to offer to You? Oh, Iris, what have I
+done to deserve that you should speak of yourself as friendless in my
+hearing!"
+
+He had touched her at last. Their tender charm showed itself once more
+in her eyes and in her smile. She rose and approached him.
+
+"What exquisite kindness it must be," she said, "that blinds a clever
+man like you to obstacles which anyone else can see! Remember, dear
+Hugh, what the world would say to that protection which your true heart
+offers to me. Are you my near relation? are you my guardian? are you
+even an old man? Ah me! you are only an angel of goodness whom I must
+submit to lose. I shall still count on your kindness when we see each
+other no more. You will pity me, when you hear that I have fallen lower
+and lower; you will be sorry for me, when I end in disgracing myself."
+
+"Even then, Iris, we shall not be separated. The loving friend who is
+near you now, will be your loving friend still."
+
+For the first time in her life, she threw her arms round him. In the
+agony of that farewell, she held him to her bosom. "Goodbye, dear," she
+said faintly--and kissed him.
+
+The next moment, a deadly pallor overspread her face. She staggered as
+she drew back, and dropped into the chair that she had just left. In
+the fear that she might faint, Mountjoy hurried out in search of a
+restorative. His bed-chamber was close by, at the end of the corridor;
+and there were smelling-salts in his dressing-case. As he raised the
+lid, he heard the door behind him, the one door in the room, locked
+from the outer side.
+
+He rushed to the door, and called to her. From the farther end of the
+corridor, her voice reached him for the last time, repeating the last
+melancholy word: "Good-bye." No renewal of the miserable parting scene:
+no more of the heartache--Iris had ended it!
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+THE FATAL WORDS
+
+WHEN Mountjoy had rung for the servant, and the bedroom door had been
+unlocked, it was too late to follow the fugitive. Her cab was waiting
+for her outside; and the attention of the porter had been distracted,
+at the same time, by a new arrival of travellers at the hotel.
+
+It is more or less in the nature of all men who are worthy of the name,
+to take refuge from distress in action. Hugh decided on writing to
+Iris, and on making his appeal to her father, that evening. He
+abstained from alluding, in his letter, to the manner in which she had
+left him; it was her right, it was even her duty to spare herself. All
+that he asked was to be informed of her present place of residence, so
+that he might communicate the result--in writing only if she preferred
+it--of his contemplated interview with her father. He addressed his
+letter to the care of Mr. Vimpany, to be forwarded, and posted it
+himself.
+
+This done, he went on at once to Mr. Henley's house.
+
+The servant who opened the door had evidently received his orders. Mr.
+Henley was "not at home." Mountjoy was in no humour to be trifled with.
+He pushed the man out of his way, and made straight for the
+dining-room. There, as his previous experience of the habits of the
+household had led him to anticipate, was the man whom he was determined
+to see. The table was laid for Mr. Henley's late dinner.
+
+Hugh's well-meant attempt to plead the daughter's cause with the father
+ended as Iris had said it would end.
+
+After hotly resenting the intrusion on him that had been committed, Mr.
+Henley declared that a codicil to his will, depriving his daughter
+absolutely of all interest in his property, had been legally executed
+that day. For a time, Mountjoy's self-control had resisted the most
+merciless provocation. All that it was possible to effect, by patient
+entreaty and respectful remonstrance, he had tried again and again, and
+invariably in vain. At last, Mr. Henley's unbridled insolence
+triumphed. Hugh lost his temper--and, in leaving the heartless old man,
+used language which he afterwards remembered with regret.
+
+To feel that he had attempted to assert the interests of Iris, and that
+he had failed, was, in Hugh's heated state of mind, an irresistible
+stimulant to further exertion. It was perhaps not too late yet to make
+another attempt to delay (if not to prevent) the marriage.
+
+In sheer desperation, Mountjoy resolved to inform Lord Harry that his
+union with Miss Henley would be followed by the utter ruin of her
+expectations from her father. Whether the wild lord only considered his
+own interests, or whether he was loyally devoted to the interests of
+the woman whom he loved, in either case the penalty to be paid for the
+marriage was formidable enough to make him hesitate.
+
+The lights in the lower window, and in the passage, told Hugh that he
+had arrived in good time at Redburn Road.
+
+He found Mr. Vimpany and the young Irishman sitting together, in the
+friendliest manner, under the composing influence of tobacco. Primed,
+as he would have said himself, with only a third glass of grog, the
+hospitable side of the doctor's character was displayed to view. He at
+once accepted Mountjoy's visit as offering a renewal of friendly
+relations between them.
+
+"Forgive and forget," he said, "there's the way to settle that little
+misunderstanding, after our dinner at the inn. You know Mr. Mountjoy,
+my lord? That's right. Draw in your chair, Mountjoy. My professional
+prospects threaten me with ruin--but while I have a roof over my head,
+there's always a welcome for a friend. My dear fellow, I have every
+reason to believe that the doctor who sold me this practice was a
+swindler. The money is gone, and the patients don't come. Well! I am
+not quite bankrupt yet; I can offer you a glass of grog. Mix for
+yourself--we'll make a night of it."
+
+Hugh explained (with the necessary excuses) that his object was to say
+a few words to Lord Harry in private. The change visible in the
+doctor's manner, when he had been made acquainted with this
+circumstance, was not amiably expressed; he had the air of a man who
+suspected that an unfair advantage had been taken of him. Lord Harry,
+on his side, appeared to feel some hesitation in granting a private
+interview to Mr. Mountjoy.
+
+"Is it about Miss Henley?" he asked.
+
+Hugh admitted that it was. Lord Harry thereupon suggested that they
+might be acting wisely if they avoided the subject. Mountjoy answered
+that there were, on the contrary, reasons for approaching the subject
+sufficiently important to have induced him to leave London for
+Hampstead at a late hour of the night.
+
+Hearing this, Lord Harry rose to lead the way to another room. Excluded
+from his visitor's confidence, Mr. Vimpany could at least remind
+Mountjoy that he exercised authority as master of the house. "Oh, take
+him upstairs, my lord," said the doctor; "you are at home under my
+humble roof!"
+
+The two young men faced each other in the barely-furnished
+drawing-room; both sufficiently doubtful of the friendly result of the
+conference to abstain from seating themselves. Hugh came to the point,
+without wasting time in preparatory words. Admitting that he had heard
+of Miss Henley's engagement, he asked if Lord Harry was aware of the
+disastrous consequences to the young lady which would follow her
+marriage. The reply to this was frankly expressed. The Irish lord knew
+nothing of the consequences to which Mr. Mountjoy had alluded. Hugh at
+once enlightened him, and evidently took him completely by surprise.
+
+"May I ask, sir," he said, "if you are speaking from your own personal
+knowledge?"
+
+"I have just come, my lord, from Mr. Henley's house; and what I have
+told you, I heard from his own lips."
+
+There was a pause. Hugh was already inclined to think that he had
+raised an obstacle to the immediate celebration of the marriage. A
+speedy disappointment was in store for him. Lord Harry was too fond of
+Iris to be influenced, in his relations with her, by mercenary
+considerations.
+
+"You put it strongly," he said. "But let me tell you, Miss Henley is
+far from being so dependent on her father--he ought to be ashamed of
+himself, but that's neither here nor there--I say, she is far from
+being so dependent on her father as you seem to think. I am not, I beg
+to inform you, without resources which I shall offer to her with all my
+heart and soul. Perhaps you wish me to descend to particulars? Oh, it's
+easily done; I have sold my cottage in Ireland."
+
+"For a large sum--in these times?" Hugh inquired.
+
+"Never mind the sum, Mr. Mountjoy--let the fact be enough for you. And,
+while we are on the question of money (a disgusting question, with
+which I refuse to associate the most charming woman in existence),
+don't forget that Miss Henley has an income of her own; derived, as I
+understand, from her mother's fortune, You will do me the justice, sir,
+to believe that I shall not touch a farthing of it."
+
+"Certainly! But her mother's fortune," Mountjoy continued, obstinately
+presenting the subject on its darkest side, "consists of shares in a
+Company. Shares rise and fall--and Companies some times fail."
+
+"And a friend's anxiety about Miss Henley's affairs sometimes takes a
+mighty disagreeable form," the Irishman added, his temper beginning to
+show itself without disguise. "Let's suppose the worst that can happen,
+and get all the sooner to the end of a conversation which is far from
+being agreeable to me. We'll say, if you like, that Miss Henley's
+shares are waste paper, and her pockets (God bless her!) as empty as
+pockets can be, does she run any other risk that occurs to your
+ingenuity in becoming my wife?"
+
+"Yes, she does!" Hugh was provoked into saying. "In the case you have
+just supposed, she runs the risk of being left a destitute widow--if
+you die."
+
+He was prepared for an angry reply--for another quarrel added, on that
+disastrous night, to the quarrel with Mr. Henley. To his astonishment,
+Lord Harry's brightly-expressive eyes rested on him with a look of
+mingled distress and alarm. "God forgive me!" he said to himself, "I
+never thought of that! What am I to do? what am I to do?"
+
+Mountjoy observed that deep discouragement, and failed to understand
+it.
+
+Here was a desperate adventurer, whose wanderings had over and over
+again placed his life in jeopardy, now apparently overcome by merely
+having his thoughts directed to the subject of death! To place on the
+circumstances such a construction as this was impossible, after a
+moment's reflection. The other alternative was to assume that there
+must be some anxiety burdening Lord Harry's mind, which he had motives
+for keeping concealed--and here indeed the true explanation had been
+found. The Irish lord had reasons, known only to himself, for recoiling
+from the contemplation of his own future. After the murder of Arthur
+Mountjoy, he had severed his connection with the assassinating
+brotherhood of the Invincibles; and he had then been warned that he
+took this step at the peril of his life, if he remained in Great
+Britain after he had made himself an object of distrust to his
+colleagues. The discovery, by the secret tribunal, of his return from
+South Africa would be followed inevitably by the sentence of death.
+Such was the terrible position which Mountjoy's reply had ignorantly
+forced him to confront. His fate depended on the doubtful security of
+his refuge in the doctor's house.
+
+While Hugh was still looking at him, in grave doubt, a new idea seemed
+to spring to life in Lord Harry's mind. He threw off the oppression
+that had weighed on his spirits in an instant. His manner towards
+Mountjoy changed, with the suddenness of a flash of light, from the
+extreme of coldness to the extreme of cordiality.
+
+"I have got it at last!" he exclaimed. "Let's shake hands. My dear sir,
+you're the best friend I have ever had!"
+
+The cool Englishman asked: "In what way?"
+
+"In this way, to be sure! You have reminded me that I can provide for
+Miss Henley--and the sooner the better. There's our friend the doctor
+down-stairs, ready to be my reference. Don't you see it?"
+
+Obstacles that might prevent the marriage Mountjoy was ready enough to
+see. Facilities that might hasten the marriage found his mind hard of
+access to new impressions.
+
+"Are you speaking seriously?" he said.
+
+The Irishman's irritable temper began to show itself again.
+
+"Why do you doubt it?" he asked.
+
+"I fail to understand you," Mountjoy replied.
+
+Never--as events were yet to prove--had words of such serious import
+fallen from Lord Harry's lips as the words that he spoke next.
+
+"Clear your mind of jealousy," he said, "and you will understand me
+well enough. I agree with you that I am bound to provide for my
+widow--and I mean to do it by insuring my life."
+
+THE END OF THE SECOND PERIOD
+
+
+THIRD PERIOD
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+NEWS OF IRIS
+
+AFTER his interview with the Irish lord, Mountjoy waited for two days,
+in the expectation of hearing from Iris. No reply arrived. Had Mr.
+Vimpany failed to forward the letter that had been entrusted to him?
+
+On the third day, Hugh wrote to make inquiries.
+
+The doctor returned the letter that had been confided to his care, and
+complained in his reply of the ungrateful manner in which he had been
+treated. Miss Henley had not trusted him with her new address in
+London; and Lord Harry had suddenly left Redburn Road; bidding his host
+goodbye in a few lines of commonplace apology, and nothing more. Mr.
+Vimpany did not deny that he had been paid for his medical services;
+but, he would ask, was nothing due to friendship? Was one man justified
+in enjoying another man's hospitality, and then treating him like a
+stranger? "I have done with them both--and I recommend you, my dear
+sir, to follow my example." In those terms the angry (and sober) doctor
+expressed his sentiments, and offered his advice.
+
+Mountjoy laid down the letter in despair.
+
+His last poor chance of preventing the marriage depended on his being
+still able to communicate with Iris--and she was as completely lost to
+him as if she had taken flight to the other end of the world. It might
+have been possible to discover her by following the movements of Lord
+Harry, but he too had disappeared without leaving a trace behind him.
+The precious hours and days were passing--and Hugh was absolutely
+helpless.
+
+Tortured by anxiety and suspense, he still lingered at the hotel in
+London. More than once, he decided on giving up the struggle, and
+returning to his pretty cottage in Scotland. More than once, he
+deferred taking the journey. At one time, he dreaded to hear that Iris
+was married, if she wrote to him. At another time, be felt mortified
+and disappointed by the neglect which her silence implied. Was she near
+him, or far from him? In England, or out of England? Who could say!
+
+After more weary days of waiting and suffering a letter arrived,
+addressed to Mountjoy in a strange handwriting, and bearing the
+post-mark of Paris. The signature revealed that his correspondent was
+Lord Harry.
+
+His first impulse was to throw the letter into the fire, unread. There
+could be little doubt, after the time that had passed, of the
+information that it would contain. Could he endure to be told of the
+marriage of Iris, by the man who was her husband? Never! There was
+something humiliating in the very idea of it. He arrived at that
+conclusion--and what did he do in spite of it? He read the letter.
+
+Lord Harry wrote with scrupulous politeness of expression. He regretted
+that circumstances had prevented him from calling on Mr. Mountjoy,
+before he left England. After the conversation that had taken place at
+Mr. Vimpany's house, he felt it his duty to inform Mr. Mountjoy that he
+had insured his life--and, he would add, for a sum of money amply, and
+more than amply, sufficient to provide for his wife in the event of her
+surviving him. Lady Harry desired her kind regards, and would write
+immediately to her old and valued friend. In the meantime, he would
+conclude by repeating the expression of his sense of obligation to Mr.
+Mountjoy.
+
+Hugh looked back at the first page of the letter, in search of the
+writer's address. It was simply, "Paris." The intention to prevent any
+further correspondence, or any personal communication, could hardly
+have been more plainly implied. In another moment, the letter was in
+the fire.
+
+In two days more, Hugh heard from Iris.
+
+She, too, wrote regretfully of the sudden departure from England;
+adding, however, that it was her own doing. A slip of the tongue, on
+Lord Harry's part, in the course of conversation, had led her to fear
+that he was still in danger from political conspirators with whom he
+had imprudently connected himself. She had accordingly persuaded him to
+tell her the whole truth, and had thereupon insisted on an immediate
+departure for the Continent. She and her husband were now living in
+Paris; Lord Harry having friends in that city whose influence might
+prove to be of great importance to his pecuniary prospects. Some
+sentences followed, expressing the writer's grateful remembrance of all
+that she had owed to Hugh in past days, and her earnest desire that
+they might still hear of each other, from time to time, by
+correspondence. She could not venture to anticipate the pleasure of
+receiving a visit from him, under present circumstances. But, she hoped
+that he would not object to write to her, addressing his letters, for
+the present, to post-restante.
+
+In a postscript a few words were added, alluding to Mr. Vimpany. Hugh
+was requested not to answer any inquiries which that bad man might
+venture to make, relating to her husband or to herself. In the bygone
+days, she had been thankful to the doctor for the care which he had
+taken, medically speaking, of Rhoda Bonnet. But, since that time, his
+behaviour to his wife, and the opinions which he had expressed in
+familiar conversation with Lord Harry, had convinced her that he was an
+unprincipled person. All further communication with him (if her
+influence could prevent it) must come to an end.
+
+Still as far as ever from feeling reconciled to the marriage, Mountjoy
+read this letter with a feeling of resentment which disinclined him to
+answer it.
+
+He believed (quite erroneously) that Iris had written to him under the
+superintendence of her husband. There were certain phrases which had
+been, as he chose to suspect, dictated by Lord Harry's distrust--
+jealous distrust, perhaps--of his wife's friend. Mountjoy would wait to
+reply, until, as he bitterly expressed it, Iris was able to write to
+him without the assistance of her master.
+
+Again he thought of returning to Scotland--and, again, he hesitated.
+
+On this occasion, he discovered objections to the cottage which had not
+occurred to him while Iris was a single woman. The situation was
+solitary; his nearest neighbours were fishermen. Here and there, at
+some little distance, there were only a few scattered houses inhabited
+by retired tradesmen. Further away yet, there was the country-seat of
+an absent person of distinction, whose health suffered in the climate
+of Scotland. The lonely life in prospect, on the shores of the Solway,
+now daunted Mountjoy for the first time.
+
+He decided on trying what society in London would do to divert his mind
+from the burdens and anxieties that weighed on it. Acquaintances whom
+he had neglected were pleasantly surprised by visits from their rich
+and agreeable young friend. He attended dinner parties; he roused hope
+in mothers and daughters by accepting invitations to balls; he
+reappeared at his club. Was there any relief to his mind in this? was
+there even amusement? No; he was acting a part, and he found it a hard
+task to keep up appearances. After a brief and brilliant interval,
+society knew him no more.
+
+Left by himself again, he enjoyed one happy evening in London. It was
+the evening on which he relented, in spite of himself, and wrote to
+Iris.
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+LORD HARRY'S HONEYMOON
+
+THE next day, Hugh received a visit from the last person in the little
+world of his acquaintance whom he expected to see. The lost Mrs.
+Vimpany presented herself at the hotel.
+
+She looked unnaturally older since Mountjoy had last seen her. Her
+artificial complexion was gone. The discarded rouge that had once
+overlaid her cheeks, through a long succession of years, had left the
+texture of the skin coarse, and had turned the colour of it to a dull
+yellowish tinge. Her hair, once so skilfully darkened, was now
+permitted to tell the truth, and revealed the sober colouring of age,
+in gray. The lower face had fallen away in substance; and even the
+penetrating brightness of her large dark eyes was a little dimmed. All
+that had been left in her of the attractions of past days, owed its
+vital preservation to her stage training. Her suave grace of movement,
+and the deep elocutionary melody of her voice, still identified Mrs.
+Vimpany--disguised as she was in a dress of dull brown, shorn without
+mercy of the milliner's hideous improvements to the figure. "Will you
+shake hands with me, Mr. Mountjoy?" Those were the first words she said
+to him, in a sad subdued manner, on entering the room.
+
+"Why not?" Hugh asked, giving her his hand.
+
+"You can have no very favourable remembrance of me," she answered. "But
+I hope to produce a better impression--if you can spare me a little of
+your time. You may, or may not, have heard of my separation from my
+husband. Anyway, it is needless to trouble you on the subject; you know
+Mr. Vimpany; you can guess what I have suffered, and why I have left
+him. If he comes to you, I hope you will not tell him where Lady Harry
+is,"--
+
+Hugh interposed: "Pray don't speak of her by that name! Call her
+'Iris,' as I do."
+
+A faint reflection of the old stage-smile trembled on Mrs. Vimpany's
+worn and weary face.
+
+"Ah, Mr. Mountjoy, I know whom she ought to have married! The worst
+enemy of women is their ignorance of men--and they only learn to know
+better, when it is too late. I try to be hopeful for Iris, in the time
+to come, but my fears conquer me."
+
+She paused, sighed, and pressed her open hand on her bosom;
+unconsciously betraying in that action some of the ineradicable
+training of the theatre.
+
+"I am almost afraid to say that I love Iris," she resumed; "but this I
+know; if I am not so bad as I once was, I owe it to that dearest and
+sweetest of women! But for the days that I passed in her company, I
+might never have tried to atone for my past life by works of mercy.
+When other people take the way of amendment, I wonder whether they find
+it as hard to follow, at first, as I did?"
+
+"There is no doubt of it, Mrs. Vimpany--if people are sincere. Beware
+of the sinners who talk of sudden conversion and perfect happiness. May
+I ask how you began your new life?"
+
+"I began unhappily, Mr. Mountjoy--I joined a nursing Sisterhood. Before
+long, a dispute broke out among them. Think of women who call
+themselves Christians, quarrelling about churches and church
+services--priest's vestments and attitudes, and candles and incense! I
+left them, and went to a hospital, and found the doctors better
+Christians than the Sisters. I am not talking about my own poor self
+(as you will soon see) without a reason. My experience in the hospital
+led to other things. I nursed a lady through a tedious illness, and was
+trusted to take her to some friends in the south of France. On my
+return, I thought of staying for a few days in Paris--it was an
+opportunity of seeing how the nurses did their work in the French
+hospitals. And, oh, it was far more than that! In Paris, I found Iris
+again."
+
+"By accident?" Hugh asked.
+
+"I am not sure," Mrs. Vimpany answered, "that there are such things as
+meetings by accident. She and her husband were among the crowds of
+people on the Boulevards, who sit taking their coffee in view of the
+other crowds, passing along the street. I went by, without noticing
+them. _She_ saw me, and sent Lord Harry to bring me back. I have been
+with them every day, at her invitation, from that time to this; and I
+have seen their life."
+
+She stopped, noticing that Hugh grew restless. "I am in doubt," she
+said, "whether you wish to hear more of their life in Paris."
+
+Mountjoy at once controlled himself.
+
+"Go on," he said quietly.
+
+"Even if I tell you that Iris is perfectly happy?"
+
+"Go on," Hugh repeated.
+
+"May I confess," she resumed, "that her husband is irresistible--not
+only to his wife, but even to an old woman like me? After having known
+him for years at his worst, as well as at his best, I am still foolish
+enough to feel the charm of his high spirits and his delightful
+good-humour. Sober English people, if they saw him now, would almost
+think him a fit subject to be placed under restraint. One of his wild
+Irish ideas of expressing devotion to his wife is, that they shall
+forget they are married, and live the life of lovers. When they dine at
+a restaurant, he insists on having a private room. He takes her to
+public balls, and engages her to dance with him for the whole evening.
+When she stays at home and is a little fatigued, he sends me to the
+piano, and whirls her round the room in a waltz. 'Nothing revives a
+woman,' he says, 'like dancing with the man she loves.' When she is out
+of breath, and I shut up the piano, do you know what he does? He
+actually kisses Me--and says he is expressing his wife's feeling for me
+when she is not able to do it herself! He sometimes dines out with men,
+and comes back all on fire with the good wine, and more amiable than
+ever. On these occasions his pockets are full of sweetmeats, stolen for
+'his angel' from the dessert. 'Am I a little tipsy?' he asks. 'Oh,
+don't be angry; it's all for love of you. I have been in the highest
+society, my darling; proposing your health over and over and over
+again, and drinking to you deeper than all the rest of the company. You
+don't blame me? Ah, but I blame myself. I was wrong to leave you, and
+dine with men. What do I want with the society of men, when I have your
+society? Drinking your health is a lame excuse. I will refuse all
+invitations for the future that don't include my wife.' And--mind!--he
+really means it, at the time. Two or three days later, he forgets his
+good resolutions, and dines with the men again, and comes home with
+more charming excuses, and stolen sweetmeats, and good resolutions. I
+am afraid I weary you, Mr. Mountjoy?"
+
+"You surprise me," Hugh replied. "Why do I hear all this of Lord
+Harry?"
+
+Mrs. Vimpany left her chair. The stage directions of other days had
+accustomed her to rise, when the character she played had anything
+serious to say. Her own character still felt the animating influence of
+dramatic habit: she rose now, and laid her hand impressively on
+Mountjoy's shoulder.
+
+"I have not thoughtlessly tried your patience," she said. "Now that I
+am away from the influence of Lord Harry, I can recall my former
+experience of him: and I am afraid I can see the end that is coming. He
+will drift into bad company; he will listen to bad advice; and he will
+do things in the future which he might shrink from doing now. When that
+time comes, I fear him! I fear him!"
+
+"When that time comes," Hugh repeated, "if I have any influence left
+over his wife, he shall find her capable of protecting herself. Will
+you give me her address in Paris?
+
+"Willingly--if you will promise not to go to her till she really needs
+you?"
+
+"Who is to decide when she needs me?"
+
+"I am to decide," Mrs. Vimpany answered; "Iris writes to me
+confidentially. If anything happens which she may be unwilling to trust
+to a letter, I believe I shall hear of it from her maid."
+
+"Are you sure the maid is to be relied on?" Mountjoy interposed.
+
+"She is a silent creature, so far as I know anything of her," Mrs.
+Vimpany admitted; "and her manner doesn't invite confidence. But I have
+spoken with Fanny Mere; I am satisfied that she is true to her mistress
+and grateful to her mistress in her own strange way. If Iris is in any
+danger, I shall not be left in ignorance of it. Does this incline you
+to consult with me, before you decide on going to Paris? Don't stand on
+ceremony; say honestly, Yes or No."
+
+Honestly, Hugh said Yes.
+
+He was at once trusted with the address of Iris. At the same time, Mrs.
+Vimpany undertook that he should know what news she received from Paris
+as soon as she knew it herself. On that understanding they parted, for
+the time being.
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+THE DOCTOR IN DIFFICULTIES
+
+SLOWLY the weeks passed. Strictly Mrs. Vimpany kept her promise.
+
+When she heard from Iris the letter was always sent to Hugh, to be
+returned after he had read it. Events in the lives of the newly-married
+pair, many of which pointed to the end that Mrs. Vimpany saw and
+dreaded, were lightly, sometimes jestingly, related by the young wife.
+Her blind belief in her husband, sincerely asserted in the earlier part
+of the correspondence, began to betray, in her later letters, signs of
+self delusion. It was sad indeed to see that bright intelligence
+rendered incapable of conceiving suspicions, which might have occurred
+to the mind of a child.
+
+When the latest news from Paris followed, in due course, Mountjoy was
+informed of it by a note from Mrs. Vimpany expressed in these terms:
+
+"My last letter from Iris is really no letter at all. It simply
+encloses a circular, with her love, and asks me to send it on to you.
+If it is in your power to make inquiries in the right quarter, I am
+sure you will not hesitate to take the trouble. There can be little
+doubt, as I think, that Lord Harry is engaged in a hazardous
+speculation, more deeply than his wife is willing to acknowledge."
+
+The circular announced the contemplated publication of a weekly
+newspaper, printed partly in English, and partly in French, having its
+chief office in Paris, and being intended to dispute the advantages of
+a European circulation with the well-known Continental journal called
+"Galignani's Messenger." A first list of contributors included names of
+some notoriety in the literature of England and the literature of
+France. Speculators who wished to know, in the first place, on what
+security they might reckon, were referred to the managing committee,
+represented by persons of importance in the financial worlds of London
+and Paris.
+
+Being in a position to make the inquiries which Mrs. Vimpany had
+suggested, Hugh received information which verified the statements
+contained in the circular, and vouched for the good faith of those
+persons who were concerned in directing the speculation. So far, so
+good.
+
+But, when the question of success was next discussed, the authorities
+consulted shook their wise heads. It was impossible to say what losses
+might not be suffered, and what sums of money might not be required,
+before the circulation of the new journal would justify the hope of
+success. This opinion Hugh communicated to Mrs. Vimpany; Iris was
+informed of it by that day's post.
+
+A longer time than usual elapsed before any further news of Lord Harry
+and his wife was received by Mountjoy. When he did at last hear again
+from Mrs. Vimpany, she forwarded a letter from Iris dated from a new
+address, in the suburb of Paris called Passy.
+
+From motives of economy (Iris wrote) her husband had decided on a
+change of residence. They were just established in their new abode,
+with the advantages of a saving in rent, a pretty little garden to
+cultivate, and purer air to breathe than the air of Paris. There the
+letter ended, without the slightest allusion to the forthcoming
+newspaper, or to the opinion that had been pronounced on the prospects
+of success.
+
+In forwarding this letter, Mrs. Vimpany wrote on the blank page as
+follows: "I am sorry to add that some disquieting news of my husband
+has reached me. For the present, I will say no more. It is at least
+possible that the report may not be worthy of belief."
+
+A few days later the report was confirmed, under circumstances which
+had certainly not been foreseen. Mr. Vimpany himself arrived at the
+hotel, on a visit to Mountjoy.
+
+Always more or less superior to the amiable weakness of modesty, the
+doctor seemed to have risen higher than ever in his own estimation,
+since Hugh had last seen him. He strutted; he stared confidently at
+persons and things; authority was in his voice when he spoke, and lofty
+indulgence distinguished his manner when he listened.
+
+"How are you?" he cried with a grand gaiety, as he entered the room.
+"Fine weather, isn't it, for the time of year? You don't look well. I
+wonder whether you notice any change in me?
+
+"You seem to be in good spirits," Hugh replied, not very cordially.
+
+"Do I carry my head high?" Mr. Vimpany went on. "When calamity strikes
+at a man, don't let him cringe and cry for pity--let him hit back
+again! Those are my principles. Look at me. Now do look at me. Here I
+am, a cultivated person, a member of an honourable profession, a man of
+art and accomplishment--stripped of every blessed thing belonging to me
+but the clothes I stand up in. Give me your hand, Mountjoy. It's the
+hand, sir, of a bankrupt."
+
+"You don't seem to mind it much," Mountjoy remarked.
+
+"Why should I mind it?" asked the doctor. "There isn't a medical man in
+England who has less reason to reproach himself than I have. Have I
+wasted money in rash speculations? Not a farthing. Have I been fool
+enough to bet at horse races? My worst enemy daren't say it of me. What
+have I done then? I have toiled after virtue--that's what I have done.
+Oh, there's nothing to laugh at! When a doctor tries to be the medical
+friend of humanity; when he only asks leave to cure disease, to soothe
+pain, to preserve life--isn't that virtue? And what is my reward? I sit
+at home, waiting for my suffering fellow-creatures; and the only
+fellow-creatures who come to me are too poor to pay. I have gone my
+rounds, calling on the rich patients whom I bought when I bought the
+practice. Not one of them wanted me. Men, women, and children, were all
+inexcusably healthy--devil take them! Is it wonderful if a man becomes
+bankrupt, in such a situation as mine? By Jupiter, I go farther than
+that! I say, a man owes it to himself (as a protest against undeserved
+neglect) to become a bankrupt. If you will allow me, I'll take a
+chair."
+
+He sat down with an air of impudent independence and looked round the
+room. A little cabinet, containing liqueurs, stood open on the
+sideboard. Mr. Vimpany got up again. "May I take a friendly liberty?"
+he said--and helped himself, without waiting for permission.
+
+Hugh bore with this, mindful of the mistake that he had committed in
+consenting to receive the doctor. At the same time, he was sufficiently
+irritated to take a friendly liberty on his side. He crossed the room
+to the sideboard, and locked up the liqueurs. Mr. Vimpany's brazen face
+flushed deeply (not with shame); he opened his lips to say something
+worthy of himself, controlled the impulse, and burst into a boisterous
+laugh. He had evidently some favour still to ask.
+
+"Devilish good!" he broke out cheerfully. "Do you remember the
+landlady's claret? Ha! you don't want to tempt me this time. Well!
+well! to return to my bankruptcy."
+
+Hugh had heard enough of his visitor's bankruptcy. "I am not one of
+your creditors," he said.
+
+Mr. Vimpany made a smart reply: "Don't you be too sure of that. Wait a
+little."
+
+"Do you mean," Mountjoy asked, "that you have come here to borrow money
+of me?"
+
+"Time---give me time," the doctor pleaded: "this is not a matter to be
+dispatched in a hurry; this is a matter of business. You will hardly
+believe it," he resumed, "but I have actually been in my present
+position, once before." He looked towards the cabinet of liqueurs. "If
+I had the key," he said, "I should like to try a drop more of your good
+Curacoa. You don't see it?"
+
+"I am waiting to hear what your business is," Hugh replied.
+
+Mr. Vimpany's pliable temper submitted with perfect amiability. "Quite
+right," he said; "let us return to business. I am a man who possesses
+great fertility of resource. On the last occasion when my creditors
+pounced on my property, do you think I was discouraged? Nothing of the
+sort! My regular medical practice had broken down under me. Very
+well--I tried my luck as a quack. In plain English, I invented a patent
+medicine. The one thing wanting was money enough to advertise it. False
+friends buttoned up their pockets. You see?"
+
+"Oh, yes; I see."
+
+"In that case," Mr. Vimpany continued, "you will not be surprised to
+hear that I draw on my resources again. You have no doubt noticed that
+we live in an age of amateurs. Amateurs write, paint, compose music,
+perform on the stage. I, too, am one of the accomplished persons who
+have taken possession of the field of Art. Did you observe the
+photographic portraits on the walls of my dining-room? They are of my
+doing, sir--whether you observed them or not I am one of the handy
+medical men, who can use the photograph. Not that I mention it
+generally; the public have got a narrow-minded notion that a doctor
+ought to be nothing but a doctor. My name won't appear in a new work
+that I am contemplating. Of course, you want to know what my new work
+is. I'll tell you, in the strictest confidence. Imagine (if you can) a
+series of superb photographs of the most eminent doctors in England,
+with memoirs of their lives written by themselves; published once a
+month, price half-a-crown. If there isn't money in that idea, there is
+no money in anything. Exert yourself, my good friend. Tell me what you
+think of it?"
+
+"I don't understand the subject," Mountjoy replied. "May I ask why you
+take _me_ into your confidence?"
+
+"Because I look upon you as my best friend."
+
+"You are very good. But surely, Mr. Vimpany, you have older friends in
+your circle of acquaintance than I am."
+
+"Not one," the doctor answered promptly, "whom I trust as I trust you.
+Let me give you a proof of it."
+
+"Is the proof in any way connected with money?" Hugh inquired.
+
+"I call that hard on me," Mr. Vimpany protested. "No unfriendly
+interruptions, Mountjoy! I offer a proof of kindly feeling. Do you mean
+to hurt me?"
+
+"Certainly not. Go on."
+
+"Thank you; a little encouragement goes a long way with me. I have
+found a bookseller, who will publish my contemplated work, on
+commission. Not a soul has yet seen the estimate of expenses. I propose
+to show it to You."
+
+"Quite needless, Mr. Vimpany."
+
+"Why quite needless?"
+
+"Because I decline lending you the money."
+
+"No, no, Mountjoy! You can't really mean that?"
+
+"I do mean it."
+
+"No!"
+
+"Yes!"
+
+The doctor's face showed a sudden change of expression---a sinister and
+threatening change. "Don't drive me into a corner," he said. "Think of
+it again."
+
+Hugh's capacity for controlling himself gave way at last.
+
+"Do you presume to threaten me?" he said. "Understand, if you please,
+that my mind is made up, and that nothing you can say or do will alter
+it."
+
+With that declaration he rose from his chair, and waited for Mr.
+Vimpany's departure.
+
+The doctor put on his hat. His eyes rested on Hugh, with a look of
+diabolical malice: "The time is not far off, Mr. Mountjoy, when you may
+be sorry you refused me." He said those words deliberately--and took
+his leave.
+
+Released from the man's presence, Hugh found himself strangely
+associating the interests of Iris with the language--otherwise beneath
+notice--which Mr. Vimpany had used on leaving the room.
+
+In desperate straits for want of money, how would the audacious
+bankrupt next attempt to fill his empty purse? If he had, by any
+chance, renewed his relations with his Irish friend--and such an event
+was at least possible--his next experiment in the art of raising a loan
+might take him to Paris. Lord Harry had already ventured on a
+speculation which called for an immediate outlay of money, and which
+was only expected to put a profit into his pocket at some future
+period. In the meanwhile, his resources in money had their limits; and
+his current expenses would make imperative demands on an ill-filled
+purse. If the temptation to fail in his resolution to respect his
+wife's fortune was already trying his fortitude, what better excuse
+could be offered for yielding than the necessities of an old friend in
+a state of pecuniary distress?
+
+Looking at the position of Iris, and at the complications which
+threatened it, from this point of view, Mountjoy left the hotel to
+consult with Mrs. Vimpany. It rested with her to decide whether the
+circumstances justified his departure for Paris.
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+LONDON AND PARIS
+
+INFORMED of all that Hugh could tell her relating to his interview with
+her husband, Mrs. Vimpany understood and appreciated his fears for the
+future. She failed, however, to agree with him that he would do well to
+take the journey to France, under present circumstances.
+
+"Wait a little longer in London," she said. "If Iris doesn't write to
+me in the next few days there will be a reason for her silence; and in
+that case (as I have already told you) I shall hear from Fanny Mere.
+You shall see me when I get a letter from Paris."
+
+On the last morning in the week, Mrs. Vimpany was announced. The letter
+that she brought with her had been written by Fanny Mere. With the pen
+in her hand, the maid's remarkable character expressed itself as
+strongly as ever:--
+
+"Madam,--I said I would let you know what goes on here, when I thought
+there was need of it. There seems to be need now. Mr. Vimpany came to
+us yesterday. He has the spare bedroom. My mistress says nothing, and
+writes nothing. For that reason, I send you the present writing.--Your
+humble servant, F."
+
+Mountjoy was perplexed by this letter, plain as it was.
+
+"It seems strange," he said, "that Iris herself has not written to you.
+She has never hitherto concealed her opinion of Mr. Vimpany."
+
+"She is concealing it now," Mr. Vimpany's wife replied gravely.
+
+"Do you know why?"
+
+"I am afraid I do. Iris will not hesitate at any sacrifice of herself
+to please Lord Harry. She will give him her money when he wants it. If
+he tells her to alter her opinion of my husband, she will obey him. He
+can shake her confidence in me, whenever he pleases; and he has very
+likely done it already."
+
+"Surely it is time for me to go to her now?" Hugh said.
+
+"Full time," Mrs. Vimpany admitted--"if you can feel sure of yourself.
+In the interests of Iris, can you undertake to be cool and careful?"
+
+"In the interests of Iris, I can undertake anything."
+
+"One word more," Mrs. Vimpany continued, "before you take your
+departure. No matter whether appearances are for him, or against him,
+be always on your guard with my husband. Let me hear from you while you
+are away; and don't forget that there is an obstacle between you and
+Iris, which will put even your patience and devotion to a hard trial."
+
+"You mean her husband?"
+
+"I do."
+
+There was no more to be said, Hugh set forth on his journey to Paris.
+
+         * * * * * * *
+
+On the morning after his arrival in the French capital, Mountjoy had
+two alternatives to consider. He might either write to Iris, and ask
+when it would be convenient to her to receive him--or he might present
+himself unexpectedly in the cottage at Passy. Reflection convinced him
+that his best chance of placing an obstacle in the way of deception
+would be to adopt the second alternative, and to take Lord Harry and
+the doctor by surprise.
+
+He went to Passy. The lively French taste had brightened the cottage
+with colour: the fair white window curtains were tied with
+rose-coloured ribbons, the blinds were gaily painted, the chimneys were
+ornamental, the small garden was a paradise of flowers. When Mountjoy
+rang the bell, the gate was opened by Fanny Mere. She looked at him in
+grave astonishment.
+
+"Do they expect you?" she asked.
+
+"Never mind that," Hugh answered. "Are they at home?"
+
+"They have just finished breakfast, sir."
+
+"Do you remember my name?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"Then show me in."
+
+Fanny opened the door of a room on the ground floor, and announced:
+"Mr. Mountjoy."
+
+The two men were smoking; Iris was watering some flowers in the window.
+Her colour instantly faded when Hugh entered the room. In doubt and
+alarm, her eyes questioned Lord Harry. He was in his sweetest state of
+good-humour. Urged by the genial impulse of the moment, he set the
+example of a cordial reception. "This is an agreeable surprise,
+indeed," he said, shaking hands with Mountjoy in his easy amiable way.
+"It's kind of you to come and see us." Relieved of anxiety (evidently
+when she had not expected it), Iris eagerly followed her husband's
+example: her face recovered its colour, and brightened with its
+prettiest smile. Mr. Vimpany stood in a corner; his cigar went out: his
+own wife would hardly have known him again--he actually presented an
+appearance of embarrassment! Lord Harry burst out laughing: "Look at
+him Iris! The doctor is shy for the first time in his life." The Irish
+good-humour was irresistible. The young wife merrily echoed her
+husband's laugh. Mr. Vimpany, observing the friendly reception offered
+to Hugh, felt the necessity of adapting himself to circumstances. He
+came out of his corner with an apology: "Sorry I misbehaved myself, Mr.
+Mountjoy, when I called on you in London. Shake hands. No offence--eh?"
+Iris, in feverish high spirits, mimicked the doctor's coarse tones when
+he repeated his favourite form of excuse. Lord Harry clapped his hands,
+delighted with his wife's clever raillery: "Ha! Mr. Mountjoy, you don't
+find that her married life has affected her spirits! May I hope that
+you have come here to breakfast? The table is ready as you see"----
+"And I have been taking lessons, Hugh, in French ways of cooking eggs,"
+Iris added; "pray let me show you what I can do." The doctor chimed in
+facetiously: "I'm Lady Harry's medical referee; you'll find her French
+delicacies half digested for you, sir, before you can open your mouth:
+signed, Clarence Vimpany, member of the College of Surgeons."
+Remembering Mrs. Vimpany's caution, Hugh concealed his distrust of this
+outbreak of hospitable gaiety, and made his excuses. Lord Harry
+followed, with more excuses, on his part. He deplored it--but he was
+obliged to go out. Had Mr. Mountjoy met with the new paper which was to
+beat "Galiguani" out of the field? The "Continental Herald "--there was
+the title. "Forty thousand copies of the first number have just flown
+all over Europe; we have our agencies in every town of importance, at
+every point of the compass; and, one of the great proprietors, my dear
+sir, is the humble individual who now addresses you." His bright eyes
+sparkled with boyish pleasure, as he made that announcement of his own
+importance. If Mr. Mountjoy would kindly excuse him, he had an
+appointment at the office that morning. "Get your hat, Vimpany. The
+fact is our friend here carries a case of consumption in his pocket;
+consumption of the purse, you understand. I am going to enrol him among
+the contributors to the newspaper. A series of articles (between
+ourselves) exposing the humbug of physicians, and asserting with fine
+satirical emphasis the overstocked state of the medical profession. Ah,
+well! you'll be glad (won't you?) to talk over old times with Iris. My
+angel, show our good friend the 'Continental Herald,' and mind you keep
+him here till we get back. Doctor, look alive! Mr. Mountjoy, au
+revoir." They shook hands again heartily. As Mrs. Vimpany had
+confessed, there was no resisting the Irish lord.
+
+But Hugh's strange experience of that morning was not at an end, yet.
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+THE BRIDE AT HOME
+
+LEFT alone with the woman whose charm still held him to her, cruelly as
+she had tried his devotion by her marriage, Mountjoy found the fluent
+amiability of the husband imitated by the wife. She, too, when the door
+had hardly closed on Lord Harry, was bent on persuading Hugh that her
+marriage had been the happiest event of her life.
+
+"Will you think the worse of me," she began, "if I own that I had
+little expectation of seeing you again?"
+
+"Certainly not, Iris."
+
+"Consider my situation," she went on. "When I remember how you tried
+(oh, conscientiously tried!) to prevent my marriage--how you predicted
+the miserable results that would follow, if Harry's life and my life
+became one--could I venture to hope that you would come here, and judge
+for yourself? Dear and good friend, I have nothing to fear from the
+result; your presence was never more welcome to me than it is now!"
+
+Whether it was attributable to prejudice on Mountjoy's part, or to keen
+and just observation, he detected something artificial in the ring of
+her enthusiasm; there was not the steady light of truth in her eyes,
+which he remembered in the past and better days of their companionship.
+He was a little--just a little--irritated. The temptation to remind her
+that his distrust of Lord Harry had once been her distrust too, proved
+to be more than his frailty could resist.
+
+"Your memory is generally exact," he said; "but it hardly serves you
+now as well as usual."
+
+"What have I forgotten?"
+
+"You have forgotten the time, my dear, when your opinion was almost as
+strongly against a marriage with Lord Harry as mine."
+
+Her answer was ready on the instant: "Ah, I didn't know him then as
+well as I know him now!"
+
+Some men, in Mountjoy's position, might have been provoked into hinting
+that there were sides to her husband's character which she had probably
+not discovered yet. But Hugh's gentle temper--ruffled for a moment
+only--had recovered its serenity. Her friend was her true friend still;
+he said no more on the subject of her marriage.
+
+"Old habits are not easily set aside," he reminded her. "I have been so
+long accustomed to advise you and help you, that I find myself hoping
+there may be some need for my services still. Is there no way in which
+I might relieve you of the hateful presence of Mr. Vimpany?"
+
+"My dear Hugh, I wish you had not mentioned Mr. Vimpany."
+
+Mountjoy concluded that the subject was disagreeable to her. "After the
+opinion of him which you expressed in your letter to me," he said, "I
+ought not to have spoken of the doctor. Pray forgive me."
+
+Iris looked distressed. "Oh, you are quite mistaken! The poor doctor
+has been sadly misjudged; and I"--she shook her head, and sighed
+penitently--"and, I," she resumed, "am one among other people who have
+ignorantly wronged him. Pray consult my husband. Hear what he can tell
+you--and you will pity Mr. Vimpany. The newspaper makes such large
+demands on our means that we can do little to help him. With your
+recommendation he might find some employment."
+
+"He has already asked me to assist him, Iris; and I have refused. I
+can't agree with your change of opinion about Mr. Vimpany."
+
+"Why not? Is it because he has separated from his wife?"
+
+"That is one reason, among many others," Mountjoy replied.
+
+"Indeed, indeed you are wrong! Lord Harry has known Mrs. Vimpany for
+years, and he says--I am truly sorry to hear it--that the separation is
+her fault."
+
+Hugh changed the subject again. The purpose which had mainly induced
+him to leave England had not been mentioned yet.
+
+Alluding to the newspaper, and to the heavy pecuniary demands made by
+the preliminary expenses of the new journal, he reminded Iris that
+their long and intimate friendship permitted him to feel some interest
+in her affairs. "I won't venture to express an opinion," he added; "let
+me only ask if Lord Harry's investments in this speculation have
+compelled him to make some use of your little fortune?"
+
+"My husband refused to touch my fortune," Iris answered. "But"--She
+paused, there. "Do you know how honourably, how nobly, he has behaved?"
+she abruptly resumed. "He has insured his life: he has burdened himself
+with the payment of a large sum of money every year. And all for me, if
+I am so unfortunate (which God forbid!) as to survive him. When a large
+share in the newspaper was for sale, do you think I could be ungrateful
+enough to let him lose the chance of making our fortune, when the
+profits begin to come in? I insisted on advancing the money--we almost
+quarrelled about it--but, you know how sweet he is. I said: 'Don't
+distress me'; and the dearest of men let me have my own way."
+
+Mountjoy listened in silence. To have expressed what he felt would have
+been only to mortify and offend Iris. Old habit (as he had said) had
+made the idea of devoting himself to her interests the uppermost idea
+in his mind. He asked if the money had all been spent. Hearing that
+some of it was still left, he resolved on making the attempt to secure
+the remains of her fortune to herself.
+
+"Tell me," he said, "have you ever heard of such a thing as buying an
+annuity?"
+
+She knew nothing about it. He carefully explained the method by which a
+moderate sum of money might be made to purchase a sufficient income for
+life. She offered no objection, when he proposed to write to his lawyer
+in London for the necessary particulars. But when he asked her to tell
+him what the sum was of which she might be still able to dispose, Iris
+hesitated, and made no reply.
+
+This time, Hugh arrived at the right conclusion.
+
+It was only too plain to him that what remained of her money
+represented an amount so trifling that she was ashamed to mention it.
+Of the need for helping her, there could be no doubt now; and, as for
+the means, no difficulties presented themselves to Mountjoy--always
+excepting the one obstacle likely to be offered by the woman herself.
+Experience warned him to approach her delicately, by the indirect way.
+
+"You know me well enough," he said, "to feel sure that I am incapable
+of saying anything which can embarrass you, or cause a moment's
+misunderstanding between two old friends. Won't you look at me, Iris,
+when I am speaking to you?"
+
+She still looked away from him. "I am afraid of what you are going to
+say to me," she answered coldly.
+
+"Then let me say it at once. In one of your letters, written long
+since--I don't suppose you remember it--you told me that I was an
+obstinate man when I once took a thing into my head. You were quite
+right. My dear, I have taken it into my head that you will be as ready
+as ever to accept my advice, and will leave me (as your man of
+business) to buy the annuity"--
+
+She stopped him.
+
+"No," she cried, "I won't hear a word more! Do you think I am
+insensible to years of kindness that I have never deserved? Do you
+think I forget how nobly you have forgiven me for those cruel refusals
+which have saddened your life? Is it possible that you expect me to
+borrow money of You?" She started wildly to her feet. "I declare, as
+God hears me, I would rather die than take that base, that shameful
+advantage of all your goodness to me. The woman never lived who owed so
+much to a man, as I owe to you--but not money! Oh, my dear, not money!
+not money!"
+
+He was too deeply touched to be able to speak to her--and she saw it.
+"What a wretch I am," she said to herself; "I have made his heart
+ache!"
+
+He heard those words. Still feeling for her--never, never for
+himself!--he tried to soothe her. In the passion of her self-reproach,
+she refused to hear him. Pacing the room from end to end, she fanned
+the fiery emotion that was consuming her. Now, she reviled herself in
+language that broke through the restraints by which good breeding sets
+its seal on a woman's social rank. And now, again, she lost herself
+more miserably still, and yielded with hysteric recklessness to a
+bitter outburst of gaiety.
+
+"If you wish to be married happily," she cried, "never be as fond of
+any other woman as you have been of me. We are none of us worth it.
+Laugh at us, Hugh--do anything but believe in us. We all lie, my
+friend. And I have been lying--shamelessly! shamelessly!"
+
+He tried to check her. "Don't talk in that way, Iris," he said sternly.
+
+She laughed at him. "Talk?" she repeated. "It isn't that; it's a
+confession."
+
+"I don't desire to hear your confession."
+
+"You must hear it--you have drawn it out of me. Come! we'll enjoy my
+humiliation together. Contradict every word I said to you about that
+brute and blackguard, the doctor--and you will have the truth. What
+horrid inconsistency, isn't it? I can't help myself; I am a wretched,
+unreasonable creature; I don't know my own mind for two days together,
+and all through my husband--I am so fond of him; Harry is delightfully
+innocent; he's like a nice boy; he never seemed to think of Mr.
+Vimpany, till it was settled between them that the doctor was to come
+and stay here----and then he persuaded me--oh, I don't know how!--to
+see his friend in quite a new light. I believed him--and I believe him
+still--I mean I _would_ believe him, but for you. Will you do me a
+favour? I wish you wouldn't look at me with those eyes that won't lie;
+I wish you wouldn't speak to me with that voice which finds things out.
+Oh, good Heavens, do you suppose I would let you think that my husband
+is a bad man, and my marriage an unhappy one? Never! If it turns my
+blood to sit and eat at the same table with Mr. Vimpany, I'm not cruel
+enough to blame the dear doctor. It's my wickedness that's to blame. We
+shall quarrel, if you tell me that Harry is capable of letting a rascal
+be his friend. I'm happy; I'm happy; I'm happy!--do you understand
+that? Oh, Hugh, I wish you had never come to see me!"
+
+She burst into a passionate fit of weeping, broken down at last under
+the terrible strain laid on her. "Let me hide myself!" was all that
+Iris could say to her old friend--before she ran out of the room, and
+left him.
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+THE MAID AND THE KEYHOLE
+
+DEEPLY as she had grieved him, keenly as he felt that his worst fears
+for her threatened already to be realised, it was characteristic of
+Mountjoy that he still refused to despair of Iris--even with the
+husband's influence against him.
+
+The moral deterioration of her, revealed in the false words that she
+had spoken, and in the deceptions that she had attempted, would have
+justified the saddest misgivings, but for the voluntary confession
+which had followed, and the signs which it had shown of the better
+nature still struggling to assert itself. How could Hugh hope to
+encourage that effort of resistance to the evil influences that were
+threatening her--first and foremost, among them, being the arrival of
+Vimpany at the cottage? His presence kept her in a state of perpetual
+contention, between her own wise instincts which distrusted him, and
+her husband's authoritative assertions which recommended him to her
+confidence. No greater service could be rendered to Iris than the
+removal of this man--but how could it be accomplished, without giving
+offence to her husband? Mountjoy's mind was still in search of a means
+of overcoming the obstacle thus presented, when he heard the door open.
+Had Iris recovered herself? or had Lord Harry and his friend returned?
+
+The person who now entered the room was the strange and silent maid,
+Fanny Mere.
+
+"Can I speak to you, sir?"
+
+"Certainly. What is it?"
+
+"Please give me your address."
+
+"For your mistress?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Does she wish to write to me?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+Hugh gave the strange creature the address of his hotel in Paris. For a
+moment, her eyes rested on him with an expression of steady scrutiny.
+She opened the door to go out---stopped--considered--came back again.
+
+"I want to speak for myself," she said. "Do you care to hear what a
+servant has to say?"
+
+Mountjoy replied that he was ready to hear what she had to say. She at
+once stepped up to him, and addressed him in these words:
+
+"I think you are fond of my mistress?"
+
+An ordinary man might have resented the familiar manner in which she
+had expressed herself. Mountjoy waited for what was still to come.
+Fanny Mere abruptly went on, with a nearer approach to agitation in her
+manner than she had shown yet:
+
+"My mistress took me into her service; she trusted me when other ladies
+would have shown me the door. When she sent for me to see her, my
+character was lost; I had nobody to feel for me, nobody to help me. She
+is the one friend who held out a hand to me. I hate the men; I don't
+care for the women. Except one. Being a servant I mustn't say I love
+that one. If I was a lady, I don't know that I should say it. Love is
+cant; love is rubbish. Tell me one thing. Is the doctor a friend of
+yours?"
+
+"The doctor is nothing of the kind."
+
+"Perhaps he is your enemy?"
+
+"I can hardly say that."
+
+She looked at Hugh discontentedly. "I want to get at it," she said.
+"Why can't we understand each other? Will you laugh at me, if I say the
+first thing that comes into my head? Are you a good swimmer?"
+
+An extraordinary question, even from Fanny Mere. It was put
+seriously--and seriously Mountjoy answered it. He said that he was
+considered to be a good swimmer.
+
+"Perhaps," she continued, "you have saved people's lives."
+
+"I have twice been so fortunate as to save lives," he replied.
+
+"If you saw the doctor drowning, would you save him? _I_ wouldn't!"
+
+"Do you hate him as bitterly as that?" Hugh asked.
+
+She passed the question over without notice. "I wish you would help me
+to get at it," she persisted. "Suppose you could rid my mistress of
+that man by giving him a kick, would you up with your foot and do it?"
+
+"Yes--with pleasure."
+
+"Thank you, sir. Now I've got it. Mr. Mountjoy, the doctor is the curse
+of my mistress's life. I can't bear to see it. If we are not relieved
+of him somehow, I shall do something wrong. When I wait at table, and
+see him using his knife, I want to snatch it out of his hand, and stick
+it into him. I had a hope that my lord might turn him out of the house
+when they quarrelled. My lord is too wicked himself to do it. For the
+love of God, sir, help my mistress--or show me the way how!"
+
+Mountjoy began to be interested. "How do you know," he asked, "that
+Lord Harry and the doctor have quarrelled?"
+
+Without the slightest appearance of embarrassment, Fanny Mere informed
+him that she had listened at the door, while her master and his friend
+were talking of their secrets. She had also taken an opportunity of
+looking through the keyhole. "I suppose, sir," said this curious woman,
+still speaking quite respectfully, "you have never tried that way
+yourself?"
+
+"Certainly not!"
+
+"Wouldn't you do it to serve my mistress?"
+
+"No."
+
+"And yet, you're fond of her! You are a merciful one--the only merciful
+one, so far as I know--among men. Perhaps, if you were frightened about
+her, you might be more ready with your help. I wonder whether I can
+frighten you? Will you let me try?"
+
+The woman's faithful attachment to Iris pleaded for her with Hugh.
+"Try, if you like," he said kindly.
+
+Speaking as seriously as ever, Fanny proceeded to describe her
+experience at the keyhole. What she had seen was not worth relating.
+What she had heard proved to be more important.
+
+The talk between my lord and the doctor had been about raising money.
+They had different notions of how to do that. My lord's plan was to
+borrow what was wanted, on his life-insurance. The doctor told him he
+couldn't do that, till his insurance had been going on for three or
+four years at least. "I have something better and bolder to propose,"
+says Mr. Vimpany. It must have been also something wicked--for he
+whispered it in the master's ear. My lord didn't take to it kindly.
+"How do you think I could face my wife," he says, "if she discovered
+me?" The doctor says: "Don't be afraid of your wife; Lady Harry will
+get used to many things which she little thought of before she married
+you." Says my lord to that: "I have done my best, Vimpany, to improve
+my wife's opinion of you. If you say much more, I shall come round to
+her way of thinking. Drop it!"--"All right," says the doctor, "I'll
+drop it now, and wait to pick it up again till you come to your last
+bank note." There the talk ended for that day---and Fanny would be glad
+to know what Mr. Mountjoy thought of it.
+
+"I think you have done me a service," Hugh replied.
+
+"Tell me how, sir."
+
+"I can only tell you this, Fanny. You have shown me how to relieve your
+mistress of the doctor."
+
+For the first time, the maid's impenetrable composure completely failed
+her. The smouldering fire in Fanny Mere flamed up. She impulsively
+kissed Mountjoy's hand. The moment her lips touched it she shrank back:
+the natural pallor of her face became whiter than ever. Startled by the
+sudden change, Hugh asked if she was ill.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"It isn't that. Yours is the first man's hand I have kissed, since--"
+She checked herself. "I beg you won't ask me about it. I only meant to
+thank you, sir; I do thank you with all my heart--I mustn't stay here
+any longer."
+
+As she spoke the sound of a key was heard, opening the lock of the
+cottage-door. Lord Harry had returned.
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+THE CONQUEST OF MR. VIMPANY
+
+THE Irish lord came in--with his medical friend sulkily in attendance
+on him. He looked at Fanny, and asked where her mistress was.
+
+"My lady is in her room, sir."
+
+Hearing this, he turned sharply to Mountjoy. On the point of speaking,
+he seemed to think better of it, and went to his wife's room. The maid
+followed. "Get rid of him now," she whispered to Hugh, glancing at the
+doctor. Mr. Vimpany was in no very approachable humour--standing at the
+window, with his hands in his empty pockets, gloomily looking out. But
+Hugh was not disposed to neglect the opportunity; he ventured to say:
+"You don't seem to be in such good spirits as usual."
+
+The doctor gruffly expressed his opinion that Mr. Mountjoy would not be
+particularly cheerful, in his place. My lord had taken him to the
+office, on the distinct understanding that he was to earn a little
+pocket-money by becoming one of the contributors to the newspaper. And
+how had it ended? The editor had declared that his list of writers was
+full, and begged leave to suggest that Mr. Vimpany should wait for the
+next vacancy. A most impertinent proposal! Had Lord Harry--a
+proprietor, remember--exerted his authority? Not he! His lordship had
+dropped the doctor "like a hot potato," and had meanly submitted to his
+own servant. What did Mr. Mountjoy think of such conduct as that?
+
+Hugh answered the question, with his own end in view. Paving the way
+for Mr. Vimpany's departure from the cottage at Passy, he made a polite
+offer of his services.
+
+"Can't I help you out of your difficulty?" he said.
+
+"You!" cried the doctor. "Have you forgotten how you received me, sir,
+when I asked for a loan at your hotel in London?"
+
+Hugh admitted that he might have spoken hastily. "You took me by
+surprise," he said, "and (perhaps I was mistaken, on my side) I thought
+you were, to say the least of it, not particularly civil. You did
+certainly use threatening language when you left me. No man likes to be
+treated in that way."
+
+Mr. Vimpany's big bold eyes stared at Mountjoy in a state of
+bewilderment. "Are you trying to make a fool of me?" he asked.
+
+"I am incapable, Mr. Vimpany, of an act of rudeness towards anybody."
+
+"If you come to that," the doctor stoutly declared, "I am incapable
+too. It's plain to me that we have been misunderstanding each other.
+Wait a bit; I want to go back for a moment to that threatening language
+which you complained of just now. I was sorry for what I had said as
+soon as your door was shut on me. On my way downstairs I did think of
+turning back and making a friendly apology before I gave you up.
+Suppose I had done that?" Mr. Vimpany asked, wondering internally
+whether Mountjoy was foolish enough to believe him.
+
+Hugh advanced a little nearer to the design that he had in view.
+
+"You might have found me more kindly disposed towards you," he said,
+"than you had anticipated."
+
+This encouraging reply cost him an effort. He had stooped to the
+unworthy practice of perverting what he had said and done on a former
+occasion, to serve a present interest. Remind himself as he might of
+the end which, in the interests of Iris, did really appear to justify
+the means, he still sank to a place in his own estimation which he was
+honestly ashamed to occupy.
+
+Under other circumstances his hesitation, slight as it was, might have
+excited suspicion. As things were, Mr. Vimpany could only discover
+golden possibilities that dazzled his eyes. "I wonder whether you're in
+the humour," he said, "to be kindly disposed towards me now?"
+
+It was needless to be careful of the feelings of such man as this.
+"Suppose you had the money you want in your pocket," Hugh suggested,
+"what would you do with it?"
+
+"Go back to London, to be sure, and publish the first number of that
+work of mine I told you of."
+
+"And leave your friend, Lord Harry?"
+
+"What good is my friend to me? He's nearly as poor as I am--he sent for
+me to advise him--I put him up to a way of filling both our pockets,
+and he wouldn't hear of it. What sort of a friend do you call that?"
+
+Pay him and get rid of him. There was the course of proceeding
+suggested by the private counsellor in Mountjoy's bosom.
+
+"Have you got the publisher's estimate of expenses?" he asked.
+
+The doctor instantly produced the document.
+
+To a rich man the sum required was, after all, trifling enough.
+Mountjoy sat down at the writing-table. As he took up a pen, Mr.
+Vimpany's protuberant eyes looked as if they would fly out of his head.
+
+"If I lend you the money--" Hugh began.
+
+"Yes? Yes?" cried the doctor.
+
+"I do so on condition that nobody is to know of the loan but
+ourselves."
+
+"Oh, sir, on my sacred word of honour--" An order on Mountjoy's bankers
+in Paris for the necessary amount, with something added for travelling
+expenses, checked Mr. Vimpany in full career of protestation. He tried
+to begin again: "My friend! my benefactor--"
+
+He was stopped once more. His friend and benefactor pointed to the
+clock.
+
+"If you want the money to-day, you have just time to get to Paris
+before the bank closes."
+
+Mr. Vimpany did want the money--always wanted the money; his gratitude
+burst out for the third time: "God bless you!"
+
+The object of that highly original form of benediction pointed through
+the window in the direction of the railway station. Mr. Vimpany
+struggled no longer to express his feelings--he had made his last
+sacrifice to appearances--he caught the train.
+
+The door of the room had been left open. A voice outside said: "Has he
+gone?"
+
+"Come in, Fanny," said Mountjoy. "He will return to London either
+to-night or to-morrow morning."
+
+The strange maid put her head in at the door. "I'll be at the
+terminus," she said, "and make sure of him."
+
+Her head suddenly disappeared, before it was possible to speak to her
+again. "Was there some other person outside? The other person entered
+the room; it was Lord Harry. He spoke without his customary smile.
+
+"I want a word with you, Mr. Mountjoy."
+
+"About what, my lord?"
+
+That direct question seemed to confuse the Irishman. He hesitated.
+
+"About you," he said, and stopped to consider. "And another person," he
+added mysteriously.
+
+Hugh was constitutionally a hater of mysteries. He felt the need of a
+more definite reply, and asked for it plainly:
+
+"Does your lordship associate that other person with me?"
+
+"Yes, I do."
+
+"Who is the person?"
+
+"My wife."
+
+CHAPTER XXX
+
+SAXON AND CELT
+
+WHEN amicable relations between two men happen to be in jeopardy, there
+is least danger of an ensuing quarrel if the friendly intercourse has
+been of artificial growth, on either side. In this case, the promptings
+of self-interest, and the laws of politeness, have been animating
+influences throughout; acting under conditions which assist the effort
+of self-control. And for this reason: the man who has never really
+taken a high place in our regard is unprovided with those sharpest
+weapons of provocation, which make unendurable demands on human
+fortitude. In a true attachment, on the other hand, there is an
+innocent familiarity implied, which is forgetful of ceremony, and blind
+to consequences. The affectionate freedom which can speak kindly
+without effort is sensitive to offence, and can speak harshly without
+restraint. When the friend who wounds us has once been associated with
+the sacred memories of the heart, he strikes at a tender place, and no
+considerations of propriety are powerful enough to stifle our cry of
+rage and pain. The enemies who have once loved each other are the
+bitterest enemies of all.
+
+Thus, the curt exchange of question and answer, which had taken place
+in the cottage at Passy, between two gentlemen artificially friendly to
+one another, led to no regrettable result. Lord Harry had been too
+readily angry: he remembered what was due to Mr. Mountjoy. Mr. Mountjoy
+had been too thoughtlessly abrupt: he remembered what was due to Lord
+Harry. The courteous Irishman bowed, and pointed to a chair. The
+well-bred Englishman returned the polite salute, and sat down. My lord
+broke the silence that followed.
+
+"May I hope that you will excuse me," he began, "if I walk about the
+room? Movement seems to help me when I am puzzled how to put things
+nicely. Sometimes I go round and round the subject, before I get at it.
+I'm afraid I'm going round and round, now. Have you arranged to make a
+long stay in Paris?"
+
+Circumstances, Mountjoy answered, would probably decide him.
+
+"You have no doubt been many times in Paris before this," Lord Harry
+continued. "Do you find it at all dull, now?"
+
+Wondering what he could possibly mean, Hugh said he never found Paris
+dull--and waited for further enlightenment. The Irish lord persisted:
+
+"People mostly think Paris isn't as gay as it used to be. Not such good
+plays and such good actors as they had at one time. The restaurants
+inferior, and society very much mixed. People don't stay there as long
+as they used. I'm told that Americans are getting disappointed, and are
+trying London for a change."
+
+Could he have any serious motive for this irrelevant way of talking? Or
+was he, to judge by his own account of himself, going round and round
+the subject of his wife and his guest, before he could get at it?
+
+Suspecting him of jealousy from the first, Hugh failed--naturally
+perhaps in his position--to understand the regard for Iris, and the
+fear of offending her, by which her jealous husband was restrained.
+Lord Harry was attempting (awkwardly indeed!) to break off the
+relations between his wife and her friend, by means which might keep
+the true state of his feelings concealed from both of them. Ignorant of
+this claim on his forbearance, it was Mountjoy's impression that he was
+being trifled with. Once more, he waited for enlightenment, and waited
+in silence.
+
+"You don't find my conversation interesting?" Lord Harry remarked,
+still with perfect good-humour.
+
+"I fail to see the connection," Mountjoy acknowledged, "between what
+you have said so far, and the subject on which you expressed your
+intention of speaking to me. Pray forgive me if I appear to hurry
+you--or if you have any reasons for hesitation."
+
+Far from being offended, this incomprehensible man really appeared to
+be pleased. "You read me like a book!" he exclaimed. "It's hesitation
+that's the matter with me. I'm a variable man. If there's something
+disagreeable to say, there are times when I dash at it, and times when
+I hang back. Can I offer you any refreshment?" he asked, getting away
+from the subject again, without so much as an attempt at concealment.
+
+Hugh thanked him, and declined.
+
+"Not even a glass of wine? Such white Burgundy, my dear sir, as you
+seldom taste."
+
+Hugh's British obstinacy was roused; he repeated his reply. Lord Harry
+looked at him gravely, and made a nearer approach to an open confession
+of feeling than he had ventured on yet.
+
+"With regard now to my wife. When I went away this morning with
+Vimpany--he's not such good company as he used to be; soured by
+misfortune, poor devil; I wish he would go back to London. As I was
+saying--I mean as I was about to say--I left you and Lady Harry
+together this morning; two old friends, glad (as I supposed) to have a
+gossip about old times. When I come back, I find you left here alone,
+and I am told that Lady Harry is in her room. What do I see when I get
+there? I see the finest pair of eyes in the world; and the tale they
+tell me is, We have been crying. When I ask what may have happened to
+account for this--'Nothing, dear,' is all the answer I get. What's the
+impression naturally produced on my mind? There has been a quarrel
+perhaps between you and my wife."
+
+"I fail entirely, Lord Harry, to see it in that light."
+
+"Ah, likely enough! Mine's the Irish point of view. As an Englishman
+you fail to understand it. Let that be. One thing; Mr. Mountjoy, I'll
+take the freedom of saying at once. I'll thank you, next time, to
+quarrel with Me."
+
+"You force me to tell you, my lord, that you are under a complete
+delusion, if you suppose that there has been any quarrel, or approach
+to a quarrel, between Lady Harry and myself."
+
+"You tell me that, on your word of honour as a gentleman?"
+
+"Most assuredly!"
+
+"Sir! I deeply regret to hear it."
+
+"Which does your lordship deeply regret? That I have spoken to you on
+my word of honour, or that I have not quarrelled with Lady Harry?"
+
+"Both, sir! By the piper that played before Moses, both!"
+
+Hugh got up, and took his hat: "We may have a better chance of
+understanding each other," he suggested, "if you will be so good as to
+write to me."
+
+"Put your hat down again, Mr. Mountjoy, and pray have a moment's
+patience. I've tried to like you, sir--and I'm bound in candour to own
+that I've failed to find a bond of union between us. Maybe, this frank
+confession annoys you."
+
+"Far from it! You are going straight to your subject at last, if I may
+venture to say so."
+
+The Irish lord's good-humour had completely disappeared by this time.
+His handsome face hardened, and his voice rose. The outbreak of jealous
+feeling, which motives honourable to himself had hitherto controlled,
+now seized on its freedom of expression. His language betrayed (as on
+some former occasions) that association with unworthy companions, which
+had been one of the evil results of his adventurous life.
+
+"Maybe I'll go straighter than you bargain for," he replied; "I'm in
+two humours about you. My common-sense tells me that you're my wife's
+friend. And the best of friends do sometimes quarrel, don't they? Well,
+sir, you deny it, on your own account. I find myself forced back on my
+other humour--and it's a black humour, I can tell you. You may be my
+wife's friend, my fine fellow, but you're something more than that. You
+have always been in love with her--and you're in love with her now.
+Thank you for your visit, but don't repeat it. Say! do we understand
+each other at last?"
+
+"I have too sincere a respect for Lady Harry to answer you," Mountjoy
+said. "At the same time, let me acknowledge my obligations to your
+lordship. You have reminded me that I did a foolish thing when I called
+here without an invitation. I agree with you that the sooner my mistake
+is set right the better."
+
+He replied in those words, and left the cottage.
+
+On the way back to his hotel, Hugh thought of what Mrs. Vimpany had
+said to him when they had last seen each other: "Don't forget that
+there is an obstacle between you and Iris which will put even your
+patience and your devotion to a hard trial." The obstacle of the
+husband had set itself up, and had stopped him already.
+
+His own act (a necessary act after the language that had been addressed
+to him) had closed the doors of the cottage, and had put an end to
+future meetings between Iris and himself. If they attempted to
+communicate by letter, Lord Harry would have opportunities of
+discovering their correspondence, of which his jealousy would certainly
+avail itself. Through the wakeful night, Hugh's helpless situation was
+perpetually in his thoughts. There seemed to be no present alternative
+before him but resignation, and a return to England.
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI
+
+THE SCHOOL FOR HUSBANDS
+
+ON the next day Mountjoy heard news of Iris, which was not of a nature
+to relieve his anxieties. He received a visit from Fanny Mere.
+
+The leave-taking of Mr. Vimpany, on the previous evening, was the first
+event which the maid had to relate. She had been present when the
+doctor said good-bye to the master and mistress. Business in London was
+the reason he gave for going away. The master had taken the excuse as
+if he really believed in it, and seemed to be glad to get rid of his
+friend. The mistress expressed her opinion that Mr. Vimpany's return to
+London must have been brought about by an act of liberality on the part
+of the most generous of living men. _"Your_ friend has, as I believe,
+got some money from _my_ friend," she said to her husband. My lord had
+looked at her very strangely when she spoke of Mr. Mountjoy in that
+way, and had walked out of the room. As soon as his back was turned,
+Fanny had obtained leave of absence. She had carried out her intention
+of watching the terminus, and had seen Mr. Vimpany take his place among
+the passengers to London by the mail train.
+
+Returning to the cottage, it was Fanny's duty to ascertain if her
+services were required in her mistress's room.
+
+On reaching the door, she had heard the voices of my lord and my lady,
+and (as Mr. Mountjoy would perhaps be pleased to know) had been too
+honourable to listen outside, on this occasion. She had at once gone
+away, and had waited until she should be sent for. After a long
+interval, the bell that summoned her had been rung. She had found the
+mistress in a state of agitation, partly angry, and partly distressed;
+and had ventured to ask if anything unpleasant had happened. No reply
+was made to that inquiry. Fanny had silently performed the customary
+duties of the night-toilet, in getting my lady ready for bed; they had
+said good-night to each other and had said no more.
+
+In the morning (that present morning), being again in attendance as
+usual, the maid had found Lady Harry in a more indulgent frame of mind;
+still troubled by anxieties, but willing to speak of them now.
+
+She had begun by talking of Mr. Mountjoy:
+
+"I think you like him, Fanny: everybody likes him. You will be sorry to
+hear that we have no prospect of seeing him again at the cottage."
+There she had stopped; something that she had not said, yet, seemed to
+be in her mind, and to trouble her. She was near to crying, poor soul,
+but struggled against it. "I have no sister," she said, "and no friend
+who might be like a sister to me. It isn't perhaps quite right to speak
+of my sorrow to my maid. Still, there is something hard to bear in
+having no kind heart near one--I mean, no other woman to speak to who
+knows what women feel. It is so lonely here--oh, so lonely! I wonder
+whether you understand me and pity me?" Never forgetting all that she
+owed to her mistress--if she might say so without seeming to praise
+herself--Fanny was truly sorry. It would have been a relief to her, if
+she could have freely expressed her opinion that my lord must be to
+blame, when my lady was in trouble. Being a man, he was by nature cruel
+to women; the wisest thing his poor wife could do would be to expect
+nothing from him. The maid was sorely tempted to offer a little good
+advice to this effect; but she was afraid of her own remembrances, if
+she encouraged them by speaking out boldly. It would be better to wait
+for what the mistress might say next.
+
+Lord Harry's conduct was the first subject that presented itself when
+the conversation was resumed.
+
+My lady mentioned that she had noticed how he looked, and how he left
+the room, when she had spoken in praise of Mr. Mountjoy. She had
+pressed him to explain himself---and she had made a discovery which
+proved to be the bitterest disappointment of her life. Her husband
+suspected her! Her husband was jealous of her! It was too cruel; it was
+an insult beyond endurance, an insult to Mr. Mountjoy as well as to
+herself. If that best and dearest of good friends was to be forbidden
+the house, if he was to go away and never to see her or speak to her
+again, of one thing she was determined--he should not leave her without
+a kind word of farewell; he should hear how truly she valued him; yes,
+and how she admired and felt for him! Would Fanny not do the same
+thing, in her place? And Fanny had remembered the time when she might
+have done it for such a man as Mr. Mountjoy. "Mind you stay indoors
+this evening, sir," the maid continued, looking and speaking so
+excitedly that Hugh hardly knew her again. "My mistress is coming to
+see you, and I shall come with her."
+
+Such an act of imprudence was incredible. "You must be out of your
+senses!" Mountjoy exclaimed.
+
+"I'm out of myself sir, if that's what you mean," Fanny answered. "I do
+so enjoy treating a man in that way! The master's going out to
+dinner--he'll know nothing about it--and," cried the cool cold woman of
+other times, "he richly deserves it."
+
+Hugh reasoned and remonstrated, and failed to produce the slightest
+effect.
+
+His next effort was to write a few lines to Lady Harry, entreating her
+to remember that a jealous man is sometimes capable of acts of the
+meanest duplicity, and that she might be watched. When he gave the note
+to Fanny to deliver, she informed him respectfully that he had better
+not trust her. A person sometimes meant to do right (she reminded him),
+and sometimes ended in doing wrong. Rather than disappoint her
+mistress, she was quite capable of tearing up the letter, on her way
+home, and saying nothing about it. Hugh tried a threat next: "Your
+mistress will not find me, if she comes here; I shall go out to-night."
+The impenetrable maid looked at him with a pitying smile, and answered:
+
+"Not you!"
+
+It was a humiliating reflection--but Fanny Mere understood him better
+than he understood himself.
+
+All that Mountjoy had said and done in the way of protest, had been
+really dictated by consideration for the young wife. If he questioned
+his conscience, selfish delight in the happy prospect of seeing Iris
+again asserted itself, as the only view with which he looked forward to
+the end of the day. When the evening approached, he took the precaution
+of having his own discreet and faithful servant in attendance, to
+receive Lady Harry at the door of the hotel, before the ringing of the
+bell could summon the porter from his lodge. On calm consideration, the
+chances seemed to be in favour of her escaping detection by Lord Harry.
+The jealous husband of the stage, who sooner (or later) discovers the
+innocent (or guilty) couple, as the case may be, is not always the
+husband of the world outside the theatre. With this fragment of
+experience present in his mind, Hugh saw the door of his sitting-room
+cautiously opened, at an earlier hour than he had anticipated. His
+trustworthy representative introduced a lady, closely veiled--and that
+lady was Iris.
+
+CHAPTER XXXII
+
+GOOD-BYE TO IRIS
+
+LADY HARRY lifted her veil, and looked at Mountjoy with sad entreaty in
+her eyes. "Are you angry with me?" she asked.
+
+"I ought to be angry with you," he said. "This is a very imprudent,
+Iris."
+
+"It's worse than that," she confessed. "It's reckless and desperate.
+Don't say I ought to have controlled myself. I can't control the shame
+I feel when I think of what has happened. Can I let you go--oh, what a
+return for your kindness!--without taking your hand at parting? Come
+and sit by me on the sofa. After my poor husband's conduct, you and I
+are not likely to meet again. I don't expect you to lament it as I do.
+Even your sweetness and your patience--so often tried--must be weary of
+me now."
+
+"If you thought that possible, my dear, you would not have come here
+to-night," Hugh reminded her. "While we live, we have the hope of
+meeting again. Nothing in this world lasts, Iris--not even jealousy.
+Lord Harry himself told me that he was a variable man. Sooner or later
+he will come to his senses."
+
+Those words seemed to startle Iris. "I hope you don't think that my
+husband is brutal to me!" she exclaimed, still resenting even the
+appearance of a reflection on her marriage, and still forgetting what
+she herself had said which justified a doubt of her happiness. "Have
+you formed a wrong impression?" she went on. "Has Fanny Mere
+innocently--?"
+
+Mountjoy noticed, for the first time, the absence of the maid. It was a
+circumstance which justified him in interrupting Iris--for it might
+seriously affect her if her visit to the hotel happened to be
+discovered.
+
+"I understood," he said, "that Fanny was to come here with you."
+
+"Yes! yes! She is waiting in the carriage. We are careful not to excite
+attention at the door of the hotel; the coachman will drive up and down
+the street till I want him again. Never mind that! I have something to
+say to you about Fanny. She thinks of her own troubles, poor soul, when
+she talks to me, and exaggerates a little without meaning it. I hope
+she has not misled you in speaking of her master. It is base and bad of
+him, unworthy of a gentleman, to be jealous--and he has wounded me
+deeply. But dear Hugh, his jealousy is a gentle jealousy. I have heard
+of other men who watch their wives--who have lost all confidence in
+them--who would even have taken away from me such a trifle as this."
+She smiled, and showed to Mountjoy her duplicate key of the cottage
+door. "Ah, Harry is above such degrading distrust as that! There are
+times when he is as heartily ashamed of his own weakness as I could
+wish him to be. I have seen him on his knees before me, shocked at his
+conduct. He is no hypocrite. Indeed, his repentance is sincere, while
+it lasts--only it doesn't last! His jealousy rises and falls, like the
+wind. He said last night (when the wind was high): 'If you wish to make
+me the happiest creature on the face of the earth, don't encourage Mr.
+Mountjoy to remain in Paris!' Try to make allowances for him!"
+
+"I would rather make allowances, Iris, for you. Do _you,_ too wish me
+to leave Paris?"
+
+Sitting very near to him--nearer than her husband might have liked to
+see--Iris drew away a little. "Did you mean to be cruel in saying
+that?" she asked. "I don't deserve it."
+
+"It was kindly meant," Hugh assured her. "If I can make your position
+more endurable by going away, I will leave Paris to-morrow."
+
+Iris moved back again to the place which she had already occupied. She
+was eager to thank him (for a reason not yet mentioned) as she had
+never thanked him yet. Silently and softly she offered her gratitude to
+Hugh, by offering her cheek. The irritating influence of Lord Harry's
+jealousy was felt by both of them at that moment. He kissed her
+cheek--and lingered over it. She was the first to recover herself.
+
+"When you spoke just now of my position with my husband," she said,
+"you reminded me of anxieties, Hugh, in which you once shared, and of
+services which I can never forget."
+
+Preparing him in those words for the disclosure which she had now to
+make, Iris alluded to the vagabond life of adventure which Lord Harry
+had led. The restlessness in his nature which that life implied, had
+latterly shown itself again; and his wife had traced the cause to a
+letter from Ireland, communicating a report that the assassin of Arthur
+Mountjoy had been seen in London, and was supposed to be passing under
+the name of Carrigeen. Hugh would understand that the desperate
+resolution to revenge the murder of his friend, with which Lord Harry
+had left England in the past time, had been urged into action once
+more. He had not concealed from Iris that she must be resigned to his
+leaving her for awhile, if the report which had reached him from
+Ireland proved to be true. It would be useless, and worse than useless,
+to remind this reckless man of the danger that threatened him from the
+Invincibles, if he returned to England. In using her power of
+influencing the husband who still loved her, Iris could only hope to
+exercise a salutary restraint in her own domestic interests, appealing
+to him for indulgence by careful submission to any exactions on which
+his capricious jealousy might insist. Would sad necessity excuse her,
+if she accepted Mountjoy's offer to leave Paris, for the one reason
+that her husband had asked it of her as a favour?
+
+Hugh at once understood her motive, and assured her of his sympathy.
+
+"You may depend upon my returning to London to-morrow," he said. "In
+the meantime, is there no better way in which I can be of use to you?
+If your influence fails, do you see any other chance of keeping Lord
+Harry's desperate purpose under control?"
+
+It had only that day occurred to Iris that there might be some prospect
+of an encouraging result, if she could obtain the assistance of Mrs.
+Vimpany.
+
+The doctor's wife was well acquainted with Lord Harry's past life, when
+he happened to be in Ireland; and she had met many of his countrymen
+with whom he had associated. If one of those friends happened to be the
+officious person who had written to him, it was at least possible that
+Mrs. Vimpany's discreet interference might prevent his mischievous
+correspondent from writing again. Lord Harry, waiting for more news,
+would in this event wait in vain. He would not know where to go, or
+what to do next--and, with such a nature as his, the end of his
+patience and the end of his resolution were likely to come together.
+
+Hugh handed his pocket-book to Iris. Of the poor chances in her favour,
+the last was to his mind the least hopeless of the two.
+
+"If you have discovered the name of your husband's correspondent," he
+said, "write it down for me, and I will ask Mrs. Vimpany if she knows
+him. I will make your excuses for not having written to her lately;
+and, in any case, I answer for her being ready to help you."
+
+As Iris thanked him and wrote the name, the clock on the chimneypiece
+struck the hour.
+
+She rose to say farewell. With a restless hand she half-lowered her
+veil, and raised it again. "You won't mind my crying," she said
+faintly, trying to smile through her tears. "This is the saddest
+parting I have ever known. Dear, dear Hugh--good-bye!"
+
+Great is the law of Duty; but the elder law of Love claims its higher
+right. Never, in all the years of their friendship, had they forgotten
+themselves as they forgot themselves now. For the first time her lips
+met his lips, in their farewell kiss. In a moment more, they remembered
+the restraints which honour imposed on them; they were only friends
+again. Silently she lowered her veil. Silently he took her arm and led
+her down to the carriage. It was moving away from them at a slow pace,
+towards the other end of the street. Instead of waiting for its return,
+they followed and overtook it.
+
+"We shall meet again," he whispered.
+
+She answered sadly: "Don't forget me."
+
+Mountjoy turned back. As he approached the hotel he noticed a tall man
+crossing from the opposite side of the street. Not two minutes after
+Iris was on her way home, her jealous husband and her old friend met at
+the hotel door.
+
+Lord Harry spoke first. "I have been dining out," he said, "and I came
+here to have a word with you, Mr. Mountjoy, on my road home."
+
+Hugh answered with formal politeness: "Let me show your lordship the
+way to my rooms."
+
+"Oh, it's needless to trouble you," Lord Harry declared. "I have so
+little to say--do you mind walking on with me for a few minutes?"
+
+Mountjoy silently complied. He was thinking of what might have happened
+if Iris had delayed her departure--or if the movement of the carriage
+had been towards, instead of away from the hotel. In either case it had
+been a narrow escape for the wife, from a dramatic discovery by the
+husband.
+
+"We Irishmen," Lord Harry resumed, "are not famous for always obeying
+the laws; but it is in our natures to respect the law of hospitality.
+When you were at the cottage yesterday I was inhospitable to my guest.
+My rude behaviour has weighed on my mind since--and for that reason I
+have come here to speak to you. It was ill-bred on my part to reproach
+you with your visit, and to forbid you (oh, quite needlessly, I don't
+doubt!) to call on me again. If I own that I have no desire to propose
+a renewal of friendly intercourse between us, you will understand me, I
+am sure; with my way of thinking, the less we see of each other for the
+future, the better it may be. But, for what I said when my temper ran
+away with me, I ask you to accept my excuses, and the sincere
+expression of my regret."
+
+"Your excuses are accepted, my lord, as sincerely as you have offered
+them," Mountjoy answered. "So far as I am concerned, the incident is
+forgotten from this moment."
+
+Lord Harry expressed his courteous acknowledgments. "Spoken as becomes
+a gentleman," he said. "I thank you."
+
+There it ended. They saluted each other; they wished each other
+good-night. "A mere formality!" Hugh thought, when they had parted.
+
+He had wronged the Irish lord in arriving at that conclusion. But time
+was to pass before events helped him to discover his error.
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII
+
+THE DECREE OF FATE
+
+ON his arrival in London, Mountjoy went to the Nurses' Institute to
+inquire for Mrs. Vimpany.
+
+She was again absent, in attendance on another patient. The address of
+the house (known only to the matron) was, on this occasion, not to be
+communicated to any friend who might make inquiries. A bad case of
+scarlet fever had been placed under the nurse's care, and the danger of
+contagion was too serious to be trifled with.
+
+The events which had led to Mrs. Vimpany's present employment had not
+occurred in the customary course.
+
+A nurse who had recently joined the Institute had been first engaged to
+undertake the case, at the express request of the suffering person--who
+was said to be distantly related to the young woman. On the morning
+when she was about to proceed to the scene of her labours, news had
+reached her of the dangerous illness of her mother. Mrs. Vimpany, who
+was free at the time, and who felt a friendly interest in her young
+colleague, volunteered to take her place. Upon this, a strange request
+had been addressed to the matron, on behalf of the sick man. He desired
+to be "informed of it, if the new nurse was an Irishwoman." Hearing
+that she was an Englishwoman, he at once accepted her services, being
+himself (as an additional element of mystery in the matter) an
+Irishman!
+
+The matron's English prejudices at once assumed that there had been
+some discreditable event in the man's life, which might be made a
+subject of scandalous exposure if he was attended by one of his own
+countrypeople. She advised Mrs. Vimpany to have nothing to do with the
+afflicted stranger. The nurse answered that she had promised to attend
+on him--and she kept her promise.
+
+Mountjoy left the Institute, after vainly attempting to obtain Mrs.
+Vimpany's address. The one concession which the matron offered to make
+was to direct his letter, and send it to the post, if he would be
+content with that form of communication.
+
+On reflection, he decided to write the letter.
+
+Prompt employment of time might be of importance, if it was possible to
+prevent any further communication with Lord Larry on the part of his
+Irish correspondent. Using the name with which Iris had provided him,
+Hugh wrote to inquire if it was familiar to Mrs. Vimpany, as the name
+of a person with whom she had been, at any time, acquainted. In this
+event, he assured her that an immediate consultation between them was
+absolutely necessary in the interests of Iris. He added, in a
+postscript, that he was in perfect health, and that he had no fear of
+infection--and sent his letter to the matron to be forwarded.
+
+The reply reached him late in the evening. It was in the handwriting of
+a stranger, and was to this effect:
+
+"Dear Mr. Mountjoy,--It is impossible that I can allow you to run the
+risk of seeing me while I am in my present situation. So serious is the
+danger of contagion in scarlet fever, that I dare not even write to you
+with my own hand on note-paper which has been used in the sick room.
+This is no mere fancy of mine; the doctor in attendance here knows of a
+case in which a small piece of infected flannel communicated the
+disease after an interval of no less than a year. I must trust to your
+own good sense to see the necessity of waiting, until I can receive you
+without any fear of consequences to yourself. In the meantime, I may
+answer your inquiry relating to the name communicated in your letter. I
+first knew the gentleman you mention some years since; we were
+introduced to each other by Lord Harry; and I saw him afterwards on
+more than one occasion."
+
+Mountjoy read this wise and considerate reply to his letter with
+indignation.
+
+Here was the good fortune for which he had not dared to hope, declaring
+itself in favour of Iris. Here (if Mrs. Vimpany could be persuaded to
+write to her friend) was the opportunity offered of keeping the
+hot-tempered Irish husband passive and harmless, by keeping him without
+further news of the assassin of Arthur Mountjoy. Under these
+encouraging circumstances the proposed consultation which might have
+produced such excellent results had been rejected; thanks to a
+contemptible fear of infection, excited by a story of a trumpery piece
+of flannel!
+
+Hugh snatched up the unfortunate letter (cast away on the floor) to
+tear it in pieces and throw it into the waste-paper basket--and checked
+himself. His angry hand had seized on it with the blank leaf of the
+note-paper uppermost.
+
+On that leaf he discovered two little lines of print, presenting, in
+the customary form, the address of the house at which the letter had
+been written! The writer, in taking the sheet of paper from the case,
+must have accidentally turned it wrong side uppermost on the desk, and
+had not cared to re-copy the letter, or had not discovered the mistake.
+Restored to his best good-humour, Hugh resolved to surprise Mrs.
+Vimpany by a visit, on the next day, which would set the theory of
+contagion at defiance, and render valuable service to Iris at a crisis
+in her life.
+
+Having time before him for reflection, in the course of the evening, he
+was at no loss to discover a formidable obstacle in the way of his
+design.
+
+Whether he gave his name or concealed his name, when he asked for Mrs.
+Vimpany at the house-door, she would in either case refuse to see him.
+The one accessible person whom he could consult in this difficulty was
+his faithful old servant.
+
+That experienced man--formerly employed, at various times, in the army,
+in the police, and in service at a public school--obtained leave to
+make some preliminary investigations on the next morning.
+
+He achieved two important discoveries. In the first place, Mrs. Vimpany
+was living in the house in which the letter to his master had been
+written. In the second place, there was a page attached to the domestic
+establishment (already under notice to leave his situation), who was
+accessible to corruption by means of a bribe. The boy would be on the
+watch for Mr. Mountjoy at two o'clock on that day, and would show him
+where to find Mrs. Vimpany, in the room near the sick man, in which she
+was accustomed to take her meals.
+
+Hugh acted on his instructions, and found the page waiting to admit him
+secretly to the house. Leading the way upstairs, the boy pointed with
+one hand to a door on the second floor, and held out the other hand to
+receive his money. While he pocketed the bribe, and disappeared,
+Mountjoy opened the door.
+
+Mrs. Vimpany was seated at a table waiting for her dinner. When Hugh
+showed himself she started to her feet with a cry of alarm.
+
+"Are you mad?" she exclaimed. "How did you get here? What do you want
+here? Don't come near me!"
+
+She attempted to pass Hugh on her way out of the room. He caught her by
+the arm, led her back to her chair, and forced her to seat herself
+again. "Iris is in trouble," he pleaded, "and you can help her."
+
+"The fever!" she cried, heedless of what he had said. "Keep back from
+me--the fever!"
+
+For the second time she tried to get out of the room. For the second
+time Hugh stopped her.
+
+"Fever or no fever," he persisted, "I have something to say to you. In
+two minutes I shall have said it, and I will go."
+
+In the fewest possible words he described the situation of Iris with
+her jealous husband. Mrs. Vimpany indignantly interrupted him.
+
+"Are you running this dreadful risk," she asked, "with nothing to say
+to me that I don't know already? Her husband jealous of her? Of course
+he is jealous of her! Leave me--or I will ring for the servant."
+
+"Ring, if you like," Hugh answered; "but hear this first. My letter to
+you alluded to a consultation between us, which might be necessary in
+the interests of Iris. Imagine her situation if you can! The assassin
+of Arthur Mountjoy is reported to be in London; and Lord Harry has
+heard of it."
+
+Mrs. Vimpany looked at him with horror in her eyes.
+
+"Gracious God!" she cried, "the man is here--under my care. Oh, I am
+not in the conspiracy to hide the wretch! I knew no more of him than
+you do when I offered to nurse him. The names that have escaped him, in
+his delirium, have told me the truth."
+
+As she spoke, a second door in the room was opened. An old woman showed
+herself for a moment, trembling with terror. "He's breaking out again,
+nurse! Help me to hold him!"
+
+Mrs. Vimpany instantly followed the woman into the bed-room. "Wait and
+listen," she said to Mountjoy--and left the door open.
+
+The quick, fierce, muttering tones of a man in delirium were now
+fearfully audible. His maddened memory was travelling back over his own
+horrible life. He put questions to himself; he answered himself:
+
+"Who drew the lot to kill the traitor? I did! I did! Who shot him on
+the road, before he could get to the wood? I did! I did! Arthur
+Mountjoy, traitor to Ireland. Set that on his tombstone, and disgrace
+him for ever. Listen, boys--listen! There is a patriot among you. I am
+the patriot--preserved by a merciful Providence. Ha, my Lord Harry,
+search the earth and search the sea, the patriot is out of your reach!
+Nurse! What's that the doctor said of me? The fever will kill him?
+Well, what does that matter, as long as Lord Harry doesn't kill me?
+Open the doors, and let everybody hear of it. I die the death of a
+saint--the greatest of all saints--the saint who shot Arthur Mountjoy.
+Oh, the heat, the heat, the burning raging heat!" The tortured creature
+burst into a dreadful cry of rage and pain. It was more than Hugh's
+resolution could support. He hurried out of the house.
+
+         * * * * * * * *
+
+Ten days passed. A letter, in a strange handwriting, reached Iris at
+Passy.
+
+The first part of the letter was devoted to the Irish desperado, whom
+Mrs. Vimpany had attended in his illness.
+
+When she only knew him as a suffering fellow-creature she had promised
+to be his nurse. Did the discovery that he was an assassin justify
+desertion, or even excuse neglect? No! the nursing art, like the
+healing art, is an act of mercy--in itself too essentially noble to
+inquire whether the misery that it relieves merits help. All that
+experience, all that intelligence, all that care could offer, the nurse
+gave to the man whose hand she would have shrunk from touching in
+friendship, after she had saved his life.
+
+A time had come when the fever threatened to take Lord Harry's
+vengeance out of his hands. The crisis of the disease declared itself.
+With the shadow of death on him, the wretch lived through it--saved by
+his strong constitution, and by the skilled and fearless woman who
+attended on him. At the period of his convalescence, friends from
+Ireland (accompanied by a medical man of their own choosing) presented
+themselves at the house, and asked for him by the name under which he
+passed--Carrigeen. With every possible care, he was removed; to what
+destination had never been discovered. From that time, all trace of him
+had been lost.
+
+Terrible news followed on the next page.
+
+The subtle power of infection had asserted itself against the poor
+mortal who had defied it. Hugh Mountjoy, stricken by the man who had
+murdered his brother, lay burning under the scarlet fire of the fever.
+
+But the nurse watched by him, night and day.
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV
+
+MY LORD'S MIND
+
+HERE, my old-vagabond-Vimpany, is an interesting case for you--the cry
+of a patient with a sick mind.
+
+Look over it, and prescribe for your wild Irish friend, if you can.
+
+You will perhaps remember that I have never thoroughly trusted you, in
+all the years since we have known each other. At this later date in our
+lives, when I ought to see more clearly than ever what an unfathomable
+man you are, am I rash enough to be capable of taking you into my
+confidence?
+
+I don't know what I am going to do; I feel like a man who has been
+stunned. To be told that the murderer of Arthur Mountjoy had been seen
+in London--to be prepared to trace him by his paltry assumed name of
+Carrigeen--to wait vainly for the next discovery which might bring him
+within reach of retribution at my hands--and then to be overwhelmed by
+the news of his illness, his recovery, and his disappearance: these are
+the blows which have stupefied me. Only think of it! He has escaped me
+for the second time. Fever that kills thousands of harmless creatures
+has spared the assassin. He may yet die in his bed, and be buried, with
+the guiltless dead around him, in a quiet churchyard. I can't get over
+it; I shall never get over it.
+
+Add to this, anxieties about my wife, and maddening letters from
+creditors--and don't expect me to write reasonably.
+
+What I want to know is whether your art (or whatever you call it) can
+get at my diseased mind, through my healthy body. You have more than
+once told me that medicine can do this. The time has come for doing it.
+I am in a bad way, and a bad end may follow. My only medical friend,
+deliver me from myself.
+
+In any case, let me beg you to keep your temper while you read what
+follows.
+
+I have to confess that the devil whose name is Jealousy has entered
+into me, and is threatening the tranquillity of my married life. You
+dislike Iris, I know--and she returns your hostile feeling towards her.
+Try to do my wife justice, nevertheless, as I do. I don't believe my
+distrust of her has any excuse--and yet, I am jealous. More
+unreasonable still, I am as fond of her as I was in the first days of
+the honeymoon. Is she as fond as ever of me? You were a married man
+when I was a boy. Let me give you the means of forming an opinion by a
+narrative of her conduct, under (what I admit to have been) very trying
+circumstances.
+
+When the first information reached Iris of Hugh Mountjoy's dangerous
+illness, we were at breakfast. It struck her dumb. She handed the
+letter to me, and left the table.
+
+I hate a man who doesn't know what it is to want money; I hate a man
+who keeps his temper; I hate a man who pretends to be my wife's friend,
+and who is secretly in love with her all the time. What difference did
+it make to me whether Hugh Mountjoy ended in living or dying? If I had
+any interest in the matter, it ought by rights (seeing that I am
+jealous of him) to be an interest in his death. Well! I declare
+positively that the alarming news from London spoilt my breakfast There
+is something about that friend of my wife--that smug, prosperous,
+well-behaved Englishman--which seems to plead for him (God knows how!)
+when my mind is least inclined in his favour. While I was reading about
+his illness, I found myself hoping that he would recover--and, I give
+you my sacred word of honour, I hated him all the time.
+
+My Irish friend is mad--you will say. Your Irish friend, my dear
+follow, does not dispute it.
+
+Let us get back to my wife. She showed herself again after a long
+absence, having something (at last) to say to her husband.
+
+"I am innocently to blame," she began, "for the dreadful misfortune
+that has fallen on Mr. Mountjoy. If I had not given him a message to
+Mrs. Vimpany, he would never have insisted on seeing her, and would
+never have caught the fever. It may help me to bear my misery of
+self-reproach and suspense, if I am kept informed of his illness. There
+is no fear of infection by my receiving letters. I am to write to a
+friend of Mrs. Vimpany, who lives in another house, and who will answer
+my inquiries. Do you object, dear Harry, to my getting news of Hugh
+Mountjoy every day, while he is in danger?"
+
+I was perfectly willing that she should get that news, and she ought to
+have known it.
+
+It seemed to me to be also a bad sign that she made her request with
+dry eyes. She must have cried, when she first heard that he was likely
+to sink under an attack of fever. Why were her tears kept hidden in her
+own room? When she came back to me, her face was pale and hard and
+tearless. Don't you think she might have forgotten my jealousy, when I
+was so careful myself not to show it? My own belief is that she was
+longing to go to London, and help your wife to nurse the poor man, and
+catch the fever, and die with him if _he_ died.
+
+Is this bitter? Perhaps it is. Tear it off, and light your pipe with
+it.
+
+Well, the correspondence relating to the sick man continued every day;
+and every day--oh, Vimpany, another concession to my jealousy!--she
+handed the letters to me to read. I made excuses (we Irish are good at
+that, if we are good at nothing else), and declined to read the medical
+reports. One morning, when she opened the letter of that day, there
+passed over her a change which is likely to remain in my memory as long
+as I live. Never have I seen such an ecstasy of happiness in any
+woman's face, as I saw when she read the lines which informed her that
+the fever was mastered. Iris is sweet and delicate and bright--
+essentially fascinating, in a word. But she was never a beautiful
+woman, until she knew that Mountjoy's life was safe; and she will never
+be a beautiful woman again, unless the time comes when my death leaves
+her free to marry him. On her wedding-day, he will see the
+transformation that I saw--and he will be dazzled as I was.
+
+She looked at me, as if she expected me to speak.
+
+"I am glad indeed," I said, "that he is out of danger."
+
+She ran to me--she kissed me; I wouldn't have believed it was in her to
+give such kisses. "Now I have your sympathy," she said, "my happiness
+is complete!" Do you think I was indebted for these kisses to myself or
+to that other man? No, no--here is an unworthy doubt. I discard it.
+Vile suspicion shall not wrong Iris this time.
+
+And yet----
+
+Shall I go on, and write the rest of it?
+
+Poor, dear Arthur Mountjoy once told me of a foreign author, who was in
+great doubt of the right answer to some tough question that troubled
+him. He went into his garden and threw a stone at a tree. If he hit the
+tree, the answer would be--Yes. If he missed the tree, the answer would
+be--No. I am going into the garden to imitate the foreign author. You
+shall hear how it ends.
+
+I have hit the tree. As a necessary consequence, I must go on and write
+the rest of it.
+
+There is a growing estrangement between Iris and myself--and my
+jealousy doesn't altogether account for it. Sometimes, it occurs to me
+that we are thinking of what our future relations with Mountjoy are
+likely to be, and are ashamed to confess it to each other.
+Sometimes--and perhaps this second, and easiest, guess may be the right
+one--I am apt to conclude that we are only anxious about money matters.
+I am waiting for her to touch on the subject, and she is waiting for
+me; and there we are at a deadlock.
+
+I wish I had some reason for going to some other place. I wish I was
+lost among strangers. I should like to find myself in a state of
+danger, meeting the risks that I used to run in my vagabond days. Now I
+think of it, I might enjoy this last excitement by going back to
+England, and giving the Invincibles a chance of shooting me as a
+traitor to the cause. But my wife would object to that.
+
+Suppose we change the subject.
+
+You will be glad to hear that you knew something of law, as well as of
+medicine. I sent instructions to my solicitor in London to raise a loan
+on my life-insurance. What you said to me turns out to be right. I
+can't raise a farthing, for three years to come, out of all the
+thousands of pounds which I shall leave behind me when I die.
+
+Are my prospects from the newspaper likely to cheer me after such a
+disappointment as this? The new journal, I have the pleasure of
+informing you, is much admired. When I inquire for my profits, I hear
+that the expenses are heavy, and I am told that I must wait for a rise
+in our circulation. How long? Nobody knows,
+
+I shall keep these pages open for a few days more, on the chance of
+something happening which may alter my present position for the better.
+
+
+My position has altered for the worse.
+
+I have been obliged to fill my empty purse, for a little while, by
+means of a bit of stamped paper. And how shall I meet my liabilities
+when the note falls due? Let time answer the question; for the present
+the evil day is put off. In the meanwhile, if that literary speculation
+of yours is answering no better than my newspaper, I can lend you a few
+pounds to get on with. What do you say (on second thoughts) to coming
+back to your old quarters at Passy, and giving me your valuable advice
+by word of mouth instead of by letter?
+
+Come, and feel my pulse, and look at my tongue--and tell me how these
+various anxieties of mine are going to end, before we are any of us a
+year older. Shall I, like you, be separated from my wife--at her
+request; oh, not at mine! Or shall I be locked up in prison? And what
+will become of You? Do you take the hint, doctor?
+
+CHAPTER XXXV
+
+MY LADY'S MIND
+
+"ENTREAT Lady Harry not to write to me. She will be tempted to do so,
+when she hears that there is good hope of Mr. Mountjoy's recovery. But,
+even from that loving and generous heart, I must not accept expressions
+of gratitude which would only embarrass me. All that I have done, as a
+nurse, and all that I may yet hope to do, is no more than an effort to
+make amends for my past life. Iris has my heart's truest wishes for her
+happiness. Until I can myself write to her without danger, let this be
+enough."
+
+
+In those terms, dearest of women, your friend has sent your message to
+me. My love respects as well as admires you; your wishes are commands
+to me. At the same time, I may find some relief from the fears of the
+future that oppress me, if I can confide them to friendly ears. May I
+not harmlessly write to you, if I only write of my own poor self?
+
+Try, dear, to remember those pleasant days when you were staying with
+us, in our honeymoon time, at Paris.
+
+You warned me, one evening when we were alone, to be on my guard
+against any circumstances which might excite my husband's jealousy.
+Since then, the trouble that you foresaw has fallen on me; mainly, I am
+afraid, through my own want of self-control. It is so hard for a woman,
+when she really loves a man, to understand a state of mind which can
+make him doubt her.
+
+I have discovered that jealousy varies. Let me tell you what I mean.
+
+Lord Harry was silent and sullen (ah, how well I knew what that meant!)
+while the life of our poor Hugh was in jeopardy. When I read the good
+news which told me that he was no longer in danger, I don't know
+whether there was any change worth remarking in myself--but, there was
+a change in my husband, delightful to see. His face showed such sweet
+sympathy when he looked at me, he spoke so kindly and nicely of Hugh,
+that I could only express my pleasure by kissing him. You will hardly
+believe me, when I tell you that his hateful jealousy appeared again,
+at that moment. He looked surprised, he looked suspicious--he looked, I
+declare, as if he doubted whether I meant it with all my heart when I
+kissed him! What incomprehensible creatures men are! We read in novels
+of women who are able to manage their masters. I wish I knew how to
+manage mine.
+
+We have been getting into debt. For some weeks past, this sad state of
+things has been a burden on my mind. Day after day I have been
+expecting him to speak of our situation, and have found him obstinately
+silent. Is his mind entirely occupied with other things? Or is he
+unwilling to speak of our anxieties because the subject humiliates him?
+Yesterday, I could bear it no longer.
+
+"Our debts are increasing," I said. "Have you thought of any way of
+paying them?"
+
+I had feared that my question might irritate him. To my relief, he
+seemed to be diverted by it.
+
+"The payment of debts," he replied, "is a problem that I am too poor to
+solve. Perhaps I got near to it the other day."
+
+I asked how.
+
+"Well," he said, "I found myself wishing I had some rich friends.
+By-the-bye, how is _your_ rich friend? What have you heard lately of
+Mr. Mountjoy?"
+
+"I have heard that he is steadily advancing towards recovery."
+
+"Likely, I dare say, to return to France when he feels equal to it," my
+husband remarked. "He is a good-natured creature. If he finds himself
+in Paris again, I wonder whether he will pay us another visit?"
+
+He said this quite seriously. On my side, I was too much as astonished
+to utter a word. My bewilderment seemed to amuse him. In his own
+pleasant way he explained himself:
+
+"I ought to have told you, my dear, that I was in Mr. Mountjoy's
+company the night before he returned to England. We had said some
+disagreeable things to each other here in the cottage, while you were
+away in your room. My tongue got the better of my judgment. In short, I
+spoke rudely to our guest. Thinking over it afterwards, I felt that I
+ought to make an apology. He received my sincere excuses with an
+amiability of manner, and a grace of language, which raised him greatly
+in my estimation."
+
+There you have Lord Harry's own words! Who would suppose that he had
+ever been jealous of the man whom he spoke of in this way?
+
+I explain it to myself, partly by the charm in Hugh's look and manner,
+which everybody feels; partly by the readiness with which my husband's
+variable nature receives new impressions. I hope you agree with me. In
+any case, pray let Hugh see what I have written to you in this place,
+and ask him what he thinks of it.*
+
+*_Note by Mrs. Vimpany._--I shall certainly not be foolish enough to
+show what she has written to Mr. Mountjoy. Poor deluded Iris! Miserable
+fatal marriage!
+
+Encouraged, as you will easily understand, by the delightful prospect
+of a reconciliation between them, I was eager to take my first
+opportunity of speaking freely of Hugh. Up to that time, it had been a
+hard trial to keep to myself so much that was deeply interesting in my
+thoughts and hopes. But my hours of disappointment were not at an end
+yet. We were interrupted.
+
+A letter was brought to us--one of many, already received!--insisting
+on immediate payment of a debt that had been too long unsettled. The
+detestable subject of our poverty insisted on claiming attention when
+there was a messenger outside, waiting for my poor Harry's last French
+bank note.
+
+"What is to be done?" I said, when we were left by ourselves again.
+
+My husband's composure was something wonderful. He laughed and lit a
+cigar.
+
+"We have got to the crisis," he said. "The question of money has driven
+us into a corner at last. My darling, have you ever heard of such a
+thing as a promissory note?"
+
+I was not quite so ignorant as he supposed me to be; I said I had heard
+my father speak of promissory notes.
+
+This seemed to fail in convincing him. "Your father," he remarked,
+"used to pay his notes when they fell due."
+
+I betrayed my ignorance, after all. "Doesn't everybody do the same?" I
+asked.
+
+He burst out laughing. "We will send the maid to get a bit of stamped
+paper," he said; "I'll write the message for her, this time."
+
+Those last words alluded to Fanny's ignorance of the French language,
+which made it necessary to provide her with written instructions, when
+she was sent on an errand. In our domestic affairs, I was able to do
+this; but, in the present case, I only handed the message to her. When
+she returned with a slip of stamped paper, Harry called to me to come
+to the writing-table.
+
+"Now, my sweet," he said, "see how easily money is to be got with a
+scratch of the pen."
+
+I looked, over his shoulder. In less than a minute it was done; and he
+had produced ten thousand francs on paper--in English money (as he told
+me), four hundred pounds. This seemed to be a large loan; I asked how
+he proposed to pay it back. He kindly reminded me that he was a
+newspaper proprietor, and, as such, possessed of the means of inspiring
+confidence in persons with money to spare. They could afford, it seems,
+to give him three months in which to arrange for repayment. In that
+time, as he thought, the profits of the new journal might come pouring
+in. He knew best, of course.
+
+We took the next train to Paris, and turned our bit of paper into notes
+and gold. Never was there such a delightful companion as my husband,
+when he has got money in his pocket. After so much sorrow and anxiety,
+for weeks past, that memorable afternoon was like a glimpse of
+Paradise.
+
+On the next morning, there was an end to my short-lived enjoyment of no
+more than the latter half of a day.
+
+Watching her opportunity, Fanny Mere came to me while I was alone,
+carrying a thick letter in her hand. She held it before me with the
+address uppermost.
+
+"Please to look at that," she said.
+
+The letter was directed (in Harry's handwriting) to Mr. Vimpany, at a
+publishing office in London. Fanny next turned the envelope the other
+way.
+
+"Look at this side," she resumed.
+
+The envelope was specially protected by a seal; bearing a device of my
+husband's own invention; that is to say, the initials of his name
+(Harry Norland) surmounted by a star--his lucky star, as he paid me the
+compliment of calling it, on the day when he married me. I was thinking
+of that day now. Fanny saw me looking, with a sad heart, at the
+impression on the wax. She completely misinterpreted the direction
+taken by my thoughts.
+
+"Tell me to do it, my lady," she proceeded; "and I'll open the letter."
+
+I looked at her. She showed no confusion. "I can seal it up again," she
+coolly explained, "with a bit of fresh wax and my thimble. Perhaps Mr.
+Vimpany won't be sober enough to notice it."
+
+"Do you know, Fanny, that you are making a dishonourable proposal to
+me?" I said.
+
+"I know there's nothing I can do to help you that I won't do," she
+answered; "and you know why. I have made a dishonourable proposal--have
+I? That comes quite naturally to a lost woman like me. Shall I tell you
+what Honour means? It means sticking at nothing, in your service.
+Please tell me to open the letter."
+
+"How did you come by the letter, Fanny?"
+
+"My master gave it to me to put in the post."
+
+"Then, post it."
+
+The strange creature, so full of contraries--so sensitive at one time,
+so impenetrable at another--pointed again to the address.
+
+"When the master writes to that man," she went on--"a long letter (if
+you will notice), and a sealed letter--your ladyship ought to see what
+is inside it. I haven't a doubt myself that there's writing under this
+seal which bodes trouble to you. The spare bedroom is empty. Do you
+want to have the doctor for your visitor again? Don't tell me to post
+the letter, till I've opened it first."
+
+"I do tell you to post the letter."
+
+Fanny submitted, so far. But she had a new form of persuasion to try,
+before her reserves of resistance were exhausted. "If the doctor comes
+back," she continued, "will your ladyship give me leave to go out,
+whenever I ask for it?"
+
+This was surely presuming on my indulgence. "Are you not expecting a
+little too much?" I suggested--not unkindly.
+
+"If you say that, my lady," she answered, "I shall be obliged to ask
+you to suit yourself with another maid."
+
+There was a tone of dictation in this, which I found beyond endurance.
+In my anger, I said: "Leave me whenever you like."
+
+"I shall leave you when I'm dead--not before," was the reply that I
+received. "But if you won't let me have my liberty without going away
+from you, for a time, I must go--for your sake."
+
+(For my sake! Pray observe that.)
+
+She went on:
+
+"Try to see it, my lady, as I do! If we have the doctor with us again,
+I must be able to watch him."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because he is your enemy, as I believe."
+
+"How can he hurt me, Fanny?"
+
+"Through your husband, my lady, if he can do it in no other way. Mr.
+Vimpany shall have a spy at his heels. Dishonourable! oh, dishonourable
+again! Never mind. I don't pretend to know what that villain means to
+do, if he and my lord get together again. But this I can tell you, if
+it's in woman's wit to circumvent him, here I am with my mind made up.
+With my mind, made up!" she repeated fiercely--and recovered on a
+sudden her customary character as a quiet well-trained servant, devoted
+to her duties. "I'll take my master's letter to the post now," she
+said. "Is there anything your ladyship wants in the town?"
+
+What do you think of Fanny Mere? Ought I to have treated this last
+offer of her services, as I treated her proposal to open the letter? I
+was not able to do it.
+
+The truth is, I was so touched by her devotion to me, that I could not
+prevail on myself to mortify her by a refusal. I believe there may be a
+good reason for the distrust of the doctor which possesses her so
+strongly; and I feel the importance of having this faithful and
+determined woman for an ally. Let me hope that Mr. Vimpany's return (if
+it is to take place) may be delayed until you can safely write, with
+your own hand, such a letter of wise advice as I sadly need.
+
+In the meantime, give my love to Hugh, and say to this dear friend all
+that I might have said for myself, if I had been near him. But take
+care that his recovery is not retarded by anxiety for me. Pray keep him
+in ignorance of the doubts and fears with which I am now looking at the
+future. If I was not so fond of my husband, I should be easier in my
+mind. This sounds contradictory, but I believe you will understand it.
+For a while, my dear, good-bye.
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI
+
+THE DOCTOR MEANS MISCHIEF
+
+ON the day after Lord Harry's description of the state of his mind
+reached London, a gentleman presented himself at the publishing office
+of Messrs. Boldside Brothers, and asked for the senior partner, Mr.
+Peter Boldside. When he sent in his card, it bore the name of "Mr.
+Vimpany."
+
+"To what fortunate circumstance am I indebted, sir, for the honour of
+your visit?" the senior partner inquired. His ingratiating manners, his
+genial smile, his roundly resonant voice, were personal advantages of
+which he made a merciless use. The literary customer who entered the
+office, hesitating before the question of publishing a work at his own
+expense, generally decided to pay the penalty when he encountered Mr.
+Peter Boldside.
+
+"I want to inquire about the sale of my work," Mr. Vimpany replied.
+
+"Ah, doctor, you have come to the wrong man. You must go to my
+brother."
+
+Mr. Vimpany protested. "You mentioned the terms when I first applied to
+you," he said, "and you signed the agreement."
+
+"That is in _my_ department," the senior partner gently explained. "And
+I shall write the cheque when, as we both hope, your large profits
+shall fall due. But our sales of works are in the department of my
+brother, Mr. Paul Boldside." He rang a bell; a clerk appeared, and
+received his instructions: "Mr. Paul. Good-morning, doctor."
+
+Mr. Paul was, personally speaking, his brother repeated--without the
+deep voice, and without the genial smile. Conducted to the office of
+the junior partner, Mr. Vimpany found himself in the presence of a
+stranger, occupied in turning over the pages of a newspaper. When his
+name was announced, the publisher started, and handed his newspaper to
+the doctor.
+
+"This is a coincidence," he said. "I was looking, sir, for your name in
+the pages which I have just put into your hand. Surely the editor can't
+have refused to publish your letter?"
+
+Mr. Vimpany was sober, and therefore sad, and therefore (again) not to
+be trifled with by a mystifying reception. "I don't understand you," he
+answered gruffly. "What do you mean?"
+
+"Is it possible that you have not seen last week's number of the
+paper?" Mr. Paul asked. "And you a literary man!" He forthwith produced
+the last week's number, and opened it at the right place. "Read that,
+sir," he said, with something in his manner which looked like virtuous
+indignation.
+
+Mr. Vimpany found himself confronted by a letter addressed to the
+editor. It was signed by an eminent physician, whose portrait had
+appeared in the first serial part of the new work--accompanied by a
+brief memoir of his life, which purported to be written by himself. Not
+one line of the autobiography (this celebrated person declared) had
+proceeded from his pen. Mr. Vimpany had impudently published an
+imaginary memoir, full of false reports and scandalous inventions--and
+this after he had been referred to a trustworthy source for the
+necessary particulars. Stating these facts, the indignant physician
+cautioned readers to beware of purchasing a work which, so far as he
+was concerned, was nothing less than a fraud on the public.
+
+"If you can answer that letter, sir," Mr. Paul Boldside resumed, "the
+better it will be, I can tell you, for the sale of your publication."
+
+Mr. Vimpany made a reckless reply: "I want to knew how the thing sells.
+Never mind the letter."
+
+"Never mind the letter?" the junior partner repeated. "A positive
+charge of fraud is advanced by a man at the head of his profession
+against a work which _we_ have published--and you say, Never mind the
+letter."
+
+The rough customer of the Boldsides struck his fist on the table.
+"Bother the letter! I insist on knowing what the sale is."
+
+Still preserving his dignity, Mr. Paul (like Mr. Peter) rang for the
+clerk, and briefly gave an order. "Mr. Vimpany's account," he said--and
+proceeded to admonish Mr. Vimpany himself.
+
+"You appear, sir, to have no defence of your conduct to offer. Our firm
+has a reputation to preserve. When I have consulted with my brother, we
+shall be under the disagreeable necessity--"
+
+Here (as he afterwards told his brother) the publisher was brutally
+interrupted by the author:
+
+"If you will have it," said this rude man, "here it is in two words.
+The doctor's portrait is the likeness of an ass. As he couldn't do it
+himself, I wanted materials for writing his life. He referred me to the
+year of his birth, the year of his marriage, the year of this, that,
+and the other. Who cares about dates? The public likes to be tickled by
+personal statements. Very well--I tickled the public. There you have it
+in a nutshell."
+
+The clerk appeared at that auspicious moment, with the author's account
+neatly exhibited under two sides: a Debtor side, which represented the
+expenditure of Hugh Mountjoy's money; and a Creditor side, which
+represented (so far) Mr. Vimpany's profits. Amount of these last: 3_l._
+14_s._ 10_d._
+
+Mr. Vimpany tore up the account, threw the pieces in the face of Mr.
+Paul, and expressed his sentiments in one opprobrious word:
+"Swindlers!"
+
+The publisher said: "You shall hear of us, sir, through our lawyer."
+
+And the author answered: "Go to the devil!"
+
+
+Once out in the streets again, the first open door at which Mr. Vimpany
+stopped was the door of a tavern. He ordered a glass of brandy and
+water, and a cigar.
+
+It was then the hour of the afternoon, between the time of luncheon and
+the time of dinner, when the business of a tavern is generally in a
+state of suspense. The dining-room was empty when Mr. Vimpany entered
+it: and the waiter's unoccupied attention was in want of an object.
+Having nothing else to notice, he looked at the person who had just
+come in. The deluded stranger was drinking fiery potato-brandy, and
+smoking (at the foreign price) an English cigar. Would his taste tell
+him the melancholy truth? No: it seemed to matter nothing to him what
+he was drinking or what he was smoking. Now he looked angry, and now he
+looked puzzled; and now he took a long letter from his pocket, and read
+it in places, and marked the places with a pencil. "Up to some
+mischief," was the waiter's interpretation of these signs. The stranger
+ordered a second glass of grog, and drank it in gulps, and fell into
+such deep thought that he let his cigar go out. Evidently, a man in
+search of an idea. And, to all appearance, he found what he wanted on a
+sudden. In a hurry he paid his reckoning, and left his small change and
+his unfinished cigar on the table, and was off before the waiter could
+say, "Thank you."
+
+The next place at which he stopped was a fine house in a spacious
+square. A carriage was waiting at the door. The servant who opened the
+door knew him.
+
+"Sir James is going out again, sir, in two minutes," the man said. Mr.
+Vimpany answered: "I won't keep him two minutes."
+
+A bell rang from the room on the ground floor; and a gentleman came
+out, as Mr. Vimpany was shown in. Sir James's stethoscope was still in
+his hand; his latest medical fee lay on the table. "Some other day,
+Vimpany," the great surgeon said; "I have no time to give you now."
+
+"Will you give me a minute?" the humble doctor asked.
+
+"Very well. What is it?"
+
+"I am down in the world now, Sir James, as you know--and I am trying to
+pick myself up again."
+
+"Very creditable, my good fellow. How can I help you? Come, come--out
+with it. You want something?"
+
+"I want your great name to do me a great service. I am going to France.
+A letter of introduction, from you, will open doors which might be
+closed to an unknown man like myself."
+
+"What doors do you mean?" Sir James asked.
+
+"The doors of the hospitals in Paris."
+
+"Wait a minute, Vimpany. Have you any particular object in view?"
+
+"A professional object, of course," the ready doctor answered. "I have
+got an idea for a new treatment of diseases of the lungs; and I want to
+see if the French have made any recent discoveries in that direction."
+
+Sir James took up his pen--and hesitated. His ill-starred medical
+colleague had been his fellow-student and his friend, in the days when
+they were both young men. They had seen but little of each other since
+they had gone their different ways--one of them, on the high road which
+leads to success, the other down the byways which end in failure. The
+famous surgeon felt a passing doubt of the use which his needy and
+vagabond inferior might make of his name. For a moment his pen was held
+suspended over the paper. But the man of great reputation was also a
+man of great heart. Old associations pleaded with him, and won their
+cause. His companion of former times left the house provided with a
+letter of introduction to the chief surgeon at the Hotel Dieu, in
+Paris.
+
+Mr. Vimpany's next, and last, proceeding for that day, was to stop at a
+telegraph-office, and to communicate economically with Lord Harry in
+three words:
+
+"Expect me to-morrow."
+
+CHAPTER XXXVII
+
+THE FIRST QUARREL
+
+EARLY in the morning of the next day, Lord Harry received the doctor's
+telegram. Iris not having risen at the time, he sent for Fanny Mere,
+and ordered her to get the spare room ready for a guest. The maid's
+busy suspicion tempted her to put a venturesome question. She asked if
+the person expected was a lady or a gentleman.
+
+"What business is it of yours who the visitor is?" her master asked
+sharply. Always easy and good-humoured with his inferiors in general,
+Lord Harry had taken a dislike to his wife's maid, from the moment when
+he had first seen her. His Irish feeling for beauty and brightness was
+especially offended by the unhealthy pallor of the woman's complexion,
+and the sullen self-suppression of her manner. All that his native
+ingenuity had been able to do was to make her a means of paying a
+compliment to his wife. "Your maid has one merit in my eyes," he said;
+"she is a living proof of the sweetness of your temper."
+
+Iris joined her husband at the breakfast-table with an appearance of
+disturbance in her face, seldom seen, during the dull days of her life
+at Passy. "I hear of somebody coming to stay with us," she said. "Not
+Mr. Vimpany again, I hope and trust?"
+
+Lord Harry was careful to give his customary morning kiss, before he
+replied. "Why shouldn't my faithful old friend come and see me again?"
+he asked, with his winning smile.
+
+"Pray don't speak of that hateful man," she answered, "as your faithful
+old friend! He is nothing of the kind. What did you tell me when he
+took leave of us after his last visit, and I owned I was glad that he
+had gone? You said: 'Faith, my dear, I'm as glad as you are.'"
+
+Her good-natured husband laughed at this little picture of himself.
+"Ah, my darling, how many more times am I to make the same confession
+to my pretty priest? Try to remember, without more telling, that it's
+one of my misfortunes to be a man of many tempers. There are times when
+I get tired to death of Mr. Vimpany; and there are times when the
+cheery old devil exercises fascinations over me. I declare you're
+spoiling the eyebrows that I admire by letting them twist themselves
+into a frown! After the trouble I have taken to clear your mind of
+prejudice against an unfortunate man, it's disheartening to find you so
+hard on the poor fellow's faults and so blind to his virtues."
+
+The time had been when this remonstrance might have influenced his
+wife's opinion. She passed it over without notice now.
+
+"Does he come here by your invitation?" she asked.
+
+"How else should he come here, my dear?"
+
+She looked at her husband with doubt too plainly visible in her eyes.
+"I wonder what your motive is for sending for him," she said.
+
+He was just lifting his teacup to his lips--he put it down again when
+he heard those words.
+
+"Are you ill this morning?" he asked.
+
+"No."
+
+"Have I said anything that has offended you?"
+
+"Certainly not."
+
+"Then I must tell you this, Iris; I don't approve of what you have just
+said. It sounds, to my mind, unpleasantly like suspicion of me and
+suspicion of my friend. I see your face confessing it, my lady, at this
+moment."
+
+"You are half right, Harry, and no more. What you see in my face is
+suspicion of your friend."
+
+"Founded on what, if you please?"
+
+"Founded on what I have seen of him, and on what I know of him. When
+you tried to alter my opinion of Mr. Vimpany some time since, I did my
+best to make my view your view. I deceived myself, for your sake; I put
+the best construction on what he said and did, when he was staying
+here. It was well meant, but it was of no use. In a thousand different
+ways, while he was doing his best to win my favour, his true self was
+telling tales of him under the fair surface. Mr. Vimpany is a bad man.
+He is the very worst friend you could have about you at any time--and
+especially at a time when your patience is tried by needy
+circumstances."
+
+"One word, Iris. The more eloquent you are, the more I admire you.
+Only, don't mention my needy circumstances again."
+
+She passed over the interruption as she had already passed over the
+remonstrance, without taking notice of it.
+
+"Dearest, you are always good to me," she continued gently. "Am I wrong
+in thinking that love gives me some little influence over you still?
+Women are vain--are they not?--and I am no better than the rest of
+them. Flatter your wife's vanity, Harry, by attaching some importance
+to her opinion. Is there time enough, yet, to telegraph to Mr. Vimpany?
+Quite out of the question, is it? Well, then, if he must come here,
+do--pray, pray do consider Me. Don't let him stay in the house! I'll
+find a good excuse, and take a bedroom for him in the neighbourhood.
+Anywhere else, so long as he is not here. He turns me cold when I think
+of him, sleeping under the same roof with ourselves. Not with us! oh,
+Harry, not with us!"
+
+Her eyes eagerly searched her husband's face; she looked there for
+indulgence, she looked for conviction. No! he was still admiring her.
+
+"On my word of honour," he burst out, "you fascinate me. What an
+imagination you have got! One of these days, Iris, I shall be prouder
+of you than ever; I shall find you a famous literary character. I don't
+mean writing a novel; women who can't even hem a handkerchief can write
+a novel. It's poetry I'm thinking of. Irish melodies by Lady Harry that
+beat Tom Moore. What a gift! And there are fortunes made, as I have
+heard, by people who spoil fair white paper to some purpose. I wish I
+was one of them."
+
+"Have you no more to say to me?" she asked.
+
+"What more should there be? You wouldn't have me take you seriously, in
+what you have just said of Vimpany?"
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Oh, come, come, my darling! Just consider. With a bedroom empty and
+waiting, upstairs, is my old Vimpany to be sent to quarters for the
+night among strangers? I wouldn't speak harshly to you, Iris, for the
+whole world; and I don't deny that the convivial doctor may be
+sometimes a little too fond of his drop of grog. You will tell me,
+maybe, that he hasn't got on nicely with his wife; and I grant it.
+There are not many people who set such a pretty example of matrimony as
+we do. Poor humanity--there's all that's to be said about it. But when
+you tell me that Vimpany is a bad man, and the worst friend I could
+possibly have, and so forth--what better can I do than set it down to
+your imagination? I've a pretty fancy, myself; and I think I see my
+angel inventing poetical characters, up among congenial clouds. What's
+the matter? Surely, you haven't done breakfast yet?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Are you going to leave me?"
+
+"I am going to my room."
+
+"You're in a mighty hurry to get away. I never meant to vex you, Iris.
+Ah, well, if you must leave the table, I'll have the honour of opening
+the door for you, at any rate. I wonder what you're going to do?"
+
+"To cultivate my imagination," she answered, with the first outbreak of
+bitterness that had escaped her yet.
+
+His face hardened. "There seems to be something like bearing malice in
+this," he said. "Are you treating me, for the first time, to an
+exhibition of enmity? What am I to call it, if it's not that?"
+
+"Call it disappointment," she suggested quietly, and left him.
+
+Lord Harry went back to his breakfast. His jealousy was up in arms
+again. "She's comparing me with her absent friend," he said to himself,
+"and wishing she had married the amiable Mountjoy instead of me."
+
+So the first quarrel ended--and Mr. Vimpany had been the cause of it.
+
+CHAPTER XXXVIII
+
+ICI ON PARLE FRANACAIS
+
+THE doctor arrived in good time for dinner, and shook hands with the
+Irish lord in excellent spirits.
+
+He looked round the room, and asked where my lady was. Lord Harry's
+reply suggested the presence of a cloud on the domestic horizon. He had
+been taking a long ride, and had only returned a few minutes since;
+Iris would (as he supposed) join them immediately.
+
+The maid put the soup on the table, and delivered a message. Her
+mistress was suffering from a headache, and was not well enough to dine
+with the gentlemen.
+
+As an old married man, Mr. Vimpany knew what this meant; he begged
+leave to send a comforting message to the suffering lady of the house.
+Would Fanny be good enough to say that he had made inquiries on the
+subject of Mr. Mountjoy's health, before he left London. The report was
+still favourable; there was nothing to complain of but the
+after-weakness which had followed the fever. On that account only, the
+attendance of the nurse was still a matter of necessity. "With my
+respects to Lady Harry," he called after Fanny, as she went out in
+dogged silence.
+
+"I have begun by making myself agreeable to your wife," the doctor
+remarked with a self-approving grin. "Perhaps she will dine with us
+to-morrow. Pass the sherry."
+
+The remembrance of what had happened at the breakfast-table, that
+morning, seemed to be dwelling disagreeably on Lord Harry's mind. He
+said but little--and that little related to the subject on which he had
+already written, at full length, to his medical friend.
+
+In an interval, when the service of the table required the attendance
+of Fanny in the kitchen, Mr. Vimpany took the opportunity of saying a
+few cheering words. He had come (he remarked) prepared with the right
+sort of remedy for an ailing state of mind, and he would explain
+himself at a fitter opportunity. Lord Harry impatiently asked why the
+explanation was deferred. If the presence of the maid was the obstacle
+which caused delay, it would be easy to tell her that she was not
+wanted to wait.
+
+The wary doctor positively forbade this.
+
+He had observed Fanny, during his previous visit, and had discovered
+that she seemed to distrust him. The woman was sly and suspicious.
+Since they had sat down to dinner, it was easy to see that she was
+lingering in the room to listen to the conversation, on one pretence or
+another. If she was told not to wait, there could be no doubt of her
+next proceeding: she would listen outside the door. "Take my word for
+it," the doctor concluded, "there are all the materials for a spy in
+Fanny Mere."
+
+But Lord Harry was obstinate. Chafing under the sense of his helpless
+pecuniary position, he was determined to hear, at once, what remedy for
+it Vimpany had discovered.
+
+"We can set that woman's curiosity at defiance," he said.
+
+"How?"
+
+"When you were learning your profession, you lived in Paris for some
+years, didn't you?
+
+"All right!"
+
+"Well, then, you can't have entirely forgotten your French?"
+
+The doctor at once understood what this meant, and answered
+significantly by a wink. He had found an opportunity (he said) of
+testing his memory, not very long since. Time had undoubtedly deprived
+him of his early mastery over the French language; but he could still
+(allowing for a few mistakes) make a shift to understand it and speak
+it. There was one thing, however, that he wanted to know first. Could
+they be sure that my lady's maid had not picked up French enough to use
+her ears to some purpose? Lord Harry easily disposed of this doubt. So
+entirely ignorant was the maid of the language of the place in which
+she was living, that she was not able to ask the tradespeople for the
+simplest article of household use, unless it was written for her in
+French before she was sent on an errand.
+
+This was conclusive. When Fanny returned to the dining-room, she found
+a surprise waiting for her. The two gentlemen had taken leave of their
+nationality, and were talking the language of foreigners.
+
+
+An hour later, when the dinner-table had been cleared, the maid's
+domestic duties took her to Lady Harry's room to make tea. She noticed
+the sad careworn look on her mistress's face, and spoke of it at once
+in her own downright way.
+
+"I thought it was only an excuse," she said, "when you gave me that
+message to the gentlemen, at dinner-time. Are you really ill, my lady?"
+
+"I am a little out of spirits," Iris replied.
+
+Fanny made the tea. "I can understand that," she said to herself, as
+she moved away to leave the room; "I'm out of spirits myself."
+
+Iris called her back: "I heard you say just now, Fanny, that you were
+out of spirits yourself. If you were speaking of some troubles of your
+own, I am sorry for you, and I won't say any more. But if you know what
+my anxieties are, and share them--"
+
+"Mine is the biggest share of the two," Fanny broke out abruptly. "It
+goes against the grain with me to distress you, my lady; but we are
+beginning badly, and you ought to know it. The doctor has beaten me
+already."
+
+"Beaten you already?" Iris repeated. "Tell me plainly what you mean?"
+
+"Here it is, if you please, as plainly as words can say it. Mr. Vimpany
+has something--something wicked, of course--to say to my master; and he
+won't let it pass his lips here, in the cottage."
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Because he suspects me of listening at the door, and looking through
+the keyhole. I don't know, my lady, that he doesn't even suspect You.
+'I've learnt something in the course of my life,' he says to my master;
+'and it's a rule with me to be careful of what I talk about indoors,
+when there are women in the, house, What are you going to do
+to-morrow?' he says. My lord told him there was to be a meeting at the
+newspaper office. The doctor says: 'I'll go to Paris with you. The
+newspaper office isn't far from the Luxembourg Gardens. When you have
+done your business, you will find me waiting at the gate. What I have
+to tell you, you shall hear out of doors in the Gardens--and in an open
+part of them, too, where there are no lurking-places among the trees.'
+My master seemed to get angry at being put off in this way. 'What is it
+you have got to tell me?' he says. 'Is it anything like the proposal
+you made, when you were on your last visit here?' The doctor laughed.
+'To-morrow won't be long in coming,' he says. 'Patience, my
+lord--patience.' There was no getting him to say a word more. Now, what
+am I to do? How am I to get a chance of listening to him, out in an
+open garden, without being seen? There's what I mean when I say he has
+beaten me. It's you, my lady--it's you who will suffer in the end."
+
+"You don't _know_ that, Fanny."
+
+"No, my lady--but I'm certain of it. And here I am, as helpless as
+yourself! My temper has been quiet, since my misfortune; it would be
+quiet still, but for this." The one animating motive, the one
+exasperating influence, in that sad and secret life was still the
+mistress's welfare--still the safety of the generous woman who had
+befriended and forgiven her. She turned aside from the table, to hide
+her ghastly face.
+
+"Pray try to control yourself." As Iris spoke, she pointed kindly to a
+chair. "There is something that I want to say when you are composed
+again. I won't hurry you; I won't look at you. Sit down, Fanny."
+
+She appeared to shrink from being seated in her mistress's presence.
+"Please to let me go to the window," she said; "the air will help me."
+
+To the window she went, and struggled with the passionate self so
+steadily kept under at other times; so obstinately conquered now. "What
+did you wish to say to me?" she asked.
+
+"You have surprised--you have perplexed me," Iris said. "I am at a loss
+to understand how you discovered what seems to have passed between your
+master and Mr. Vimpany. You don't surely mean to tell me that they
+talked of their private affairs while you were waiting at table?"
+
+"I don't tell lies, my lady," Fanny declared impulsively. "They talked
+of nothing else all through the dinner."
+
+"Before _you!"_ Iris exclaimed.
+
+There was a pause. Fear and shame confessed themselves furtively on the
+maid's colourless face. Silently, swiftly, she turned to the door. Had
+a slip of the tongue hurried her into the betrayal of something which
+it was her interest to conceal? "Don't be alarmed," Iris said
+compassionately; "I have no wish to intrude on your secrets."
+
+With her hand on the door, Fanny Mere closed it again, and came back.
+
+"I am not so ungrateful," she said, "as to have any secrets from You.
+It's hard to confess what may lower me in your good opinion, but it
+must be done. I have deceived your ladyship--and I am ashamed of it. I
+have deceived the doctor--and I glory in it. My master and Mr. Vimpany
+thought they were safe in speaking French, while I was waiting on them.
+I know French as well as they do."
+
+Iris could hardly believe what she heard. "Do you really mean what you
+say?" she asked.
+
+"There's that much good in me," Fanny replied; "I always mean what I
+say."
+
+"Why did you deceive me? Why have you been acting the part of an
+ignorant woman?"
+
+"The deceit has been useful in your service," the obstinate maid
+declared. "Perhaps it may be useful again."
+
+"Was that what you were thinking of," Iris said, "when you allowed me
+to translate English into French for you, and never told me the truth?"
+
+"At any rate, I will tell you the truth, now. No: I was not thinking of
+you, when you wrote my errands for me in French--I was thinking again
+of some advice that was once given to me."
+
+"Was it advice given by a friend?"
+
+"Given by a man, my lady, who was the worst enemy I have ever had."
+
+Her considerate mistress understood the allusion, and forbade her to
+distress herself by saying more. But Fanny felt that atonement, as well
+as explanation, was due to her benefactress. Slowly, painfully she
+described the person to whom she had referred. He was a Frenchman, who
+had been her music-master during the brief period at which she had
+attended a school: he had promised her marriage; he had persuaded her
+to elope with him. The little money that they had to live on was earned
+by her needle, and by his wages as accompanist at a music-hall. While
+she was still able to attract him, and to hope for the performance of
+his promise, he amused himself by teaching her his own language. When
+he deserted her, his letter of farewell contained, among other things
+the advice to which she had alluded.
+
+"In your station of life," this man had written, "knowledge of French
+is still a rare accomplishment. Keep your knowledge to yourself.
+English people of rank have a way of talking French to each other, when
+they don't wish to be understood by their inferiors. In the course of
+your career, you may surprise secrets which will prove to be a little
+fortune, if you play your cards properly. Anyhow, it is the only
+fortune I have to leave to you." Such had been the villain's parting
+gift to the woman whom he had betrayed.
+
+She had hated him too bitterly to be depraved by his advice.
+
+On the contrary, when the kindness of a friend (now no longer in
+England) had helped her to obtain her first employment as a domestic
+servant, she had thought it might be to her interest to mention that
+she could read, write, and speak French. The result proved to be not
+only a disappointment, but a warning to her for the future. Such an
+accomplishment as a knowledge of a foreign language possessed by an
+Englishwoman, in her humble rank of life, was considered by her
+mistress to justify suspicion. Questions were asked, which it was
+impossible for her to answer truthfully. Small scandal drew its own
+conclusions--her life with the other servants became unendurable--she
+left her situation.
+
+From that time, until the happy day when she met with Iris, concealment
+of her knowledge of French became a proceeding forced on her by her own
+poor interests. Her present mistress would undoubtedly have been taken
+into her confidence, if the opportunity had offered itself. But Iris
+had never encouraged her to speak of the one darkest scene in her life;
+and for that reason, she had kept her own counsel until the date of her
+mistress's marriage. Distrusting the husband, and the husband's
+confidential friend--for were they not both men?--she had thought of
+the vile Frenchman's advice, and had resolved to give it a trial; not
+with the degrading motive which he had suggested, but with the vague
+presentiment of making a discovery of wickedness, threatening mischief
+under a French disguise, which might be of service to her benefactress
+at some future time.
+
+"And I may still turn it to your advantage, my lady," Fanny ventured to
+add, "if you will consent to say nothing to anybody of your having a
+servant who has learnt French."
+
+Iris looked at her coldly and gravely. "Must I remind you," she said,
+"that you are asking my help in practicing a deception on my husband?"
+
+"I shall be sent away," Fanny answered, "if you tell my master what I
+have told you."
+
+This was indisputably true. Iris hesitated. In her present situation,
+the maid was the one friend on whom she could rely. Before her
+marriage, she would have recoiled from availing herself, under any
+circumstances, of such services as Fanny's reckless gratitude had
+offered to her. But the moral atmosphere in which she was living had
+begun, as Mrs. Vimpany had foreseen, to exert its baneful influence.
+The mistress descended to bargaining with the servant.
+
+"Deceive the doctor," she said, "and I well remember that it may be for
+my good." She stopped, and considered for a moment. Her noble nature
+rallied its forces, and prompted her next words: "But respect your
+master, if you wish me to keep your secret. I forbid you to listen to
+what my lord may say, when he speaks with Mr. Vimpany to-morrow."
+
+"I have already told your ladyship that I shall have no chance of
+listening to what they say to each other, out of doors," Fanny
+rejoined. "But I can watch the doctor at any rate. We don't know what
+he may not do when he is left by himself, while my master is at the
+meeting. I want to try if I can follow that rogue through the streets,
+without his finding me out. Please to send me on an errand to Paris
+to-morrow."
+
+"You will be running a terrible risk," her mistress reminded her, "if
+Mr. Vimpany discovers you."
+
+"I'll take my chance of that," was the reckless reply.
+
+Iris consented.
+
+CHAPTER XXXIX
+
+THE MYSTERY OF THE HOSPITAL
+
+ON the next morning Lord Harry left the cottage, accompanied by the
+doctor.
+
+After a long absence, he returned alone. His wife's worst
+apprehensions, roused by what Fanny had told her, were more than
+justified, by the change which she now perceived in him. His eyes were
+bloodshot, his face was haggard, his movements were feeble and slow. He
+looked like a man exhausted by some internal conflict, which had
+vibrated between the extremes of anger and alarm. "I'm tired to death,"
+he said; "get me a glass of wine."
+
+She waited on him with eager obedience, and watched anxiously for the
+reviving effect of the stimulant.
+
+The little irritabilities which degrade humanity only prolong their
+mischievous existence, while the surface of life stagnates in calm.
+Their annihilation follows when strong emotion stirs in the depths, and
+raises the storm. The estrangement of the day before passed as
+completely from the minds of the husband and wife--both strongly
+agitated--as if it had never existed. All-mastering fear was busy at
+their hearts; fear, in the woman, of the unknown temptation which had
+tried the man; fear, in the man, of the tell-tale disturbance in him,
+which might excite the woman's suspicion. Without venturing to look at
+him, Iris said: "I am afraid you have heard bad news?" Without
+venturing to look at her, Lord Harry answered: "Yes, at the newspaper
+office." She knew that he was deceiving her; and he felt that she knew
+it. For awhile, they were both silent.
+
+From time to time, she anxiously stole a look at him.
+
+His mind remained absorbed in thought. There they were, in the same
+room--seated near each other; united by the most intimate of human
+relationships--and yet how far, how cruelly far, apart! The slowest of
+all laggard minutes, the minutes which are reckoned by suspense,
+followed each other tardily and more tardily, before there appeared the
+first sign of a change. He lifted his drooping head. Sadly, longingly,
+he looked at her. The unerring instinct of true love encouraged his
+wife to speak to him.
+
+"I wish I could relieve your anxieties," she said simply. "Is there
+nothing I can do to help you?"
+
+"Come here, Iris."
+
+She rose and approached him. In the past days of the honeymoon and its
+sweet familiarities, he had sometimes taken her on his knee. He took
+her on his knee now, and put his arm round her. "Kiss me," he said.
+
+With all her heart she kissed him. He sighed heavily; his eyes rested
+on her with a trustful appealing look which she had never observed in
+them before.
+
+"Why do you hesitate to confide in me?" she asked. "Dear Harry, do you
+think I don't see that something troubles you?"
+
+"Yes," he said, "there is something that I regret."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"Iris," he answered, "I am sorry I asked Vimpany to come back to us."
+
+At that unexpected confession, a bright flush of joy and pride
+overspread his wife's face. Again, the unerring instinct of love guided
+her to discovery of the truth. The opinion of his wicked friend must
+have been accidentally justified, at the secret interview of that day,
+by the friend himself! In tempting her husband, Vimpany had said
+something which must have shocked and offended him. The result, as she
+could hardly doubt, had been the restoration of her domestic influence
+to its helpful freedom of control--whether for the time only it was not
+in her nature, at that moment of happiness, to inquire. "After what you
+have just told me," she ventured to say, "I may own that I am glad to
+see you come home, alone."
+
+In that indirect manner, she confessed the hope that friendly
+intercourse between the two men had come to an end. His reply
+disappointed her.
+
+"Vimpany only remains in Paris," he said, "to present a letter of
+introduction. He will follow me home."
+
+"Soon?" she asked, piteously.
+
+"In time for dinner, I suppose." She was still sitting on his knee. His
+arm pressed her gently when he said his next words, "I hope you will
+dine with us to-day, Iris?"
+
+"Yes--if you wish it."
+
+"I wish it very much. Something in me recoils from being alone with
+Vimpany. Besides, a dinner at home without you is no dinner at all."
+
+She thanked him for that little compliment by a look. At the same time,
+her grateful sense of her husband's kindness was embittered by the
+prospect of the doctor's return. "Is he likely to dine with us often,
+now?" she was bold enough to say.
+
+"I hope not."
+
+Perhaps he was conscious that he might have made a more positive reply.
+He certainly took refuge in another subject--more agreeable to himself.
+
+"My dear, you have expressed the wish to relieve my anxieties," he
+said; "and you can help me, I think, in that way. I have a letter to
+write--of some importance, Iris, to your interests as well as to
+mine--which must go to Ireland by to-day's post. You shall read it, and
+say if you approve of what I have done. Don't let me be disturbed. This
+letter, I can tell you, will make a hard demand on my poor brains--I
+must go and write in my own room."
+
+Left alone with the thoughts that now crowded on her mind, Iris found
+her attention claimed once more by passing events. Fanny Mere arrived,
+to report herself on her return from Paris.
+
+She had so managed her departure from Passy as to precede Lord Harry
+and Mr. Vimpany, and to watch for their arrival in Paris by a later
+train. They had driven from the railway to the newspaper office---with
+the maid in attendance on them in another cab. When they separated, the
+doctor proceeded on foot to the Luxembourg Gardens. Wearing a plain
+black dress, and protected from close observation by her veil, Fanny
+followed him, cautiously keeping at a sufficient distance, now on one
+side of the street and now on the other. When my lord joined his
+friend, she just held them in view, and no more, as they walked up and
+down in the barest and loneliest part of the Gardens that they could
+find. Their talk having come to an end, they parted. Her master was the
+first who came out into the street; walking at a great rate, and
+looking most desperately upset. Mr. Vimpany next appeared, sauntering
+along with his hands in his pockets, grinning as if his own villainous
+thoughts were thoroughly amusing him. Fanny was now more careful than
+ever not to lose sight of the doctor. The course which he pursued led
+them to the famous hospital called the Hotel Dieu.
+
+At the entrance she saw him take a letter out of his pocket, and give
+it to the porter. Soon afterwards, a person appeared who greeted him
+politely, and conducted him into the building. For more than an hour,
+Fanny waited to see Mr. Vimpany come out again, and waited in vain.
+What could he possibly want in a French hospital? And why had he
+remained in that foreign institution for so long a time? Baffled by
+these mysteries, and weary after much walking, Fanny made the best of
+her way home, and consulted her mistress.
+
+Even if Iris had been capable of enlightening her, the opportunity was
+wanting. Lord Harry entered the room, with the letter which he had just
+written, open in his hand, As a matter of course, the maid retired.
+
+CHAPTER XL
+
+DIRE NECESSITY
+
+THE Irish lord had a word to say to his wife, before he submitted to
+her the letter which he had just written.
+
+He had been summoned to a meeting of proprietors at the office of the
+newspaper, convened to settle the terms of a new subscription rendered
+necessary by unforeseen expenses incurred in the interests of the
+speculation. The vote that followed, after careful preliminary
+consultation, authorised a claim on the purses of subscribing
+proprietors, which sadly reduced the sum obtained by Lord Harry's
+promissory note. Nor was this inconvenience the only trial of endurance
+to which the Irish lord was compelled to submit. The hope which he had
+entertained of assistance from the profits of the new journal, when
+repayment of the loan that he had raised became due, was now plainly
+revealed as a delusion. Ruin stared him in the face, unless he could
+command the means of waiting for the pecuniary success of the
+newspaper, during an interval variously estimated at six months, or
+even at a year to come.
+
+"Our case is desperate enough," he said, "to call for a desperate
+remedy. Keep up your spirits, Iris--I have written to my brother."
+
+Iris looked at him in dismay.
+
+"Surely," she said, "you once told me you had written to your brother,
+and he answered you in the cruellest manner through his lawyers."
+
+"Quite true, my dear. But, this time, there is one circumstance in our
+favour--my brother is going to be married. The lady is said to be an
+heiress; a charming creature, admired and beloved wherever she goes.
+There must surely be something to soften the hardest heart in that
+happy prospect. Read what I have written, and tell me what you think of
+it."
+
+The opinion of the devoted wife encouraged the desperate husband: the
+letter was dispatched by the post of that day.
+
+If boisterous good spirits can make a man agreeable at the
+dinner-table, then indeed Mr. Vimpany, on his return to the cottage,
+played the part of a welcome guest. He was inexhaustible in gallant
+attentions to his friend's wife; he told his most amusing stories in
+his happiest way; he gaily drank his host's fine white Burgundy, and
+praised with thorough knowledge of the subject the succulent French
+dishes; he tried Lord Harry with talk on politics, talk on sport, and
+(wonderful to relate in these days) talk on literature. The preoccupied
+Irishman was equally inaccessible on all three subjects. When the
+dessert was placed on the table--still bent on making himself agreeable
+to Lady Harry--Mr. Vimpany led the conversation to the subject of
+floriculture. In the interests of her ladyship's pretty little garden,
+he advocated a complete change in the system of cultivation, and
+justified his revolutionary views by misquoting the published work of a
+great authority on gardening with such polite obstinacy that Iris
+(eager to confute him) went away to fetch the book. The moment he had
+entrapped her into leaving the room, the doctor turned to Lord Harry
+with a sudden change to the imperative mood in look and manner.
+
+"What have you been about," he asked, "since we had that talk in the
+Gardens to-day? Have you looked at your empty purse, and are you wise
+enough to take my way of filling it?"
+
+"As long as there's the ghost of a chance left to me," Lord Harry
+replied, "I'll take any way of filling my purse but yours."
+
+"Does that mean you have found a way?"
+
+"Do me a favour, Vimpany. Defer all questions till the end of the
+week."
+
+"And then I shall have your answer?"
+
+"Without fail, I promise it. Hush!"
+
+Iris returned to the dining-room with her book; and polite Mr. Vimpany
+owned in the readiest manner that he had been mistaken.
+
+The remaining days of the week followed each other wearily. During the
+interval, Lord Harry's friend carefully preserved the character of a
+model guest--he gave as little trouble as possible. Every morning after
+breakfast the doctor went away by the train. Every morning (with
+similar regularity) he was followed by the resolute Fanny Mere.
+Pursuing his way through widely different quarters of Paris, he
+invariably stopped at a public building, invariably presented a letter
+at the door, and was invariably asked to walk in. Inquiries, patiently
+persisted in by the English maid, led in each case to the same result.
+The different public buildings were devoted to the same benevolent
+purpose. Like the Hotel Dieu, they were all hospitals; and Mr.
+Vimpany's object in visiting them remained as profound a mystery as
+ever.
+
+Early on the last morning of the week the answer from Lord Harry's
+brother arrived. Hearing of it, Iris ran eagerly into her husband's
+room. The letter was already scattered in fragments on the floor. What
+the tone of the Earl's inhuman answer had been in the past time, that
+it was again now.
+
+Iris put her arms round her husband's neck. "Oh, my poor love, what is
+to be done?"
+
+He answered in one reckless word: "Nothing!"
+
+"Is there nobody else who can help us?" she asked.
+
+"Ah, well, darling, there's perhaps one other person still left,"
+
+"Who is the person?"
+
+"Who should it be but your own dear self?"
+
+She looked at him in undisguised bewilderment: "Only tell me, Harry,
+what I can do?"
+
+"Write to Mountjoy, and ask him to lend me the money."
+
+He said it. In those shameless words, he said it. She, who had
+sacrificed Mountjoy to the man whom she had married, was now asked by
+that man to use Mountjoy's devotion to her, as a means of paying his
+debts! Iris drew back from him with a cry of disgust.
+
+"You refuse?" he said.
+
+"Do you insult me by doubting it?" she answered.
+
+He rang the bell furiously, and dashed out of the room. She heard him,
+on the stairs, ask where Mr. Vimpany was. The servant replied: "In the
+garden, my lord."
+
+Smoking a cigar luxuriously in the fine morning air, the doctor saw his
+excitable Irish friend hastening out to meet him.
+
+"Don't hurry," he said, in full possession of his impudent good-humour;
+"and don't lose your temper. Will you take my way out of your
+difficulties, or will you not? Which is it--Yes or No?"
+
+"You infernal scoundrel--Yes!"
+
+"My dear lord, I congratulate you."
+
+"On what, sir?"
+
+"On being as great a scoundrel as I am."
+
+CHAPTER XLI
+
+THE MAN IS FOUND.
+
+THE unworthy scheme, by means of which Lord Harry had proposed to
+extricate himself from his pecuniary responsibilities, had led to
+serious consequences. It had produced a state of deliberate
+estrangement between man and wife.
+
+Iris secluded herself in her own room. Her husband passed the hours of
+every day away from the cottage; sometimes in the company of the
+doctor, sometimes among his friends in Paris. His wife suffered acutely
+under the self-imposed state of separation, to which wounded pride and
+keenly felt resentment compelled her to submit. No friend was near her,
+in whose compassionate advice she might have token refuge. Not even the
+sympathy of her maid was offered to the lonely wife.
+
+With the welfare of Iris as her one end in view, Fanny Mere honestly
+believed that it would be better and safer for Lady Harry if she and
+her husband finally decided on living separate lives. The longer my
+lord persisted in keeping the doctor with him as his guest, the more
+perilously he was associated with a merciless wretch, who would be
+capable of plotting the ruin of anyone--man or woman, high person or
+low person--who might happen to be an obstacle in his way. So far as a
+person in her situation could venture on taking the liberty, the maid
+did her best to widen the breach between her master and her mistress.
+
+While Fanny was making the attempt to influence Lady Harry, and only
+producing irritation as the result, Vimpany was exerting stronger
+powers of persuasion in the effort to prejudice the Irish lord against
+any proposal for reconciliation which might reach him through his wife.
+
+"I find an unforgiving temper in your charming lady," the doctor
+declared. "It doesn't show itself on the surface, my dear fellow, but
+there it is. Take a wise advantage of circumstances--say you will raise
+no inconvenient objections, if she wants a separation by mutual
+consent. Now don't misunderstand me. I only recommend the sort of
+separation which will suit our convenience. You know as well as I do
+that you can whistle your wife back again--"
+
+Mr. Vimpany's friend was rude enough to interrupt him, there.
+
+"I call that a coarse way of putting it," Lord Harry interposed.
+
+"Put it how you like for yourself," the doctor rejoined. "Lady Harry
+may be persuaded to come back to you, when we want her for our grand
+project. In the meantime (for I am always a considerate man where women
+are concerned) we act delicately towards my lady, in sparing her the
+discovery of--what shall I call our coming enterprise?--venturesome
+villainy, which might ruin you in your wife's estimation. Do you see
+our situation now, as it really is? Very well. Pass the bottle, and
+drop the subject for the present."
+
+The next morning brought with it an event, which demolished the
+doctor's ingenious arrangement for the dismissal of Iris from the scene
+of action. Lord and Lady Harry encountered each other accidentally on
+the stairs.
+
+Distrusting herself if she ventured to look at him, Iris turned her
+eyes away from her husband. He misinterpreted the action as an
+expression of contempt. Anger at once inclined him to follow Mr.
+Vimpany's advice.
+
+He opened the door of the dining-room, empty at that moment, and told
+Iris that he wished to speak with her. What his villainous friend had
+suggested that he should say, on the subject of a separation, he now
+repeated with a repellent firmness which he was far from really
+feeling. The acting was bad, but the effect was produced. For the first
+time, his wife spoke to him.
+
+"Do you really mean it?" she asked,
+
+The tone in which she said those words, sadly and regretfully telling
+its tale of uncontrollable surprise; the tender remembrance of past
+happy days in her eyes; the quivering pain, expressive of wounded love,
+that parted her lips in the effort to breathe freely, touched his
+heart, try as he might in the wretched pride of the moment to conceal
+it. He was silent.
+
+"If you are weary of our married life," she continued, "say so, and let
+us part. I will go away, without entreaties and without reproaches.
+Whatever pain I may feel, you shall not see it!" A passing flush
+crossed her face, and left it pale again. She trembled under the
+consciousness of returning love--the blind love that had so cruelly
+misled her! At a moment when she most needed firmness, her heart was
+sinking; she resisted, struggled, recovered herself. Quietly, and even
+firmly, she claimed his decision. "Does your silence mean," she asked,
+"that you wish me to leave you?"
+
+No man who had loved her as tenderly as her husband had loved her,
+could have resisted that touching self-control. He answered his wife
+without uttering a word--he held out his arms to her. The fatal
+reconciliation was accomplished in silence.
+
+At dinner on that day Mr. Vimpany's bold eyes saw a new sight, and Mr.
+Vimpany's rascally lips indulged in an impudent smile. My lady appeared
+again in her place at the dinner-table. At the customary time, the two
+men were left alone over their wine. The reckless Irish lord, rejoicing
+in the recovery of his wife's tender regard, drank freely.
+Understanding and despising him, the doctor's devilish gaiety indulged
+in facetious reminiscences of his own married life.
+
+"If I could claim a sovereign," he said, "for every quarrel between
+Mrs. Vimpany and myself, I put it at a low average when I declare that
+I should be worth a thousand pounds. How does your lordship stand in
+that matter? Shall we say a dozen breaches of the marriage agreement up
+to the present time?"
+
+"Say two--and no more to come!" his friend answered cheerfully.
+
+"No more to come!" the doctor repeated. "My experience says plenty more
+to come; I never saw two people less likely to submit to a peaceable
+married life than you and my lady. Ha! you laugh at that? It's a habit
+of mine to back my opinion. I'll bet you a dozen of champagne there
+will be a quarrel which parts you two, for good and all, before the
+year is out. Do you take the bet?"
+
+"Done!" cried Lord Harry. "I propose my wife's good health, Vimpany, in
+a bumper. She shall drink confusion to all false prophets in the first
+glass of your champagne!"
+
+The post of the next morning brought with it two letters.
+
+One of them bore the postmark of London, and was addressed to Lady
+Harry Norland. It was written by Mrs. Vimpany, and it contained a few
+lines added by Hugh Mountjoy. "My strength is slow in returning to me"
+(he wrote); "but my kind and devoted nurse says that all danger of
+infection is at an end. You may write again to your old friend if Lord
+Harry sees no objection, as harmlessly as in the happy past time. My
+weak hand begins to tremble already. How glad I shall be to hear from
+you, it is, happily for me, quite needless to add."
+
+In her delight at receiving this good news Iris impulsively assumed
+that her husband would give it a kindly welcome on his side; she
+insisted on reading the letter to him. He said coldly, "I am glad to
+hear of Mr. Mountjoy's recovery"--and took up the newspaper. Was this
+unworthy jealousy still strong enough to master him, even at that
+moment? His wife had forgotten it. Why had he not forgotten it too?
+
+On the same day Iris replied to Hugh, with the confidence and affection
+of the bygone time before her marriage. After closing and addressing
+the envelope, she found that her small store of postage stamps was
+exhausted, and sent for her maid. Mr. Vimpany happened to pass the open
+door of her room, while she was asking for a stamp; he heard Fanny say
+that she was not able to accommodate her mistress. "Allow me to make
+myself useful," the polite doctor suggested. He produced a stamp, and
+fixed it himself on the envelope. When he had proceeded on his way
+downstairs, Fanny's distrust of him insisted on expressing itself. "He
+wanted to find out what person you have written to," she said. "Let me
+make your letter safe in the post." In five minutes more it was in the
+box at the office.
+
+While these trifling events were in course of progress, Mr. Vimpany had
+gone into the garden to read the second of the two letters, delivered
+that morning, addressed to himself. On her return from the post-office,
+Fanny had opportunities of observing him while she was in the
+greenhouse, trying to revive the perishing flowers--neglected in the
+past days of domestic trouble.
+
+Noticing her, after he had read his letter over for the second time,
+Mr. Vimpany sent the maid into the cottage to say that he wished to
+speak with her master. Lord Harry joined him in the garden--looked at
+the letter--and, handing it back, turned away. The doctor followed him,
+and said something which seemed to be received with objection. Mr.
+Vimpany persisted nevertheless, and apparently carried his point. The
+two gentlemen consulted the railway time-table, and hurried away
+together, to catch the train to Paris.
+
+Fanny Mere returned to the conservatory, and absently resumed her
+employment among the flowers. On what evil errand had the doctor left
+the cottage? And, why, on this occasion, had he taken the master with
+him?
+
+The time had been when Fanny might have tried to set these questions at
+rest by boldly following the two gentlemen to Paris; trusting to her
+veil, to her luck, and to the choice of a separate carriage in the
+train, to escape notice. But, although her ill-judged interference with
+the domestic affairs of Lady Harry had been forgiven, she had not been
+received again into favour unreservedly. Conditions were imposed, which
+forbade her to express any opinion on her master's conduct, and which
+imperatively ordered her to leave the protection of her mistress--if
+protection was really needed--in his lordship's competent hands. "I
+gratefully appreciate your kind intentions," Iris had said, with her
+customary tenderness of regard for the feelings of others; "but I never
+wish to hear again of Mr. Vimpany, or of the strange suspicions which
+he seems to excite in your mind." Still as gratefully devoted to Iris
+as ever, Fanny viewed the change in my lady's way of thinking as one of
+the deplorable results of her return to her husband, and waited
+resignedly for the coming time when her wise distrust of two
+unscrupulous men would be justified.
+
+Condemned to inaction for the present, Lady Harry's maid walked
+irritably up and down the conservatory, forgetting the flowers. Through
+the open back door of the cottage the cheap clock in the hall poured
+its harsh little volume of sound, striking the hour. "I wonder," she
+said to herself, "if those two wicked ones have found their way to a
+hospital yet?" That guess happened to have hit the mark. The two wicked
+ones were really approaching a hospital, well known to the doctor by
+more previous visits than one. At the door they were met by a French
+physician, attached to the institution--the writer of the letter which
+had reached Mr. Vimpany in the morning.
+
+This gentleman led the way to the official department of the hospital,
+and introduced the two foreigners to the French authorities assembled
+for the transaction of business.
+
+As a medical man, Mr. Vimpany's claims to general respect and
+confidence were carefully presented. He was a member of the English
+College of Surgeons; he was the friend, as well as the colleague of the
+famous President of that College, who had introduced him to the chief
+surgeon of the Hotel Dieu. Other introductions to illustrious medical
+persons in Paris had naturally followed. Presented under these
+advantages, Mr. Vimpany announced his discovery of a new system of
+treatment in diseases of the lungs. Having received his medical
+education in Paris, he felt bound in gratitude to place himself under
+the protection of "the princes of science," resident in the brilliant
+capital of France. In that hospital, after much fruitless investigation
+in similar institutions, he had found a patient suffering from the form
+of lung disease, which offered to him the opportunity that he wanted.
+It was impossible that he could do justice to his new system, unless
+the circumstances were especially favourable. Air more pure than the
+air of a great city, and bed-room accommodation not shared by other
+sick persons, were among the conditions absolutely necessary to the
+success of the experiment. These, and other advantages, were freely
+offered to him by his noble friend, who would enter into any
+explanations which the authorities then present might think it
+necessary to demand.
+
+The explanations having been offered and approved, there was a general
+move to the bed occupied by the invalid who was an object of
+professional interest to the English doctor.
+
+The patient's name was Oxbye. He was a native of Denmark, and had
+followed in his own country the vocation of a schoolmaster. His
+knowledge of the English language and the French had offered him the
+opportunity of migrating to Paris, where he had obtained employment as
+translator and copyist. Earning his bread, poorly enough in this way,
+he had been prostrated by the malady which had obliged him to take
+refuge in the hospital. The French physician, under whose medical care
+he had been placed, having announced that he had communicated his notes
+enclosed in a letter to his English colleague, and having frankly
+acknowledged that the result of the treatment had not as yet
+sufficiently justified expectation, the officers of the institution
+spoke next. The Dane was informed of the nature of Mr. Vimpany's
+interest in him, and of the hospitable assistance offered by Mr.
+Vimpany's benevolent friend; and the question was then put, whether he
+preferred to remain where he was, or whether he desired to be removed
+under the conditions which had just been stated?
+
+Tempted by the prospect of a change, which offered to him a bed-chamber
+of his own in the house of a person of distinction--with a garden to
+walk about in, and flowers to gladden his eyes, when he got
+better--Oxbye eagerly adopted the alternative of leaving the hospital.
+"Pray let me go," the poor fellow said: "I am sure I shall be the
+better for it." Without opposing this decision, the responsible
+directors reminded him that it had been adopted on impulse, and decided
+that it was their duty to give him a little time for consideration.
+
+In the meanwhile, some of the gentlemen assembled at the bedside,
+looking at Oxbye and then looking at Lord Harry, had observed a certain
+accidental likeness between the patient and "Milord, the
+philanthropist," who was willing to receive him. The restraints of
+politeness had only permitted them to speak of this curious discovery
+among themselves. At the later time, however, when the gentlemen had
+taken leave of each other, Mr. Vimpany--finding himself alone with Lord
+Harry--had no hesitation in introducing the subject, on which delicacy
+had prevented the Frenchmen from entering.
+
+"Did you look at the Dane?" he began abruptly.
+
+"Of course I did!"
+
+"And you noticed the likeness?"
+
+"Not I!"
+
+The doctor's uproarious laughter startled the people who were walking
+near them in the street. "Here's another proof," he burst out, "of the
+true saying that no man knows himself. You don't deny the likeness, I
+suppose?"
+
+"Do you yourself see it?" Lord Harry asked.
+
+Mr. Vimpany answered the question scornfully: "Is it likely that I
+should have submitted to all the trouble I have taken to get possession
+of that man, if I had not seen a likeness between his face and yours?"
+
+The Irish lord said no more. When his friend asked why he was silent,
+he gave his reason sharply enough: "I don't like the subject."
+
+CHAPTER XLII
+
+THE METTLESOME MAID
+
+ON the evening of that day Fanny Mere, entering the dining-room with
+the coffee, found Lord Harry and Mr. Vimpany alone, and discovered (as
+soon as she opened the door) that they changed the language in which
+they were talking from English to French.
+
+She continued to linger in the room, apparently occupied in setting the
+various objects on the sideboard in order. Her master was speaking at
+the time; he asked if the doctor had succeeded in finding a bed-room
+for himself in the neighbourhood. To this Mr. Vimpany replied that he
+had got the bed-room. Also, that he had provided himself with something
+else, which it was equally important to have at his disposal. "I mean,"
+he proceeded, in his bad French, "that I have found a photographic
+apparatus on hire. We are ready now for the appearance of our
+interesting Danish guest."
+
+"And when the man comes," Lord Harry added, "what am I to say to my
+wife? How am I to find an excuse, when she hears of a hospital patient
+who has taken possession of your bed-room at the cottage--and has done
+it with my permission, and with you to attend on him?"
+
+The doctor sipped his coffee. "We have told a story that has satisfied
+the authorities," he said coolly. "Repeat the story to your wife."
+
+"She won't believe it," Lord Harry replied.
+
+Mr. Vimpany waited until he had lit another cigar, and had quite
+satisfied himself that it was worth smoking.
+
+"You have yourself to thank for that obstacle," he resumed. "If you had
+taken my advice, your wife would have been out of our way by this time.
+I suppose I must manage it. If you fail, leave her ladyship to me. In
+the meanwhile, there's a matter of more importance to settle first. We
+shall want a nurse for our poor dear invalid. Where are we to find
+her?"
+
+As he stated that difficulty, he finished his coffee, and looked about
+him for the bottle of brandy which always stood on the dinner-table. In
+doing this, he happened to notice Fanny. Convinced that her mistress
+was in danger, after what she had already heard, the maid's anxiety and
+alarm had so completely absorbed her that she had forgotten to play her
+part. Instead of still busying herself at the sideboard, she stood with
+her back to it, palpably listening. Cunning Mr. Vimpany, possessing
+himself of the brandy, made a request too entirely appropriate to
+excite suspicion.
+
+"Some fresh cold water, if you please," was all that he said.
+
+The moment that Fanny left the room, the doctor addressed his friend in
+English, with his eye on the door: "News for you, my boy! We are in a
+pretty pickle--Lady Harry's maid understands French."
+
+"Quite impossible," Lord Harry declared.
+
+"We will put that to the test," Mr. Vimpany answered. "Watch her when
+she comes in again."
+
+"What are you going to do."
+
+"I am going to insult her in French. Observe the result."
+
+In another minute Fanny returned with the fresh water. As she placed
+the glass jug before Mr. Vimpany he suddenly laid his hand on her arm
+and looked her straight in the face. "Vous nous avez mis dedans,
+drolesse!"* he said.
+
+*In English: "You have taken us in, you jade!"
+
+An uncontrollable look of mingled rage and fear made its plain
+confession in Fanny's face. She had been discovered; she had heard
+herself called "drolesse;" she stood before the two men self-condemned.
+Her angry master threatened her with instant dismissal from the house.
+The doctor interfered.
+
+"No, no," he said; "you mustn't deprive Lady Harry, at a moment's
+notice, of her maid. Such a clever maid, too," he added with his
+rascally smile. "An accomplished person, who understands French, and is
+too modest to own it!"
+
+The doctor had led Fanny through many a weary and unrewarded walk when
+she had followed him to the hospitals; he had now inflicted a
+deliberate insult by calling her "drolesse" and he had completed the
+sum of his offences by talking contemptuously of her modesty and her
+mastery of the French language. The woman's detestation of him, which
+under ordinary circumstances she might have attempted to conceal, was
+urged into audaciously asserting itself by the strong excitement that
+now possessed her. Driven to bay, Fanny had made up her mind to
+discover the conspiracy of which Mr. Vimpany was the animating spirit,
+by a method daring enough to be worthy of the doctor himself.
+
+"My knowledge of French has told me something," she said. "I have just
+heard, Mr. Vimpany, that you want a nurse for your invalid gentleman.
+With my lord's permission, suppose you try Me?"
+
+Fanny's audacity was more than her master's patience could endure. He
+ordered her to leave the room.
+
+The peace-making doctor interfered again: "My dear lord, let me beg you
+will not be too hard on the young woman." He turned to Fanny, with an
+effort to look indulgent, which ended in the reappearance of his
+rascally smile. "Thank you, my dear, for your proposal," he said; "I
+will let you know if we accept it, to-morrow."
+
+Fanny's unforgiving master pointed to the door; she thanked Mr.
+Vimpany, and went out. Lord Harry eyed his friend in angry amazement.
+"Are you mad?" he asked.
+
+"Tell me something first," the doctor rejoined. "Is there any English
+blood in your family?"
+
+Lord Harry answered with a burst of patriotic feeling: "I regret to say
+my family is adulterated in that manner. My grandmother was an
+Englishwoman."
+
+Mr. Vimpany received this extract from the page of family history with
+a coolness all his own.
+
+"It's a relief to hear that," he said. "You may be capable (by the
+grandmother's side) of swallowing a dose of sound English sense. I can
+but try, at any rate. That woman is too bold and too clever to be
+treated like an ordinary servant--I incline to believe that she is a
+spy in the employment of your wife. Whether I am right or wrong in this
+latter case, the one way I can see of paring the cat's claws is to turn
+her into a nurse. Do you find me mad now?"
+
+"Madder than ever!"
+
+"Ah, you don't take after your grandmother! Now listen to me. Do we run
+the smallest risk, if Fanny finds it her interest to betray us? Suppose
+we ask ourselves what she has really found out. She knows we have got a
+sick man from a hospital coming here--does she know what we want him
+for? Not she! Neither you nor I said a word on that subject. But she
+also heard us agree that your wife was in our way. What does that
+matter? Did she hear us say what it is that we don't want your wife to
+discover? Not she, I tell you again! Very well, then--if Fanny acts as
+Oxbye's nurse, shy as the young woman may be, she innocently associates
+herself with the end that we have to gain by the Danish gentleman's
+death! Oh, you needn't look alarmed! I mean his natural death by lung
+disease--no crime, my noble friend! no crime!"
+
+The Irish lord, sitting near the doctor, drew his chair back in a
+hurry.
+
+"If there's English blood in my family," he declared, "I'll tell you
+what, Vimpany, there's devil's blood in yours!"
+
+"Anything you like but Irish blood," the cool scoundrel rejoined.
+
+As he made that insolent reply, Fanny came in again, with a sufficient
+excuse for her reappearance. She announced that a person from the
+hospital wished to speak to the English doctor.
+
+The messenger proved to be a young man employed in the secretary's
+office. Oxbye still persisting in his desire to be placed under Mr.
+Vimpany's care; one last responsibility rested on the official
+gentlemen now in charge of him. They could implicitly trust the medical
+assistance and the gracious hospitality offered to the poor Danish
+patient; but, before he left them, they must also be satisfied that he
+would be attended by a competent nurse. If the person whom Mr. Vimpany
+proposed to employ in this capacity could be brought to the hospital,
+it would be esteemed a favour; and, if her account of herself satisfied
+the physician in charge of Oxbye's case, the Dane might be removed to
+his new quarters on the same day.
+
+The next morning witnessed the first in a series of domestic incidents
+at the cottage, which no prophetic ingenuity could have foreseen. Mr.
+Vimpany and Fanny Mere actually left Passy together, on their way to
+Paris!
+
+CHAPTER XLIII
+
+FICTION: ATTEMPTED BY MY LORD
+
+THE day on which the doctor took his newly-appointed nurse with him to
+the hospital became an occasion associated with distressing
+recollections in the memory of Iris.
+
+In the morning, Fanny Mere had asked for leave to go out. For some time
+past this request had been so frequently granted, with such poor
+results so far as the maid's own designs were concerned, that Lady
+Harry decided on administering a tacit reproof, by means of a refusal.
+Fanny made no attempt at remonstrance; she left the room in silence.
+
+Half an hour later, Iris had occasion to ring for her attendant. The
+bell was answered by the cook--who announced, in explanation of her
+appearance, that Fanny Mere had gone out. More distressed than
+displeased by this reckless disregard of her authority, on the part of
+a woman who had hitherto expressed the most grateful sense of her
+kindness, Iris only said: "Send Fanny to me as soon as she comes back."
+
+Two hours passed before the truant maid returned.
+
+"I refused to let you go out this morning," Lady Harry said; "and you
+have taken the liberty of leaving the house for two hours. You might
+have made me understand, in a more becoming manner, that you intended
+to leave my service."
+
+Steadily respectful, Fanny answered: "I don't wish to leave your
+ladyship's service."
+
+"Then what does your conduct mean?"
+
+"It means, if you please, that I had a duty to do--and did it."
+
+"A duty to yourself?" Iris asked.
+
+"No, my lady; a duty to you."
+
+As she made that strange reply the door was opened, and Lord Harry
+entered the room. When he saw Fanny Mere he turned away again, in a
+hurry, to go out. "I didn't know your maid was with you," he said.
+"Another time will do."
+
+His permitting a servant to be an obstacle in his way, when he wished
+to speak to his wife, was a concession so entirely unbecoming in the
+master of the house, and so strangely contrary to his customary sense
+of what was due to himself, that Iris called him back in astonishment.
+She looked at her maid, who at once understood her, and withdrew. "What
+can you possibly be thinking of?" she said to her husband, when they
+were alone. Putting that question, she noticed an embarrassment in his
+manner, and an appearance of confusion in his face, which alarmed her.
+"Has something happened?" she asked; "and is it so serious that you
+hesitate to mention it to me?"
+
+He sat down by her and took her hand. The loving look in his eyes,
+which she knew so well, was not in them now; they expressed doubt, and
+something with it which suggested an effort at conciliation.
+
+"I am fearing I shall surprise you," he said.
+
+"Don't keep me in suspense!" she returned. "What is it?"
+
+He smiled uneasily: "It's something about Vimpany."
+
+Having got as far as that, he stopped. She drew her hand away from him.
+"I understand now," she said; "I must endeavour to control myself--you
+have something to tell me which will try my temper."
+
+He held up his hands in humorous protest: "Ah, my darling, here's your
+vivid imagination again, making mountains out of molehills, as they
+say! It's nothing half so serious as you seem to think; I have only to
+tell you of a little change."
+
+"A little change?" she repeated. "What change?"
+
+"Well, my dear, you see--" He hesitated and recovered himself. "I mean,
+you must know that Vimpany's plans are altered. He won't any longer
+occupy his bedroom in the cottage here."
+
+Iris looked inexpressibly relieved. "Going away, at last!" she
+exclaimed. "Oh, Harry, if you have been mystifying me, I hope you will
+never do it again. It isn't like you; it's cruel to alarm me about
+nothing. Mr. Vimpany's empty bedroom will be the most interesting room
+in the house, when I look into it to-night."
+
+Lord Harry got up, and walked to the window. As a sign of trouble in
+his mind, and of an instinctive effort to relieve it, the object of
+this movement was well-known to Iris. She followed him and stood by his
+side. It was now plain to her that there was something more to be
+told--and that he was hesitating how to confide it to his wife.
+
+"Go on," she said resignedly.
+
+He had expected her to take his arm, or perhaps to caress him, or at
+least to encourage him by her gentlest words and her prettiest smiles.
+The steady self-restraint which she now manifested was a sign, as he
+interpreted it, of suppressed resentment. Shrinking, honestly
+shrinking, from the bare possibility of another quarrel, he confronted
+the hard necessities of further confession.
+
+"Well, now," he said, "it's only this--you mustn't look into the empty
+bedroom to-night."
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Ah, for the best of all good reasons! Because you might find somebody
+in there."
+
+This reply excited her curiosity: her eyes rested on him eagerly. "Some
+friend of yours?" she asked.
+
+He persisted in an assumption of good-humour, which betrayed itself as
+mere artifice in the clumsiest manner: "I declare I feel as if I were
+in a court of justice, being cross-examined by a lawyer of skill and
+dexterity! Well, my sweet counsellor, no--not exactly a friend of
+mine."
+
+She reflected for a moment. "You don't surely mean one of Mr. Vimpany's
+friends?" she said.
+
+He pretended not to have heard her, and pointed to the view of the
+garden from the window. "Isn't it a lovely day? Let's go and look at
+the flowers," he suggested.
+
+"Did you not hear what I said to you just now?" she persisted.
+
+"I beg your pardon, dear; I was thinking of something else. Suppose we
+go into the garden?"
+
+When women have a point to gain in which they are interested, how many
+of them are capable of deferring it to a better opportunity? One in a
+thousand, perhaps. Iris kept her place at the window, resolved on
+getting an answer.
+
+"I asked you, Harry, whether the person who is to occupy our spare
+bedroom, to-night, was one of Mr. Vimpany's friends?"
+
+"Say one of Mr. Vimpany's patients--and you will be nearer the truth,"
+he answered, with an outburst of impatience.
+
+She could hardly believe him. "Do you mean a person who is really ill?"
+she said.
+
+"Of course I mean it," he said; irritated into speaking out, at last.
+
+"A man? or a woman?"
+
+"A man."
+
+"May I ask if he comes from England?"
+
+"He comes from one of the French hospitals. Anything more?"
+
+Iris left her husband to recover his good-humour, and went back to her
+chair. The extraordinary disclosure which she had extracted from him
+had produced a stupefying effect on her mind. Her customary sympathy
+with him, her subtle womanly observation of his character, her intimate
+knowledge of his merits and his defects, failed to find the rational
+motive which might have explained his conduct. She looked round at him
+with mingled feelings of perplexity and distrust.
+
+He was still at the window, but he had turned his back on the view of
+the garden; his eyes were fixed, in furtive expectation, on his wife.
+Was he waiting to hear her say something more? She ran the risk and
+said it.
+
+"I don't quite understand the sacrifice you seem to be making to Mr.
+Vimpany," she confessed. "Will you tell me, dear, what it means?"
+
+Here was the opportunity offered of following the doctor's advice, and
+putting his wife's credulity to the test. With her knowledge of
+Vimpany, would she really believe the story which had imposed on the
+strangers who managed the hospital? Lord Harry made up his mind, to try
+the experiment. No matter what the result might be, it would bring the
+responsibilities that were crushing him to an end. He need say no more,
+if the deception succeeded. He could do no more, if it failed. Under
+the influence of this cheering reflection, he recovered his temper; his
+handsome face brightened again with its genial boyish smile.
+
+"What a wonderful woman you are!" he cried. "Isn't it just the thing
+that I am here for, to tell you what I mean--and my clever wife sees
+through and through me, and reminds me of what I must do! Pay my fee
+beforehand, Iris! Give me a kiss--and my poor meaning shall be offered
+in return. It will help me if you remember one thing. Vimpany and I are
+old friends, and there's nothing we won't do to accommodate each other.
+Mind that!"
+
+Tried fairly on its own merits, the stupid fiction invented by the
+doctor produced an effect for which Lord Harry was not prepared. The
+longer Iris listened, the more strangely Iris looked at him. Not a word
+fell from her lips when he had done. He noticed that she had turned
+pale: it seemed to be almost possible that he had frightened her!
+
+If his bird-witted brains could have coupled cause and effect, this was
+exactly the result which he might have anticipated.
+
+She was asked to believe that a new system of medical practice had been
+invented by such a person as Mr. Vimpany. She was asked to believe that
+an invalid from a foreign hospital, who was a perfect stranger to Lord
+Harry, had been willingly made welcome to a bedroom at the cottage. She
+was asked to believe that this astounding concession had been offered
+to the doctor as a tribute of friendship, after her husband had himself
+told her that he regretted having invited Vimpany, for the second time,
+to become his guest. Here was one improbable circumstance accumulated
+on another, and a clever woman was expected to accept the monstrous
+excuses, thus produced, as a trustworthy statement of facts.
+Irresistibly, the dread of some evil deed in secret contemplation cast
+its darkening presence on the wife's mind. Lord Harry's observation had
+not misled him, when he saw Iris turn pale, and when the doubt was
+forced on him whether he might not have frightened her.
+
+"If my explanation of this little matter has satisfied you," he
+ventured to resume, "we need say no more about it."
+
+"I agree with you," she answered, "let us say no more about it."
+Conscious, in spite of the effort to resist it, of a feeling of
+oppression while she was in the same room with a man who had
+deliberately lied to her, and that man her husband, she reminded Lord
+Harry that he had proposed to take a walk in the garden. Out in the
+pure air, under the bright sky, she might breathe more freely. "Come to
+the flowers," she said.
+
+They went to the garden together--the wife fearing the deceitful
+husband, the husband fearing the quick-witted wife.
+
+Watching each other like two strangers, they walked silently side by
+side, and looked now and then at the collection of flowers and plants.
+Iris noticed a delicate fern which had fallen away from the support to
+which it had been attached. She stopped, and occupied herself in
+restoring it to its place. When she looked round again, after attending
+to the plant, her husband had disappeared, and Mr. Vimpany was waiting
+in his place.
+
+CHAPTER XLIV
+
+FICTION: IMPROVED BY THE DOCTOR
+
+"WHERE is Lord Harry?" Iris asked.
+
+The reply startled her: "Lord Harry leaves me to say to your ladyship,
+what he has not had resolution enough to say for himself."
+
+"I don't understand you, Mr. Vimpany."
+
+The doctor pointed to the fern which had just been the object of Lady
+Harry's care.
+
+"You have been helping that sickly plant there to live and thrive," he
+said, "and I have felt some curiosity in watching you. There is another
+sickly plant, which I have undertaken to rear if the thing can be done.
+My gardening is of the medical kind--I can only carry it on
+indoors--and whatever else it may be, I tell you plainly, like the
+outspoken sort of fellow I am, it's not likely to prove agreeable to a
+lady. No offence, I hope? Your humble servant is only trying to produce
+the right sort of impression--and takes leave to doubt his lordship in
+one particular."
+
+"In what particular, sir?"
+
+"I'll put it in the form of a question, ma'am. Has my friend persuaded
+you to make arrangements for leaving the cottage?"
+
+Iris looked at Lord Harry's friend without attempting to conceal her
+opinion of him.
+
+"I call that an impertinent question," she said. "By what right do you
+presume to inquire into what my husband and I may, or may not, have
+said to each other?"
+
+"Will you do me a favour, my lady? Or, if that is asking too much,
+perhaps you will not object to do justice to yourself. Suppose you try
+to exercise the virtue of self-control?
+
+"Quite needless, Mr. Vimpany. Pray understand that you are not capable
+of making me angry."
+
+"Many thanks, Lady Harry: you encourage me to go on. When I was bold
+enough to speak of your leaving the cottage, my motive was to prevent
+you from being needlessly alarmed."
+
+Did this mean that he was about to take her into his confidence? All
+her experience of him forbade her to believe it possible. But the
+doubts and fears occasioned by her interview with her husband had
+mastered her better sense; and the effort to conceal from the doctor
+the anxiety under which she suffered was steadily weakening the
+influence of her self-respect. "Why should I be alarmed?" she asked, in
+the vain hope of encouraging him to tell the truth.
+
+The doctor arrived at a hasty conclusion, on his side. Believing that
+he had shaken her resolution, he no longer troubled himself to assume
+the forms of politeness which he had hitherto, with some difficulty,
+contrived to observe.
+
+"In this curious little world of ours," he resumed, "we enjoy our lives
+on infernally hard terms. We live on condition that we die. The man I
+want to cure may die, in spite of the best I can do for him---he may
+sink slowly, by what we medical men call a hard death. For example, it
+wouldn't much surprise me if I found some difficulty in keeping him in
+his bed. He might roam all over your cottage when my back was turned.
+Or he might pay the debt of Nature--as somebody calls it--with
+screaming and swearing. If you were within hearing of him, I'm afraid
+you might be terrified, and, with the best wish to be useful, I
+couldn't guarantee (if the worst happened) to keep him quiet. In your
+place, if you will allow me to advise you--"
+
+Iris interrupted him. Instead of confessing the truth, he was
+impudently attempting to frighten her. "I don't allow a person in whom
+I have no confidence to advise me," she said; "I wish to hear no more."
+
+Mr. Vimpany found it desirable to resume the forms of politeness.
+Either he had failed to shake her resolution, or she was sufficiently
+in possession of herself to conceal what she felt.
+
+"One last word!" he said. "I won't presume to advise your ladyship; I
+will merely offer a suggestion. My lord tells me that Hugh Mountjoy is
+on the way to recovery. You are in communication with him by letter, as
+I happened to notice when I did you that trifling service of providing
+a postage-stamp. Why not go to London and cheer your convalescent
+friend? Harry won't mind it--I beg your pardon, I ought to have said
+Lord Harry. Come! come! my dear lady; I am a rough fellow, but I mean
+well. Take a holiday, and come back to us when my lord writes to say
+that he can have the pleasure of receiving you again." He waited for a
+moment. "Am I not to be favoured with an answer?" he asked.
+
+"My husband shall answer you."
+
+With those parting words, Iris turned her back on him.
+
+She entered the cottage. Now in one room, and now in another, she
+searched for Lord Harry; he was nowhere to be found. Had he purposely
+gone out to avoid her? Her own remembrance of Vimpany's language and
+Vimpany's manner told her that so it must be--the two men were in
+league together. Of all dangers, unknown danger is the most terrible to
+contemplate. Lady Harry's last resources of resolution failed her. She
+dropped helplessly into a chair.
+
+After an interval--whether it was a long or a short lapse of time she
+was unable to decide--someone gently opened the door. Had her husband
+felt for her? Had he returned? "Come in! she cried eagerly--" come in!
+
+CHAPTER XLV
+
+FACT: RELATED BY FANNY
+
+THE person who now entered the room was Fanny Mere.
+
+But one interest was stirring in the mind of Iris now. "Do you know
+where your master is?" she asked.
+
+"I saw him go out," the maid replied. "Which way I didn't particularly
+notice--" She was on the point of adding, "and I didn't particularly
+care," when she checked herself. "Yesterday and to-day, my lady, things
+have come to my knowledge which I must not keep to myself," the
+resolute woman continued. "If a servant may say such a thing without
+offence, I have never been so truly my mistress's friend as I am now. I
+beg you to forgive my boldness; there is a reason for it."
+
+So she spoke, with no presumption in her looks, with no familiarity in
+her manner. The eyes of her friendless mistress filled with tears, the
+offered hand of her friendless mistress answered in silence. Fanny took
+that kind hand, and pressed it respectfully--a more demonstrative woman
+than herself might perhaps have kissed it. She only said, "Thank you,
+my lady," and went on with what she felt it her duty to relate.
+
+As carefully as usual, as quietly as usual, she repeated the
+conversation, at Lord Harry's table; describing also the manner in
+which Mr. Vimpany had discovered her as a person who understood the
+French language, and who had cunningly kept it a secret. In this
+serious state of things, the doctor--yes, the doctor himself!--had
+interfered to protect her from the anger of her master, and, more
+wonderful still, for a reason which it seemed impossible to dispute. He
+wanted a nurse for the foreigner whose arrival was expected on that
+evening, and he had offered the place to Fanny. "Your ladyship will, I
+hope, excuse me; I have taken the place."
+
+This amazing end to the strange events which had just been narrated
+proved to be more than Iris was immediately capable of understanding.
+"I am in the dark," she confessed. "Is Mr. Vimpany a bolder villain
+even than I have supposed him to be?"
+
+"That he most certainly is!" Fanny said with strong conviction. "As to
+what he really had in his wicked head when he engaged me, I shall find
+that out in time. Anyway, I am the nurse who is to help him. When I
+disobeyed you this morning, my lady, it was to go to the hospital with
+Mr. Vimpany. I was taken to see the person whose nurse I am to be. A
+poor, feeble, polite creature, who looked as if he couldn't hurt a
+fly---and yet I promise you he startled me! I saw a likeness, the
+moment I looked at him."
+
+"A likeness to anybody whom I know?" Iris asked.
+
+"To the person in all the world, my lady, whom you know most nearly--a
+likeness to my master."
+
+"What!"
+
+"Oh, it's no fancy; I am sure of what I say. To my mind, that Danish
+man's likeness to my lord is (if you will excuse my language) a nasty
+circumstance. I don't know why or wherefore--all I can say is, I don't
+like it; and I shan't rest until I have found out what it means.
+Besides this, my lady, I must know the reason why they want to get you
+out of their way. Please to keep up your heart; I shall warn you in
+time, when I am sure of the danger."
+
+Iris refused to sanction the risk involved in this desperate design.
+"It's _you_ who will be in danger!" she exclaimed.
+
+In her coolest state of obstinacy, Fanny answered: "That's in your
+ladyship's service--and that doesn't reckon."
+
+Feeling gratefully this simple and sincere expression of attachment,
+Iris held to her own opinion, nevertheless.
+
+"You are in my service," she said; "I won't let you go to Mr. Vimpany.
+Give it up, Fanny! Give it up!"
+
+"I'll give it up, my lady, when I know what the doctor means to do--not
+before."
+
+The assertion of authority having failed, Iris tried persuasion next.
+
+"As your mistress, it is my duty to set you an example," she resumed.
+"One of us must be considerate and gentle in a dispute--let me try to
+be that one. There can be no harm, and there may be some good, in
+consulting the opinion of a friend; some person in whose discretion we
+can trust."
+
+"Am I acquainted with the person your ladyship is thinking of?" Fanny
+inquired. "In that case, a friend will know what we want of her by
+to-morrow morning. I have written to Mrs. Vimpany."
+
+"The very person I had in my mind, Fanny! When may we expect to hear
+from her?"
+
+"If Mrs. Vimpany can put what she has to say to us into few words,"
+Fanny replied, "we shall hear from her to-morrow by telegraph."
+
+As she answered her mistress in those cheering words, they were
+startled by a heavy knock at the door of the room. Under similar
+circumstances, Lord Harry's delicate hand would have been just loud
+enough to be heard, and no more. Iris called out suspiciously: "Who's
+there?"
+
+The doctor's gross voice answered: "Can I say a word, if you please, to
+Fanny Mere?"
+
+The maid opened the door. Mr. Vimpany's heavy hand laid bold of her
+arm, pulled her over the threshold, and closed the door behind her.
+After a brief absence, Fanny returned with news of my lord.
+
+A commissioner had arrived with a message for the doctor; and Fanny was
+charged to repeat it or not, just as she thought right under the
+circumstances. Lord Harry was in Paris. He had been invited to go to
+the theatre with some friends, and to return with them to supper. If he
+was late in getting home, he was anxious that my lady should not be
+made uneasy. After having authorised Mr. Vimpany's interference in the
+garden, the husband evidently had his motives for avoiding another
+interview with the wife. Iris was left alone, to think over that
+discovery. Fanny had received orders to prepare the bedroom for the
+doctor's patient.
+
+CHAPTER XLVI
+
+MAN AND WIFE
+
+TOWARDS evening, the Dane was brought to the cottage.
+
+A feeling of pride which forbade any display of curiosity, strengthened
+perhaps by an irresistible horror of Vimpany, kept Iris in her room.
+Nothing but the sound of footsteps, outside, told her when the
+suffering man was taken to his bed-chamber on the same floor. She was,
+afterwards informed by Fanny that the doctor turned down the lamp in
+the corridor, before the patient was helped to ascend the stairs, as a
+means of preventing the mistress of the house from plainly seeing the
+stranger's face, and recognising the living likeness of her husband.
+
+The hours advanced--the bustle of domestic life sank into
+silence--everybody but Iris rested quietly in bed.
+
+Through the wakeful night the sense of her situation oppressed her
+sinking spirits. Mysteries that vaguely threatened danger made their
+presence felt, and took their dark way through her thoughts. The
+cottage, in which the first happy days of her marriage had been passed,
+might ere long be the scene of some evil deed, provoking the lifelong
+separation of her husband and herself! Were these the exaggerated fears
+of a woman in a state of hysterical suspicion? It was enough for Iris
+to remember that Lord Harry and Mr. Vimpany had been alike incapable of
+telling her the truth. The first had tried to deceive her; the second
+had done his best to frighten her. Why? If there was really nothing to
+be afraid of--why? The hours of the early morning came; and still she
+listened in vain for the sound of my lord's footstep on the stairs;
+still she failed to hear the cautious opening of his dressing-room
+door. Leaving her chair, Iris rested on the bed. As time advanced,
+exhaustion mastered her; she slept.
+
+Awakening at a late hour, she rang for Fanny Mere. The master had just
+returned. He had missed the latest night-train to Passy; and, rather
+than waste money on hiring a carriage at that hour, he had accepted the
+offer of a bed at the house of his friends. He was then below stairs,
+hoping to see Lady Harry at breakfast.
+
+His wife joined him.
+
+Not even at the time of the honeymoon had the Irish lord been a more
+irresistibly agreeable man than he was on that memorable morning. His
+apologies for having failed to return at the right time were little
+masterpieces of grace and gaiety. The next best thing to having been
+present, at the theatrical performance of the previous night, was to
+hear his satirical summary of the story of the play, contrasting
+delightfully with his critical approval of the fine art of the actors.
+The time had been when Iris would have resented such merciless trifling
+with serious interests as this. In these earlier and better days, she
+would have reminded him affectionately of her claim to be received into
+his confidence--she would have tried all that tact and gentleness and
+patience could do to win his confession of the ascendency exercised
+over him by his vile friend--and she would have used the utmost
+influence of her love and her resolution to disunite the fatal
+fellowship which was leading him to his ruin.
+
+But Iris Henley was Lady Harry now.
+
+She was sinking--as Mrs. Vimpany had feared, as Mountjoy had
+foreseen--lower and lower on the descent to her husband's level. With a
+false appearance of interest in what he was saying she waited for her
+chance of matching him with his own weapons of audacious deceit. He
+ignorantly offered her the opportunity--setting the same snare to catch
+his wife, which she herself had it in contemplation to use for
+entrapping her husband into a confession of the truth.
+
+"Ah, well--I have said more than enough of my last night's amusement,"
+he confessed. "It's your turn now, my dear. Have you had a look at the
+poor fellow whom the doctor is going to cure?" he asked abruptly; eager
+to discover whether she had noticed the likeness between Oxbye and
+himself.
+
+Her eyes rested on him attentively. "I have not yet seen the person you
+allude to," she answered. "Is Mr. Vimpany hopeful of his recovery?"
+
+He took out his case, and busied himself in choosing a cigar. In the
+course of his adventurous life, he had gained some knowledge of the
+effect of his own impetuous temper on others, and of difficulties which
+he had experienced when circumstances rendered it necessary to keep his
+face in a state of discipline.
+
+"Oh, there's no reason for anxiety!" he said, with an over-acted
+interest in examining his cigar. "Mr. Oxbye is in good hands."
+
+"People do sometimes sink under an illness," she quietly remarked.
+
+Without making any reply he took out his matchbox. His hand trembled a
+little; he failed at the first attempt to strike a light.
+
+"And doctors sometimes make mistakes," Iris went on.
+
+He was still silent. At the second attempt, he succeeded with the
+match, and lit his cigar.
+
+"Suppose Mr. Vimpany made a mistake," she persisted. "In the case of
+this stranger, it might lead to deplorable results."
+
+Lord Harry lost his temper, and with it his colour.
+
+"What the devil do you mean?" he cried.
+
+"I might ask, in my turn," she said, "what have I done to provoke an
+outbreak of temper? I only made a remark."
+
+At that critical moment, Fanny Mere entered the room with a telegram in
+her hand.
+
+"For you, my lady."
+
+Iris opened the telegram. The message was signed by Mrs. Vimpany, and
+was expressed in these words: "You may feel it your duty to go to your
+father. He is dangerously ill."
+
+Lord Harry saw a sudden change in his wife's face that roused his
+guilty suspicions. "Is it anything about me?" he asked.
+
+Iris handed the telegram to him in silence. Having looked at it, he
+desired to hear what her wishes were.
+
+"The telegram expresses my wishes," she said. "Have you any objection
+to my leaving you?"
+
+"None whatever," he answered eagerly. "Go, by all means."
+
+If it had still been possible for her to hesitate, that reply would
+have put an end to all further doubt. She turned away to leave the
+room. He followed her to the door.
+
+"I hope you don't think there is any want of sympathy on my part," he
+said. "You are quite right to go to your father. That was all I meant."
+He was agitated, honestly agitated, while he spoke. Iris saw it, and
+felt it gratefully. She was on the point of making a last appeal to his
+confidence, when he opened the door for her. "Don't let me detain you,"
+he said. His voice faltered; he suddenly turned aside before she could
+look at him.
+
+Fanny was waiting in the hall, eager to see the telegram. She read it
+twice and reflected for a moment. "How often do things fit themselves
+to one's wishes in this convenient way?" she asked herself. "It's
+lucky," she privately decided--"almost too lucky. Let me pack up your
+things," she continued, addressing her mistress, "while I have some
+time to myself. Mr. Oxbye is asleep."
+
+As the day wore on, the noble influences in the nature of Iris, failing
+fast, yet still at rare intervals struggling to assert themselves,
+inspired her with the resolution to make a last attempt to give her
+husband an opportunity of trusting her. He was not in his room, not in
+any other part of the house, not in the garden. The hours passed--she
+was left to eat her dinner in solitude. For the second time, he was
+avoiding her. For the second time, he distrusted the influence of his
+wife. With a heavy heart she prepared for her departure by the
+night-mail.
+
+The duties of the new nurse kept her in the cottage. Filled with alarm
+for the faithful creature whom she was leaving--to what fate, who could
+say?--Iris kissed her at parting.
+
+Fanny's faint blue eyes filled with tears. She dashed them away, and
+held her mistress for an instant in her arms. "I know whom you are
+thinking of," she whispered. "He is not here to bid you good-bye. Let
+me see what I can find in his room." Iris had already looked round the
+room, in the vain hope of finding a letter. Fanny rushed up the stairs,
+determined on a last search--and ran down again with a folded morsel of
+flimsy foreign notepaper in her hand. "My ugly eyes are quicker than
+yours," she said. "The air must have come in at the window and blown it
+off the table." Iris eagerly read the letter:
+
+"I dare not deny that you will be better away from us, but only for a
+while. Forgive me, dearest; I cannot find the courage to say good-bye."
+Those few words spoke for him--and no more.
+
+Briefly on her side, but not unkindly, his wife answered him:
+
+"You have spared me a bitter moment. May I hope to find the man whom I
+have trusted and honoured, when I come back? Good-bye."
+
+When were they to meet again? And how?
+
+CHAPTER XLVII
+
+THE PATIENT AND MY LORD
+
+THERE now remained but one other person in Lord Harry's household whose
+presence on the scene was an obstacle to be removed.
+
+This person was the cook. On condition of her immediate departure
+(excused by alleged motives of economy), she received a month's wages
+from her master, in advance of the sum due to her, and a written
+character which did ample justice to her many good qualities. The poor
+woman left her employment with the heartiest expressions of gratitude.
+To the end of her days, she declared the Irish lord to be a nobleman by
+nature. Republican principles, inherited from her excellent parents,
+disinclined her to recognise him as a nobleman by birth.
+
+But another sweet and simple creature was still left to brighten the
+sinister gloom in the cottage.
+
+The geod Dane sorely tried the patience of Fanny Mere. This countryman
+of Hamlet, as he liked to call himself, was a living protest against
+the sentiments of inveterate contempt and hatred, with which his nurse
+was accustomed to regard the men. When pain spared him at intervals,
+Mr. Oxbye presented the bright blue eyes and the winning smile which
+suggested the resemblance to the Irish lord. His beardless face, thin
+towards the lower extremities, completed the likeness in some degree
+only. The daring expression of Lord Harry, in certain emergencies,
+never appeared. Nursing him carefully, on the severest principles of
+duty as distinguished from inclination, Fanny found herself in the
+presence of a male human being, who in the painless intervals of his
+malady, wrote little poems in her praise; asked for a few flowers from
+the garden, and made prettily arranged nosegays of them devoted to
+herself; cried, when she told him he was a fool, and kissed her hand
+five minutes afterwards, when she administered his medicine, and gave
+him no pleasant sweet thing to take the disagreeable taste out of his
+mouth. This gentle patient loved Lord Harry, loved Mr. Vimpany, loved
+the furious Fanny, resist it as she might. On her obstinate refusal to
+confide to him the story of her life--after he had himself set her the
+example at great length--he persisted in discovering for himself that
+"this interesting woman was a victim of sorrows of the heart." In
+another state of existence, he was offensively certain that she would
+be living with _him._ "You are frightfully pale, you will soon die; I
+shall break a blood-vessel, and follow you; we shall sit side by side
+on clouds, and sing together everlastingly to accompaniment of
+celestial harps. Oh, what a treat!" Like a child, he screamed when he
+was in pain; and, like a child, he laughed when the pain had gone away.
+When she was angry enough with him to say, "If I had known what sort of
+man you were, I would never have undertaken to nurse you," he only
+answered, "my dear, let us thank God together that you did not know."
+There was no temper in him to be roused; and, worse still, on buoyant
+days, when his spirits were lively, there was no persuading him that he
+might not live long enough to marry his nurse, if he only put the
+question to her often enough. What was to be done with such a man as
+this? Fanny believed that she despised her feeble patient. At the same
+time, the food that nourished him was prepared by her own hands--while
+the other inhabitants of the cottage were left (in the absence of the
+cook) to the tough mercies of a neighbouring restaurant. First and
+foremost among the many good deeds by which the conduct of women claims
+the gratitude of the other sex, is surely the manner in which they let
+an unfortunate man master them, without an unworthy suspicion of that
+circumstance to trouble the charitable serenity of their minds.
+
+Carefully on the look-out for any discoveries which might enlighten
+her, Fanny noticed with ever-increasing interest the effect which the
+harmless Dane seemed to produce on my lord and the doctor.
+
+Every morning, after breakfast, Lord Harry presented himself in the
+bedroom. Every morning, his courteous interest in his guest expressed
+itself mechanically in the same form of words:
+
+"Mr. Oxbye, how do you find yourself to-day?"
+
+Sometimes the answer would be: "Gracious lord, I am suffering pain."
+Sometimes it was: "Dear and admirable patron, I feel as if I might get
+well again." On either occasion, Lord Harry listened without looking at
+Mr. Oxbye--said he was sorry to hear a bad account or glad to hear a
+good account, without looking at Mr. Oxbye--made a remark on the
+weather, and took his leave, without looking at Mr. Oxbye. Nothing
+could be more plain than that his polite inquiries (once a day) were
+unwillingly made, and that it was always a relief to him to get out of
+the room. So strongly was Fanny's curiosity excited by this strange
+behaviour, that she ventured one day to speak to her master.
+
+"I am afraid, my lord, you are not hopeful of Mr. Oxeye's recovering?"
+
+"Mind your own business," was the savage answer that she received.
+
+Fanny never again took the liberty of speaking to him; but she watched
+him more closely than ever. He was perpetually restless. Now he
+wandered from one room to another, and walked round and round the
+garden, smoking incessantly. Now he went out riding, or took the
+railway to Paris and disappeared for the day. On the rare occasions
+when he was in a state of repose, he always appeared to have taken
+refuge in his wife's room; Fanny's keyhole-observation discovered him,
+thinking miserably, seated in his wife's chair. It seemed to be
+possible that he was fretting after Lady Harry. But what did his
+conduct to Mr. Oxbye mean? What was the motive which made him persist,
+without an attempt at concealment, in keeping out of Mr. Vimpany's way?
+And, treated in this rude manner, how was it that his wicked friend
+seemed to be always amused, never offended?
+
+As for the doctor's behaviour to his patient, it was, in Fanny's
+estimation, worthy of a savage.
+
+He appeared to feel no sort of interest in the man who had been sent to
+him from the hospital at his own request, and whose malady it was
+supposed to be the height of his ambition to cure. When Mr. Oxbye
+described his symptoms, Mr. Vimpany hardly even made a pretence at
+listening. With a frowning face he applied the stethoscope, felt the
+pulse, looked at the tongue--and drew his own conclusions in sullen
+silence. If the nurse had a favourable report to make, he brutally
+turned his back on her. If discouraging results of the medical
+treatment made their appearance at night, and she felt it a duty to
+mention them, he sneered as if he doubted whether she was speaking the
+truth. Mr. Oxbye's inexhaustible patience and amiability made endless
+allowances for his medical advisor. "It is my misfortune to keep my
+devoted doctor in a state of perpetual anxiety," he used to say; "and
+we all know what a trial to the temper is the consequence of unrelieved
+suspense. I believe in Mr. Vimpany." Fanny was careful not to betray
+her own opinion by making any reply; her doubts of the doctor had, by
+this time, become terrifying doubts even to herself. Whenever an
+opportunity favoured her, she vigilantly watched him. One of his ways
+of finding amusement, in his leisure hours, was in the use of a
+photographic apparatus. He took little pictures of the rooms in the
+cottage, which were followed by views in the garden. Those having come
+to an end, he completed the mystification of the nurse by producing a
+portrait of the Dane, while he lay asleep one day after he had been
+improving in health for some little time past. Fanny asked leave to
+look at the likeness when it had been "printed" from the negative, in
+the garden. He first examined it himself--and then deliberately tore it
+up and let the fragments fly away in the wind. "I am not satisfied with
+it," was all the explanation he offered. One of the garden chairs
+happened to be near him; he sat down, and looked like a man in a state
+of torment under his own angry thoughts.
+
+If the patient's health had altered for the worse, and if the tendency
+to relapse had proved to be noticeable after medicine had been
+administered, Fanny's first suspicions might have taken a very serious
+turn. But the change in Oxbye--sleeping in purer air and sustained by
+better food than he could obtain at the hospital--pointed more and more
+visibly to a decided gain of vital strength. His hollow checks were
+filling out, and colour was beginning to appear again on the pallor of
+his skin. Strange as the conduct of Lord Harry and Mr. Vimpany might
+be, there was no possibility, thus far, of connecting it with the
+position occupied by the Danish guest. Nobody who had seen his face,
+when he was first brought to the cottage, could have looked at him
+again, after the lapse of a fortnight, and have failed to discover the
+signs which promise recovery of health.
+
+CHAPTER XLVIII
+
+"THE MISTRESS AND THE MAID"
+
+IN the correspondence secretly carried on between the mistress in
+London and the maid at Passy, it was Fanny Mere's turn to write next.
+She decided on delaying her reply until she had once more given careful
+consideration to the first letter received from Lady Harry, announcing
+her arrival in England, and a strange discovery that had attended it.
+
+Before leaving Paris, Iris had telegraphed instructions to Mrs. Vimpany
+to meet her at the terminus in London. Her first inquiries were for her
+father. The answer given, with an appearance of confusion and even of
+shame, was that there was no need to feel anxiety on the subject of Mr.
+Henley's illness. Relieved on hearing this good news, Iris naturally
+expressed some surprise at her father's rapid recovery. She asked if
+the doctors had misunderstood his malady when they believed him to be
+in danger. To this question Mrs. Vimpany had replied by making an
+unexpected confession.
+
+She owned that Mr. Henley's illness had been at no time of any serious
+importance. A paragraph in a newspaper had informed her that he was
+suffering from nothing worse than an attack of gout. It was a wicked
+act to have exaggerated this report, and to have alarmed Lady Harry on
+the subject of her father's health. Mrs. Vimpany had but one excuse to
+offer. Fanny's letter had filled her with such unendurable doubts and
+forebodings that she had taken the one way of inducing Lady Harry to
+secure her own safety by at once leaving Passy--the way by a false
+alarm. Deceit, so sincerely repented, so resolutely resisted, had tried
+its power of temptation again, and had prevailed.
+
+"When I thought of you at the mercy of my vile husband," Mrs. Vimpany
+said, "with your husband but too surely gained as an accomplice, my
+good resolutions failed me. Is it only in books that a true repentance
+never stumbles again? Or am I the one fallible mortal creature in the
+world? I am ashamed of myself. But, oh, Lady Harry, I was so frightened
+for you! Try to forgive me; I am so fond of you, and so glad to see you
+here in safety. Don't go back! For God's sake, don't go back!"
+
+Iris had no intention of returning, while the doctor and his patient
+were still at Passy; and she found in Mrs. Vimpany's compassion good
+reason to forgive an offence committed through devotion to herself, and
+atoned for by sincere regret.
+
+Fanny looked carefully over the next page of the letter, which
+described Lady Harry's first interview with Mr. Mountjoy since his
+illness. The expressions of happiness on renewing her relations with
+her old and dear friend confirmed the maid in her first impression that
+there was no fear of a premature return to Passy, with the wish to see
+Lord Harry again as the motive. She looked over the later letters
+next--and still the good influence of Mr. Mountjoy seemed to be in time
+ascendant. There was anxiety felt for Fanny's safety, and curiosity
+expressed to hear what discoveries she might have made; but the only
+allusions to my lord contained ordinary inquiries relating to the state
+of his health, and, on one occasion, there was a wish expressed to know
+whether he was still on friendly terms with Mr. Vimpany. There seemed
+to be no fear of tempting her mistress to undervalue the danger of
+returning to the cottage, if she mentioned the cheering improvement now
+visible in Mr. Oxbye. And yet Fanny still hesitated to trust her first
+impressions, even after they had been confirmed. Her own sad experience
+reminded her of the fatal influence which an unscrupulous man can
+exercise over the woman who loves him. It was always possible that Lady
+Harry might not choose to confide the state of her feelings towards her
+husband to a person who, after all, only occupied the position of her
+maid. The absence, in her letters, of any expressions of affectionate
+regret was no proof that she was not thinking of my lord. So far as he
+was personally concerned, the Dane's prospects of recovery would appear
+to justify the action of the doctor and his accomplice. Distrusting
+them both as resolutely as ever, and determined to keep Lady Harry as
+long as possible at the safe distance of London, Fanny Mere, in writing
+her reply, preserved a discreet silence on the subject of Mr. Oxbye's
+health.
+
+[At this point Wilkie Collins' health prevented his finishing the
+novel.]
+
+CHAPTER XLIX
+
+THE NURSE IS SENT AWAY
+
+"YOU have repented and changed your mind, Vimpany?" said Lord Harry.
+
+"I repented?" the doctor repeated, with a laugh. "You think me capable
+of that, do you?"
+
+"The man is growing stronger and better every day. You are going to
+make him recover, after all. I was afraid"--he corrected himself--"I
+thought"--the word was the truer--"that you were going to poison him."
+
+"You thought I was going--we were going, my lord--to commit a stupid
+and a useless crime. And, with our clever nurse present, all the time
+watching with the suspicions of a cat, and noting every change in the
+symptoms? No--I confess his case has puzzled me because I did not
+anticipate this favourable change. Well--it is all for the best. Fanny
+sees him grow stronger every day--whatever happens she can testify to
+the care with which the man has been treated. So far she thought she
+would have us in her power, and we have her."
+
+"You are mighty clever, Vimpany; but sometimes you are too clever for
+me, and, perhaps, too clever for yourself."
+
+"Let me make myself clearer"--conscious of the nurse's suspicions, he
+leaned forward and whispered: "Fanny must go. Now is the time. The man
+is recovering. The man must go: the next patient will be your lordship
+himself. Now do you understand?"
+
+"Partly."
+
+"Enough. If I am to act it is sufficient for you to understand step by
+step. Our suspicious nurse is to go. That is the next step. Leave me to
+act."
+
+Lord Harry walked away. He left the thing to the doctor. It hardly
+seemed to concern him. A dying man; a conspiracy; a fraud:--yet the
+guilty knowledge of all this gave him small uneasiness. He carried with
+him his wife's last note: "May I hope to find on my return the man whom
+I have trusted and honoured?" His conscience, callous as regards the
+doctor's scheme, filled him with remorse whenever--which was fifty
+times a day--he took this little rag of a note from his pocket-book and
+read it again. Yes: she would always find the man, on her return--the
+man whom she had trusted and honoured--the latter clause he passed
+over--it would be, of course the same man: whether she would still be
+able to trust and honour him--that question he did not put to himself.
+After all, the doctor was acting--not he, himself.
+
+And he remembered Hugh Mountjoy. Iris would be with him--the man whose
+affection was only brought out in the stronger light by his respect,
+his devotion, and his delicacy. She would be in his society: she would
+understand the true meaning of this respect and delicacy: she would
+appreciate the depth of his devotion: she would contrast Hugh, the man
+she might have married, with himself, the man she did marry.
+
+And the house was wretched without her; and he hated the sight of the
+doctor--desperate and reckless.
+
+He resolved to write to Iris: he sat down and poured out his heart, but
+not his conscience, to her.
+
+"As for our separation," he said, "I, and only I, am to blame. It is my
+own abominable conduct that has caused it. Give me your pardon, dearest
+Iris. If I have made it impossible for you to live with me, it is also
+impossible for me to live without you. So am I punished. The house is
+dull and lonely; the hours crawl, I know not how to kill the time; my
+life is a misery and a burden because you are not with me. Yet I have
+no right to complain; I ought to rejoice in thinking that you are happy
+in being relieved of my presence. My dear, I do not ask you to come at
+present"--he remembered, indeed, that her arrival at this juncture
+might be seriously awkward--"I cannot ask you to come back yet, but let
+me have a little hope--let me feel that in the sweetness of your nature
+you will believe in my repentance, and let me look forward to a speedy
+reunion in the future."
+
+When he had written this letter, which he would have done better to
+keep in his own hands for awhile, he directed it in a feigned hand to
+Lady Harry Norland, care of Hugh Mountjoy, at the latter's London
+hotel. Mountjoy would not know Iris's correspondent, and would
+certainly forward the letter. He calculated--with the knowledge of her
+affectionate and impulsive nature--that Iris would meet him half-way,
+and would return whenever he should be able to call her back. He did
+not calculate, as will be seen, on the step which she actually took.
+
+The letter despatched, he came back to the cottage happier--he would
+get his wife again. He looked in at the sick-room. The patient was
+sitting up, chatting pleasantly; it was the best day he had known; the
+doctor was sitting in a chair placed beside the bed, and the nurse
+stood quiet, self-composed, but none the less watchful and suspicious.
+
+"You are going on so well, my man," Doctor Vimpany was saying, "That we
+shall have you out and about again in a day or two. Not quite yet,
+though--not quite yet," he pulled out his stethoscope and made an
+examination with an immense show of professional interest. "My
+treatment has succeeded, you see"--he made a note or two in his
+pocket-book--"has succeeded," he repeated. "They will have to
+acknowledge that."
+
+"Gracious sir, I am grateful. I have given a great deal too much
+trouble."
+
+"A medical case can never give too much trouble--that is impossible.
+Remember, Oxbye, it is Science which watches at your bedside. You are
+not Oxbye; you are a case; it is not a man, it is a piece of machinery
+that is out of order. Science watches: she sees you through and
+through. Though you are made of solid flesh and bones, and clothed, to
+Science you are transparent. Her business is not only to read your
+symptoms, but to set the machinery right again."
+
+The Dane, overwhelmed, could only renew his thanks.
+
+"Can he stand, do you think, nurse?" the doctor went on. "Let us
+try--not to walk about much to-day, but to get out of bed, if only to
+prove to himself that he is so much better; to make him understand that
+he is really nearly well. Come, nurse, let us give him a hand."
+
+In the most paternal manner possible the doctor assisted his patient,
+weak, after so long a confinement to his bed, to get out of bed, and
+supported him while he walked to the open window, and looked out into
+the garden. "There," he said, "that is enough. Not too much at first.
+To-morrow he will have to get up by himself. Well, Fanny, you agree at
+last, I suppose, that I have brought this poor man round? At last, eh?"
+
+His look and his words showed what he meant. "You thought that some
+devilry was intended." That was what the look meant. "You proposed to
+nurse this man in order to watch for and to discover this devilry. Very
+well, what have you got to say?"
+
+All that Fanny had to say was, submissively, that the man was clearly
+much better; and, she added, he had been steadily improving ever since
+he came to the cottage.
+
+That is what she said; but she said it without the light of confidence
+in her eyes--she was still doubtful and suspicious. Whatever power the
+doctor had of seeing the condition of lungs and hidden machinery, he
+certainly had the power of reading this woman's thoughts. He saw, as
+clearly as if upon a printed page, the bewilderment of her mind. She
+knew that something was intended---something not for her to know. That
+the man had been brought to the cottage to be made the subject of a
+scientific experiment she did not believe. She had looked to see him
+die, but he did not die. He was mending fast; in a little while he
+would be as well as ever he had been in his life. What had the doctor
+done it for? Was it really possible that nothing was ever intended
+beyond a scientific experiment, which had succeeded? In the case of any
+other man, the woman's doubts would have been entirely removed; in the
+case of Dr. Vimpany these doubts remained. There are some men of whom
+nothing good can be believed, whether of motive or of action; for if
+their acts seem good, their motive must be bad. Many women know, or
+fancy they know, such a man--one who seems to them wholly and
+hopelessly bad. Besides, what was the meaning of the secret
+conversation and the widespread colloquies of the doctor and my lord?
+And why, at first, was the doctor so careless about his patient?
+
+"The time has come at last," said the doctor that evening, when the two
+men were alone, "for this woman to go. The man is getting well rapidly,
+he no longer wants a nurse; there is no reason for keeping her. If she
+has suspicions there is no longer the least foundation for them; she
+has assisted at the healing of a man desperately sick by a skilful
+physician. What more? Nothing--positively nothing."
+
+"Can she tell my wife so much and no more?" asked Lord Harry. "Will
+there be no more?"
+
+"She can tell her ladyship no more, because she will have no more to
+tell," the doctor replied quietly. "She would like to learn more; she
+is horribly disappointed that there is no more to tell; but she shall
+hear no more. She hates me: but she hates your lordship more."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because her mistress loves you still. Such a woman as this would like
+to absorb the whole affection of her mistress in herself. You laugh.
+She is a servant, and a common person. How can such a person conceive
+an affection so strong as to become a passion for one so superior? But
+it is true. It is perfectly well known, and there have been many
+recorded instances of such a woman, say a servant, greatly inferior in
+station, conceiving a desperate affection for her mistress, accompanied
+by the fiercest jealousy. Fanny Mere is jealous--and of you. She hates
+you; she wants your wife to hate you. She would like nothing better
+than to go back to her mistress with the proofs in her hand of such
+acts on your part--such acts, I say," he chose his next words
+carefully, "as would keep her from you for ever."
+
+"She's a devil, I dare say," said Lord Harry, carelessly. "What do I
+care? What does it matter to me whether a lady's maid, more or less,
+hates me or loves me?"
+
+"There spoke the aristocrat. My lord, remember that a lady's maid is a
+woman. You have been brought up to believe, perhaps, that people in
+service are not men and women. That is a mistake--a great mistake.
+Fanny Mere is a woman--that is to say, an inferior form of man; and
+there is no man in the world so low or so base as not to be able to do
+mischief. The power of mischief is given to every one of us. It is the
+true, the only Equality of Man--we can all destroy. What? a shot in the
+dark; the striking of a lucifer match; the false accusation; the false
+witness; the defamation of character;--upon my word, it is far more
+dangerous to be hated by a woman than by a man. And this excellent and
+faithful Fanny, devoted to her mistress, hates you, my lord, even
+more"--he paused and laughed--"even more than the charming Mrs. Vimpany
+hates her husband. Never mind. To-morrow we see the last of Fanny Mere.
+She goes; she leaves her patient rapidly recovering. That is the fact
+that she carries away--not the fact she hoped and expected to carry
+away. She goes to-morrow and she will never come back again."
+
+The next morning the doctor paid a visit to his patient rather earlier
+than usual. He found the man going on admirably: fresh in colour,
+lively and cheerful, chatting pleasantly with his nurse.
+
+"So," said Dr. Vimpany, after the usual examination and questions,
+"this is better than I expected. You are now able to get up. You can do
+so by-and-by, after breakfast; you can dress yourself, you want no more
+help. Nurse," he turned to Fanny, "I think that we have done with you.
+I am satisfied with the careful watch you have kept over my patient. If
+ever you think of becoming a nurse by profession, rely on my
+recommendation. The experiment," he added, thoughtfully, "has fully
+succeeded. I cannot deny that it has been owing partly to the
+intelligence and patience with which you have carried out my
+instructions. But I think that your services may now be relinquished."
+
+"When am I to go, sir?" she asked, impassively.
+
+"In any other case I should have said, 'Stay a little longer, if you
+please. Use your own convenience.' In your case I must say, 'Go to your
+mistress.' Her ladyship was reluctant to leave you behind. She will be
+glad to have you back again. How long will you take to get ready?"
+
+"I could be ready in ten minutes, if it were necessary."
+
+"That is not necessary. You can take the night mail _via_ Dieppe and
+Newhaven. It leaves Paris at 9.50. Give yourself an hour to get from
+station to station. Any time, therefore, this evening before seven
+o'clock will do perfectly well. You will ask his lordship for any
+letters or messages he may have."
+
+"Yes, sir," Fanny replied. "With your permission, sir, I will go at
+once, so as to get a whole day in Paris."
+
+"As you please, as you please," said the doctor, wondering why she
+wanted a day in Paris; but it could have nothing to do with his sick
+man. He left the room, promising to see the Dane again in an hour or
+two, and took up a position at the garden gate through which the nurse
+must pass. In about half an hour she walked down the path carrying her
+box. The doctor opened the gate for her.
+
+"Good-bye, Fanny," he said. "Again, many thanks for your care and your
+watchfulness--especially the latter. I am very glad," he said, with
+what he meant for the sweetest smile, but it looked like a grin, "that
+it has been rewarded in such a way as you hardly perhaps expected."
+
+"Thank you, sir," said the girl. "The man is nearly well now, and can
+do without me very well indeed."
+
+"The box is too heavy for you, Fanny. Nay, I insist upon it: I shall
+carry it to the station for you."
+
+It was not far to the station, and the box was not too heavy, but Fanny
+yielded it. "He wants to see me safe out of the station," she thought.
+
+"I will see her safe out of the place," he thought.
+
+Ten minutes later the doors of the _salle d'attente_ were thrown open,
+the train rolled in, and Fanny was carried away.
+
+The doctor returned thoughtfully to the house. The time was come for
+the execution of his project. Everybody was out of the way.
+
+"She is gone," he said, when Lord Harry returned for breakfast at
+eleven. "I saw her safely out of the station."
+
+"Gone!" his confederate echoed: "and I am alone in the house with you
+and--and----"
+
+"The sick man--henceforth, yourself, my lord, yourself."
+
+CHAPTER L
+
+IN THE ALCOVE
+
+THE doctor was wrong. Fanny Mere did return, though he did not discover
+the fact.
+
+She went away in a state of mind which is dangerous when it possesses a
+woman of determination. The feminine mind loves to understand motives
+and intentions; it hates to be puzzled. Fanny was puzzled. Fanny could
+not understand what had been intended and what was now meant. For,
+first, a man, apparently dying, had been brought into the house--why?
+Then the man began slowly to recover, and the doctor, whose attentions
+had always been of the most slender character, grew more morose every
+day. Then he suddenly, on the very day when he sent her away, became
+cheerful, congratulated the patient on his prospect of recovery, and
+assisted in getting him out of bed for a change. The cook having been
+sent away, there was now no one in the house but the Dane, the doctor,
+and Lord Harry.
+
+Man hunts wild creatures; woman hunts man. Fanny was impelled by the
+hunting instinct. She was sent out of the house to prevent her hunting;
+she began to consider next, how, without discovery, she could return
+and carry on the hunt.
+
+Everything conspired to drive her back: the mystery of the thing; the
+desire to baffle, or at least to discover, a dark design; the wish to
+be of service to her mistress; and the hope of finding out something
+which would keep Iris from going back to her husband. Fanny was unable
+to comprehend the depth of her mistress's affection for Lord Harry; but
+that she was foolishly, weakly in love with him, and that she would
+certainly return to him unless plain proofs of real villainy were
+prepared--so much Fanny understood very well. When the omnibus set her
+down, she found a quiet hotel near the terminus for Dieppe. She spent
+the day walking about--to see the shops and streets, she would have
+explained; to consider the situation, she should have explained. She
+bought a new dress, a new hat, and a thick veil, so as to be disguised
+at a distance. As for escaping the doctor's acuteness by any disguise
+should he meet her face to face, that was impossible. But her mind was
+made up--she would run any risk, meet any danger, in order to discover
+the meaning of all this.
+
+Next morning she returned by an omnibus service which would allow her
+to reach the cottage at about a quarter-past eleven. She chose this
+time for two reasons: first, because breakfast was sent in from the
+restaurant at eleven, and the two gentlemen would certainly be in the
+_salle 'a manger_ over that meal; and, next, because the doctor always
+visited his patient after breakfast. She could, therefore, hope to get
+in unseen, which was the first thing.
+
+The spare bedroom--that assigned to the patient--was on the
+ground-floor next to the dining-room; it communicated with the garden
+by French windows, and by a small flight of steps.
+
+Fanny walked cautiously along the road past the garden-gate; a rapid
+glance assured her that no one was there; she hastily opened the gate
+and slipped in. She knew that the windows of the sick-room were closed
+on the inner side, and the blinds were still down. The patient,
+therefore, had not yet been disturbed or visited. The windows of the
+dining-room were on the other side of the house. The woman therefore
+slipped round to the back, where she found, as she expected, the door
+wide open. In the hall she heard the voices of the doctor and Lord
+Harry and the clicking of knives and forks. They were at breakfast.
+
+One thing more--What should she say to Oxbye? What excuse should she
+make for coming back? How should she persuade him to keep silence about
+her presence? His passion suggested a plan and a reason. She had come
+back, she would tell him, for love of him, to watch over him, unseen by
+the doctor, to go away with him when he was strong enough to travel. He
+was a simple and a candid soul, and he would fall into such a little
+innocent conspiracy. Meantime, it would be quite easy for her to remain
+in the house perfectly undisturbed and unknown to either of the
+gentlemen.
+
+She opened the door and looked in.
+
+So far, no reason would be wanted. The patient was sleeping peacefully.
+But not in the bed. He was lying, partly dressed and covered with a
+blanket, on the sofa. With the restlessness of convalescence he had
+changed his couch in the morning after a wakeful night, and was now
+sleeping far into the morning.
+
+The bed, as is common in French houses, stood in an alcove. A heavy
+curtain hung over a rod, also in the French manner. Part of this
+curtain lay over the head of the bed.
+
+The woman perceived the possibility of using the curtain as a means of
+concealment. There was a space of a foot between the bed and the wall.
+She placed herself, therefore, behind the bed, in this space, at the
+head, where the curtain entirely concealed her. Nothing was more
+unlikely than that the doctor should look behind the bed in that
+corner. Then with her scissors she pierced a hole in the curtain large
+enough for her to see perfectly without the least danger of being seen,
+and she waited to see what would happen.
+
+She waited for half an hour, during which the sleeping man slept on
+without movement, and the voices of the two men in the _salle 'a
+manger_ rose and fell in conversation. Presently there was silence,
+broken only by an occasional remark. "They have lit their cigars,"
+Fanny murmured; "they will take their coffee, and in a few minutes they
+will be here."
+
+When they came in a few minutes later, they had their cigars, and Lord
+Harry's face was slightly flushed, perhaps with the wine he had taken
+at breakfast--perhaps with the glass of brandy after his coffee.
+
+The doctor threw himself into a chair and crossed his legs, looking
+thoughtfully at his patient. Lord Harry stood over him.
+
+"Every day," he said, "the man gets better."
+
+"He has got better every day, so far," said the doctor.
+
+"Every day his face gets fatter, and he grows less like me."
+
+"It is true," said the doctor.
+
+"Then--what the devil are we to do?"
+
+"Wait a little longer," said the doctor.
+
+The woman in her hiding-place hardly dared to breathe.
+
+"What?" asked Lord Harry. "You mean that the man, after all--"
+
+"Wait a little longer," the doctor repeated quietly.
+
+"Tell me"--Lord Harry bent over the sick man eagerly--"you think----"
+
+"Look here," the doctor said. "Which of us two has had a medical
+education--you, or I?"
+
+"You, of course."
+
+"Yes; I, of course. Then I tell you, as a medical man, that appearances
+are sometimes deceptive. This man, for instance--he looks better; he
+thinks he is recovering; he feels stronger. You observe that he is
+fatter in the face. His nurse, Fanny Mere, went away with the knowledge
+that he was much better, and the conviction that he was about to leave
+the house as much recovered as such a patient with such a disorder can
+expect."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Well, my lord, allow me to confide in you. Medical men mostly keep
+their knowledge in such matters to themselves. We know and recognise
+symptoms which to you are invisible. By these symptoms--by those
+symptoms," he repeated slowly and looking hard at the other man, "I
+know that this man--no longer Oxbye, my patient, but--another--is in a
+highly dangerous condition. I have noted the symptoms in my book"--he
+tapped his pocket--"for future use."
+
+"And when--when----" Lord Harry was frightfully pale. His lips moved,
+but he could not finish the sentence. The Thing he had agreed to was
+terribly near, and it looked uglier than he had expected.
+
+"Oh! when?" the doctor replied carelessly. "Perhaps to-day--perhaps in
+a week. Here, you see, Science is sometimes baffled. I cannot say."
+
+Lord Harry breathed deeply. "If the man is in so serious a condition,"
+he said, "is it safe or prudent for us to be alone in the house without
+a servant and without a nurse?"
+
+"I was not born yesterday, my lord, I assure you," said the doctor in
+his jocular way. "They have found me a nurse. She will come to-day. My
+patient's life is, humanly speaking"--Lord Harry shuddered--"perfectly
+safe until her arrival."
+
+"Well--but she is a stranger. She must know whom she is nursing."
+
+"Certainly. She will be told--I have already told her--that she is
+going to nurse Lord Harry Norland, a young Irish gentleman. She is a
+stranger. That is the most valuable quality she possesses. She is a
+complete stranger. As for you, what are you? Anything you please. An
+English gentleman staying with me under the melancholy circumstances of
+his lordship's illness. What more natural? The English doctor is
+staying with his patient, and the English friend is staying with the
+doctor. When the insurance officer makes inquiries, as he is very
+likely to do, the nurse will be invaluable for the evidence she will
+give."
+
+He rose, pulled up the blinds noiselessly, and opened the windows.
+Neither the fresh air nor the light awoke the sleeping man.
+
+Vimpany looked at his watch. "Time for the medicine," he said. "Wake
+him up while I get it ready."
+
+"Would you not--at least---suffer him to have his sleep out?" asked
+Lord Harry, again turning pale.
+
+"Wake him up. Shake him by the shoulder. Do as I tell you," said the
+doctor, roughly. "He will go to sleep again. It is one of the finer
+qualities of my medicine that it sends people to sleep. It is a most
+soothing medicine. It causes a deep--a profound sleep. Wake him up, I
+say." he went to the cupboard in which the medicines were kept. Lord
+Harry with some difficulty roused the sick man, who awoke dull and
+heavy, asking why he was disturbed.
+
+"Time for your medicine, my good fellow," said the doctor. "Take it,
+and you shall not be disturbed again--I promise you that."
+
+The door of the cupboard prevented the spy from seeing what the doctor
+was doing; but he took longer than usual in filling the glass. Lord
+Harry seemed to observe this, for he left the Dane and looked over the
+doctor's shoulder. "What are you doing?" he asked in a whisper.
+
+"Better not inquire, my lord," said the doctor. "What do you know about
+the mysteries of medicine?"
+
+"Why must I not inquire?"
+
+Vimpany turned, closing the cupboard behind him. In his hand was a
+glass full of the stuff he was about to administer.
+
+"If you look in the glass," he said, "you will understand why."
+
+Lord Harry obeyed. He saw a face ghastly in pallor: he shrank back and
+fell into a chair, saying no more.
+
+"Now, my good friend," said the doctor, "drink this and you'll be
+better--ever so much better, ever so much better. Why--that is
+brave----" he looked at him strangely, "How do you like the medicine?"
+
+Oxbye shook his head as a man who has taken something nauseous. "I
+don't like it at all," he said. "It doesn't taste like the other
+physic."
+
+"No I have been changing it--improving it."
+
+The Dane shook his head again. "There's a pain in my throat," he said;
+"it stings--it burns!"
+
+"Patience--patience. It will pass away directly, and you will lie down
+again and fall asleep comfortably."
+
+Oxbye sank back upon the sofa. His eyes closed. Then he opened them
+again, looking about him strangely, as one who is suffering some new
+experience. Again he shook his head, again he closed his eyes, and he
+opened them no more. He was asleep.
+
+The doctor stood at his head watching gravely. Lord Harry, in his
+chair, leaned forward, also watching, but with white face and trembling
+hands.
+
+As they watched, the man's head rolled a little to the side, turning
+his face more towards the room. Then a curious and terrifying thing
+happened. His mouth began slowly to fall open.
+
+"Is he--is he--is he fainting?" Lord Harry whispered.
+
+"No; he is asleep. Did you never see a man sleep with his mouth wide
+open?"
+
+They were silent for a space.
+
+The doctor broke the silence.
+
+"There's a good light this morning," he said carelessly. "I think I
+will try a photograph. Stop! Let me tie up his mouth with a
+handkerchief--so." The patient was not disturbed by the operation,
+though the doctor tied up the handkerchief with vigour enough to awaken
+a sound sleeper. "Now--we'll see if he looks like a post-mortem
+portrait."
+
+He went into the next room, and returned with his camera. In a few
+minutes he had taken the picture, and was holding the glass negative
+against the dark sleeve of his coat, so as to make it visible. "We
+shall see how it looks," he said, "when it is printed. At present I
+don't think it is good enough as an imitation of you to be sent to the
+insurance offices. Nobody, I am afraid, who knew you, would ever take
+this for a post-mortem portrait of Lord Harry. Well, we shall see.
+Perhaps by-and-by--to-morrow--we may be able to take a better
+photograph. Eh?" Lord Harry followed his movements, watching him
+closely, but said nothing. His face remained pale and his fingers still
+trembled. There was now no doubt at all in his mind, not only as to
+Vimpany's intentions, but as to the crime itself. He dared not speak or
+move.
+
+A ring at the door pealed through the house. Lord Harry started in his
+chair with a cry of terror.
+
+"That," said the doctor, quietly, "is the nurse--the new nurse---the
+stranger." He took off the handkerchief from Oxbye's face, looked about
+the room as if careful that everything should be in its right place,
+and went out to admit the woman. Lord Harry sprang to his feet and
+passed his hand over the sick man's face.
+
+"Is it done?" he whispered. "Can the man be poisoned? Is he already
+dead?--already? Before my eyes?"
+
+He laid his finger on the sick man's pulse. But the doctor's step and
+voice stopped him. Then the nurse came in, following Vimpany. She was
+an elderly, quiet-looking French woman.
+
+Lord Harry remained standing at the side of the sofa, hoping to see the
+man revive.
+
+"Now," said Vimpany, cheerfully, "here is your patient, nurse. He is
+asleep now. Let him have his sleep out--he has taken his medicine and
+will want nothing more yet awhile. If you want anything let me know. We
+shall be in the next room or in the garden--somewhere about the house.
+Come, my friend." He drew away Lord Harry gently by the arm, and they
+left the room.
+
+Behind the curtain Fanny Mere began to wonder how she was to get off
+unseen.
+
+The nurse, left alone, looked at her patient, who lay with his head
+turned partly round, his eyes closed, his mouth open. "A strange
+sleep," she murmured; "but the doctor knows, I suppose. He is to have
+his sleep out."
+
+"A strange sleep, indeed!" thought the watcher. She was tempted at this
+moment to disclose herself and to reveal what she had seen; but the
+thought of Lord Harry's complicity stopped her. With what face could
+she return to her mistress and tell her that she herself was the means
+of her husband being charged with murder? She stayed herself,
+therefore, and waited.
+
+Chance helped her, at last, to escape.
+
+The nurse took off her bonnet and shawl and began to look about the
+room. She stepped to the bed and examined the sheets and pillow-case as
+a good French housewife should. Would she throw back the curtain? If
+so--what would happen next? Then it would become necessary to take the
+new nurse into confidence, otherwise----Fanny did not put the
+remainder of this sentence into words. It remained a terror: it meant
+that if Vimpany found out where she had been and what she had seen and
+heard, there would be two, instead of one, cast into a deep slumber.
+
+The nurse turned from the bed, however, attracted by the half-open door
+of the cupboard. Here were the medicine bottles. She took them out one
+by one, looked at them with professional curiosity, pulled out the
+corks, smelt the contents, replaced the bottles. Then she went to the
+window, which stood open; she stepped out upon the stone steps which
+led into the garden, looking about her, to breathe the soft air of noon
+among the flowers.
+
+She came back, and it again seemed as if she would examine the bed, but
+her attention was attracted by a small book-case. She began to pull
+down the books one after the other and to turn them over, as a
+half-educated person does, in the hope of finding something amusing.
+She found a book with pictures. Then she sat down in the armchair
+beside the sofa and began to turn over the leaves slowly. How long was
+this going to last?
+
+It lasted about half an hour. The nurse laid down the volume with a
+yawn, stretched herself, yawned again, crossed her hands, and closed
+her eyes. She was going to sleep. If she would only fall so fast asleep
+that the woman behind the curtain could creep away!
+
+But sometimes at the sleepiest moment sleep is driven away by an
+accident. The accident in this case was that the nurse before finally
+dropping off remembered that she was nursing a sick man, and sat up to
+look at him before she allowed herself to drop off.
+
+Stung with sudden inspiration she sprang to her feet and bent over the
+man. "Does he breathe?" she asked. She bent lower. "His pulse! does it
+beat?" she caught his wrist.
+
+"Doctor!" she shrieked, running into the garden. "Doctor! Come--come
+quick! He is dead!"
+
+Fanny Mere stepped from her hiding-place and ran out of the back door,
+and by the garden gate into the road.
+
+She had escaped. She had seen the crime committed. She knew now at
+least what was intended and why she was sent away. The motive for the
+crime she could not guess.
+
+CHAPTER LI
+
+WHAT NEXT?
+
+WHAT should she do with the terrible secret?
+
+She ought to inform the police. But there were two objections. First,
+the nurse may have been mistaken in supposing her patient to be dead.
+She herself had no choice but to escape as she did. Next, the dreadful
+thought occurred to her that she herself until the previous day had
+been the man's nurse--his only nurse, day and night. What was to
+prevent the doctor from fixing the guilt of poisoning upon herself?
+Nay; it would be his most obvious line of action. The man was left
+alone all the morning; the day before he had shown every sign of
+returning strength; she would have to confess that she was in hiding.
+How long had she been there? Why was she in hiding? Was it not after
+she had poisoned the man and when she heard the doctor's footstep?
+Naturally ignorant of poisons and their symptoms, it seemed to her as
+if these facts so put together would be conclusive against her.
+Therefore, she determined to keep quiet in Paris that day and to cross
+over by the night boat from Dieppe in the evening. She would at first
+disclose everything to Mrs. Vimpany and to Mountjoy. As to what she
+would tell her mistress she would be guided by the advice of the
+others.
+
+She got to London in safety and drove straight to Mr. Mountjoy's hotel,
+proposing first to communicate the whole business to him. But she found
+in his sitting-room Mrs. Vimpany herself.
+
+"We must not awake him," she said, "whatever news you bring. His
+perfect recovery depends entirely on rest and quiet. There"--she
+pointed to the chimneypiece--"is a letter in my lady's handwriting. I
+am afraid I know only too well what it tells him."
+
+"What does it tell?"
+
+"This very morning," Mrs. Vimpany went on, "I called at her lodging.
+She has gone away."
+
+"Gone away? My lady gone away? Where is she gone?"
+
+"Where do you think she is most likely to have gone?"
+
+"Not?--oh!--not to her husband? Not to him!--oh! this is more
+terrible--far more terrible--than you can imagine."
+
+"You will tell me why it is now so much more terrible. Meantime, I find
+that the cabman was told to drive to Victoria. That is all I know. I
+have no doubt, however, but that she has gone back to her husband. She
+has been in a disturbed, despondent condition ever since she arrived in
+London. Mr. Mountjoy has been as kind as usual: but he has not been
+able to chase away her sadness. Whether she was fretting after her
+husband, or whether--but this I hardly think--she was comparing the man
+she had lost with the man she had taken--but I do not know. All I do
+know is that she has been uneasy ever since she came from France, and
+what I believe is that she has been reproaching herself with leaving
+her husband without good cause."
+
+"Good cause!" echoed Fanny. "Oh! good gracious! If she only knew,
+there's cause enough to leave a hundred husbands."
+
+"Nothing seemed to rouse her," Mrs. Vimpany continued, without
+regarding the interruption. "I went with her to the farm to see her
+former maid, Rhoda. The girl's health is re-established; she is engaged
+to marry the farmer's brother. Lady Harry was kind, and said the most
+pleasant things; she even pulled off one of her prettiest rings and
+gave it to the girl. But I could see that it was an effort for her to
+appear interested--her thoughts were with her husband all the time. I
+was sure it would end in this way, and I am not in the least surprised.
+But what will Mr. Mountjoy say when he opens the letter?"
+
+"Back to her husband!" Fanny repeated. "Oh! what shall we do?"
+
+"Tell me what you mean. What has happened?"
+
+"I must tell you. I thought I would tell Mr. Mountjoy first: but I must
+tell you, although--" She stopped.
+
+"Although it concerns my husband. Never mind that consideration--go
+on." Fanny told the story from the beginning.
+
+When she had finished, Mrs. Vimpany looked towards the bedroom door.
+"Thank God!" she said, "that you told this story to me instead of to
+Mr. Mountjoy. At all events, it gives me time to warn you not to tell
+him what you have told me. We can do nothing. Meantime, there is one
+thing you must do--go away. Do not let Mr. Mountjoy find you here. He
+must not learn your story. If he hears what has happened and reads her
+letter, nothing will keep him from following her to Passy. He will see
+that there is every prospect of her being entangled in this vile
+conspiracy, and he will run any risk in the useless attempt to save
+her. He is too weak to bear the journey--far too weak for the violent
+emotions that will follow; and, oh! how much too weak to cope with my
+husband--as strong and as crafty as he is unprincipled!
+
+"Then, what, in Heaven's name, are we to do?"
+
+"Anything--anything--rather than suffer Mr. Mountjoy, in his weak
+state, to interfere between man and wife."
+
+"Yes--yes--but such a man! Mrs. Vimpany, he was present when the Dane
+was poisoned. He _knew_ that the man was poisoned. He sat in the chair,
+his face white, and he said nothing. Oh! It was as much as I could do
+not to rush out and dash the glass from his hands. Lord Harry said
+nothing."
+
+"My dear, do you not understand what you have got to do?"
+
+Fanny made no reply.
+
+"Consider--my husband---Lord Harry--neither of them knows that you were
+present. You can return with the greatest safety; and then whatever
+happens, you will be at hand to protect my lady. Consider, again, as
+her maid, you can be with her always--in her own room; at night;
+everywhere and at all times; while Mr. Mountjoy could only be with her
+now and then, and at the price of not quarrelling with her husband."
+
+"Yes," said Fanny.
+
+"And you are strong, and Mr. Mountjoy is weak and ill."
+
+"You think that I should go back to Passy?"
+
+"At once, without the delay of an hour. Lady Harry started last night.
+Do you start this evening. She will thus have you with her twenty-four
+hours after her arrival."
+
+Fanny rose.
+
+"I will go," she said. "It terrifies me even to think of going back to
+that awful cottage with that dreadful man. Yet I will go. Mrs. Vimpany,
+I know that it will be of no use. Whatever is going to happen now will
+happen without any power of mine to advance or to prevent. I am certain
+that my journey will prove useless. But I will go. Yes, I will go this
+evening."
+
+Then, with a final promise to write as soon as possible--as soon as
+there should be anything to communicate--Fanny went away.
+
+Mrs. Vimpany, alone, listened. From the bedroom came no sound at all.
+Mr. Mountjoy slept still. When he should be strong enough it would be
+time to let him know what had been done. But she sat thinking--
+thinking--even when one has the worst husband in the world, and very
+well knows his character, it is disagreeable to hear such a story as
+Fanny had told that wife this morning.
+
+CHAPTER LII
+
+THE DEAD MAN'S PHOTOGRAPH
+
+"HE is quite dead," said the doctor, with one finger on the man's pulse
+and another lifting his eyelid. "He is dead. I did not look for so
+speedy an end. It is not half an hour since I left him breathing
+peacefully. Did he show signs of consciousness?"
+
+"No, sir; I found him dead."
+
+"This morning he was cheerful. It is not unusual in these complaints. I
+have observed it in many cases of my own experience. On the last
+morning of life, at the very moment when Death is standing on the
+threshold with uplifted dart, the patient is cheerful and even joyous:
+he is more hopeful than he has felt for many months: he thinks--nay, he
+is sure--that he is recovering: he says he shall be up and about before
+long: he has not felt so strong since the beginning of his illness.
+Then Death strikes him, and he falls." He made this remark in a most
+impressive manner.
+
+"Nothing remains," he said, "but to certify the cause of death and to
+satisfy the proper forms and authorities. I charge myself with this
+duty. The unfortunate young man belonged to a highly distinguished
+family. I will communicate with his friends and forward his papers. One
+last office I can do for him. For the sake of his family, nurse, I will
+take a last photograph of him as he lies upon his death-bed." Lord
+Harry stood in the doorway, listening with an aching and a fearful
+heart. He dared not enter the chamber. It was the Chamber of Death.
+What was his own part in calling the Destroying Angel who is at the
+beck and summons of every man--even the meanest? Call him and he comes.
+Order him to strike--and he obeys. But under penalties.
+
+The doctor's prophecy, then, had come true. But in what way and by what
+agency? The man was dead. What was his own share in the man's death? He
+knew when the Dane was brought into the house that he was brought there
+to die. As the man did not die, but began to recover fast, he had seen
+in the doctor's face that the man would have to die. He had heard the
+doctor prophesy out of his medical knowledge that the man would surely
+die; and then, after the nurse had been sent away because her patient
+required her services no longer, he had seen the doctor give the
+medicine which burned the patient's throat. What was that medicine? Not
+only had it burned his throat, but it caused him to fall into a deep
+sleep, in which his heart ceased to beat and his blood ceased to flow.
+
+He turned away and walked out of the cottage. For an hour he walked
+along the road. Then he stopped and walked back. Ropes drew him; he
+could no longer keep away. He felt as if something must have happened.
+Possibly he would find the doctor arrested and the police waiting for
+himself, to be charged as an accomplice or a principal.
+
+He found no such thing. The doctor was in the salon, with letters and
+official forms before him. He looked up cheerfully.
+
+"My English friend," he said, "the unexpected end of this young Irish
+gentleman is a very melancholy affair. I have ascertained the name of
+the family solicitors and have written to them. I have also written to
+his brother as the head of the house. I find also, by examination of
+his papers, that his life is insured--the amount is not stated, but I
+have communicated the fact of the death. The authorities--they are,
+very properly, careful in such matters--have received the necessary
+notices and forms: to-morrow, all legal forms having been gone through,
+we bury the deceased."
+
+"So soon?"
+
+"So soon? In these eases of advanced pulmonary disease the sooner the
+better. The French custom of speedy interment may be defended as more
+wholesome than our own. On the other hand, I admit that it has its weak
+points. Cremation is, perhaps, the best and only method of removing the
+dead which is open to no objections except one. I mean, of course, the
+chance that the deceased may have met with his death by means of
+poison. But such cases are rare, and, in most instances, would be
+detected by the medical man in attendance before or at the time of
+death. I think we need not----My dear friend, you look ill. Are you
+upset by such a simple thing as the death of a sick man? Let me
+prescribe for you. A glass of brandy neat. So," he went into the _salle
+'a manger_ and returned with his medicine. "Take that. Now let us
+talk." The doctor continued his conversation in a cheerfully scientific
+strain, never alluding to the conspiracy or to the consequences which
+might follow, He told hospital stories bearing on deaths sudden and
+unexpected; some of them he treated in a jocular vein. The dead man in
+the next room was a Case: he knew of many similar and equally
+interesting Cases. When one has arrived at looking upon a dead man as a
+Case, there is little fear of the ordinary human weakness which makes
+us tremble in the awful presence of death.
+
+Presently steps were heard outside. The doctor rose and left the
+room--but returned in a few minutes.
+
+"The _croque-morts_ have come," he said. "They are with the nurse
+engaged upon their business. It seems revolting to the outside world.
+To them it is nothing but the daily routine of work. By-the-way, I took
+a photograph of his lordship in the presence of the nurse.
+Unfortunately--but look at it----"
+
+"It is the face of the dead man"--Lord Harry turned away. "I don't want
+to see it. I cannot bear to see it. You forget--I was actually present
+when--"
+
+"Not when he died. Come, don't be a fool. What I was going to say was
+this: The face is no longer in the least like you. Nobody who ever saw
+you once even would believe that this is your face. The creature--he
+has given us an unconscionable quantity of trouble--was a little like
+you when he first came. I was wrong in supposing that this likeness was
+permanent. Now he is dead, he is not in the least like you. I ought to
+have remembered that the resemblance would fade away and disappear in
+death. Come and look at him."
+
+"No, no."
+
+"Weakness! Death restores to every man his individuality. No two men
+are like in death, though they may be like in life. Well. It comes to
+this. We are going to bury Lord Harry Norland to-morrow, and we must
+have a photograph of him as he lay on his deathbed."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Well, my friend, go upstairs to your own room, and I will follow with
+the camera."
+
+
+In a quarter of an hour he was holding the glass against his sleeve.
+
+"Admirable!" he said. "The cheek a little sunken--that was the effect
+of the chalk and the adjustment of the shadows--the eyes closed, the
+face white, the hands composed. It is admirable! Who says that we
+cannot make the sun tell lies?"
+
+As soon as he could get a print of the portrait, he gave it to Lord
+Harry.
+
+"There," he said, "we shall get a better print to-morrow. This is the
+first copy."
+
+He had mounted it on a frame of card, and had written under it the name
+once borne by the dead man, with the date of his death. The picture
+seemed indeed that of a dead man. Lord Harry shuddered.
+
+"There," he said, "everything else has been of no use to us--the
+presence of the sick man--the suspicions of the nurse--his death-even
+his death--has been of no use to us. We might have been spared the
+memory--the awful memory--of this death!"
+
+"You forget, my English friend, that a dead body was necessary for us.
+We had to bury somebody. Why not the man Oxbye?"
+
+CHAPTER LIII
+
+THE WIFE'S RETURN
+
+OF course Mrs. Vimpany was quite right. Iris had gone back to her
+husband. She arrived, in fact, at the cottage in the evening just
+before dark--in the falling day, when some people are more than
+commonly sensitive to sights and sounds, and when the eyes are more apt
+than at other times to be deceived by strange appearances. Iris walked
+into the garden, finding no one there. She opened the door with her own
+key and let herself in. The house struck her as strangely empty and
+silent. She opened the dining-room door: no one was there. Like all
+French dining-rooms, it was used for no other purpose than for eating,
+and furnished with little more than the barest necessaries. She closed
+the door and opened that of the salon: that also was empty. She called
+her husband: there was no answer. She called the name of the cook:
+there was no answer. It was fortunate that she did not open the door of
+the spare room, for there lay the body of the dead man. She went
+upstairs to her husband's room. That too was empty. But there was
+something lying on the table--a photograph. She took it up. Her face
+became white suddenly and swiftly. She shrieked aloud, then drooped the
+picture and fell fainting to the ground. For the photograph was nothing
+less than that of her husband, dead in his white graveclothes, his
+hands composed, his eyes closed, his cheek waxen.
+
+The cry fell upon the ears of Lord Harry, who was in the garden below.
+He rushed into the house and lifted his wife upon the bed. The
+photograph showed him plainly what had happened.
+
+She came to her senses again, but seeing her husband alive before her,
+and remembering what she had seen, she shrieked again, and fell into
+another swoon.
+
+"What is to be done now?" asked the husband. "What shall I tell her?
+How shall I make her understand? What can I do for her?"
+
+As for help, there was none: the nurse was gone on some errand; the
+doctor was arranging for the funeral of Oxbye under the name of Lord
+Harry Norland; the cottage was empty.
+
+Such a fainting fit does not last for ever. Iris came round, and sat
+up, looking wildly around.
+
+"What is it?" she cried. "What does it mean?"
+
+"It means, my love, that you have returned to your husband." He laid an
+arm round her, and kissed her again and again.
+
+"You are my Harry!--living!--my own Harry?"
+
+"Your own Harry, my darling. What else should I be?"
+
+"Tell me then, what does it mean--that picture--that horrid
+photograph?"
+
+"That means nothing--nothing--a freak--a joke of the doctor's. What
+could it mean?" He took it up. "Why, my dear, I am living--living and
+well. What should this mean but a joke?"
+
+He laid it on the table again, face downwards. But her eyes showed that
+she was not satisfied. Men do not make jokes on death; it is a sorry
+jest indeed to dress up a man in grave-clothes, and make a photograph
+of him as of one dead.
+
+"But you--you, my Iris; you are here--tell me how and why--and when,
+and everything? Never mind that stupid picture: tell me."
+
+"I got your letter, Harry," she replied.
+
+"My letter?" he repeated. "Oh! my dear, you got my letter, and you saw
+that your husband loved you still."
+
+"I could not keep away from you, Harry, whatever had happened. I stayed
+as long as I could. I thought about you day and night. And at last
+I--I--I came back. Are you angry with me, Harry?"
+
+"Angry? Good God! my dearest, angry?" He kissed her passionately--not
+the less passionately that she had returned at a time so terrible. What
+was he to say to her? How was he to tell her? While he showered kisses
+on her he was asking himself these questions. When she found out--when
+he should confess to her the whole truth--she would leave him again.
+Yet he did not understand the nature of the woman who loves. He held
+her in his arms; his kisses pleaded for him; they mastered her--she was
+ready to believe, to accept, to surrender even her truth and honesty;
+and she was ready, though she knew it not, to become the accomplice of
+a crime. Rather than leave her husband again, she would do everything.
+
+Yet, Lord Harry felt there was one reservation: he might confess
+everything, except the murder of the Dane. No word of confession had
+passed the doctor's lips, yet he knew too well that the man had been
+murdered; and, so far as the man had been chosen for his resemblance to
+himself, that was perfectly useless, because the resemblance, though
+striking at the first, had been gradually disappearing as the man Oxbye
+grew better; and was now, as we have seen, wholly lost after death.
+
+"I have a great deal--a great deal--to tell you, dear," said the
+husband, holding both her hands tenderly. "You will have to be very
+patient with me. You must make up your mind to be shocked at first,
+though I shall be able to convince you that there was really nothing
+else to be done--nothing else at all."
+
+"Oh! go on, Harry. Tell me all. Hide nothing."
+
+"I will tell you all," he replied.
+
+"First, where is that poor man whom the doctor brought here and Fanny
+nursed? And where is Fanny?"
+
+"The poor man," he replied carelessly, "made so rapid a recovery that
+he has got on his legs and gone away--I believe, to report himself to
+the hospital whence he came. It is a great triumph for the doctor,
+whose new treatment is now proved to be successful. He will make a
+grand flourish of trumpets about it. I dare say, if all he claims for
+it is true, he has taken a great step in the treatment of lung
+diseases."
+
+Iris had no disease of the lungs, and consequently cared very little
+for the scientific aspect of the question.
+
+"Where is my maid, then?"
+
+"Fanny? She went away--let me see: to-day is Friday--on Wednesday
+morning. It was no use keeping her here. The man was well, and she was
+anxious to get back to you. So she started on Wednesday morning,
+proposing to take the night boat from Dieppe. She must have stopped
+somewhere on the way."
+
+"I suppose she will go to see Mrs. Vimpany. I will send her a line
+there."
+
+"Certainly. That will be sure to find her."
+
+"Well, Harry, is there anything else to tell me?
+
+"A great deal," he repeated. "That photograph, Iris, which frightened
+you so much, has been very carefully taken by Vimpany for a certain
+reason."
+
+"What reason?"
+
+"There are occasions," he replied, "when the very best thing that can
+happen to a man is the belief that he is dead. Such a juncture of
+affairs has happened to myself--and to you--at this moment. It is
+convenient--even necessary--for me that the world should believe me
+dead. In point of fact, I must be dead henceforth. Not for anything
+that I have done, or that I am afraid of--don't think that. No; it is
+for the simple reason that I have no longer any money or any resources
+whatever. That is why I must be dead. Had you not returned in this
+unexpected manner, my dear, you would have heard of my death from the
+doctor, and he would have left it to chance to find a convenient
+opportunity of letting you know the truth. I am, however, deeply
+grieved that I was so careless as to leave that photograph upon the
+table."
+
+"I do not understand," she said. "You pretend to be dead?"
+
+"Yes. I _must_ have money. I have some left--a very little. I _must_
+have money; and, in order to get it, I must be dead."
+
+"How will that help?"
+
+"Why, my dear, I am insured, and my insurances will be paid after my
+death; but not before."
+
+"Oh! must you get money--even by a----" She hesitated.
+
+"Call it a conspiracy, my dear, if you please. As there is no other way
+whatever left, I must get money that way."
+
+"Oh, this is dreadful! A conspiracy, Harry? a--a--fraud?"
+
+"If you please. That is the name which lawyers give to it."
+
+"But oh, Harry!--it is a crime. It is a thing for which men are tried
+and found guilty and sentenced."
+
+"Certainly; if they are found out. Meantime, it is only the poor,
+ignorant, clumsy fool who gets found out. In the City these things are
+done every day. Quite as a matter of course," he added carelessly. "It
+is not usual for men to take their wives into confidence, but in this
+case I must take you into confidence: I have no choice, as you will
+understand directly."
+
+"Tell me, Harry, who first thought of this way?"
+
+"Vimpany, of course. Oh! give him the credit where real cleverness is
+concerned. Vimpany suggested the thing. He found me well-nigh as
+desperately hard up as he is himself. He suggested it. At first, I
+confess, I did not like it. I refused to listen to any more talk about
+it. But, you see, when one meets destitution face to face, one will do
+anything--everything. Besides, as I will show you, this is not really a
+fraud. It is only an anticipation of a few years. However, there was
+another reason."
+
+"Was it to find the money to meet the promissory note?"
+
+"My dear, you may forget--you may resolve never to throw the thing in
+my teeth; but my love for you will never suffer me to forget that I
+have lost your little fortune in a doubtful speculation It is all gone,
+never to be recovered again; and this after I had sworn never to touch
+a farthing of it. Iris!"--he started to his feet and walked about the
+room as one who is agitated by emotion--"Iris! I could face
+imprisonment for debt, I could submit to pecuniary ruin, for that
+matter; the loss of money would not cause me the least trouble, but I
+cannot endure to have ruined you."
+
+"Oh! Harry, as if I mind. Everything that I have is yours When I gave
+you myself I gave all. Take--use--lose it all. As you think, I should
+never _feel_ reproach, far less utter a word of blame. Dearest Harry,
+if that is all--"
+
+"No; it is the knowledge that you will not even feel reproach that is
+my constant accuser. At my death you will get all back again. But I am
+not old; I may live for many, many years to come. How can I wait for my
+own death when I can repair this wickedness by a single stroke?"
+
+"But by another wickedness--and worse."
+
+"No--not another crime. Remember that this money is mine. It will come
+to my heirs some day, as surely as to-morrow's sun will rise. Sooner or
+later it will be mine; I will make it sooner, that is all. The
+Insurance Company will lose nothing but the paltry interest for the
+remainder of my life. My dear, if it is disgraceful to do this I will
+endure disgrace. It is easier to bear that than constant self-reproach
+which I feel when I think of you and the losses I have inflicted upon
+you."
+
+Again he folded her in his arms; he knelt before her; he wept over her.
+Carried out of herself by this passion, Iris made no more resistance.
+
+"Is it--is it," she asked timidly, "too late to draw back?"
+
+"It is too late," he replied, thinking of the dead man below. "It is
+too late. All is completed."
+
+"My poor Harry! What shall we do? How shall we live? How shall we
+contrive never to be found out?"
+
+She would not leave him, then. She accepted the situation. He was
+amazed at the readiness with which she fell; but he did not understand
+how she was ready to cling to him, for better for worse, through worse
+evils than this; nor could he understand how things formerly impossible
+to her had been rendered possible by the subtle deterioration of the
+moral nature, when a woman of lofty mind at the beginning loves and is
+united to a man of lower nature and coarser fibre than herself. Only a
+few months before, Iris would have swept aside these sophistrics with
+swift and resolute hand. Now she accepted them.
+
+"You have fallen into the doctor's hands, dear," she said. "Pray Heaven
+it brings us not into worse evils! What can I say? it is through love
+of your wife--through love of your wife--oh! husband!" she threw
+herself into his arms, and forgave everything and accepted everything.
+Henceforth she would be--though this she knew not--the willing
+instrument of the two conspirators.
+
+CHAPTER LIV
+
+ANOTHER STEP
+
+"I HAVE left this terrible thing about once too often already," and
+Lord Harry took it from the table. "Let me put it in a place of
+safety."
+
+He unlocked a drawer and opened it. "I will put it here," he said.
+"Why"--as if suddenly recollecting something--"here is my will. I shall
+be leaving that about on the table next. Iris, my dear, I have left
+everything to you. All will be yours." He took out the document. "Keep
+it for me, Iris. It is yours. You may as well have it now, and then I
+know, in your careful hands, it will be quite safe. Not only is
+everything left to you, but you are the sole executrix."
+
+Iris took the will without a word. She understood, now, what it meant.
+If she was the sole executrix she would have to act. If everything was
+left to her she would have to receive the money. Thus, at a single
+step, she became not only cognisant of the conspiracy, but the chief
+agent and instrument to carry it out.
+
+This done, her husband had only to tell her what had to be done at
+once, in consequence of her premature arrival. He had planned, he told
+her, not to send for her--not to let her know or suspect anything of
+the truth until the money had been paid to the widow by the Insurance
+Company. As things had turned out, it would be best for both of them to
+leave Passy at once--that very evening--before her arrival was known by
+anybody, and to let Vimpany carry out the rest of the business. He was
+quite to be trusted--he would do everything that was wanted. "Already,"
+he said, "the Office will have received from the doctor a notification
+of my death. Yesterday evening he wrote to everybody--to my
+brother--confound him!--and to the family solicitor. Every moment that
+I stay here increases the danger of my being seen and recognised--after
+the Office has been informed that I am dead."
+
+"Where are we to go?"
+
+"I have thought of that. There is a little quiet town in Belgium where
+no English people ever come at all. We will go there, then we will take
+another name; we will be buried to the outer world, and will live, for
+the rest of our lives, for ourselves alone. Do you agree?"
+
+"I will do, Harry, whatever you think best."
+
+"It will be for a time only. When all is ready, you will have to step
+to the front--the will in your hand to be proved--to receive what is
+due to you as the widow of Lord Harry Norland. You will go back to
+Belgium, after awhile, so as to disarm suspicion, to become once more
+the wife of William Linville."
+
+Iris sighed heavily, Then she caught her husband's eyes gathering with
+doubt, and she smiled again.
+
+"In everything, Harry," she said, "I am your servant. When shall we
+start?"
+
+"Immediately. I have only to write a letter to the doctor. Where is
+your bag? Is this all? Let me go first to see that no one is about.
+Have you got the will? Oh! it is here--yes--in the bag. I will bring
+along the bag."
+
+He ran downstairs, and came up quickly.
+
+"The nurse has returned," he said. "She is in the spare room."
+
+"What nurse?"
+
+"The nurse who came after Fanny left. The man was better, but the
+doctor thought it wisest to have a nurse to the end," he explained
+hurriedly, and she suspected nothing till afterwards. "Come down
+quietly--go out by the back-door--she will not see you." So Iris
+obeyed. She went out of her own house like a thief, or like her own
+maid Fanny, had she known. She passed through the garden, and out of
+the garden into the road. There she waited for her husband.
+
+Lord Harry sat down and wrote a letter.
+
+"Dear Doctor," he said, "while you are arranging things outside an
+unexpected event has happened inside. Nothing happens but the
+unexpected. My wife has come back. It is the most unexpected event of
+any. Anything else might have happened. Most fortunately she has not
+seen the spare bedroom, and has no idea of its contents.
+
+"At this point reassure yourself.
+
+"My wife has gone.
+
+"She found on the table your first print of the negative. The sight of
+this before she saw me threw her into some kind of swoon, from which,
+however, she recovered.
+
+"I have explained things to a certain point. She understands that Lord
+Harry Norland is deceased. She does not understand that it was
+necessary to have a funeral; there is no necessity to tell her of that.
+I think she understands that she must not seem to have been here.
+Therefore she goes away immediately.
+
+"The nurse has not seen her. No one has seen her.
+
+"She understands, further, that as the widow, heir, and executrix of
+Lord Harry she will have to prove his will, and to receive the money
+due to him by the Insurance Company. She will do this out of love for
+her husband. I think that the persuasive powers of a certain person
+have never yet been estimated at their true value.
+
+"Considering the vital importance of getting her out of the place
+before she can learn anything of the spare bedroom, and of getting me
+out of the place before any messenger can arrive from the London
+office, I think you will agree with me that I am right in leaving
+Passy--and Paris--with Lady Harry this very afternoon.
+
+"You may write to William Linville, Poste-Restante, Louvain, Belgium. I
+am sure I can trust you to destroy this letter.
+
+"Louvain is a quiet, out-of-the-way place, where one can live quite
+separated from all old friends, and very cheaply.
+
+"Considering the small amount of money that I have left, I rely upon
+you to exercise the greatest economy. I do not know how long it may be
+before just claims are paid up--perhaps in two months--perhaps in
+six--but until things are settled there will be tightness.
+
+"At the same time it will not be difficult, as soon as Lady Harry goes
+to London, to obtain some kind of advance from the family solicitor on
+the strength of the insurance due to her from her late husband.
+
+"I am sorry, dear doctor, to leave you alone over the obsequies of this
+unfortunate gentleman. You will also have, I hear, a good deal of
+correspondence with his family. You may, possibly, have to see them in
+England. All this you will do, and do very well. Your bill for medical
+attendance you will do well to send in to the widow.
+
+"One word more. Fanny Mere, the maid, has gone to London; but she has
+not seen Lady Harry. As soon as she hears that her mistress has left
+London she will be back to Passy. She may come at any moment. I think
+if I were you I would meet her at the garden gate and send her on. It
+would be inconvenient if she were to arrive before the funeral.
+
+"My dear doctor, I rely on your sense, your prudence, and your
+capability.--Yours very sincerely,
+
+"Your ENGLISH FRIEND."
+
+
+He read this letter very carefully. Nothing in it he thought the least
+dangerous, and yet something suggested danger. However, he left it; he
+was obliged to caution and warn the doctor, and he was obliged to get
+his wife away as quietly as possible.
+
+This done, he packed up his things and hurried off to the station, and
+Passy saw him no more.
+
+The next day the mortal remains of Lord Harry Norland were lowered into
+the grave.
+
+CHAPTER LV
+
+THE ADVENTURES OF A FAITHFUL MAID
+
+IT was about five o'clock on Saturday afternoon. The funeral was over.
+The unfortunate young Irish gentleman was now lying in the cemetery of
+Auteuil in a grave purchased in perpetuity. His name, age, and rank
+were duly inscribed in the registers, and the cause of his death was
+vouched for by the English physician who had attended him at the
+request of his family. He was accompanied, in going through the
+formalities, by the respectable woman who had nursed the sick man
+during his last seizure. Everything was perfectly in order. The
+physician was the only mourner at the funeral. No one was curious about
+the little procession. A funeral, more or less, excites no attention.
+
+The funeral completed, the doctor gave orders for a single monument to
+be put in memory of Lord Harry Norland, thus prematurely cut off. He
+then returned to the cottage, paid and dismissed the nurse, taking her
+address in case he should find an opportunity, as he hoped, to
+recommend her among his numerous and distinguished clientele, and
+proceeded to occupy himself in setting everything in order before
+giving over the key to the landlord. First of all he removed the
+medicine bottles from the cupboard with great care, leaving nothing.
+Most of the bottles he threw outside into the dust-hole; one or two he
+placed in a fire which he made for the purpose in the kitchen: they
+were shortly reduced to two or three lumps of molten glass. These
+contained, no doubt, the mysteries and secrets of Science. Then he went
+into every room and searched in every possible place for any letters or
+papers which might have been left about. Letters left about are always
+indiscreet, and the consequences of an indiscretion may be far-reaching
+and incalculable. Satisfied at last that the place was perfectly
+cleared, he sat down in the salon and continued his business
+correspondence with the noble family and the solicitors. Thus engaged,
+he heard footsteps outside, footsteps on the gravel, footsteps on the
+doorstop. He got up, not without the slightest show of nervousness, and
+opened the door. Lord Harry was right. There stood the woman who had
+been his first nurse--the woman who overheard and watched--the woman
+who suspected. The suspicion and the intention of watching were legible
+in her eyes still. She had come back to renew her watch.
+
+In her hand she carried her box, which she had lugged along from the
+place where the omnibus had deposited her. She made as if she were
+stepping in; but the big form of the doctor barred the way.
+
+"Oh!" he said carelessly, "it is you. Who told you to come back?"
+
+"Is my mistress at home?"
+
+"No; she is not." He made no movement to let her pass.
+
+"I will come in, please, and wait for her."
+
+He still stood in the way.
+
+"What time will she return?"
+
+"Have you heard from her?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Did she leave orders that you were to follow her?"
+
+"No; none that I received. I thought--"
+
+"Servants should never think. They should obey."
+
+"I know my duty, Dr. Vimpany, without learning it from you. Will you
+let me pass?"
+
+He withdrew, and she entered.
+
+"Come in, by all means," he said, "if you desire my society for a short
+time. But you will not find your mistress here."
+
+"Not here! Where is she, then?"
+
+"Had you waited in London for a day or two you would, I dare say, have
+been informed. As it is, you have had your journey for nothing."
+
+"Has she not been here?"
+
+"She has not been here."
+
+"Dr. Vimpany," said the woman, driven to desperation, "I don't believe
+you! I am certain she has been here. What have you done with her?"
+
+"Don't you believe me? That is sad, indeed. But one cannot always help
+these wanderings. You do not believe me? Melancholy, truly!"
+
+"You may mock as much as you like. Where is she?"
+
+"Where, indeed?"
+
+"She left London to join his lordship. Where is he?
+
+"I do not know. He who would answer that question would be a wise man
+indeed."
+
+"Can I see him?"
+
+"Certainly not. He has gone away. On a long journey. By himself."
+
+"Then I shall wait for him. Here!" she added with decision. "In this
+house!"
+
+"By all means."
+
+She hesitated. There was an easy look about the doctor which she did
+not like.
+
+"I believe," she said, "that my mistress is in the house. She must be
+in the house. What are you going to do with her? I believe you have put
+her somewhere."
+
+"Indeed!"
+
+"You would do anything! I will go to the police."
+
+"If you please."
+
+"Oh! doctor, tell me where she is!"
+
+"You are a faithful servant: it is good, in these days, to find a woman
+so zealous on account of her mistress. Come in, good and faithful.
+Search the house all over. Come in--what are you afraid of? Put down
+your box, and go and look for your mistress." Fanny obeyed. She ran
+into the house, opened the doors of the salon and the dining-room one
+after the other: no one was there. She ran up the stairs and looked
+into her mistress's room: nothing was there, not even a ribbon or a
+hair-pin, to show the recent presence of a woman. She looked into Lord
+Harry's room. Nothing was there. If a woman leaves hairpins about, a
+man leaves his toothbrush: nothing at all was there. Then she threw
+open the armoire in each room: nothing behind the doors. She came
+downstairs slowly, wondering what it all meant.
+
+"May I look in the spare room?" she asked, expecting to be roughly
+refused.
+
+"By all means--by all means," said the doctor, blandly. "You know your
+way about. If there is anything left belonging to your mistress or to
+you, pray take it."
+
+She tried one more question.
+
+"How is my patient? How is Mr. Oxbye?"
+
+"He is gone."
+
+"Gone? Where has he gone to? Gone?"
+
+"He went away yesterday--Friday. He was a grateful creature. I wish we
+had more such grateful creatures as well as more such faithful
+servants. He said something about finding his way to London in order to
+thank you properly. A good soul, indeed!"
+
+"Gone?" she repeated. "Why, on Thursday morning I saw him--" She
+checked herself in time.
+
+"It was on Wednesday morning that you saw him, and he was then
+recovering rapidly."
+
+"But he was far too weak to travel."
+
+"You may be quite certain that I should not have allowed him to go away
+unless he was strong enough."
+
+Fanny made no reply. She had seen with her own eyes the man lying still
+and white, as if in death; she had seen the new nurse rushing off,
+crying that he was dead. Now she was told that he was quite well, and
+that he had gone away! But it was no time for thought.
+
+She was on the point of asking where the new nurse was, but she
+remembered in time that it was best for her to know nothing, and to
+awaken no suspicions. She opened the door of the spare room and looked
+in. Yes; the man was gone--dead or alive--and there were no traces left
+of his presence. The place was cleared up; the cupboard stood with open
+doors, empty; the bed was made; the curtain pushed back; the sofa was
+in its place against the wall; the window stood open. Nothing in the
+room at all to show that there had been an occupant only two days
+before. She stared blankly. The dead man was gone, then. Had her senses
+altogether deceived her? Was he not dead, but only sleeping? Was her
+horror only a thing of imagination? Behind her, in the hall, stood the
+doctor, smiling, cheerful.
+
+She remembered that her first business was to find her mistress. She
+was not connected with the Dane. She closed the door and returned to
+the hall.
+
+"Well," asked the doctor, "have you made any discoveries? You see that
+the house is deserted. You will perhaps learn before long why. Now what
+will you do? Will you go back to London?"
+
+"I must find her ladyship."
+
+The doctor smiled.
+
+"Had you come here in a different spirit," he said, "I would have
+spared you all this trouble. You come, however, with suspicion written
+on your face. You have always been suspecting and watching. It may be
+in a spirit of fidelity to your mistress; but such a spirit is not
+pleasing to other people, especially when there is not a single person
+who bears any resentment towards that mistress. Therefore, I have
+allowed you to run over the empty house, and to satisfy your suspicious
+soul. Lady Harry is not hidden here. As for Lord Harry--but you will
+hear in due time no doubt. And now I don't mind telling you that I have
+her ladyship's present address."
+
+"Oh! What is it?"
+
+"She appears to have passed through Paris on her way to Switzerland two
+days ago, and has sent here her address for the next fortnight. She has
+now, I suppose, arrived there. The place is Berne; the Hotel ----. But
+how do I know that she wants you?"
+
+"Of course she wants me."
+
+"Or of course you want her? Very good. Yours is the responsibility, not
+mine. Her address is the Hotel d'Angleterre. Shall I write it down for
+you? There it is. 'Hotel d'Angleterre, Berne.' Now you will not forget.
+She will remain there for one fortnight only. After that, I cannot say
+whither she may go. And, as all her things have been sent away, and as
+I am going away, I am not likely to hear."
+
+"Oh I must go to her. I must find her!" cried the woman earnestly; "if
+it is only to make sure that no evil is intended for her."
+
+"That is your business. For my own part, I know of no one who can wish
+her ladyship any evil."
+
+"Is my lord with her?"
+
+"I don't know whether that is your business. I have already told you
+that he is gone. If you join your mistress in Berne, you will very soon
+find out if he is there as well." Something in his tone made Fanny look
+up quickly. But his face revealed nothing. "What shall you do then?"
+asked the doctor. "You must make up your mind quickly whether you will
+go back to England or whether you will go on to Switzerland. You cannot
+stay here, because I am putting together the last things, and I shall
+give the landlord the key of the house this evening. All the bills are
+paid, and I am going to leave the place."
+
+"I do not understand. There is the patient," she murmured vaguely.
+"What does it mean? I cannot understand."
+
+"My good creature," he replied roughly, "what the devil does it matter
+to me whether you understand or whether you do not understand? Her
+ladyship is, as I have told you, at Berne. If you please to follow her
+there, do so. It is your own affair, not mine. If you prefer to go back
+to London, do so. Still--your own affair. Is there anything else to
+say?"
+
+Nothing. Fanny took up her box--this time the doctor did not offer to
+carry it for her.
+
+"Where are you going?" he asked. "What have you decided?"
+
+"I can get round by the Chemin de Fer de Ceinture to the Lyons station.
+I shall take the first cheap train which will take me to Berne."
+
+"Bon voyage!" said the doctor, cheerfully, and shut the door.
+
+
+It is a long journey from Paris to Berne even for those who can travel
+first class and express--that is, if sixteen hours can be called a long
+journey. For those who have to jog along by third class, stopping at
+all the little country stations, it is a long and tedious journey
+indeed. The longest journey ends at last. The train rolled slowly into
+the station of Berne, and Fanny descended with her box. Her wanderings
+were over for the present. She would find her mistress and be at rest.
+
+She asked to be directed to the Hotel d'Angleterre. The Swiss guardian
+of the peace with the cocked hat stared at her. She repeated the
+question.
+
+"Hotel d'Angleterre?" he echoed. "There is no Hotel d'Angleterre in
+Berne."
+
+"Yes, yes; there is. I am the maid of a lady who is staying at that
+hotel."
+
+"No; there is no Hotel d'Angleterre," he reported. "There is the Hotel
+Bernehof."
+
+"No." She took out the paper and showed it to him--"Lady Harry Norland,
+Hotel d'Angleterre, Berne."
+
+"There is the Hotel de Belle Vue, the Hotel du Faucon, the Hotel
+Victoria, the Hotel Schweizerhof. There is the Hotel schrodel, the
+Hotel Schneider, the Pension Simkin."
+
+Fanny as yet had no other suspicion than that the doctor had
+accidentally written a wrong name. Her mistress was at Berne: she would
+be in one of the hotels. Berne is not a large place. Very good; she
+would go round to the hotels and inquire. She did so. There are not, in
+fact, more than half a dozen hotels in Berne where an English lady
+could possibly stay. Fanny went to every one of these. No one had heard
+of any such lady: they showed her the lists of their visitors. She
+inquired at the post-office. No lady of that name had asked for
+letters. She asked if there were any pensions, and went round them
+all--uselessly.
+
+No other conclusion was possible. The doctor had deceived her wilfully.
+To get her out of the way he sent her to Berne. He would have sent her
+to Jericho if her purse had been long enough to pay the fare. She was
+tricked.
+
+She counted her money. There was exactly twenty-eight shillings and
+tenpence in her purse.
+
+She went back to the cheapest (and dirtiest) of the pensions she had
+visited. She stated her case--she had missed milady her mistress--she
+must stay until she should receive orders to go on, and money--would
+they take her in until one or the other arrived? Certainly. They would
+take her in, at five francs a day, payable every morning in advance.
+
+She made a little calculation--she had twenty-eight and tenpence;
+exactly thirty-five francs--enough for seven days. If she wrote to Mrs.
+Vimpany at once she could get an answer in five days.
+
+She accepted the offer, paid her five shillings, was shown into a room,
+and was informed that the dinner was served at six o'clock.
+
+Very good. Here she could rest, at any rate, and think what was to be
+done. And first she wrote two letters--one to Mrs. Vimpany and one to
+Mr. Mountjoy.
+
+In both of these letters she told exactly what she had found: neither
+Lord Harry nor his wife at the cottage, the place vacated, and the
+doctor on the point of going away. In both letters she told how she had
+been sent all the way into Switzerland on a fool's errand, and now
+found herself planted there without the means of getting home. In the
+letter to Mrs. Vimpany she added the remarkable detail that the man
+whom she had seen on the Thursday morning apparently dead, whose actual
+poisoning she thought she had witnessed, was reported on the Saturday
+to have walked out of the cottage, carrying his things, if he had any,
+and proposing to make his way to London in order to find out his old
+nurse. "Make what you can out of that," she said. "For my own part, I
+understand nothing."
+
+In the letter which she wrote to Mr. Mountjoy she added a petition that
+he would send her money to bring her home. This, she said, her mistress
+she knew would willingly defray.
+
+She posted these letters on Tuesday, and waited for the answers.
+
+Mrs. Vimpany wrote back by return post.
+
+
+"My dear Fanny," she said, "I have read your letter with the greatest
+interest. I am not only afraid that some villainy is afloat, but I am
+perfectly sure of it. One can only hope and pray that her ladyship may
+be kept out of its influence. You will be pleased to hear that Mr.
+Mountjoy is better. As soon as he was sufficiently recovered to stand
+the shock of violent emotion, I put Lady Harry's letter into his hands.
+It was well that I had kept it from him, for he fell into such a
+violence of grief and indignation that I thought he would have had a
+serious relapse. 'Can any woman,' he cried, 'be justified in going back
+to an utterly unworthy husband until he has proved a complete change?
+What if she had received a thousand letters of penitence? Penitence
+should be shown by acts, not words: she should have waited.' He wrote
+her a letter, which he showed me. 'Is there,' he asked, 'anything in
+the letter which could justly offend her?' I could find nothing. He
+told her, but I fear too late, that she risks degradation--perhaps
+worse, if there is anything worse--if she persists in returning to her
+unworthy husband. If she refuses to be guided by his advice, on the
+last occasion on which he would presume to offer any device, he begged
+that she would not answer. Let her silence say--No. That was the
+substance of his letter. Up to the present moment no answer has been
+received from Lady Harry. Nor has he received so much as an
+acknowledgment of the letter. What can be understood by this silence?
+Clearly, refusal.
+
+"You must return by way of Paris, though it is longer than by Basle and
+Laon. Mr. Mountjoy, I know, will send you the money you want. He has
+told me as much. 'I have done with Lady Harry,' he said. 'Her movements
+no longer concern me, though I can never want interest in what she
+does. But since the girl is right to stick to her mistress, I will send
+her the money--not as a loan to be paid back by Iris, but as a gift
+from myself.'
+
+"Therefore, my dear Fanny, stop in Paris for one night at least, and
+learn what has been done if you can. Find out the nurse, and ask her
+what really happened. With the knowledge that you already possess, it
+will be hard, indeed, if we cannot arrive at the truth. There must be
+people who supplied things to the cottage--the restaurant, the
+_pharmacien,_ the laundress. See them all--you know them already, and
+we will put the facts together. As for finding her ladyship, that will
+depend entirely upon herself. I shall expect you back in about a week.
+If anything happens here I shall be able to tell you when you arrive.
+
+"Yours affectionately,
+
+L. Vimpany."
+
+
+This letter exactly coincided with Fanny's own views. The doctor was
+now gone. She was pretty certain that he was not going to remain alone
+in the cottage; and the suburb of Passy, though charming in many ways,
+is not exactly the place for a man of Dr. Vimpany's temperament. She
+would stay a day, or even two days or more, if necessary, at Passy. She
+would make those inquiries.
+
+The second letter, which reached her the same day, was from Mr.
+Mountjoy. He told her what he had told Mrs. Vimpany: he would give her
+the money, because he recognised the spirit of fidelity which caused
+Fanny to go first to Paris and then to Berne.
+
+But he could not pretend to any right to interference in the affairs of
+Lord and Lady Harry Norland. He enclosed a _mandat postal_ for a
+hundred and twenty-five francs, which he hoped would be sufficient for
+her immediate wants.
+
+She started on her return-journey on the same day--namely, Saturday. On
+Sunday evening she was in a pension at Passy, ready to make those
+inquiries. The first person whom she sought out was the _rentier_--the
+landlord of the cottage. He was a retired tradesman--one who had made
+his modest fortune in a _charcuterie_ and had invested it in house
+property. Fanny told him that she had been lady's-maid to Lady Harry
+Norland, in the recent occupancy of the cottage, and that she was
+anxious to know her present address.
+
+"Merci, mon Dieu! que sais-je? What do I know about it?" he replied.
+"The wife of the English milord is so much attached to her husband that
+she leaves him in his long illness--"
+
+"His long illness?"
+
+"Certainly--Mademoiselle is not, perhaps, acquainted with the
+circumstances--his long illness; and does not come even to see his dead
+body after he is dead. There is a wife for you--a wife of the English
+fashion!"
+
+Fanny gasped.
+
+"After he is dead! Is Lord Harry dead? When did he die?"
+
+"But, assuredly, Mademoiselle has not heard? The English milord died on
+Thursday morning, a week and more ago, of consumption, and was buried
+in the cemetery of Auteuil last Saturday. Mademoiselle appears
+astonished."
+
+"En effet, Monsieur, I am astonished."
+
+"Already the tombstone is erected to the memory of the unhappy young
+man, who is said to belong to a most distinguished family of Ireland.
+Mademoiselle can see it with her own eyes in the cemetery."
+
+"One word more, Monsieur. If Monsieur would have the kindness to tell
+her who was the nurse of milord in his last seizure?"
+
+"But certainly. All the world knows the widow La Chaise. It was the
+widow La Chaise who was called in by the doctor. Ah! there is a
+man--what a man! What a miracle of science! What devotion to his
+friend! What admirable sentiments! Truly, the English are great in
+sentiments when their insular coldness allows them to speak. This widow
+can be found--easily found."
+
+He gave Fanny, in fact, the nurse's address. Armed with this, and
+having got out of the landlord the cardinal fact of Lord Harry's
+alleged death, the lady's-maid went in search of this respectable
+widow.
+
+She found her, in her own apartments, a respectable woman indeed,
+perfectly ready to tell everything that she knew, and evidently quite
+unsuspicious of anything wrong. She was invited to take charge of a
+sick man on the morning of Thursday: she was told that he was a young
+Irish lord, dangerously ill of a pulmonary disorder; the doctor, in
+fact, informed her that his life hung by a thread, and might drop at
+any moment, though on the other hand he had known such cases linger on
+for many months. She arrived as she had been ordered, at midday: she
+was taken into the sick-room by the doctor, who showed her the patient
+placidly sleeping on a sofa: the bed had been slept in, and was not yet
+made. After explaining the medicines which she was to administer, and
+the times when they were to be given, and telling her something about
+his diet, the doctor left her alone with the patient.
+
+"He was still sleeping profoundly," said the nurse.
+
+"You are sure that he was sleeping, and not dead?" asked Fanny,
+sharply.
+
+"Mademoiselle, I have been a nurse for many years. I know my duties.
+The moment the doctor left me I verified his statements. I proved that
+the patient was sleeping by feeling his pulse and observing his
+breath."
+
+Fanny made no reply. She could hardly remind this respectable person
+that after the doctor left her she employed herself first in examining
+the cupboards, drawers, _armoire,_ and other things; that she then
+found a book with pictures, in which she read for a quarter of an hour
+or so; that she then grew sleepy and dropped the book--
+
+"I then," continued the widow, "made arrangements against his
+waking--that is to say, I drew back the curtains and turned over the
+sheet to air the bed"--O Madame! Madame! Surely this was
+needless!--"shook up the pillows, and occupied myself in the cares of a
+conscientious nurse until the time came to administer the first dose of
+medicine. Then I proceeded to awaken my patient. Figure to yourself! He
+whom I had left tranquilly breathing, with the regularity of a
+convalescent rather than a dying man, was dead! He was dead!"
+
+"You are sure he was dead?"
+
+"As if I had never seen a dead body before! I called the doctor, but it
+was for duty only, for I knew that he was dead."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"Then the doctor--who must also have known that he was dead--felt his
+pulse and his heart, and looked at his eyes, and declared that he was
+dead."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"What then? If a man is dead he is dead. You cannot restore him to
+life. Yet one thing the doctor did. He brought a camera and took a
+photograph of the dead man for the sake of his friends."
+
+"Oh! he took a photograph of--of Lord Harry Norland. What did he do
+that for?"
+
+"I tell you: for the sake of his friends."
+
+Fanny was more bewildered than ever. Why on earth should the doctor
+want a photograph of the Dane Oxbye to show the friends of Lord Harry?
+Could he have made a blunder as stupid as it was uncalled for? No one
+could possibly mistake the dead face of that poor Dane for the dead
+face of Lord Harry.
+
+She had got all the information she wanted--all, in fact, that was of
+any use to her. One thing remained. She would see the grave.
+
+The cemetery of Auteuil is not so large as that of Pere-la-Chaise, nor
+does it contain so many celebrated persons as the latter--perhaps the
+greatest cemetery, as regards its illustrious dead, in the whole world.
+It is the cemetery of the better class. The tombs are not those of
+Immortals but of Respectables.
+
+Among them Fanny easily found, following the directions given to her,
+the tomb she was searching after.
+
+On it was written in English, "Sacred to the Memory of Lord Harry
+Norland, second son of the Marquis of Malven." Then followed the date
+and the age, and nothing more.
+
+Fanny sat down on a bench and contemplated this mendacious stone.
+
+"The Dane Oxbye," she said, "was growing better fast when I went away.
+That was the reason why I was sent away. The very next day the doctor,
+thinking me far away, poisoned him. I saw him do it. The nurse was told
+that he was asleep, and being left alone presently discovered that he
+was dead. She has been told that the sick man is a young Irish
+gentleman. He is buried under the name of Lord Harry. That is the
+reason I found the doctor alone. And my lady? Where is she?"
+
+CHAPTER LVI
+
+FANNY'S NARRATIVE
+
+FANNY returned to London. Partly, the slenderness of her resources gave
+her no choice; partly, she had learned all there was to learn, and
+would do no good by staying longer at Passy.
+
+She arrived with thirty shillings left out of Mr. Mountjoy's timely
+gift. She sought a cheap lodging, and found a room, among people who
+seemed respectable, which she could have for four-and-sixpence a week,
+with board at a shilling a day. This settled, she hastened to Mr.
+Mountjoy's hotel brimful of her news for Mrs. Vimpany.
+
+Everyone knows the disappointment when the one person in the world whom
+you want at the moment to see and to talk with proves to be out. Then
+the news has to be suppressed; the conclusions, the suspicions, the
+guesses have to be postponed; the active brain falls back upon itself.
+
+This disappointment--almost as great as that at Berne--was experienced
+by Fanny Mere at the hotel.
+
+Mr. Mountjoy was no longer there.
+
+The landlady of the hotel, who knew Fanny, came out herself and told
+her what had happened.
+
+"He was better," she said, "but still weak. They sent him down to
+Scotland in Mrs. Vimpany's care. He was to travel by quick or slow
+stages, just as he felt able. And I've got the address for you. Here it
+is. Oh! and Mrs. Vimpany left a message. Will you, she says, when you
+write, send the letter to her and not to him? She says, you know why."
+
+Fanny returned to her lodging profoundly discouraged. She was filled
+with this terrible secret that she had discovered. The only man who
+could advise at this juncture was Mr. Mountjoy, and he was gone. And
+she knew not what had become of her mistress. What could she do? The
+responsibility was more than she could bear.
+
+The conversation with the French nurse firmly established one thing in
+her mind. The man who was buried in the cemetery of Auteuil with the
+name of Lord Harry Norland on a headstone, the man who had lingered so
+long with pulmonary disease, was the man whose death she had witnessed.
+It was Oxbye the Dane. Of that there could be no doubt. Equally there
+was no doubt in her own mind that he had been poisoned by the
+doctor--by Mrs. Vimpany's husband--in the presence and, to all
+appearance, with the consent and full knowledge of Lord Harry himself.
+Then her mistress was in the power of these two men--villains who had
+now added murder to their other crimes. As for herself, she was alone,
+almost friendless; in a week or two she would be penniless. If she told
+her tale, what mischief might she not do? If she was silent, what
+mischief might not follow?
+
+She sat down to write to the only friend she had. But her trouble froze
+her brain. She had not been able to put the case plainly. Words failed
+her.
+
+She was not at any time fluent with her pen. She now found herself
+really unable to convey any intelligible account of what had happened.
+To state clearly all that she knew so that the conclusion should be
+obvious and patent to the reader would have been at all times
+difficult, and was now impossible. She could only confine herself to a
+simple vague statement. "I can only say that from all I have seen and
+heard I have reasons for believing that Lord Harry is not dead at all."
+She felt that this was a feeble way of summing up, but she was not at
+the moment equal to more. "When I write again, after I have heard from
+you, I will tell you more. To-day I cannot. I am too much weighed down.
+I am afraid of saying too much. Besides, I have no money, and must look
+for work. I am not anxious, however, about my own future, because my
+lady will not forsake me. I am sure of that. It is my anxiety about her
+and the dreadful secrets I have learned which give me no rest."
+
+Several days passed before the answer came. And then it was an answer
+which gave her little help. "I have no good news for you," she said.
+"Mr. Mountjoy continues weak. Whatever your secret, I cannot ask you to
+communicate it to him in his present condition. He has been grieved and
+angry beyond all belief by Lady Harry's decision to rejoin her husband.
+It is hard to understand that a man should be so true a friend and so
+constant a lover. Yet he has brought himself to declare that he has
+broken off all friendly relations with her. He could no longer endure
+London. It was associated with thoughts and memories of her. In spite
+of his weak condition, he insisted on coming down here to his Scotch
+villa. Ill as he was, he would brook no delay. We came down by very
+easy stages, stopping at Peterborough, York, Durham, Newcastle, and
+Berwick--at some places for one night, and others for more. In spite of
+all my precautions, when we arrived at the villa he was dangerously
+exhausted. I sent for the local doctor, who seems to know something. At
+all events, he is wise enough to understand that this is not a case for
+drugs. Complete rest and absence from all agitating thoughts must be
+aimed at. Above all, he is not to see the newspapers. That is
+fortunate, because, I suppose, Lord Harry's death has been announced in
+them, and the thought that his former mistress is a widow might excite
+him very dangerously. You will now understand why I left that message
+at the hotel for you, and why I have not shown him your letter. I told
+him, it is true, that you had returned without finding your mistress.
+'Speak no more to me of Lady Harry,' he replied irritably. So I have
+said no more. As for money, I have a few pounds by me, which are at
+your service. You can repay me at some future time. I have thought of
+one thing--that new Continental paper started by Lord Harry. Wherever
+she may be, Lady Harry is almost sure to see that. Put an advertisement
+in it addressed to her, stating that you have not heard of her address,
+but that you yourself will receive any letter sent to some post-office
+which you can find. I think that such an advertisement will draw a
+reply from her, unless she desires to remain in seclusion."
+
+Fanny thought the suggestion worth adopting. After careful
+consideration, she drew up an advertisement:--
+
+"Fanny H. to L--H--. I have not been able to ascertain your address.
+Please write to me, at the Post Office, Hunter Street, London, W.C."
+
+She paid for the insertion of this advertisement three times on
+alternate Saturdays. They told her that this would be a more likely way
+than to take three successive Saturdays. Then, encouraged by the
+feeling that something, however little, had been done, she resolved to
+sit down to write out a narrative in which she would set down in order
+everything that had happened--exactly as it had happened. Her intense
+hatred and suspicion of Dr. Vimpany aided her, strange to say, to keep
+to the strictest fidelity as regards the facts. For it was not her
+desire to make up charges and accusations. She wanted to find out the
+exact truth, and so to set it down that anybody who read her statement
+would arrive at the same conclusion as she herself had done. In the
+case of an eye-witness there are thousands of things which cannot be
+produced in evidence which yet are most important in directing and
+confirming suspicions. The attitude, the voice, the look of a speaker,
+the things which he conceals as well as the things which he
+reveals--all these are evidence. But these Fanny was unable to set
+down. Therefore it behoved her to be strictly careful.
+
+First, she stated how she became aware that there was some secret
+scheme under consideration between Lord Harry and the doctor. Next, she
+set down the fact that they began to talk French to each other,
+thinking that she could not understand them; that they spoke of
+deceiving Lady Harry by some statement which had already deceived the
+authorities; that the doctor undertook to get the lady out of the
+house; that they engaged herself as nurse to a sick man; that she
+suspected from the beginning that their design was to profit in some
+way by the death of this sick than, who bore a slight resemblance to
+Lord Harry himself. And so on, following the story as closely as she
+could remember, to the death of the Dane and her own subsequent
+conversation with the nurse. She was careful to put in the dates, day
+after day. When she had done all this--it took a good deal of time--she
+bought a manuscript book and copied it all out. This enabled her to
+remember two or three facts which had escaped her at the beginning.
+Then she made another copy this time without names of people or place.
+The second copy she forwarded as a registered letter to Mrs. Vimpany,
+with a letter of which this was the conclusion: "Considering,
+therefore, that on Wednesday morning I left Lord Harry in perfect
+health; considering that on the Thursday morning I saw the man who had
+been ill so long actually die--how, I have told you in the packet
+enclosed; considering that the nurse was called in purposely to attend
+a patient who was stated to have long been ill--there can be no doubt
+whatever that the body in the cemetery is that of the unfortunate Dane,
+Oxbye; and that, somewhere or other, Lord Harry is alive and well.
+
+"What have they done it for? First of all, I suppose, to get money. If
+it were not for the purpose of getting money the doctor would have had
+nothing to do with the conspiracy, which was his own invention. That is
+very certain. Your idea was they would try to get money out of the
+Insurance Offices. I suppose that is their design. But Lord Harry may
+have many other secret reasons of his own for wishing to be thought
+dead. They say his life has been full of wicked things, and he may well
+wish to be considered dead and gone. Lots of wicked men would like
+above all things, I should think, to be considered dead and buried. But
+the money matter is at the bottom of all, I am convinced. What are we
+to do?"
+
+What could they do? These two women had got hold of a terrible secret.
+Neither of them could move. It was too big a thing. One cannot expect a
+woman to bring her own husband--however wicked a husband he may be--to
+the awful shame and horror of the gallows if murder should be
+proved--or to a lifelong imprisonment if the conspiracy alone should be
+brought home to him. Therefore Mrs. Vimpany could do nothing. As for
+Fanny, the mere thought of the pain she would inflict upon her
+mistress, were Lord Harry, through her interference, to be brought to
+justice and an infamous sentence, kept her quiet.
+
+Meantime, the announcement of Lord Harry's death had been made. Those
+who knew the family history spoke cheerfully of the event. "Best timing
+he had ever done. Very good thing for his people. One more bad lot out
+of the way. Dead, Sir, and a very good thing, too. Married, I believe.
+One of the men who have done everything. Pity they can't write a life
+of him." These were the comments made upon the decease of this young
+gentleman. Such is fame. Next day he was clean forgotten; just as if he
+had never existed. Such is life.
+
+CHAPTER LVII
+
+AT LOUVAIN
+
+NOT many English tourists go out of their way to visit Louvain, even
+though it has a Hotel de Ville surpassing even that of Brussels itself,
+and though one can get there in an hour from that city of youth and
+pleasure. And there are no English residents at all in the place--at
+least, none in evidence, though perhaps there may be some who have gone
+there for the same reasons which led Mr. William Linville and his wife
+to choose this spot--in order to be private and secluded. There are
+many more people than we know of who desire, above all things,
+seclusion and retirement, and dread nothing so much as a chance meeting
+with an old friend.
+
+Mr. William Linville took a small house, furnished, like the cottage at
+Passy, and, also like that little villa, standing in its own garden.
+Here, with a cook and a maid, Iris set up her modest _menage._ To ask
+whether she was happy would be absurd. At no time since her marriage
+had she been happy; to live under the condition of perpetual
+concealment is not in itself likely to make a woman any the happier.
+Fortunately she had no time to experience the full bitterness of the
+plan proposed by her husband.
+
+Consider. Had their scheme actually been carried out quite
+successfully, this pair, still young, would have found themselves
+condemned to transportation for life. That was the first thing. Next,
+they could never make any friends among their own countrymen or
+countrywomen for fear of discovery. Iris could never again speak to an
+English lady. If they had children the risk would appear ten times more
+terrible, the consequences ten times more awful. The children
+themselves would have to grow up without family and without friends.
+The husband, cut off from intercourse with other men, would be thrown
+back upon himself. Husband and wife, with this horrible load laid upon
+them, would inevitably grow to loathe and hate the sight of each other.
+The man would almost certainly take to drink: the woman--but we must
+not follow this line any further. The situation lasted only so long as
+to give the wife a glimpse of what it might become in the future.
+
+They took their house, and sat down in it. They were very silent. Lord
+Harry, his great _coup_ successfully carried so far, sat taciturn and
+glum. He stayed indoors all day, only venturing out after dark. For a
+man whose whole idea of life was motion, society, and action, this
+promised ill.
+
+The monotony was first broken by the arrival of Hugh's letter, which
+was sent in with other documents from Passy. Iris read it; she read it
+again, trying to understand exactly what it meant. Then she tore it up.
+"If he only knew," she said, "he would not have taken the trouble even
+to write this letter. There is no answer, Hugh. There can be none--now.
+Act by your advice? Henceforth, I must act by order. I am a
+conspirator."
+
+Two days afterwards came a letter from the doctor. He did not think it
+necessary to say anything about Fanny's appearance or her journey to
+Borne. "Everything," he wrote, "has so far gone well. The world knows,
+through the papers, that Lord Harry is dead. There will be now only the
+business of claiming the money. For this purpose, as his widow is the
+sole heiress and executrix, it will be necessary for her to place the
+will and the policies of insurance in the hands of her husband's
+lawyers, so that the will may be proved and the claims duly made. Forms
+will have to be signed. The medical certificate of death and the forms
+attesting the burial are already in the lawyers' hands. The sooner the
+widow goes to London the better. She should write to announce her
+arrival, and she should write from Paris as if she had been staying
+there after her husband's death.
+
+"I have only to remind you, my dear Linville, that you are indebted to
+me in a good round sum. Of course, I shall be very pleased to receive a
+cheque for this sum in full as soon as you have touched the amount due
+to you. I shall be in Paris, at the Hotel Continental, where you may
+address me. Naturally, there is no desire for concealment, and if the
+Insurance Companies desire any information from me I am always ready
+and willing to afford it."
+
+Lord Harry gave this letter to his wife.
+
+She read it, and laid it open in her lap.
+
+"Must it be, Harry? Oh! must it be?"
+
+"There is no other way possible, dear. But really, it is nothing. You
+were not at Passy when your husband died. You had been in London--you
+were in Brussels--anywhere; when you arrived it was all over; you have
+seen his headstone. Dr. Vimpany had him in his care; you knew he was
+ill, but you thought it was a trifling matter which time would cure;
+you go to the lawyers and present the will. They have the policies, and
+will do everything else; you will not even have to sign anything. The
+only thing that you must do is to get a complete rig-out of widow's
+weeds. Mind--there will not be the slightest doubt or question raised.
+Considering everything, you will be more than justified in seeing no
+one and going nowhere."
+
+Hugh's letter breaking in upon her fool's paradise had awakened the
+poor woman to her better self; she had gone so far with the fraud as to
+acquiesce in it; but she recoiled with horror and shame when this
+active part was forced upon her.
+
+"Oh, Harry!"--she burst into tears. "I cannot--I cannot. You ask me to
+be a liar and a thief--oh! heavens!--a vile thief!
+
+"It is too late, Iris! We are all vile thieves. It is too late to begin
+crying now."
+
+"Harry"--she threw herself upon her knees--"spare me! Let some other
+woman go, and call herself your widow. Then I will go away and hide
+myself."
+
+"Don't talk nonsense, Iris," he replied roughly. "I tell you it is far
+too late. You should have thought of this before. It is now all
+arranged."
+
+"I cannot go," she said.
+
+"You must go; otherwise, all our trouble may prove useless."
+
+"Then I will not go!" she declared, springing to her feet. "I will not
+degrade myself any further. I will not go!"
+
+Harry rose too. He faced her for a moment. His eyes dropped. Even he
+remembered, at that moment, how great must be the fall of a woman who
+would consent to play such a part.
+
+"You shall not go," he said, "unless you like. You can leave me to the
+consequences of my own acts--to my own degradation. Go back to England.
+In one thing only spare me. Do not tell what you know. As for me, I
+will forge a letter from you--"
+
+"Forge a letter!"
+
+It is the only way left open, giving the lawyers authority to act, and
+inclosing the will. What will happen next? By whose hands the money is
+to reach me I know not yet. But you can leave me, Iris. Better that you
+should leave me--I shall only drag you lower."
+
+"Why must you forge the letter? Why not come with me somewhere--the
+world is large!--to some place where you are not known, and there let
+us begin a new life? We have not much money, but I can sell my watches
+and chains and rings, and we shall have enough. O Harry! for once be
+guided--listen to me! We shall find some humble manner of living, and
+we may be happy yet. There is no harm done if you have only pretended
+to be dead; nobody has been injured or defrauded--"
+
+"Iris, you talk wildly! Do you imagine, for one moment, that the doctor
+will release me from my bargain?"
+
+"What bargain?"
+
+"Why--of course he was to be paid for the part he has taken in the
+business. Without him it could never have been done at all."
+
+"Yes--yes--it was in the letter that you gave me," she said, conscious
+that such agreements belonged to works of fiction and to police courts.
+
+"Certainly I have to pay him a good large slice out of the money."
+
+"It is fifteen thousand pounds, is it not? How much is to be paid to
+the--to the doctor?"
+
+"We agreed that he was to have the half," said Lord Harry, laughing
+lightly. "But as I thought that seven thousand five hundred pounds was
+a sum of money which would probably turn his head and bring him to
+starvation in a year or two, I told him that the whole amount was four
+thousand pounds. Therefore he is to have two thousand pounds for his
+share. And quite enough too."
+
+"Treachery on treachery!" said his wife. "Fraud on fraud! Would to
+GOD," she added with a sigh, "that you had never met this man!"
+
+"I dare say it would have been better for me, on the whole," he
+replied. "But then, my dear, a man like myself is always meeting people
+whom it would have been better not to have met. Like will to like, I
+suppose. Given the active villain and the passive consenter, and they
+are sure to meet. Not that I throw stones at the worthy doctor. Not at
+all."
+
+"We cannot, Harry," said his wife.
+
+"We cannot, my dear. _Bien entendu!_ Well, Iris, there is no more to be
+said. You know the situation completely. You can back out of it if you
+please, and leave me. Then I shall have to begin all over again a new
+conspiracy far more dangerous than the last. Well, I shall not drag you
+down with me. That is my resolution. If it comes to public
+degradation--but it shall not. Iris, I promise you one thing." For once
+he looked as if he meant it. "Death before dishonour. Death without
+your name being mixed up at all, save with pity for being the wife of
+such a man."
+
+Again he conquered her.
+
+"Harry," she said, "I will go."
+
+CHAPTER LVIII
+
+OF COURSE THEY WILL PAY
+
+THREE days afterwards a hansom cab drove to the offices of the very
+respectable firm of solicitors who managed the affairs of the Norland
+family. They had one or two other families as well, and in spite of
+agricultural depression, they made a very good thing indeed out of a
+very comfortable business. The cab contained a lady in deep widow's
+weeds.
+
+Lady Harry Norland expected to be received with coldness and suspicion.
+Her husband, she knew, had not led the life expected in these days of a
+younger son. Nor had his record been such as to endear him to his elder
+brother. Then, as may be imagined, there were other tremors, caused by
+a guilty knowledge of certain facts which might by some accident "come
+out." Everybody has tremors for whom something may come out. Also, Iris
+had had no experience of solicitors, and was afraid of them.
+
+Instead of being received, however, by a gentleman as solemn as the
+Court of Chancery and as terrible as the Court of Assize, she found an
+elderly gentleman, of quiet, paternal manners, who held both her hands,
+and looked as if he was weeping over her bereavement. By long practice
+this worthy person could always, at a moment's notice, assume the
+appearance of one who was weeping with his client.
+
+"My dear lady!" he murmured. "My dear lady! This is a terrible time for
+you."
+
+She started. She feared that something had come out.
+
+"In the moment of bereavement, too, to think of business."
+
+"I have brought you," she replied curtly, "my husband's--my late
+husband's--will."
+
+"Thank you. With your permission--though it may detain your ladyship--I
+will read it. Humph! it is short and to the point. This will certainly
+give us little trouble. I fear, however, that, besides the insurances,
+your ladyship will not receive much."
+
+"Nothing. My husband was always a poor man, as you know. At the time of
+his death he left a small sum of money only. I am, as a matter of fact,
+greatly inconvenienced."
+
+"Your ladyship shall be inconvenienced no longer. You must draw upon
+us. As regards Lord Harry's death, we are informed by Dr. Vimpany, who
+seems to have been his friend as well as his medical adviser--"
+
+"Dr. Vimpany had been living with him for some time."
+
+--"that he had a somewhat protracted illness?"
+
+"I was away from my husband. I was staying here in London--on
+business--for some time before his death. I was not even aware that he
+was in any danger. When I hurried back to Passy I was too late. My
+husband was--was already buried."
+
+"It was most unfortunate. And the fact that his lordship was not on
+speaking terms with the members of his own family--pray understand that
+I am not expressing any opinion on the case--but this fact seems to
+render his end more unhappy."
+
+"He had Dr. Vimpany," said Iris, in a tone which suggested to the
+lawyer jealousy or dislike of the doctor.
+
+"Well," he said, "it remains to prove the will and to make our claims
+against the Insurance Office. I have the policy here. His lordship was
+insured in the Royal Unicorn Life Insurance Company for the sum
+of 15,000 pounds. We must not expect to have this large claim satisfied
+quite immediately. Perhaps the office will take three months to settle.
+But, as I said before, your ladyship can draw upon us."
+
+"You are certain that the Company will pay?"
+
+"Assuredly. Why not? They must pay."
+
+"Oh! I thought that perhaps so large a sum--"
+
+"My dear Madam"--the man who administered so much real and personal
+property smiled--"fifteen thousand pounds is not what we call a very
+large sum. Why, if an Insurance Company refused to pay a lawful claim
+it would cut its own throat--absolutely. Its very existence depends
+upon its meeting all just and lawful claims. The death being proved it
+remains for the Company to pay the insurance into the hands of the
+person entitled to receive it. That is, in this case, to me, acting for
+you."
+
+"Yes--I see--but I thought that, perhaps, my husband having died abroad
+there might be difficulty--"
+
+There might, if he had died in Central Africa. But he died in a suburb
+of Paris, under French law, which, in such matters, is even more
+careful and exacting than our own. We have the official papers, and the
+doctor's certificate. We have, besides, a photograph of the unfortunate
+gentleman lying on his death-bed--this was well thought of: it is an
+admirable likeness--the sun cannot lie--we have also a photograph of
+the newly erected tombstone. Doubt? Dear me, Madam, they could no more
+raise a doubt as to your husband's death than if he were buried in the
+family vault. If anything should remove any ground for doubt, it is the
+fact that the only person who benefits by his death is yourself. If, on
+the other hand, he had been in the hands of persons who had reason to
+wish for his death, there might have been suspicions of foul play,
+which would have been matter for the police--but not for an insurance
+company."
+
+"Oh! I am glad to learn, at least, that there will be no trouble. I
+have no knowledge of business, and I thought that--"
+
+"No--no--your ladyship need have no such ideas. In fact, I have already
+anticipated your arrival, and have sent to the manager of the company.
+He certainly went so far as to express a doubt as to the cause of
+death. Consumption in any form was not supposed to be in your husband's
+family. But Lord Harry--ahem!--tried his constitution--tried his
+constitition, as I put it."
+
+He had put it a little differently. What he said was to the following
+effect--"Lord Harry Norland, sir, was a devil. There was nothing he did
+not do. I only wonder that he has lived so long. Had I been told that
+he died of everything all together, I should not have been surprised.
+Ordinary rapid consumption was too simple for such a man."
+
+Iris gave the lawyer her London address, obeyed him by drawing a
+hundred pounds, half of which she sent to Mr. William Linville, at
+Louvain, and went home to wait. She must now stay in London until the
+claim was discharged.
+
+She waited six weeks. At the end of that time she learned from her
+solicitors that the company had settled, and that they, the lawyers,
+had paid to her bankers the sum of 15,000 pounds being the whole of the
+insurance.
+
+Acting, then, on her husband's instructions, she sought another bank
+and opened an account for one William Linville, gentleman, residing
+abroad. She gave herself as a reference, left the usual signature of
+William Linville, and paid to his account a cheque for 8,000 pounds.
+She saw the manager of her own bank, explained that this large cheque
+was for an investment, and asked him to let her have 2,000 pounds in
+bank notes. This sum, she added, was for a special purpose. The manager
+imagined that she was about to perform some act of charity, perhaps an
+expiatory work on behalf of her late husband.
+
+She then wrote to Dr. Vimpany, who was in Paris, making an appointment
+with him. Her work of fraud and falsehood was complete.
+
+"There has been no trouble at all," she wrote to her husband; "and
+there will not be any. The insurance company has already settled the
+claim. I have paid 8,000 pounds to the account of William Linville. My
+own banker--who knows my father--believes that the money is an
+investment. My dear Harry, I believe that, unless the doctor begins to
+worry us--which he will do as soon as his money is all gone--a clear
+course lies before us. Let us, as I have already begged you to do, go
+straight away to some part of America, where you are certain not to be
+known. You can dye your hair and grow a beard to make sure. Let us go
+away from every place and person that may remind us of time past.
+Perhaps, in time, we may recover something of the old peace and--can it
+ever be?--the old self-respect."
+
+There was going to be trouble, however, and that of a kind little
+expected, impossible to be guarded against. And it would be trouble
+caused by her own act and deed.
+
+CHAPTER LIX
+
+THE CONSEQUENCES OF AN ADVERTISEMENT
+
+THE trouble was made by Iris herself.
+
+In this way--
+
+She saw Fanny's advertisement. Her first impulse was to take her back
+into her service. But she remembered the necessity for concealment. She
+must not place herself--she realised already the fact that she had done
+a thing which would draw upon her the vengeance of the law--and her
+husband in the power of this woman, whose fidelity might not stand the
+shock of some fit of jealousy, rage, or revenge for fancied slight. She
+must henceforth be cut off altogether from all her old friends.
+
+She therefore answered the letter by one which contained no address,
+and which she posted with her own hand at the General Post Office. She
+considered her words carefully. She must not say too much or too
+little.
+
+"I enclose," she said, "a bank note for ten pounds to assist you. I am
+about to travel abroad, but must, under existing circumstances,
+dispense with the services of a maid. In the course of my travels I
+expect to be in Brussels. If, therefore, you have anything to tell me
+or to ask of me, write to me at the Poste Restante of that city, and in
+the course of six mouths or so I am tolerably sure to send for the
+letter. In fact, I shall expect to find a letter from you. Do not think
+that I have forgotten you or your faithful services, though for a
+moment I am not able to call you to my side. Be patient."
+
+There was no address given in the letter. This alone was mysterious. If
+Lady Harry was in London and the letter was posted at the General Post
+Office--why should she not give her address? If she was abroad, why
+should she hide her address? In any case, why should she do without a
+maid--she who had never been without a maid--to whom a maid was as
+necessary as one of her hands? Oh! she could never get along at all
+without a maid. As for Iris's business in London and her part in the
+conspiracy, of course Fanny neither knew nor suspected.
+
+She had recourse again to her only friend--Mrs. Vimpany--to whom she
+sent Lady Harry's letter, and imploring her to lay the whole before Mr.
+Mountjoy.
+
+"He is getting so much stronger," Mrs. Vimpany wrote back, "that I
+shall be able to tell him every thing before long. Do not be in a
+hurry. Let us do nothing that may bring trouble upon her. But I am sure
+that something is going on--something wicked. I have read your account
+of what has happened over and over again. I am as convinced as you
+could possibly be that my husband and Lord Harry are trading on the
+supposed death of the letter. We can do nothing. Let us wait."
+
+Three days afterwards she wrote again.
+
+"The opportunity for which I have been waiting has come at last. Mr.
+Mountjoy is, I believe, fully recovered. This morning, seeing him so
+well and strong, I asked him if I might venture to place in his hands a
+paper containing a narrative.
+
+"'Is it concerning Iris?' he asked.
+
+"'It has to do with Lady Harry--indirectly.'
+
+"For a while he made no reply. Then he asked me if it had also to do
+with her husband.
+
+"'With her husband and with mine,' I told him.
+
+"Again he was silent.
+
+"After a bit he looked up and said, 'I had promised myself never again
+to interfere in Lady Harry Norland's affairs. You wish me to read this
+document, Mrs. Vimpany?
+
+"'Certainly; I am most anxious that you should read it and should
+advise upon it.'
+
+"'Who wrote it?'
+
+"'Fanny Mere, Lady Harry's maid.'
+
+"'If it is only to tell me that her husband is a villain,' he said, 'I
+will not read it.'
+
+"'If you were enabled by reading it to keep Lady Harry from a dreadful
+misfortune?' I suggested.
+
+"'Give me the document,' he said.
+
+"Before I gave it to him--it was in my pocket--I showed him a newspaper
+containing a certain announcement.
+
+"'Lord Harry dead?' he cried. 'Impossible! Then Iris is free.'
+
+"'Perhaps you will first read the document.' I drew it out of my
+pocket, gave it to him, and retired He should be alone while he read
+it.
+
+"Half an hour afterwards I returned. I found him in a state of the most
+violent agitation, without, however, any of the weakness which he
+betrayed on previous occasions.
+
+"'Mrs. Vimpany,' he cried, 'this is terrible! There is no doubt--not
+the least doubt--in my mind that the man Oxbye is the man buried under
+the name of Lord Harry, and that he was murdered--murdered in cold
+blood--by that worst of villains----'
+
+"'My husband,' I said.
+
+"'Your husband--most unfortunate of wives! As for Lord Harry's share in
+the murder, it is equally plain that he knew of it, even if he did not
+consent to it. Good heavens! Do you understand? Do you realise what
+they have done? Your husband and Iris's husband may be tried--actually
+tried--for murder and put to a shameful death. Think of it!'
+
+"'I do think of it, Heaven knows! I think of it every day--I think of
+it all day long. But, remember, I will say nothing that will bring this
+fate upon them. And Fanny will say nothing, Without Fanny's evidence
+there cannot be even a suspicion of the truth.'
+
+"'What does Iris know about it?'
+
+"'I think that she cannot know anything of the murder. Consider the
+dates. On Wednesday Fanny was dismissed; on Thursday she returned
+secretly and witnessed the murder. It was on Thursday morning that Lady
+Harry drove to Victoria on her return to Passy, as we all supposed, and
+as I still suppose. On Saturday Funny was back again. The cottage was
+deserted. She was told that the man Oxbye had got up and walked away;
+that her mistress had not been at the house at all, but was travelling
+in Switzerland; and that Lord Harry was gone on a long journey. And she
+was sent into Switzerland to get her out of the way. I gather from all
+this that Lady Harry was taken away by her husband directly she
+arrived--most likely by night--and that of the murder she knew
+nothing.'
+
+"'No--no--she could know nothing! That, at least, they dared not tell
+her. But about the rest? How much does she know? How far has she lent
+herself to the conspiracy? Mrs. Vimpany, I shall go back to London
+to-night. We will travel by the night train. I feel quite strong
+enough.'
+
+"I began this letter in Scotland; I finish it in London.
+
+"We are back again in town. Come to the hotel at once, and see us."
+
+So, there was now a Man to advise. For once, Fanny was thankful for the
+creation of Man. To the most misanthropic female there sometimes comes
+a time when she must own that Man has his uses. These two women had now
+got a Man with whom to take counsel.
+
+"I do not ask you," said Mr. Mountjoy, with grave face, "how far this
+statement of yours is true: I can see plainly that it is true in every
+particular."
+
+"It is quite true, sir; every word of it is true. I have been tempted
+to make out a worse case against the doctor, but I have kept myself to
+the bare truth."
+
+"You could not make out a worse case against any man. It is the
+blackest case that I ever heard of or read. It is the foulest murder. I
+do not understand the exact presence of Lord Harry when the medicine
+was given. Did he see the doctor administer it? Did he say anything?"
+
+"He turned white when the doctor told him that the man was going to
+die--that day, perhaps, or next day. When the doctor was pouring out
+the medicine he turned pale again and trembled. While the doctor was
+taking the photograph he trembled again. I think, sir--I really
+think--that he knew all along that the man was going to die, but when
+it came to the moment, he was afraid. If it had depended on him, Oxbye
+would be alive still."
+
+"He was a consenting party. Well; for the moment both of you keep
+perfect silence. Don't discuss the timing with each other lest you
+should be overheard: bury the thing. I am going to make some
+inquiries."
+
+The first thing was to find out what steps had been taken, if any, with
+insurance companies. For Iris's sake his inquiry had to be conducted
+quite openly. His object must seem none other than the discovery of
+Lady Harry Norland's present address. When bankers, insurance
+companies, and solicitors altogether have to conduct a piece of
+business it is not difficult to ascertain such a simple matter.
+
+He found out the name of the family solicitor, he went to the office,
+sent in his card, and stated his object. As a very old friend of Lady
+Harry's, he wanted to learn her address. He had just come up from
+Scotland, where he had been ill, and had only just learned her terrible
+bereavement.
+
+The lawyer made no difficulty at all. There was no reason why he
+should. Lady Harry had been in London; she was kept in town for nearly
+two months by business connected with the unfortunate event; but she
+had now gone--she was travelling Switzerland or elsewhere. As for her
+address, a letter addressed to his care should be forwarded on hearing
+from her ladyship.
+
+"Her business, I take it, was the proving of the will and the
+arrangement of the property."
+
+"That was the business which kept her in town."
+
+"Lady Harry," Mr. Mountjoy went on, "had a little property of her own
+apart from what she may ultimately get from her father. About five
+thousand pounds--not more."
+
+"Indeed? She did not ask my assistance in respect of her own property."
+
+"I suppose it is invested and in the hands of trustees. But, indeed, I
+do not know. Lord Harry himself, I have heard, was generally in a
+penniless condition. Were there any insurances?"
+
+"Yes; happily there was insurance paid for him by the family. Otherwise
+there would have been nothing for the widow."
+
+"And this has been paid up, I suppose?"
+
+"Yes; it has been paid into her private account."
+
+"Thank you," said Mr. Mountjoy. "With your permission, I will address a
+letter to Lady Harry here. Will you kindly order it to be forwarded at
+the very earliest opportunity?"
+
+"Iris," he thought, "will not come to London any more. She has been
+persuaded by her husband to join in the plot. Good heavens! She has
+become a swindler--a conspirator---a fraudulent woman! Iris!--it is
+incredible--it is horrible! What shall we do?"
+
+He first wrote a letter, to the care of the lawyers. He informed her
+that he had made a discovery of the highest importance to herself--he
+refrained from anything that might give rise to suspicion; he implored
+her to give him an interview anywhere, in any part of the world--alone,
+he told her that the consequences of refusal might be fatal--absolutely
+fatal--to her future happiness: he conjured her to believe that he was
+anxious for nothing but her happiness: that he was still, as always,
+her most faithful friend.
+
+Well; he could do no more. He had not the least expectation that his
+letter would do any good; he did not even believe that it would reach
+Iris. The money was received and paid over to her own account. There
+was really no reason at all why she should place herself again in
+communication with these lawyers. What would she do, then? One thing
+only remained. With her guilty husband, this guilty woman must remain
+in concealment for the rest of their days, or until death released her
+of the man who was pretending to be dead. At the best, they might find
+some place where there would be no chance of anybody ever finding them
+who knew either of them before this wicked thing was done.
+
+But could she know of the murder?
+
+He remembered the instruction given to Fanny. She was to write to
+Brussels. Let her therefore write at once. He would arrange what she
+was to say. Under his dictation, therefore, Fanny wrote as follows:--
+
+"My Lady,--I have received your ladyship's letter, and your kind gift
+of ten pounds. I note your directions to write to you at Brussels, and
+I obey them.
+
+"Mr. Mountjoy, who has been ill and in Scotland, has come back to
+London. He begs me to tell you that he has had an interview with your
+lawyers, and has learned that you have been in town on business, the
+nature of which he has also learned. He has left an important letter
+for you at their office. They will forward it as soon as they learn
+your address.
+
+"Since I came back from Passy I have thought it prudent to set down in
+writing an exact account of everything that happened there under my own
+observation. Mr. Mountjoy has read my story, and thinks that I ought
+without delay to send a copy of it to you. I therefore send you one, in
+which I have left out all the names, and put in A, B, and C instead, by
+his directions. He says that you will have no difficulty in filling up
+the names.
+
+"I remain, my dear Lady,
+
+"Your ladyship's most obedient and humble servant,
+
+"FANNY MERE."
+
+
+This letter, with the document, was dispatched to Brussels that night.
+And this is the trouble which Iris brought upon herself by answering
+Fanny's advertisement.
+
+
+CHAPTER LX
+
+ON THE EVE OF A CHANGE
+
+IRIS returned to Louvain by way of Paris. She had to settle up with the
+doctor.
+
+He obeyed her summons and called upon her at the hotel.
+
+"Well, my lady," he began in his gross voice, rubbing his hands and
+laughing, "it has come off, after all; hasn't it?"
+
+"I do not desire, Dr. Vimpany, to discuss anything with you. We will
+proceed to settle what business we have together."
+
+"To think that your ladyship should actually fall in!" he replied. "Now
+I confess that this was to me the really difficult part of the job. It
+is quite easy to pretend that a man is dead, but not so easy to touch
+his money. I really do not see how we could have managed at all without
+your co-operation. Well, you've had no difficulty, of course?"
+
+"None at all."
+
+"I am to have half."
+
+"I am instructed to give you two thousand pounds. I have the money here
+for you."
+
+"I hope you consider that I deserve this share?"
+
+"I think, Dr. Vimpany, that whatever you get in the future or the
+present you will richly deserve. You have dragged a man down to your
+own level--"
+
+"And a woman too."
+
+"A woman too. Your reward will come, I doubt not."
+
+"If it always takes the form of bank-notes I care not how great the
+reward may be. You will doubtless, as a good Christian, expect your own
+reward--for him and for you?"
+
+"I have mine already," she replied sadly. "Now, Dr. Vimpany, let me pay
+you, and get rid of your company."
+
+He counted the money carefully and put it in the banker's bag in his
+coat-pocket. "Thank you, my lady. We have exchanged compliments enough
+over this job."
+
+"I hope--I pray--that we may never set eyes on you again."
+
+"I cannot say. People run up against each other in the strangest
+manner, especially people who've done shady things and have got to keep
+in the background."
+
+"Enough!--enough!"
+
+"The background of the world is a very odd place, I assure you. It is
+full of interesting people. The society has a piquancy which you will
+find, I hope, quite charming. You will be known by another name, of
+course?"
+
+"I shall not tell you by what name--"
+
+"Tut--tut! I shall soon find out. The background gets narrower when you
+fall into misery."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"I mean, Lady Harry, that your husband has no idea whatever as to the
+value of money. The two thousand that you are taking him will vanish in
+a year or two. What will you do then? As for myself, I know the value
+of money so well that I am always buying the most precious and
+delightful things with it. I enjoy them immensely. Never any man
+enjoyed good things so much as I do. But the delightful things cost
+money. Let us be under no illusions. Your ladyship and your noble
+husband and I all belong to the background; and in a year or two we
+shall belong to the needy background. I daresay that very soon after
+that the world will learn that we all belong to the criminal
+background. I wish your ladyship a joyful reunion with your husband!"
+
+He withdrew, and Iris set eyes on him no more. But the prophecy with
+which he departed remained with her, and it was with a heart foreboding
+fresh sorrrows that she left Paris and started for Louvain.
+
+
+Here began the new life--that of concealment and false pretence. Iris
+put off her weeds, but she never ventured abroad without a thick veil.
+Her husband, discovering that English visitors sometimes ran over from
+Brussels to see the Hotel de Ville, never ventured out at all till
+evening. They had no friends and no society of any kind.
+
+The house, which stood secluded behind a high wall in its garden, was
+in the quietest part of this quiet old city; no sound of life and work
+reached it; the pair who lived there seldom spoke to each other. Except
+at the midday breakfast and the dinner they did not meet. Iris sat in
+her own room, silent; Lord Harry sat in his, or paced the garden walks
+for hours.
+
+Thus the days went on monotonously. The clock ticked; the hours struck;
+they took meals; they slept; they rose and dressed; they took meals
+again--this was all their life. This was all that they could expect for
+the future.
+
+The weeks went on. For three months Iris endured this life. No news
+came to her from the outer world; her husband had even forgotten the
+first necessary of modern life--the newspaper. It was not the ideal
+life of love, apart from the world, where the two make for themselves a
+Garden of Eden; it was a prison, in which two were confined together
+who were kept apart by their guilty secret.
+
+They ceased altogether to speak; their very meals were taken in
+silence. The husband saw continual reproach in his wife's eyes; her sad
+and heavy look spoke more plainly than any words, "It is to this that
+you have brought me."
+
+One morning Iris was idly turning over the papers in her desk. There
+were old letters, old photographs, all kinds of trifling treasures that
+reminded her of the past--a woman keeps everything; the little
+mementoes of her childhood, her first governess, her first school, her
+school friendships--everything. As Iris turned over these things her
+mind wandered back to the old days. She became again a young
+girl--innocent, fancy free; she grew up--she was a woman innocent
+still. Then her mind jumped at one leap to the present, and she saw
+herself as she was--innocent no longer, degraded and guilty, the vile
+accomplice of a vile conspiracy.
+
+Then, as one who has been wearing coloured glasses puts them off and
+sees things in their own true colours, she saw how she had been pulled
+down by a blind infatuation to the level of the man who had held her in
+his fascination; she saw him as he was--reckless, unstable, careless of
+name and honour. Then for the first time she realised the depths into
+which she was plunged and the life which she was henceforth doomed to
+lead. The blind love fell from her--it was dead at last; but it left
+her bound to the man by a chain which nothing could break; she was in
+her right senses; she saw things as they were; but the knowledge came
+too late.
+
+Her husband made no attempt to bridge over the estrangement which had
+thus grown up between them: it became wider every day; he lived apart
+and alone; he sat in his own room, smoking more cigars, drinking more
+brandy-and-water than was good for him; sometimes he paced the gravel
+walks in the garden; in the evening, after dinner, he went out and
+walked about the empty streets of the quiet city. Once or twice he
+ventured into a cafe, sitting in a corner, his hat drawn over his eyes;
+but that was dangerous. For the most part he kept in the streets, and
+he spoke to no one.
+
+Meantime the autumn had given place to winter, which began in wet and
+dreary fashion. Day and night the rain fell, making the gravel walks
+too wet and the streets impossible. Then Lord Harry sat in his room and
+smoked all day long. And still the melancholy of the one increased, and
+the boredom of the other.
+
+He spoke at last. It was after breakfast.
+
+"Iris," he said, "how long is this to continue?"
+
+"This--what?"
+
+"This life--this miserable solitude and silence."
+
+"Till we die," she replied. "What else do you expect? You have sold our
+freedom, and we must pay the price."
+
+"No; it shall end. I will end it. I can endure it no longer."
+
+"You are still young. You will perhaps have forty years more to
+live--all like this--as dull and empty. It is the price we must pay."
+
+"No," he repeated, "it shall end. I swear that I will go on like this
+no longer."
+
+"You had better go to London and walk in Piccadilly to get a little
+society."
+
+"What do you care what I do or where I go?"
+
+"We will not reproach each other, Harry."
+
+"Why--what else do you do all day long but reproach me with your gloomy
+looks and your silence?"
+
+"Well--end it if you can. Find some change in the life."
+
+"Be gracious for a little, and listen to my plan. I have made a plan.
+Listen, Iris. I can no longer endure this life. It drives me mad."
+
+"And me too. That is one reason why we should not desire to change it.
+Mad people forget. They think they are somewhere else. For us to
+believe that we were somewhere else would be in itself happiness."
+
+"I am resolved to change it--to change it, I say--at any risk. We will
+leave Louvain."
+
+"We can, I dare say," Iris replied coldly, "find another town, French
+or Belgian, where we can get another cottage, behind high walls in a
+garden, and hide there."
+
+"No. I will hide no longer. I am sick of hiding."
+
+"Go on. What is your plan? Am I to pretend to be some one else's
+widow?"
+
+"We will go to America. There are heaps of places in the States where
+no English people ever go---neither tourists nor settlers--places where
+they have certainly never heard of us. We will find some quiet village,
+buy a small farm, and settle among the people. I know something about
+farming. We need not trouble to make the thing pay. And we will go back
+to mankind again. Perhaps, Iris--when we have gone back to the
+world--you will--" he hesitated--"you will be able to forgive me, and
+to regard me again with your old thoughts. It was done for your sake."
+
+"It was not done for my sake. Do not repeat that falsehood. The old
+thoughts will never come back, Harry. They are dead and gone. I have
+ceased to respect you or myself. Love cannot survive the loss of
+self-respect. Who am I that I should give love to anybody? Who are you
+that you should expect love?"
+
+"Will you go with me to America--love or no love? I cannot stay here--I
+will not stay here."
+
+"I will go with you wherever you please. I should like not to run
+risks. There are still people whom it would pain to see Iris Henley
+tried and found guilty with two others on a charge of fraudulent
+conspiracy."
+
+"I wouldn't accustom myself, if I were you, Iris, to speak of things
+too plainly. Leave the thing to me and I will arrange it. See now, we
+will travel by a night train from Brussels to Calais. We will take the
+cross-country line from Amiens to Havre; there we will take boat for
+New York--no English people ever travel by the Havre line. Once in
+America we will push up country--to Kentucky or somewhere--and find
+that quiet country place: after that I ask no more. I will settle down
+for the rest of my life, and have no more adventures. Do you agree,
+Iris?"
+
+"I will do anything that you wish," she replied coldly.
+
+"Very well. Let us lose no time. I feel choked here. Will you go into
+Brussels and buy a Continental Bradshaw or a Baedeker, or something
+that will tell us the times of sailing, the cost of passage, and all
+the rest of it? We will take with us money to start us with: you will
+have to write to your bankers. We can easily arrange to have the money
+sent to New York, and it can be invested there--except your own
+fortune--in my new name. We shall want no outfit for a fortnight at
+sea. I have arranged it all beautifully. Child, look like your old
+self." He took an unresisting hand. "I want to see you smile and look
+happy again."
+
+"You never will."
+
+"Yes--when we have got ourselves out of this damnable, unwholesome way
+of life; when we are with our fellow-creatures again. You will forget
+this--this little business--which was, you know, after all, an unhappy
+necessity."
+
+"Oh! how can I ever forget?"
+
+"New interests will arise; new friendships will be formed--"
+
+"Harry, it is myself that I cannot forgive. Teach me to forgive myself,
+and I will forget everything."
+
+He pressed her no longer.
+
+"Well, then," he said, "go to Brussels and get this information. If you
+will not try to conquer this absurd moral sensitiveness--which comes
+too late--you will at least enable me to place you in a healthier
+atmosphere."
+
+"I will go at once," she said, "I will go by the next train."
+
+"There is a train at a quarter to two. You can do all you have to do
+and catch the train at five. Iris"--the chance of a change made him
+impatient--"let us go to-morrow. Let us go by the night express. There
+will be English travellers, but they shall not recognise me. We shall
+be in Calais at one in the morning. We will go on by an early train
+before the English steamer comes in. Will you be ready?"
+
+"Yes; there is nothing to delay me. I suppose we can leave the house by
+paying the rent? I will go and do what you want."
+
+"Let us go this very night."
+
+"If you please; I am always ready."
+
+"No: there will be no time; it will look like running away. We will go
+to-morrow night. Besides, you would be too tired after going to
+Brussels and back. Iris, we are going to be happy again--I am sure we
+are." He, for one, looked as if there was nothing to prevent a return
+of happiness. He laughed and waved his hands. "A new sky---new
+scenes--new work--you will be happy again, Iris. You shall go, dear.
+Get me the things I want."
+
+She put on her thick veil and started on her short journey. The
+husband's sudden return to his former good spirits gave her a gleam of
+hope. The change would be welcome indeed if it permitted him to go
+about among other men, and to her if it gave her occupation. As to
+forgetting--how could she forget the past, so long as they were reaping
+the fruit of their wickedness in the shape of solid dividends? She
+easily found what she wanted. The steamer of the Compagnie Generale
+Transatlantique left Havre every eighth day. They would go by that
+line. The more she considered the plan the more it recommended itself.
+They would at any rate go out of prison. There would be a change in
+their life. Miserable condition! To have no other choice of life but
+that of banishment and concealment: no other prospect than that of
+continual fraud renewed by every post that brought them money.
+
+When she had got all the information that was wanted she had still an
+hour or two before her. She thought she would spend the time wandering
+about the streets of Brussels. The animation and life of the cheerful
+city--where all the people except the market-women are young--pleased
+her. It was long since she had seen any of the cheerfulness that
+belongs to a busy street. She walked slowly along, up one street and
+down another, looking into the shops. She made two or three little
+purchases. She looked into a place filled with Tauchnitz Editions, and
+bought two or three books. She was beginning to think that she was
+tired and had better make her way back to the station, when suddenly
+she remembered the post-office and her instructions to Fanny Mere.
+
+"I wonder," she said, "if Fanny has written to me."
+
+She asked the way to the post-office. There was time if she walked
+quickly.
+
+At the Poste Restante there was a letter for her--more than a letter, a
+parcel, apparently a book.
+
+She received it and hurried back to the station.
+
+In the train she amused herself with looking through the leaves of her
+new books. Fanny Mere's letter she would read after dinner.
+
+At dinner they actually talked. Lord Harry was excited with the
+prospect of going back to the world. He had enjoyed his hermitage, he
+said, quite long enough. Give him the society of his fellow-creatures.
+"Put me among cannibals," he said, "and I should make friends with
+them. But to live alone--it is the devil! To-morrow we begin our new
+flight."
+
+After dinner he lit his cigar, and went on chattering about the future.
+Iris remembered the packet she had got at the post-office, and opened
+it. It contained a small manuscript book filled with writing and a
+brief letter. She read the letter, laid it down, and opened the book.
+
+CHAPTER LXI
+
+THE LAST DISCOVERY
+
+"I SHALL like to turn farmer," Lord Harry went on talking while Iris
+opened and began to read Fanny's manuscript. "After all my adventures,
+to settle down in a quiet place and cultivate the soil. On market-day
+we will drive into town together"--he talked as if Kentucky were
+Warwickshire--"side by side in a spring cart. I shall have samples of
+grain in bags, and you will have a basket of butter and cream. It will
+be an ideal life. We shall dine at the ordinary, and, after dinner,
+over a pipe and a glass of grog, I shall discuss the weather and the
+crops. And while we live in this retreat of ours, over here the very
+name of Harry Norland will have been forgotten. Queer, that! We shall
+go on living long after we are dead and buried and forgotten. In the
+novels the man turns up after he is supposed to be cast
+away--wrecked--drowned--dead long ago. But he never turns up when he is
+forgotten--unless he is Rip Van Winkle. By Gad, Iris! when we are old
+people we will go home and see the old places together. It will be
+something to look forward to--something to live for--eh?"
+
+"I feel quite happy this evening, Iris; happier than I have been for
+months. The fact is, this infernal place has hipped us both
+confoundedly. I didn't like to grumble, but I've felt the monotony more
+than a bit. And so have you. It's made you brood over things. Now, for
+my part, I like to look at the bright side. Here we are comfortably cut
+off from the past. That's all done with. Nothing in the world can
+revive the memory of disagreeable things if we are only true to
+ourselves and agree to forget them. What has been done can never be
+discovered. Not a soul knows except the doctor, and between him and
+ourselves we are going to put a few thousand--What's the matter, Iris?
+What the devil is the matter?"
+
+For Iris, who had been steadily reading while her husband chattered on,
+suddenly dropped the book, and turned upon hum a white face and eyes
+struck with horror.
+
+"What is it?" Lord Harry repeated.
+
+"Oh! Is this true?"
+
+"What?"
+
+"I cannot say it. Oh, my God! can this be true?"
+
+"What? Speak, Iris." He sprang to his feet. "Is it--is it discovered?"
+
+"Discovered? Yes, all--all--all--is discovered!"
+
+"Where? How? Give me the thing, Iris. Quick! Who knows? What is known?"
+
+He snatched the book from her hands. She shrank from his touch, and
+pushed back her chair, standing in an attitude of self-defence--
+watching him as one would watch a dangerous creature.
+
+He swiftly read page after page, eager to know the worst. Then he threw
+the book upon the table.
+
+"Well?" he said, not lifting his eyes.
+
+"The man was murdered--murdered!" she whispered.
+
+He made no reply.
+
+"You looked on while he was murdered! You looked on consenting! You are
+a murderer!"
+
+"I had no share or part in it. I did not know he was being poisoned."
+
+"You knew when I was with you. Oh! the dead man--the murdered man--was
+in the house at the very moment! Your hands were red with blood when
+you took me away--to get me out of the way--so that I should not
+know--" She stopped, she could not go on.
+
+"I did not know, Iris--not with certainty. I thought he was dying when
+he came into the house. He did not die; he began to recover. When the
+doctor gave him his medicine--after that woman went away--I suspected.
+When he died, my suspicions were stronger. I challenged him. He did not
+deny it. Believe me, Iris, I neither counselled it nor knew of it."
+
+"You acquiesced in it. You consented. You should have warned the--the
+other murderer that you would denounce him if the man died. You took
+advantage of it. His death enabled you to carry out your fraud with me
+as your accomplice. With ME! I am an accomplice in a murder!"
+
+"No, no, Iris; you knew nothing of it. No one can ever accuse you--"
+
+"You do not understand. It is part of the accusation which I make
+against myself."
+
+"As for what this woman writes," her husband went on, "it is true. I
+suppose it is useless to deny a single word of it. She was hidden
+behind the curtain, then! She heard and saw all! If Vimpany had found
+her! He was right. No one so dangerous as a woman. Yes; she has told
+you exactly what happened. She suspected all along. We should have sent
+her away and changed our plans. This comes of being too clever. Nothing
+would do for the doctor but the man's death. I hoped--we both
+hoped--that he would die a natural death. He did not. Without a dead
+man we were powerless. We had to get a dead man, Iris, I will hide
+nothing more from you, whatever happens. I confess everything. I knew
+that he was going to die. When he began to get well I was filled with
+forebodings, because I knew that he would never be allowed to go away.
+How else could we find a dead body? You can't steal a body; you can't
+make one up. You must have one for proof of death. I say"--his voice
+was harsh and hoarse--"I say that I knew he must die. I saw his death
+in the doctor's face. And there was no more money left for a new
+experiment if Oxeye should get well and go away. When it came to the
+point I was seized with mortal terror. I would have given up
+everything--everything--to see the man get up from his bed and go away.
+But it was too late. I saw the doctor prepare the final dose, and when
+he had it to his lips I saw by his eyes that it was the drink of death.
+I have told you all," he concluded.
+
+"You have told me all," she repeated. "All! Good Heavens! All!"
+
+"I have hidden nothing from you. Now there is nothing more to tell."
+
+She stood perfectly still--her hands clasped, her eyes set, her face
+white and stern.
+
+"What I have to do now," she said, "lies plain before me."
+
+"Iris! I implore you, make no change in our plans. Let us go away as we
+proposed. Let the past be forgotten. Come with me--"
+
+"Go with you? With you? With you? Oh!" she shuddered.
+
+"Iris! I have told you all. Let us go on as if you had heard nothing.
+We cannot be more separated than we have been for the last three
+months. Let us remain as we are until the time when you will be able to
+feel for me--to pity my weakness--and to forgive me."
+
+"You do not understand. Forgive you? It is no longer a question of
+forgiveness. Who am I that my forgiveness should be of the least value
+to you--or to any?"
+
+"What is the question, then?"
+
+"I don't know. A horrible crime has been committed--a horrible,
+ghastly, dreadful crime--such a thing as one reads of in the papers and
+wonders, reading it, what manner of wild beasts must be those who do
+such things. Perhaps one wonders, besides, what manner of women must be
+those who associate with those wild beasts. My husband is one of those
+wild beasts!--my husband!--my husband!--and--I--I am one of the women
+who are the fit companions of these wild creatures."
+
+"You can say what you please, Iris; what you please."
+
+"I have known--only since I came here have I really known and
+understood--that I have wrecked my life in a blind passion. I have
+loved you, Harry; it has been my curse. I followed you against the
+warnings of everybody: I have been rewarded--by this. We are in hiding.
+If we are found we shall be sent to a convict prison for conspiracy. We
+shall be lucky if we are not tried for murder and hanged by the neck
+until we are dead. This is my reward!"
+
+"I have never played the hypocrite with you, Iris. I have never
+pretended to virtues which I do not possess. So far--"
+
+"Hush! Do not speak to me. I have something more to say, and then I
+shall never speak to you any more. Hush! Let me collect my thoughts. I
+cannot find the words. I cannot. . . Wait--wait! Oh!" She sat down and
+burst into sobbings and moanings. But only for a minute. Then she
+sprang to her feet again and dashed back the tears. "Time for crying,"
+she said, "when all is done. Harry, listen carefully; these are my last
+words. You will never hear from me any more. You must manage your own
+life in your own way, to save it or to spoil it; I will never more bear
+any part in it. I am going back to England--alone. I shall give up your
+name, and I shall take my maiden name again--or some other. I shall
+live somewhere quietly where you will not discover me. But perhaps you
+will not look for me?"
+
+"I will not," he said. "I owe you so much. I will not look for you."
+
+"As regards the money which I have obtained for you under false
+pretences, out of the fifteen thousand pounds for which you were
+insured, five thousand have been paid to my private account. I shall
+restore to the Company all that money."
+
+"Good Heavens! Iris, you will be prosecuted on a criminal charge."
+
+"Shall I? That will matter little, provided I make reparation. Alas!
+who shall make reparation--who shall atone--for the blood-spilling? For
+all things else in this world we may make what we call atonement; but
+not for the spilling of blood."
+
+"You mean this? You will deliberately do this?"
+
+"I mean every word. I will do nothing and say nothing that will betray
+you. But the money that I can restore, I will restore--SO HELP ME,
+GOD!" With streaming eyes she raised her hand and pointed upwards.
+
+Her husband bowed his head.
+
+"You have said all you wished to say?" he asked humbly.
+
+"I have said all."
+
+"Let me look in your face once more---so--full--with the light upon it.
+Yes; I have loved you, Iris--I have always loved you. Better, far
+better, for you had you fallen dead at my feet on the day when you
+became my wife. Then I should have been spared--I should have been
+spared a great deal. You are right, Iris. Your duty lies plainly before
+you. As for me, I must think of mine. Farewell! The lips of a murderer
+are not fit to touch even the hem of your garments. Farewell!"
+
+He left her. She heard the hall door open and shut. She would see her
+husband no more.
+
+She went to her own room and packed a single box with necessary things.
+Then she called the housemaid and informed her that she had been
+summoned to return suddenly to England; she must reach Brussels at
+least that evening. The woman brought a porter who carried her box to
+the station; and Iris left Louvain--and her husband--for ever.
+
+CHAPTER LXII
+
+THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS
+
+AT a Board Meeting of the Royal Unicorn Life Insurance Company,
+specially convened, the Chairman had to make a communication of a very
+remarkable character.
+
+"Gentlemen," he said, "I call upon the Secretary, without further
+introduction, to read a letter, to consider which you are called
+together this day."
+
+"The letter," the Secretary began, "is simply headed 'Paris,' dated two
+days ago."
+
+"Only two days ago," said the Chairman, mysteriously. "But, of course,
+that means nothing. There has been plenty of time for him to change his
+residence. I dare say he may be in London at our very elbow. Go on, if
+you please."
+
+"Gentlemen"--the Secretary proceeded to read the letter. "It is now
+three months since a claim was sent in to you by the firm of Erskine,
+Mansfield, Denham & Co., solicitors of Lincoln's Inn Fields, for the
+sum of 15,000 pounds due to the heirs of Lord Harry Norland in respect
+of an insurance effected upon his life."
+
+"The claim, gentlemen," said the Chairman, "was duly acknowledged and
+paid some weeks later. It was a heavy loss; but these things will
+occur, and there seemed no reason to doubt the facts alleged, or to
+dispute the claim."
+
+"I write this letter," the Secretary continued reading, "in order to
+inform you that the claim was fraudulent, inasmuch as Lord Harry
+Norland was at the time, and is still, actually living."
+
+Fraudulent! The man still living! At this point there was a sudden
+awakening. Everybody sat up and listened with all their ears.
+
+"I may tell you, gentlemen," the Chairman explained, "that the writer
+of this remarkable letter is none other than Lord Harry Norland
+himself, We will now proceed without further interruption."
+
+"In conjunction with another person, I devised and carried out
+successfully a plan by which I was enabled to touch at once, and
+without the disagreeable necessity of previously expiring and being
+buried, the whole of the money for which I was insured. Other people
+have attempted the same design, I believe, but the thing has hitherto
+been managed clumsily. In my own case, it has been managed with great
+dexterity and artistic skill. As you will naturally be curious on a
+subject which interests you so closely I have no objection to reveal
+the method. It is not enough to write to your office and state that a
+certain person is dead. One must be prepared with proofs of the death
+should any doubt arise. No proof of death is quite satisfactory without
+evidence as to the disposal of the dead body. With that object, we
+procured from the Hotel Dieu a patient apparently in an advanced state
+of consumption. My accomplice, being a medical man, highly recommended,
+was able to do this without suspicion. We nursed him ostentatiously.
+During the latter part of the illness he was nursed under the name of
+Lord Harry Norland. He died. His name was entered in the official
+register as Lord Harry Norland. He was buried in the cemetery at
+Auteuil, near Paris, as Lord Harry Norland. A headstone marks his
+grave, which is purchased in perpetuity. The doctor certified the cause
+of his death, and communicated the fact to the deceased's brother, Lord
+Malven, and to the deceased's solicitors. The death was also announced
+to the papers. The difficulties attendant on the successful conduct of
+the business are so great that you need not fear a repetition. Nobody,
+in order to assist a fraud, will consent to die and lend his own body.
+It is seldom, indeed, that a sick man can be found--a foreigner and
+friendless--whose death will cause no curiosity and raise no questions.
+Add to this, it is extremely difficult, as I have now experienced, to
+find the necessary assistance without encountering the objections of
+conscience."
+
+"Upon my word!" cried one of the Directors, "this is a most wonderful
+letter. I beg your pardon. Pray go on."
+
+"We began very well. We buried our man under the name of Lord Harry
+Norland, as I have said. The difficulty then arose as to the
+presentation of the claim. It was most desirable that the claim should
+be made by the person who would most naturally be the deceased's heir
+and after proving his will and by his own solicitor.
+
+"I am married. I have no children. I have not lived on good terms with
+my family. It was, therefore, quite reasonable to expect that I should
+leave my wife sole heir and executrix. It was also natural that she
+should go to my solicitors--the family solicitors--and ask them to
+manage her affairs.
+
+"With this object I confessed to my wife as much of the conspiracy as
+was necessary. Like many women, she possesses, in addition to every
+virtue, a blessed devotion to her husband. Where he is concerned she is
+easily led even from the paths of honour. I practised on that devotion;
+I used all the arguments and persuasions based on that devotion
+necessary to convert a woman of honour into the accomplice of a
+conspiracy. In brief, I made my wife join in the fraud. She consented
+to act for me, persuaded that if she did not the conspiracy would be
+discovered. The business has, therefore been carried through with the
+greatest success. You have paid the claim in full without question. For
+me there was left the very comfortable provision of 15,000 pounds, with
+the consciousness of a daring and successful swindle. Unfortunately, my
+wife has now discovered that her conscience will give her no peace or
+rest until full restitution of the money has been made. She has
+informed me of her intention to send back without delay that part of it
+which lies at her bank in her own name--that is to say, five thousand
+pounds.
+
+"I do not suppose that, as gentlemen, you would be disposed to subject
+a woman who thus desires to repair a wrong to the degradation of a
+public prosecution. No useful end, in fact, will be served in so doing.
+It is, in fact, in the conviction that you will take no proceedings
+that I write this letter.
+
+"Further, as I wish my wife's scruples of conscience to be completely
+set at rest, I am prepared, on an assurance that the matter will be
+allowed to drop, to forward to you the remainder of the money, less two
+thousand pounds, which I have reason to believe will be sent to you in
+course of time. I am also prepared to instruct my wife, as my heir, in
+the event of my death to make no claim on the Company; and I have
+requested my solicitor to cease paying the annual premium. The Company
+will, therefore, be the gainers of the whole premiums which have been
+paid--namely, 300 pounds a year for ten years: that is to say, 3,000
+pounds.
+
+"As for myself, I will take the necessary steps as soon as you have
+given me that letter of assurance. As regards the other principal in
+the Conspiracy, it is hardly worth your while to search after him. I
+shall be obliged if you will be so good as to acknowledge this letter
+without delay, with any assurance which you may be able to make as
+regards the person whom I have dragged into the affair. I send you an
+address where a letter will find me. You may wish to watch the house. I
+assure you beforehand that it is useless. I shall not go there.--I
+remain, Gentlemen,
+
+"Your obedient servant,
+
+"HARRY NORLAND."
+
+
+"Perhaps," said the Secretary, "it is in connection with this letter
+that I have this day received a packet of bank-notes amounting in all
+to the sum of five thousand pounds. The packet is endorsed 'Restitution
+money.'"
+
+"Bank-notes, gentlemen," said the Chairman significantly, "may be
+traced if necessary."
+
+The Directors looked at each other. This was, indeed, a very remarkable
+story, and one never before brought to the notice of any Board.
+
+"Gentlemen," said the Chairman, "you have heard the letter; you now
+have the case before you. I should like to hear your views."
+
+"We are likely to get most of our money back," said one of the
+Directors, "it seems to me, by holding our tongues. That is the main
+thing."
+
+"If we could get Lord Harry himself," said another, "I should say: Go
+for him, but not for his wife. I wonder we ever took his life at all.
+If all stories are true about him he is as bad as they make 'em. He ran
+away when he was a boy, and went to sea: he was a strolling actor after
+that: he went out to the States and was reported to have been seen in
+the West: he has been a ship's steward: he has been on the turf. What
+has he not been?"
+
+"We have got the money," said another; "that is the great thing. We
+must remember that we should never have found out the thing unless--"
+
+"The Company must not compound a felony," said the Chairman.
+
+"Certainly not. By no means. At the same time, would any good purpose
+be served by public scandal in connection with a noble House?"
+
+"The noble House," said another Director, who was Radical, "may very
+well take came of itself. Question is, Would it do any good to anybody
+if we ran in the wife?"
+
+"Who is she?"
+
+"You would expect a ruffian like Lord Harry to marry a woman like
+himself. Not at all. He married a most charming creature named
+Henley--Iris Henley--father very well known in the City. I heard of it
+at the time. She would have him---infatuated about him--sad business.
+Mr. Chairman, I submit that it is quite impossible for us to take
+proceedings against this unfortunate lady, who is doing her utmost to
+make restitution."
+
+"The Company must not compound a felony," the Chairman repeated.
+
+"Even if we do not get back that two thousand pounds," said the
+Secretary, "the Company will lose nothing. The surrender value must be
+considered."
+
+Then another of the Directors spoke. "We do not know where thus lady is
+to be found. She is probably passing under another name. It is not our
+business to hunt her down."
+
+"And if we found her we should have to prove the case, and her guilty
+knowledge of the conspiracy," said another. "How would this precious
+letter be taken as evidence? Why, we do not even know that it is true.
+We might exhume the body: what would that prove after three months? We
+might open up the case, and spend a heap of money, and create a great
+scandal, and be none the better for it afterwards. My advice is, let
+the thing drop."
+
+"Well, but," objected another, "suppose we admit that the man is still
+living. He may die, and then there would be another claim upon us."
+
+"Of that," said the Chairman, "I think there need be no apprehension
+whatever. You have heard his letter. But, I repeat, we must not
+compound a felony!"
+
+"I submit, Mr. Chairman," said one who had not spoken--and he was a
+barrister--"that the Company knows nothing at all about Lady Harry
+Norland. We have had to deal with the firm of Erskine, Mansfield,
+Denham & Co., of Lincoln's Inn Fields: and a most respectable firm too.
+On their representations we paid the money. If it can be ascertained
+that we have been defrauded we must look to them. If we have to
+prosecute anybody it must be that respectable firm."
+
+"Good," said the Chairman.
+
+"I propose, therefore, that the Secretary write to Lord Harry Norland,
+informing him that the Company have had nothing at all to do with his
+wife, and do not recognise her action in any way. We shall then see
+what happens, and can proceed in accordance."
+
+At this moment a card was brought in. It was that of Mr. Erskine
+himself, senior partner in the very firm.
+
+He came in, old, eminently respectable, but shaken. He was greatly
+shaken. "Gentlemen," he said nervously, "I hasten to bring you a
+communication, a most extraordinary communication, which I have just
+received. It is nothing less than a confession--a full confession--from
+a person whom I had every reason to believe was dead. It is from Lord
+Harry Norland."
+
+"We know already," said the Chairman, superior, "the main facts which
+you are going to lay before us. We are met to-day in order to discuss
+our action in view of these facts. There has been a conspiracy of a
+very artful and ingenious character. It has been successful so far
+through the action of a woman. By the action of the same woman it is
+sought to make restitution. The hand of justice, however--"
+
+"Perhaps," said the lawyer, "you will oblige me by allowing me to read
+the letter."
+
+"Pray read it"--the Chairman bowed--"though I do not suppose it will
+add to the information we already possess."
+
+"Gentlemen"--the lawyer read--"You will be surprised and pained to
+learn that I am not--as you were given to understand--dead; but on the
+other hand, living and in the enjoyment of rude health. I see no reason
+why my life should not be prolonged to threescore years and ten.
+
+"The claim, therefore, which you sent in to the Royal Unicorn Life
+Insurance Company was fraudulent. It was the result of a deep-laid
+conspiracy. You have been made the innocent accomplice of a great
+crime.
+
+"My wife, who now knows the whole truth, is most anxious for
+restitution to be made. She is about to restore that portion of the
+money which lies in her name. Most of the rest will be sent back by
+myself, on certain conditions.
+
+"In communicating the fact of my being still alive to the head of my
+family you will please also to inform him that I authorise the
+discontinuance of the premium. This will save the family 300 pounds a
+year. This will be a solatium to him for the fact that his brother
+still lives to disgrace the name. If I should die before the next
+premium is due I order my heirs not to claim the money.--I remain,
+Gentlemen, your obedient servant,
+
+"HARRY NORLAND."
+
+
+"The premium which should have been paid under ordinary circumstances,"
+said the Secretary, "was due six weeks ago. The policy has therefore
+expired."
+
+"It is a characteristic letter," said the lawyer. "Lord Harry was born
+to be a trouble to his family. There has never been a time, so far as I
+remember, when he was not a trouble and a disgrace. Hitherto, however,
+he has avoided actual crime--at least, actual detection. Now, I
+suppose, the game is up. Yet, gentlemen, the letter is not that of an
+utter villain."
+
+"He will not be caught," observed the Chairman. "The letter is from too
+cool a hand. He has prepared a retreat. I dare say by this time he is
+in some safe and convenient disguise. We are only concerned--are we
+not?--for the moment with the lady. She has received the money from
+you. We paid it to you on your representations."
+
+"Observe," said the lawyer, "that the moment she learns the truth she
+hastens to make restitution."
+
+"Humph!" said the Director, turning over Lord Harry's letter so that
+the lawyer should not be able to read the contents. "Have you seen
+her?"
+
+"I have not. I expect to do so before long. She will certainly call
+upon me."
+
+"She will be ill-advised," said the Chairman, "if she calls upon
+anybody just at present. Well, sir, I confess that I should be
+sorry--every member of this Board would be sorry--to see that lady
+placed in the dock beside her husband."
+
+"In the interests of the noble family concerned, I hope that neither of
+them will be placed in the dock."
+
+"Do you know who is the other man--the second principal?"
+
+"I can guess. I do not know, however, where he is. All I know is what I
+have communicated to you--the contents of this letter."
+
+"One would like to get hold of the other man," said the Chairman.
+"Presumably he does not belong to a noble family. Well, sir, I don't
+know what may be done; but this Company cannot, I repeat, compound a
+felony."
+
+"Certainly not. Most certainly not. At present, however, you have got
+very little to go upon. And unless evidence is forthcoming--"
+
+"We will not discuss that part of the business," said the Chairman. "A
+conspiracy has been undoubtedly entered into. We may be compelled to
+bring an action of some kind against your firm, Mr. Erskine. As regards
+the lady, if she is guilty--"
+
+"No--no," said the lawyer, "upon my life! Sinned against--not guilty."
+
+The Chairman folded up Lord Harry's letter and gave it to the
+Secretary.
+
+"We are much obliged to you, sir, for your prompt action. It is, of
+course, only what we should have expected of your firm. Meantime,
+remember that the claim was made by you, that you received the money,
+and--but we will communicate with you in a few days."
+
+The Secretary wrote such a letter as was suggested. By return of post a
+cheque was sent, signed by one William Linville, for the sum of eight
+thousand pounds. The Company had, therefore, recovered thirteen out of
+fifteen thousand pounds. The Secretary had another interview with Mr.
+Erskine, the result of which was that the Company recovered the
+remaining two thousand pounds.
+
+Every firm of solicitors contains its own secrets and keeps them.
+Therefore, we need not inquire whether it was intended that this money
+should be paid by the firm or by the noble family to which Lord Harry
+Norland belonged. It is, however, certain that a few days afterwards
+Mr. Hugh Mountjoy called at the office and had a long conversation with
+the senior partner, and that he left behind him a very big cheque.
+
+The subject has never been brought before the Directors again. It was,
+indeed, privately discussed, and that frequently. Perhaps the story was
+whispered about outside the Board-room. These things do get about.
+There has been, however, a feeling that the thing, which would have
+been perfectly successful but for the conscience of a woman concerned,
+might be repeated with less tender consciences, and so the Companies be
+defrauded. Now the wickedness of the world is already so great that it
+needs no more teaching to make it worse. On the whole, the less said
+the better.
+
+Besides, the tragic event which happened a day or two later effectively
+prevented any further step. That in itself was sufficient to wipe out
+the whole business.
+
+CHAPTER LXIII
+
+A REFUGE
+
+IT was all over. Iris had sent in her money. She was in a small lodging
+found for her by Fanny Mere, who called her cousin. She stayed indoors
+all day long, afraid of stirring abroad; afraid to read the papers;
+afraid that her husband was arrested on the charge of conspiracy and
+fraud; afraid that some kind of hue and cry might be out after her.
+
+Therefore, when she heard a manly step on the stair, she started and
+turned pale, expecting nothing short of an armed messenger of the law.
+She never was in this danger for a single minute, but conscience made a
+coward of her.
+
+The step was that of Hugh Mountjoy.
+
+"I found you out," he said, "by means of Fanny. The girl knew that she
+was safe in letting me know your secret. Why are you in concealment?"
+
+"You cannot know all, or you would not ask me that."
+
+"I do know all; and again I ask, why are you in concealment?"
+
+"Because--Oh, Hugh--spare me!"
+
+"I know all, which is the reason why I cannot choose but come to see
+you. Come out of this poor place; resume your own name. There is no
+reason why you should not. You were not present at Passy when this
+conspiracy was hatched; you got there after the funeral. You,
+naturally, went to see the family solicitors. Iris, what has the
+conspiracy to do with you?" It will be observed that Hugh had not read
+the letter written to the Directors of the Company.
+
+"Do you know about the money?"
+
+"Certainly. You sent back all that you could--five thousand pounds.
+That showed your own innocence--"
+
+"Hugh, you know that I am guilty."
+
+"The world will think that you are innocent. At any rate, you can come
+out and go about without fear. Tell me, what are your plans?"
+
+"I have no plans. I only want to hide my head--somewhere."
+
+"Yes; we will talk about that presently. Meantime, I have some news for
+you."
+
+"News? What news?"
+
+"Really good news. I have to tell you a thing which will surprise you."
+
+"Good news? What good news is there for me?"
+
+"Your husband has sent back the whole of the money."
+
+"Sent back? To the Insurance Office?"
+
+"All has been sent back. He wrote two letters--one to the solicitors
+and the other to the Insurance Company. It is not likely now that
+anything can be said, because the Directors have accepted the money.
+Moreover, it appears that they might have proceeded against the lawyers
+for the recovery of the money, but that they have nothing to do either
+with you or with Lord Harry Norland. That is a difficult point,
+however. Somebody, it seems, has compounded--or is going to compound--a
+felony. I do not understand exactly what this means, or what dreadful
+consequences might follow; but I am assured by the lawyers that we need
+apprehend nothing more. All is over."
+
+Iris heaved a profound sigh.
+
+"Then he is safe?" she said.
+
+"You think of him first," said Hugh, jealously. "Yes: he is safe; and,
+I do hope, gone away, out of the country, never to come back any more.
+The more important thing is that you should be safe from him. As for
+the doctor--but I cannot speak of the doctor with common patience. Let
+him be left to the end which always awaits such men. It is to be hoped
+that he will never, wherever he goes, feel himself in safety."
+
+"I am safe," said Iris, "not only from my husband, but from what else
+beside? You know what I mean. You mean that I, as well as my husband,
+am safe from that. Oh! the fear of it has never left me--never for one
+moment. You tell me that I am safe from public disgrace, and I
+rejoice--when I ought to sink into the earth with shame!" She covered
+her face with her hands.
+
+"Iris, we know what you have done. We also know why you did it. What
+need we say more? The thing is finished and done with. Let us never
+again allude to it. The question now is--what will you do next? Where
+will you live?"
+
+"I do not know. I have got Fanny Mere with me. Mrs. Vimpany is also
+anxious to live with me. I am rich, indeed, since I have two faithful
+dependants and one friend."
+
+"In such wealth, Iris, you will always be rich. Now listen seriously. I
+have a villa in the country. It is far away from London, in the
+Scottish Lowlands--quite out of the way--remote even from tourists and
+travellers. It is a very lonely place, but there is a pretty house,
+with a great garden behind and a stretch of sand and seashore in front.
+There one may live completely isolated. I offer you that villa for your
+residence. Take it; live in it as long as you please."
+
+"No, no. I must not accept such a gift."
+
+"You must, Iris--you shall. I ask it of you as a proof of friendship,
+and nothing more. Only, I fear that you will get tired of the
+loneliness."
+
+"No--no," she said. "I cannot get tired of loneliness it is all I
+want."
+
+"There is no society at all."
+
+"Society? Society for me?"
+
+"I go to the neighbourhood sometimes for fishing. You will let me call
+upon you?"
+
+"Who else has such a right?"
+
+"Then you will accept my offer?"
+
+"I feel that I must. Yes, Hugh; yes, with deepest gratitude."
+
+The next day she went down by the night-mail to Scotland. With her
+travelled Mrs. Vimpany and Fanny Mere.
+
+CHAPTER LXIV
+
+THE INVINCIBLES
+
+THE proceedings of Lord Harry after he had sent off that cheque were
+most remarkable. If he had invited--actually courted--what followed--he
+could not have acted differently.
+
+He left London and crossed over to Dublin.
+
+Arrived there, he went to a small hotel entirely frequented by Irish
+Americans and their friends. It was suspected of being the principal
+place of resort of the Invincibles. It was known to be a house entirely
+given up to the Nationalists. He made no attempt to conceal his name.
+He entered the hotel, greeted the landlord cheerfully, saluted the head
+waiter, ordered his dinner, and took no notice of the sullen looks with
+which he was received or the scowls which followed him about the
+coffee-room, where half a dozen men were sitting and talking, for the
+most part in whispers.
+
+He slept there that night.
+
+The next day, still openly and as if there was nothing to fear, either
+from England or from Ireland, he walked to the station and took his
+ticket, paying no attention to what all the world might have seen and
+understood--that he was watched. When he had taken his ticket two men
+immediately afterwards took tickets to the same place. The place where
+he was going was that part of Kerry where the Invincibles had formerly
+assassinated Arthur Mountjoy.
+
+The two men who followed him--who took their tickets for the same
+place--who got into the same carriage with him--were two members of
+that same fraternity. It is well known that he who joins that body and
+afterwards leaves it, or disobeys its order, or is supposed to betray
+its secrets, incurs the penalty of death.
+
+On the unexpected arrival of Lord Harry at this hotel, there had been
+hurriedly called together a meeting of those members then in Dublin. It
+was resolved that the traitor must be removed. Lots were cast, and the
+lot fell upon one who remembered past acts of kindness done by Lord
+Harry to his own people. He would fain have been spared this business,
+but the rules of the society are imperative. He must obey.
+
+It is the practice of the society when a murder has been resolved upon
+to appoint a second man, whose duty it is to accompany the murderer and
+to see that he executes his task.
+
+In the afternoon, about an hour before sunset, the train arrived at the
+station where Lord Harry was to get down. The station-master recognised
+him, and touched his hat. Then he saw the two other men got down after
+him, and he turned pale.
+
+"I will leave my portmanteau," said Lord Harry, "in the cloak-room. It
+will be called for."
+
+Afterwards the station-master remembered those words. Lord Harry did
+not say "I will call for it," but "It will be called for." Ominous
+words.
+
+The weather was cold; a drizzling rain fell; the day was drawing in.
+Lord Harry left the station, and started with quick step along the
+road, which stretched across a dreary desolate piece of country.
+
+The two men walked after him. One presently quickened his step, leaving
+the second man twenty yards behind.
+
+The station-master looked after them till he could see them no longer.
+Then he shook his head and returned to his office.
+
+Lord Harry walking along the road knew that the two men were following
+him. Presently he became aware that one of them was quickening his
+pace.
+
+He walked on. Perhaps his cheeks paled and his lips were set close,
+because he knew that he was walking to his death.
+
+The steps behind him approached faster--faster. Lord Harry never even
+turned his head. The man was close behind him. The man was beside him.
+
+"Mickey O'Flynn it is," said Lord Harry.
+
+"'Tis a ---- traitor, you are," said the man.
+
+"Your friends the Invincibles told you that, Mickey. Why, do you think
+I don't know, man, what are you here for? Well?" he stopped. "I am
+unarmed. You have got a revolver in your hand--the hand behind your
+back. What are you stopping for?"
+
+"I cannot," said the man.
+
+"You must, Mickey O'Flynn--you must; or it's murdered you'll be
+yourself," said Lord Harry, coolly. "Why, man, 'tis but to lift your
+hand. And then you'll be a murderer for life. I am another--we shall
+both be murderers then. Why don't you fire, man."
+
+"By ---- I cannot!" said Mickey. He held the revolver behind him, but
+he did not lift his arm. His eyes started: his mouth was open; the
+horror of the murderer was upon him before the murder was committed.
+Then he started. "Look!" he cried. "Look behind you, my lord!"
+
+Lord Harry turned. The second man was upon him. He bent forward and
+peered in his face.
+
+"Arthur Mountjoy's murderer!" he cried, and sprang at his throat.
+
+One, two, three shots rang out in the evening air. Those who heard them
+in the roadside cabin, at the railway-station on the road, shuddered.
+They knew the meaning of those shots. One more murder to load the soul
+of Ireland.
+
+But Lord Harry lay dead in the middle of the road.
+
+The second man got up and felt at his throat.
+
+"Faith!" he said, "I thought I was murdered outright. Come, Mick, let
+us drag him to the roadside."
+
+They did so, and then with bent heads and slouched hats, they made
+their way across country to another station where they would not be
+recognised as the two who had followed Lord Harry down the road.
+
+Two mounted men of the Constabulary rode along an hour later and found
+the body lying where it had been left.
+
+They searched the pockets. They found a purse with a few sovereigns;
+the portrait of a lady---the murdered man's wife--a sealed envelope
+addressed to Hugh Mountjoy, Esq, care of his London hotel; and a
+card-case: nothing of any importance.
+
+"It is Lord Harry Norland," said one. "The wild lord--he has met his
+end at last."
+
+The letter to Iris was brief. It said:
+
+"Farewell! I am going to meet the death of one who is called a Traitor
+to the Cause. I am the Traitor of a Cause far higher. May the end that
+is already plotted for me be accepted as an atonement! Forgive me,
+Iris! Think of me as kindly as you can. But I charge you--it is my
+latest word--mourn not for one who has done his best to poison your
+life and to ruin your soul."
+
+In the other letter he said:
+
+"I know the affection you have always entertained for Iris. She will
+tell you what she pleases about the past. If she tells you nothing
+about her late husband, think the worst and you will not be wrong.
+Remember that whatever she has done was done for me and at my
+instigation. She ought to have married you instead of me.
+
+"I am in the presence of Death. The men who are going to kill me are
+under this very roof. They will kill me, perhaps to-night. Perhaps they
+will wait for a quieter and a safer place. But they will kill me.
+
+"In the presence of Death, I rise superior to the pitiful jealousy with
+which I have always regarded you. I now despise it. I ask your pardon
+for it. Help Iris to forget the action of her life of which she has
+most reason to be ashamed. Show that you forgive me--when you have
+forgiven her--and when you have helped her in the warmth and strength
+of your love to drive me out of your thoughts for ever.
+
+"H. N."
+
+
+EPILOGUE
+
+IT is two years after the murder of Lord Harry Norland, the last event
+connected with this history.
+
+Iris, when she accepted Hugh Mountjoy's offer of his Scotch villa, went
+them resolved to hide herself from the world. Too many people, she
+thought, knew her history, and what she had done. It was not likely
+that the Directors of the Insurance Company would all hold their
+tongues about a scandal so very unusual. Even if they did not charge
+her with complicity, as they could, they would certainly tell the
+story--all the more readily since Lord Harry's murder--of the
+conspiracy and its success. She could never again, she told herself, be
+seen in the world.
+
+She was accompanied by her friend and maid--the woman whose fidelity to
+her had been so abundantly proved--and by Mrs. Vimpany, who acted as
+housekeeper.
+
+After a decent interval, Hugh Mountjoy joined her. She was now a widow.
+She understood very well what he wished to say, and she anticipated
+him. She informed him that nothing would ever induce her to become the
+wife of any other man after her degradation. Hugh received this
+intimation without a remark. He remained in the neighbourhood, however,
+calling upon her frequently and offering no word of love. But he became
+necessary to her. The frequent visits became daily; the afternoon
+visits were paid in the morning: the visitor stayed all day. When the
+time came for Iris to yield, and he left the house no more, there
+seemed to be no change. But still they continued their retired life,
+and now I do not think they will ever change it again.
+
+Their villa was situated on the north shore of the Solway Firth, close
+to the outfall of the Annan River, but on the west bank, opposite to
+the little town of Annan. At the back was a large garden, the front
+looked out upon the stretch of sand at low tide and the water at high
+tide. The house was provided with a good library. Iris attended to her
+garden, walked on the sands, read, or worked. They were a quiet
+household. Husband and wife talked little. They walked about in the
+garden, his arm about her waist, or hand in hand. The past, if not
+forgotten, was ceasing to trouble them; it seemed a dreadful, terrible
+dream. It left its mark in a gentle melancholy which had never belonged
+to Iris in the old days.
+
+And then happened the last event which the chronicler of this history
+has to relate.
+
+It began in the morning with a letter.
+
+Mrs. Vimpany received it. She knew the handwriting, started, and hid it
+quickly in her bosom. As soon as she could get away to her own room she
+opened and read it.
+
+"Good and Tender Creature,--I ascertained, a good while ago, thinking
+that probably I might have to make this kind of application to you,
+where you were living and with whom. It was not difficult; I only had
+to connect you with Mr. Hugh Mountjoy and to find out where he lived. I
+congratulate you on being so well able to take care of yourself. You
+are probably settled for life in a comfortable home. I feel as happy
+about it as if I had myself contributed to thus satisfactory result.
+
+"I have no intention of making myself more disagreeable than I am
+obliged to do. Necessity, however, knows no law. You will understand me
+when I tell you that I have spent all my money. I do not regret the
+manner in which the money has been spent, but the fact that it has all
+gone. This it is which cuts me to the heart.
+
+"I have also discovered that the late lamented Lord Harry, whose death
+I myself have the greatest reasons to deplore, played me a scurvy trick
+in regard to certain sums of money. The amount for which he was insured
+was not less than 15,000 pounds. The amount as he stated it to me was
+only 4,000 pounds. In return for certain services rendered at a
+particular juncture I was to receive the half of the insurance money. I
+only received 2,000 pounds, consequently there is still due to me the
+sum of 5,500 pounds. This is a large lump of money. But Mr. Mountjoy
+is, I believe, a wealthy man. He will, doubtless, see the necessity of
+paying this money to me without further question or delay.
+
+"You will, therefore, seek his presence--he is now, I hear, at home.
+You may read to him any part of this letter that you please, and you
+will let him know that I am in earnest. A man with empty pockets cannot
+choose but be in earnest.
+
+"He may very possibly object.
+
+"Very good. In that case you will tell him that a fraud has been
+committed in connection with which I am prepared to make a full
+confession. I consented, on the death of my patient, and at the earnest
+entreaty of Lord Harry Norland, to represent the dead man as his
+lordship. I then went away, resolving to have nothing more to do with
+the further villainy which I believe was carried on to the obtaining of
+the whole amount for which he was insured.
+
+"The murder of Lord Harry immediately afterwards caused the Company to
+drop their intended prosecution. I shall reveal to them the present
+residence of his widow, and shall place my evidence at their
+disposition. Whatever happens I shall make the facts of the case
+public. This done, nothing can hurt me; while, whether the Public
+Prosecutor intervenes or not, neither Mr. Hugh Mountjoy nor his wife
+can ever show face to the world again.
+
+"Tell Mr. Mountjoy, I say, whatever you please, except that I am
+joking. You must not tell him that. I shall call to-morrow morning, and
+shall expect to find the business as good as done.
+
+"A. V."
+
+
+Mrs. Vimpany dropped the letter in dismay. Her husband had vanished out
+of her life for more than two years. She hoped that she was effectually
+hidden; she hoped that he had gone away to some far-off country where
+he would never more return. Alas! This world of ours has no far-off
+country left, and, even if the wicked man turneth away from his
+wickedness so far as to go to the Rocky Mountains, an express train and
+a swift boat will bring him back to his wickedness whenever he desires
+a little more enjoyment and the society of his old friends.
+
+Mr. Vimpany was back again. What should she do? What would Iris do?
+What would Mr. Mountjoy do?
+
+She read the letter again.
+
+Two things were obvious: first, that he had no clue of the restitution;
+and, next, that he had no idea of the evidence against him for the
+murder of the Dane. She resolved to communicate the latter fact only.
+She was braver now than she had been formerly. She saw more clearly
+that the way of the wicked man is not always so easy for him. If he
+knew that his crime could be brought home to him; that he would
+certainly be charged with murder if he dared to show himself, or if he
+asked for money, he would desist. Before such a danger the most
+hardened villain would shrink.
+
+She also understood that it was desirable to hide from him the nature
+of the evidence and the name of the only witness against him. She would
+calmly tell him what would happen, and bid him begone, or take the
+consequences.
+
+Yet even if he were driven off he would return. She would live
+henceforth in continual apprehension of his return. Her tranquillity
+was gone.
+
+Heavens! That a man should have such power over the lives of others!
+
+She passed the most wretched day of her whole life. She saw in
+anticipation the happiness of that household broken up. She pictured
+his coming, but she could not picture his departure. For she had never
+seen him baffled and defeated.
+
+He would come in, big, burly, with his farmer-like manner confident,
+bullying, masterful. He would ask her what she had done; he would swear
+at her when he learned that she had done nothing; he would throw
+himself into the most comfortable chair, stretch out his legs, and
+order her to go and fetch Mr. Mountjoy. Would she be subdued by him as
+of old? Would she find the courage to stand up to him? For the sake of
+Iris--yes. For the sake of the man who had been so kind to her--yes.
+
+In the evening, the two women--Mrs. Vimpany and Fanny--were seated in
+the housekeeper's room. Both had work in their laps: neither was doing
+any work. The autumnal day had been boisterous; the wind was getting
+higher.
+
+"What are you thinking of?" asked Fanny.
+
+"I was thinking of my husband. If he were to come back, Fanny--if he
+were to threaten--"
+
+"You would loose my tongue--you would let me speak?"
+
+"Yes; for her sake. I would have shielded him once---if I could. But
+not now. I know, at last, that there is no single good thing left in
+him."
+
+"You have heard from him. I saw the letter this morning, in the box. I
+knew the handwriting. I have been waiting for you to speak."
+
+"Hush! Yes, Fanny; I have heard from him. He wants money. He will come
+here to-morrow morning, and will threaten Mr. Mountjoy. Keep your
+mistress in her own room. Persuade her to lie in bed--anything."
+
+"He does not know what I have seen. Charge him with the murder of the
+Dane. Tell him," said Fanny, her lips stiffening, that if he dares to
+come again--if he does not go away--he shall be arrested for murder. I
+will keep silence no longer!"
+
+"I will--I am resolved! Oh! who will rid us of this monster?"
+
+Outside, the gale rose higher--higher still. They heard it howling,
+grinding branches together; they heard the roaring and the rushing of
+the waters as the rising tide was driven over the shallow sands, like a
+mountain reservoir at loose among the valleys below.
+
+In the midst of the tempest there came a sudden lull. Wind and water
+alike seemed hushed. And out of the lull, as if in answer to the
+woman's question, there came a loud cry--the shriek of a man in deadly
+peril.
+
+The two women caught each other by the hand and rushed to the window.
+They threw it open; the tempest began again; a fresh gust drove them
+back; the waters roared: the wind howled; they heard the voice no more.
+They closed the window and put up the shutters.
+
+It was long past midnight when they dared to go to bed. One of them lay
+awake the whole night long. In the roaring tempest she had seen an omen
+of the wrath of Heaven about to fall once more upon her mistress.
+
+She was wrong. The wrath of Heaven fell upon one far more guilty.
+
+In the morning, with the ebbing tide, a dead body was found lashed to
+the posts of one of the standing nets in the Solway. It was recognised
+by Hugh, who went out to look at it, and found it the body of Vimpany.
+
+Whether he was on his way back to Annan, or whether he intended to call
+at the villa that evening instead of next morning, no one can tell. His
+wife shed tears, but they were tears of relief. The man was buried as a
+stranger. Hugh kept his counsel. Mrs. Vimpany put the letter in the
+fire. Neither of them thought it wise to disturb the mind of Iris by
+any mention of the man. Some days later, however, Mrs. Vimpany came
+downstairs in a widow's cap.
+
+To Iris's look of interrogation she replied calmly, "Yes, I heard the
+other day. He is dead. Is it not better--even for him, perhaps--that he
+should be dead? He can do no more wickedness; he can bring misery into
+no more households. He is dead."
+
+Iris made no reply. Better--better far--that he was dead. But how she
+had been delivered from the man, to what new dangers she had been
+exposed, she knew not, and will never know.
+
+She has one secret--and only one--which she keeps from her husband. In
+her desk she preserves a lock of Lord Harry's hair. Why? I know not.
+Blind Love doth never wholly die.
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Blind Love, by Wilkie Collins
+
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