"Well," I said at length, "I admit it. I admit that in a moment of mad
ecstasy I made a foolish declaration of affection--an avowal which I
have ever since regretted."
She gave me a pitying, scornful look, a glance which proved to me how
fierce was her hatred of Aline.
"If you had told me of your fascination I might have been able to have
explained the truth concerning her. But as you have thought fit to
preserve your secret, no end can now be gained by the exposure of
anything I know," she said, quite calmly.
"What do you know about her, Muriel?" I inquired, laying my hand upon
her arm in all seriousness. "Tell me."
But she shook her head, rather sadly perhaps. The bright expression of
happiness which had illuminated her countenance until that moment had
died away and been replaced by a look of dull despair. The sun shone
down upon her brightly, the birds were singing in the trees and all
around was gladness, but she seemed troubled and oppressed as one
heartbroken.
"No!" she answered in a low tone, her breast slowly heaving and falling.
"If you have really escaped the enthralment it is enough. You may
congratulate yourself."
"Why?"
"Merely because you have avoided the pitfall set in your path," she
answered. "She was beautiful. It was because of her loveliness that
you became entranced, was it not?"
"There is no necessity to conceal anything," I said.
"You speak the truth."
"And you had some illustrations of the evil influence which lay within
her?" Muriel asked.
I recollected how my crucifix had been mysteriously reduced to ashes,
and nodded in the affirmative, wondering whether I should ever succeed
in obtaining knowledge of the truth which she evidently possessed.
"Yet you had the audacity to love her!" she laughed. "You thought that
she--this woman whom all the world would hound down if they knew the
true facts--could love you in return! It is amazing how a pretty face
can lead the strongest-willed man to ruin."
I rather resented her attitude in thus interfering in my private
affairs. That I admired her was true; yet I was not her lover, and she
had no right to object to any of my actions.
"I cannot see that I have been so near ruin as you would make out," I
exclaimed, philosophically. "An unrequited love is an incident in most
men's lives."
"Ah! she spared you!" she cried. "If she had smitten you, you would
have perished as swiftly as objects dissolve into ashes when she is
present. At least she pitied you. And you were doubly fortunate."
"Yes," I said, reflecting upon her words, at the same time recollecting
her mysterious connection with poor Roddy Morgan. "She was without
doubt endowed with a power that was inexplicable."
"Inexplicable!" she echoed. "It was supernatural. Things withered at
her touch."
"If I, your friend, am fortunate in my escape, would it not be but an
act of friendship to explain to me all you know concerning her?"
Her dark, luminous eyes met mine in a long, earnest glance.
"No!" she answered, after a moment's reflection. "I have already
explained. You have escaped; the incident is ended." And she added
with a laugh, "Your neglect of me was, of course, fully justified in
such circumstances."
"Now, that's unfair, Muriel," I exclaimed. "I had no intention of
neglecting you, neither had I the slightest suspicion that you desired
me to say farewell to you. Have you not told me that you have an
admirer whom you could love? Surely that is sufficient. Love him, and
we may always remain friends, as we now are."
"No!" she responded, with a dark look of foreboding. "We cannot remain
friends longer. Our mutual confidence is shattered. We may be
acquaintances, but nothing more."
I had not mentioned poor Roddy's death, for it was a subject so painful
that I discussed it as little as possible. Was it not, however, likely
that if I explained all the circumstances and told her my suspicions,
her hatred might lead her to disclose some clue whereby I might trace
Aline Cloud?
Her words had caused me considerable misgiving, for it was now entirely
plain that, contrary to what I had confidently believed, namely, that
she loved me, she in reality held me in contempt as weak and fickle,
influenced by every pretty face or wayward glance.
I looked at her again. Yes, my eyes were not love-blinded now. She was
absolutely bewitching in her beauty. For the first time I became aware
that there was but one woman I really loved, and that it was Muriel.
"I regret that you should not consider me to be still worthy your
confidence," I said, bending towards her seriously. "I have admitted
everything, and have expressed regret. What more can I do?"
"Forget her!" she answered, with a quick petulance. "It is best to
forget."
"Ah!" I sighed. "That is unfortunately impossible."
"Then you love her still!" she cried, turning upon me. "You love her!"
"No," I answered. "I do not love her, because--"
"Because she treated you shabbily, and left without giving you her
address, eh? You see, I know all the circumstances."
"You are mistaken," I protested. "I do not love her because I entertain
a well-founded if perhaps absurd suspicion."
"Suspicion! What do you suspect?" she asked quickly.
Then, linking my arm in hers, I walked on, and commencing at the
beginning told her of that fateful day when I discovered the tragic
death of poor Roddy, and the circumstances which, combined with Aline's
own confession, seemed to point to her being his visitor, immediately
prior to his death.
As she listened her face grew ashen, and she perceptibly trembled. A
violent emotion shook her slight frame, and as I continued to relate my
dismal story and piece together the evidence which I felt certain must
some day connect Aline with the tragedy, I was dumbfounded to discern
that which, in a single instant, changed the whole aspect of the
situation.
Muriel was speechless. She was trembling with fear.
"And you really suspect that your friend was murdered?" she exclaimed at
last in the voice of one preoccupied. "If that had been really so,
wouldn't the doctors have known?"
"Medical evidence is not always reliable," I answered. "From what I
have already explained it is proved conclusively that some one visited
him in his valet's absence."
"Who called there, do you think?"
"Ah! I don't know," I answered. "That is what I am endeavouring to
discover."
She gave a slight, almost imperceptible sigh. It was a sigh of relief!
Could it be true that my little friend held locked within her breast the
secret of Roddy's tragic end? I glanced again at her face as she
strolled by my side. Yes, her countenance was now pale and agitated,
its aspect entirely changed from what it had been half an hour before.
"Why cannot you tell me something of Aline?" I asked quietly, after a
long silence.
"Because I am as entirely ignorant of her as you are," she answered
without hesitation. "All I know is that she is a strange person--a
woman possessed of powers so marvellous as to appear almost
supernatural. Indeed, she seems the very incarnation of the Evil One
himself. It was because of that I was angry when I knew that her beauty
had entranced you."
"But you are acquainted with her," I declared. "Your words prove that."
"No, I have had no dealings with her," she answered. "I should fear to
have, lest I should fall beneath her evil influence."
"Then how did you know of my acquaintance with her?" I asked, noting
how charming she was, and wondering within myself why during all the
years that I had known her I had not discovered the true estimate of her
beauty until that afternoon.
"The information was conveyed to me," she responded vaguely.
"And you believed that I had forgotten you, Muriel?" I said tenderly,
in a voice of reproach.
"It is certain that you were held powerless under that spell which she
can cast over men at will. You reposed in contentment beneath her
fascination, and called it love."
"But it was not love," I hastened to assure her. "I admired her, it is
true, but surely you do not think that I could love a woman who is thus
under suspicion?"
"Had your friend ever spoken of her?" she inquired after a brief
silence.
"No," I said. "Aline, however, admitted that she knew him, but
strangely enough declared that he had committed suicide at Monte Carlo
months before."
"Then what she said could not be correct," Muriel observed thoughtfully.
"I really don't know what to believe," I answered, bewildered. "Her
words were so strange and her influence so subtle and extraordinary that
sometimes I feel inclined to think that she was some supernatural and
eminently beautiful being who, having wrought in the world the evil
which was allotted as her work, has vanished, leaving no more trace than
a ray of light in space."
"Others who have known her have held similar opinions," my pretty
companion said. "Yet she was apparently of flesh and blood like all of
us. At any rate, she ate and drank and slept and spoke like every other
human being, and certainly her loves and her hatreds were just as
intense as those of any one of us."
"But her touch was deadly," I said. "As a magician is able to change
things, so at her will certain objects dissolved in air, leaving only a
handful of ashes behind. In her soft, white hand was a power for the
working of evil which was irresistible, an influence which was nothing
short of demoniacal."
Muriel held her breath, her eyes cast upon the ground. There was a
mysteriousness in her manner, such as I had never before noticed.
"You are right--quite right," she answered. "She was a woman of
mystery."
"Cannot you, now that I have made explanation and told you the reason of
my apparent neglect, tell me what you know of her?" I asked earnestly.
"I have no further knowledge," she assured me. "I know nothing of her
personally."
But her words did not convince me when I remembered how, on explaining
my suspicions regarding Aline's complicity in the crime, she had
betrayed an abject fear.
"No," I said dubiously. "You are concealing something from me, Muriel."
"Concealing something!" she echoed, with a strange, hollow laugh. "I'm
certain I'm not."
"Well," I exclaimed, rather impatiently, "to-day you have treated me,
your oldest friend, very unfairly. You tell me that I merely consider
you a convenient companion to be patronised when I have no other more
congenial acquaintance at hand. That I deny. I may have neglected
you," I went on in deep earnestness, as we halted for a moment beneath
the great old trees, "but this neglect of late has been owing to the
tragedy which has so filled my mind. I have set myself to trace out its
author, and nothing shall deter me in my investigations."
She was blanched to the lips. I noticed how the returning colour died
from her face again at my words, but continuing, said--
"We have been friends. Those who know of our friendship would refuse to
believe the truth if it were told to them, so eager is the world to
ridicule the idea of a purely platonic friendship between man and woman.
Yet ours has, until now, been a firm friendship, without a thought of
love, without a single affectionate word."
"That is the reason why I regret that it must now end," she answered,
faltering, her voice half-choked with emotion.
"End! What do you mean?" I cried, dismayed.
"Ah, no!" she exclaimed, putting up both her hands, as if to shut me out
from her gaze. "Don't let us discuss it further. It is sufficient that
we can exchange no further confidences. It is best now that this
friendship of ours should cease."
"You are annoyed that I should have preferred the society of that
strange, mysterious woman to yours," I said. "Well, I regret--I shall
always regret that we met--for she has only brought me grief, anxiety,
and despair. Cannot you forgive me?"
"I have nothing to forgive," she answered blankly. "To have admired
this woman was surely no offence against me?"
"But it was," I declared, grasping her hand against her will.
"Why?"
I held my breath and looked straight into her dark, luminous eyes.
Then, in as firm a voice as I could summon, I said--
"Because--because, Muriel, I love you?"
"Love me!" she gasped, with a look of bewilderment. "No! No!"
"Yes," I went on, in mad impetuousness, "for years I have loved you, but
feared to tell you, because you might regard my declaration as a mere
foolish fancy on account of our positions, and impossible of realisation
because of the probable opposition of my family. But I have now told
you the truth, Muriel. I love you!"
And with my hands holding hers, I bent for the first time to kiss her
lips. But in an instant she avoided me, and twisted her gloved fingers
from my grasp.
"You must be mad!" she cried, with a glint of indignation in her eyes.
"You must be mad to think that I could love you--of all men!"