glad to see me and shook hands. She put out her arms, and he came and
kissed her: her eyes followed him everywhere; her cheeks had a sudden
colour: it was easy to see that he was her one great joy in life. And
the bright colour made her poor thin face look almost charming.
"I can't stay a minute, Trottie; going out in a hurry. I think I left my
gloves up here."
"So you did, papa. There was a tiny hole in the thumb and I mended it
for you."
"That's my little attentive daughter! Good-bye. Mr. Ludlow, if you will
stay to dinner we shall be happy."
Mrs. Smith came in as he left the room. She was rather a plain likeness
of Miss Chalk, not much older. But her face had a straightforward, open
look, and I liked her. She made much of me and said how kind she had
thought it of Mrs. Todhetley to be at the trouble of making a fichu for
her, a stranger. She hoped--she did hope, she added rather anxiously,
that Sophie had not asked her to do it. And it struck me that Mrs. Smith
had not quite the implicit confidence in Miss Sophie's sayings and
doings that she might have had.
It was five o'clock when I got away. At the door of the office in the
side street stood a gentleman--the same I had seen pass me the other
day. I looked at him, and he at me.
"Is it Roger Monk?"
A startled look came over his face. He evidently did not remember me. I
said who I was.
"Dear me! How you have grown! Do walk in." And he spoke to me in the
tones an equal would speak, not as a servant.
As he was leading the way into a sort of parlour, we passed a clerk at a
desk, and a man talking to him.
"Here's Mr. Everty; he will tell you," said the clerk, indicating Monk.
"He is asking about those samples of pale brandy, sir: whether they are
to go."
"Yes, of course; you ought to have taken them before this, Wilson," was
Roger Monk's answer. And so I saw that _he_ was Mr. Everty.
"I have resumed my true name, Everty," he said to me in low tones. "The
former trouble, that sent me away a wanderer, is over. Many men, I
believe, are forced into such episodes in life."
"You are with Mr. Smith?"
"These two years past. I came to him as head-clerk; I now have a
commission on sales, and make a most excellent thing of it. I don't
think the business could get on without me now."
"Is it true that you are to marry Miss Chalk?" I asked, speaking on a
sudden impulse.
"Quite true; if she does not throw me over," he answered, and I wondered
at his candour. "I suppose you have heard of it indoors?"
"Yes. I wish you all success."--And didn't I wish it in my inmost heart!
"Thank you. I can give her a good home now. Perhaps you will not talk
about that old time if you can help it, Mr. Ludlow. You used to be
good-natured, I remember. It was a dark page in my then reckless life; I
am doing what I can to redeem it."
I dare say he was; and I told him he need not fear. But I did not like
his eyes yet, for they had the same kind of shifty look that Roger
Monk's used to have. He might get on none the worse in business; for, as
the Squire says, it is a shifty world.
Sophie Chalk engaged to Mr. Everty, and he Roger Monk! Well, it was a
complication. I went back to Miss Deveen's without, so to say, seeing
daylight.
XV.
THE GAME FINISHED.
The clang of the distant church bell was ringing out for the daily
morning service, and Miss Cattledon was picking her way across the road
to attend to it, her thin white legs displayed, and a waterproof cloak
on. It had rained in the night, but the clouds were breaking, promising
a fine day. I stood at the window, watching the legs and the pools of
water; Miss Deveen sat at the table behind, answering a letter that had
come to her by the morning post.
"Have you ever thought mine a peculiar name, Johnny?" she suddenly
asked.
"No," I said, turning to answer her. "I think it a pretty one."
"It was originally French: De Vigne: but like many other things has been
corrupted with time, and made into what it is. Is that ten o'clock
striking?"
Yes: and the bell was ceasing. Miss Cattledon would be late. It was a
regular penalty to her, I knew, to go out so early, and quite a new
whim, begun in the middle of Lent. She talked a little in her vinegar
way of the world's wickedness in not spending some of its working
hours inside a church, listening to that delightful curate with the
mild voice, whose hair had turned prematurely grey. Miss Deveen,
knowing it was meant for her, laughed pleasantly, and said if the many
years' prayers from her chamber had not been heard as well as though
she had gone into a church to offer them up, she should be in a poor
condition now. I went with Miss Cattledon one Monday morning out of
politeness. There were nine-and-twenty in the pews, for I counted
them: eight-and-twenty being single ladies (to judge by the look),
some young, some as old as Cattledon. The grey-haired curate was
assisted by a young deacon, who had a black beard and a lisp and his
hair parted down the middle. It was very edifying, especially the
ten-minutes' gossip with the two clergymen coming out, when we all
congregated in the aisle by the door.
"My great-grandfather was a grand old proprietor in France, Johnny; a
baron," continued Miss Deveen. "I don't think I have much of the French
nature left in me."
"I suppose you speak French well, Miss Deveen?"
"Not a word of it, Johnny. They pretended to teach it me when I was a
child, but I'm afraid I was unusually stupid. Why, who can this be?"
She alluded to a ring at the visitors' bell. One of the servants came in
and said that the gentleman who had called once or twice before had come
again.
Miss Deveen looked up, first at the servant, then at me. She seemed to
be considering.
"I will see him in two or three minutes, George"--and the man shut the
door.
"Johnny," she said, "I have taken you partly into my confidence in
this affair of the lost studs; I think I will tell you a little more.
After I sent for Lettice Lane here--and my impression, as I told you,
was very strongly in favour of her innocence--it occurred to me that I
ought to see if anything could be done to prove it; or at least to set
the matter at rest, one way or the other, instead of leaving it to
time and chance. The question was, how could I do it? I did not like
to apply to the police, lest more should be made of it than I wished.
One day a friend of mine, to whom I was relating the circumstances,
solved the difficulty. He said he would send to me some one with whom
he was well acquainted, a Mr. Bond, who had once been connected with
the detective police, and who had got his dismissal through an affair
he was thought to have mismanaged. It sounded rather formidable to my
ears, 'once connected with the detective police;' but I consented, and
Mr. Bond came. He has had the thing in hand since last February."
"And what has he found out?"
"Nothing, Johnny. Unless he has come to tell me now that he has--for it
is he who is waiting. I think it may be so, as he has called so early.
First of all, he was following up the matter down in Worcestershire,
because the notion he entertained was, that the studs must have been
taken by one of the Whitneys' servants. He stayed in the neighbourhood,
pursuing his inquiries as to their characters and habits, and visiting
all the pawnbrokers' shops that he thought were at available distances
from the Hall."
"Did he think it was Lettice Lane?"
"He _said_ he did not: but he took care (as I happen to know) to worm
out all he could of Lettice's antecedents while he was inquiring about
the rest. I had the girl in this room at his first visit, not alarming
her, simply saying that I was relating the history of the studs'
disappearance to this friend who had called, and desired her to describe
her share in it to make the story complete. Lettice suspected nothing;
she told the tale simply and naturally, without fear: and from that
very moment, Johnny, I have felt certain in my own mind the girl is as
innocent as I am. Mr. Bond '_thought_ she might be,' but he would not
go beyond that; for women, he said, were crafty, and knew how to make
one think black was white."
"Miss Deveen, suppose, after all, it should turn out to have been
Lettice?" I asked. "Should you proceed against her?"
"I shall not proceed against any one, Johnny; and I shall hush the
matter up if I can," she answered, ringing for Mr. Bond to be shown in.
I was curious to see him also; ideas floating through my brain of
cocked-hats and blue uniform and Richard Mayne. Mr. Bond turned out to
be a very inoffensive-looking individual indeed; a little man, wearing
steel spectacles, in a black frock-coat and grey trousers.
"When I last saw you, madam," he began, after he was seated, and Miss
Deveen had told him he might speak before me, "I mentioned that I
had abandoned my search in the country, and intended to prosecute my
inquiries in London."
"You did, Mr. Bond."
"That the theft lay amongst Sir John Whitney's female servants, I have
thought likely all along," continued Mr. Bond. "If the thief felt afraid
to dispose of the emeralds after taking them--and I could find no trace
of them in the country--the probability was that she would keep them
secreted about her, and get rid of them as soon as she came to London,
if she were one of the maids brought up by Lady Whitney. There were two
I thought in particular might have done it; one was the lady's maid;
the other, the upper-housemaid, who had been ill the night of their
disappearance. All kinds of ruses are played off in the pursuit of
plunder, as we have cause to learn every day; and it struck me the
housemaid might have feigned illness, the better to cover her actions
and throw suspicion off herself. I am bound to say I could not learn
anything against either of these two young women; but their business
took them about the rooms at Whitney Hall; and an open jewel-case is a
great temptation."
"It is," assented Miss Deveen. "That carelessness lay at my door, and
therefore I determined never to prosecute in this case; never, in fact,
to bring the offender to open shame of any sort in regard to it."
"And that has helped to increase the difficulty," remarked Mr. Bond.
"Could the women have been searched and their private places at Whitney
Hall turned out, we might or might not have found the emeralds;
but----"
"I wouldn't have had it done for the Lord Chancellor, sir," interrupted
Miss Deveen, hotly. "_One_ was searched, and that was quite enough for
me, for I believe her to be innocent. If you can get at the right person
quietly, for my own satisfaction, well and good. My instructions went so
far, but no farther."
Mr. Bond took off his spectacles for a minute, and put them on again.
"I understood this perfectly when I took the business in hand," he said
quietly. "Well, madam, to go on. Lady Whitney brought her servants to
London, and I came up also. Last night I gleaned a little light on the
matter."
He paused, and put his hand into his pocket. I looked, and Miss Deveen
looked.
"Should you know the studs again?" he asked her.
"You may as well ask me if I should know my own face in the glass, Mr.
Bond. Of course I should."
Mr. Bond opened a pill-box: three green studs lay in it on white cotton.
He held it out to Miss Deveen.
"Are these they?"
"No, certainly not," replied Miss Deveen, speaking like one in
disappointment. "_Those_ are not to be compared with mine, sir."
Mr. Bond put the lid on the box, and returned it to his pocket. Out came
another box, long and thin.
"These are my studs," quickly exclaimed Miss Deveen, before she had
given more than a glance. "You can look yourself for the private marks I
told you about, Mr. Bond."
Three brilliant emeralds, that seemed to light up the room, connected
together by a fine chain of gold. At either end, the chain was finished
off by a small square plate of thin gold, on one of which was an
engraved crest, on the other Miss Deveen's initials. In shape the
emeralds looked like buttons more than studs.
"I never knew they were linked together, Miss Deveen," I exclaimed in
surprise.
"Did you not, Johnny?"
Never. I had always pictured them as three loose studs. Mr. Bond, who no
doubt had the marks by heart before he brought them up, began shutting
them into the box as he had the others.
"Anticipating from the first that the studs would most probably be found
at a pawnbroker's, if found at all, I ventured to speak to you then of
a difficulty that might attend the finding," said he to Miss Deveen.
"Unless a thing can be legally proved to have been stolen, a pawnbroker
cannot be forced to give it up. And I am under an engagement to return
these studs to the pawnbroker, whence I have brought them, in the course
of the morning."
"You may do so," said Miss Deveen. "I dare say he and I can come to an
amicable arrangement in regard to giving them up later. My object has
been to discover who stole them, not to bring trouble or loss upon
pawnbrokers. How did you discover them, Mr. Bond?"
"In a rather singular manner. Last evening, in making my way to Regent
Street to a place I had to go to on business, I saw a young woman turn
out of a pawnbroker's shop. The shutters were put up, but the doors were
open. Her face struck me as being familiar; and I remembered her as Lady
Whitney's housemaid--the one who had been ill in bed, or pretended to
be, the night the studs were lost. Ah, ah, I thought, some discovery may
be looming up here. I have some acquaintance with the proprietor of the
shop; a very respectable man, who has become rich by dint of hard,
honest work, and is a jeweller now as well as a pawnbroker. My own
business could wait, and I went in and found him busy with accounts in
his private room. He thought at first I had only called in to see him in
passing. I gave him no particulars; but said I fancied a person in whom
I was professionally interested, had just been leaving some emerald
studs in his shop."
"What is the pawnbroker's name?" interrupted Miss Deveen.
"James. He went to inquire, and came back, saying that his assistant
denied it. There was only one assistant in the shop: the other had left
for the night. This assistant said that no one had been in during the
last half-hour, excepting a young woman, a cousin of his wife's; who did
not come to pledge anything, but simply to say how-d'ye-do, and to ask
where they were living now, that she might call and see the wife. Mr.
James added that the man said she occupied a good situation in the
family of Sir John and Lady Whitney, and was not likely to require to
pledge anything. Plausible enough, this, you see, Miss Deveen; but the
coincidence was singular. I then told James that I had been in search
for these two months of some emerald studs lost out of Sir John
Whitney's house. He stared a little at this, paused a moment in thought,
and then asked whether they were of unusual value and very beautiful.
Just so, I said, and minutely described them. Mr. James, without another
word, went away and brought the studs in. Your studs, Miss Deveen."
"And how did he come by them?"
"He won't tell me much about it--except that they took in the goods some
weeks ago in the ordinary course of business. The fact is he is vexed:
for he has really been careful and has managed to avoid these unpleasant
episodes, to which all pawnbrokers are liable. It was with difficulty I
could get him to let me bring them up here: and that only on condition
that they should be in his hands again before the clock struck twelve."
"You shall keep faith with him. But now, Mr. Bond, what is your opinion
of all this?"
"My opinion is that that same young woman stole the studs: and that
she contrived to get them conveyed to London to this assistant, her
relative, who no doubt advanced money upon them. I cannot see my way to
any other conclusion under the circumstances," continued Mr. Bond,
firmly. "But for James's turning crusty, I might have learned more."
"I will go to him myself," said Miss Deveen, with sudden resolution.
"When he finds that my intention is to hold his pocket harmless and make
no disturbance in any way, he will not be crusty with me. But this
matter must be cleared up if it be possible to clear it."
Miss Deveen was not one to be slow of action, once a resolve was taken.
Mr. Bond made no attempt to oppose her: on the contrary, he seemed to
think it might be well that she should go. She sent George out for a
cab, in preference to taking her carriage, and said I might accompany
her. We were off long before Miss Cattledon's conference with the
curates within the church was over.
The shop was in a rather obscure street, not far from Regent Street. I
inquired for Mr. James at the private door, and he came out to the cab.
Miss Deveen said she had called to speak to him on particular business,
and he took us upstairs to a handsomely furnished room. He was a
well-dressed, portly, good-looking man, with a pleasant face and easy
manners. Miss Deveen, bidding him sit down near her, explained the
affair in a few words, and asked him to help her to elucidate it. He
responded frankly at once, and said he would willingly give all the aid
in his power.
"Singular to say, I took these studs in myself," he observed. "I never
do these things now, but my foreman had a holiday that day to attend
a funeral, and I was in the shop. They were pledged on the 27th of
January: since Mr. Bond left this morning I have referred to my books."
The 27th of January. It was on the night of the 23rd that the studs
disappeared. Then the thief had not lost much time! I said so.
"Stay a minute, Johnny," cried Miss Deveen: "you young ones sum up
things too quickly for me. Let me trace past events. The studs, as you
say, were lost on the 23rd; the loss was discovered on the 24th, and
Lettice Lane was discharged; on the 25th those of us staying at Whitney
Hall began to talk of leaving; and on the 26th you two went home after
seeing Miss Chalk off by rail to London."
"And Mrs. Hughes also. They went up together."
"Who is Mrs. Hughes?" asked Miss Deveen.
"Don't you remember?--that young married lady who came to the dance with
the Featherstons. She lives somewhere in London."
Miss Deveen considered a little. "I don't remember any Mrs. Hughes,
Johnny."
"But, dear Miss Deveen, you must remember her," I persisted. "She was
very young-looking, as little as Sophie Chalk; Harry Whitney, dancing
with her, trod off the tail of her thin pink dress. I heard old
Featherston telling you about Mrs. Hughes, saying it was a sad history.
Her husband lost his money after they were married, and had been obliged
to take a small situation."
Recollection flashed upon Miss Deveen. "Yes, I remember now. A pale,
lady-like little woman with a sad face. But let us go back to business.
You all left on the 26th; I and Miss Cattledon on the 27th. Now, while
the visitors were at the Hall, I don't think the upper-housemaid could
have had time to send off the studs by rail. Still less could she have
come up herself to pledge them."
Miss Deveen's head was running on Mr. Bond's theory.
"It was no housemaid that pledged the studs," spoke Mr. James.
"I was about to say, Mr. James, that if you took them in yourself over
the counter, they could not have been sent up to your assistant."
"All the people about me are trustworthy, I can assure you, ma'am," he
interrupted. "They would not lend themselves to such a thing. It was a
lady who pledged those studs."
"A lady?"
"Yes, ma'am, a lady. And to tell the truth, if I may venture to say it,
the description you have now given of a lady just tallies with her."
"Mrs. Hughes?"
"It seems so to me," continued Mr. James. "Little, pale, and lady-like:
that is just what she was."
"Dear me!" cried Miss Deveen, letting her hands drop on her lap as if
they had lost their power. "You had better tell me as much as you can
recollect, please."
"It was at dusk," said Mr. James. "Not quite dark, but the lamps were
lighted in the streets and the gas indoors: just the hour, ma'am, that
gentlefolk choose for bringing their things to us. I happened to be
standing near the door, when a lady came into the shop and asked to see
the principal. I said I was he, and retired behind the counter. She
brought out these emerald studs"--touching the box--"and said she wanted
to sell them, or pledge them for their utmost value. She told me a
tale, in apparent confidence, of a brother who had fallen into debt at
college, and she was trying to get together some money to help him, or
frightful trouble might come of it. If it was not genuine," broke off
Mr. James, "she was the best actor I ever saw in all my life."
"Please go on."
"I saw the emeralds were very rare and beautiful. She said they were an
heirloom from her mother, who had brought the stones from India and had
them linked together in England. I told her I could not buy them; she
rejoined that it might be better only to pledge them, for they would not
be entirely lost to her, and she might redeem them ere twelve months had
passed if I would keep them as long as that. I explained that the law
exacted it. The name she gave was Mary Drake, asking if I had ever heard
of the famous old forefather of theirs, Admiral Drake. The name answers
to the initials on the gold."
"'M. D.' They were engraved for Margaret Deveen. Perhaps she claimed the
crest, also, Mr. James," added that lady, sarcastically.
"She did, ma'am; in so far as that she said it was the crest of the
Drake family."
"And you call her a lady?"
"She had every appearance of one, in tone and language too. Her
hand--she took one of her gloves off when showing the studs--was a
lady's hand; small, delicate, and white as alabaster. Ma'am, rely upon
it, though she may not be a lady in deeds, she must be living the life
of one."
"But now, who was it?"
Yes, who was it? Miss Deveen, looking at us, seemed to wait for an
answer, but she did not get one.
"How much did you lend upon the studs?"
"Ten pounds. Of course that is nothing like their value."
"Should you know her again? How was she dressed?"
"She wore an ordinary Paisley shawl; it was cold weather; and had a
thick veil over her face, which she never lifted."
"Should not that have excited your suspicion?" interrupted Miss Deveen.
"I don't like people who keep their veils down while they talk to you."
The pawnbroker smiled. "Most ladies keep them down when they come here.
As to knowing her again, I am quite certain that I should; and her voice
too. Whoever she was, she went about it very systematically, and took me
in completely. Her asking for the principal may have thrown me somewhat
off my guard."
We came away, leaving the studs with Mr. James: the time had not arrived
for Miss Deveen to redeem them. She seemed very thoughtful as we went
along in the cab.
"Johnny," she said, breaking the silence, "we talk lightly enough about
the Finger of Providence; but I don't know what else it can be that
has led to this discovery so far. Out of the hundreds of pawnbroking
establishments scattered about the metropolis, it is wonderfully
strange that this should have been the one the studs were taken to; and
furthermore, that Bond should have been passing it last night at the
moment Lady Whitney's housemaid came forth. Had the studs been pledged
elsewhere, we might never have heard of them; neither, as it is, but
for the housemaid's being connected with Mr. James's assistant."
Of course it was strange.
"You were surprised to see the studs connected together, Johnny. That
was the point I mentioned in reference to Lettice Lane. '_One_ might
have fallen down,' she sobbed out to me, in leaving Whitney Hall; 'even
two; but it's beyond the bounds of probability that three should,
ma'am.' She was thinking of the studs as separated; and it convinced
me that she had never seen them. True, an artful woman might say so
purposely to deceive me, but I am sure that Lettice has not the art to
do it. But now, Johnny, we must consider what steps to take next. I
shall not rest until the matter is cleared."
"Suppose it should never get on any further!"
"Suppose you are like a young bear, all your experience to come?"
retorted Miss Deveen. "Why, Johnny Ludlow, do you think that when that
Finger I ventured to speak of is directing an onward course, It halts
midway? There cannot, I fear, be much doubt as to the thief; but we must
have proof."
"You think it was----"
"Mrs. Hughes. What else can I think? She is very nice, and I could not
have believed it of her. I suppose the sight of the jewels, combined
with her poverty, must have proved the temptation. I shall get back the
emeralds, but we must screen her."
"Miss Deveen, I don't believe it was Mrs. Hughes."
"Not believe it?"
"No. Her face is not that of one who would do such a thing. You might
trust it anywhere."
"Oh, Johnny! there you are at your faces again!"
"Well, I was never deceived in any face yet. Not in one that I
_thoroughly_ trusted."