Before guard-mounting--almost half an hour before his usual time for
appearing at the office--Colonel Maynard hurried in to his desk, sent
the orderly for Captain Chester, and then the clerks in the
sergeant-major's room heard him close and lock the door. As the subject
of the shooting was already under discussion among the men there
assembled, this action on the part of the chief was considered highly
significant. It was hardly five minutes before Chester came, looked
surprised at finding the door locked, knocked, and was admitted.
The look on the haggard face at the desk, the dumb misery in the eyes,
the wrath and horror in it all, carried him back twenty years to that
gloomy morning in the casemates when the story was passed around that
Captain Maynard had lost a wife and an intimate friend during the
previous night. Chester saw at a glance that, despite his precautions,
the blow had come, the truth been revealed at one fell swoop.
"Lock the door again, Chester, and come here. I have some questions to
ask you."
The captain silently took the chair which was indicated by a wave of the
colonel's hand, and waited. For a moment no word more was spoken. The
old soldier, white and trembling strangely, reseated himself at the
desk, and covered his face with his hands. Twice he drew them with
feebly stroking movement over his eyes, as though to rally the stunned
faculties and face the trying ordeal. Then a shiver passed through his
frame, and with sudden lift of the head he fixed his gaze on Chester's
face and launched the question,--
"Chester, is there any kindness to a man who has been through what I
have in telling only half a tale, as you have done?"
The captain colored red. "I am at a loss to answer you, colonel," he
said, after brief reflection. "You know far more than you did half an
hour ago, and what I knew I could not bear to tell you as yet."
"My God! my God! Tell me _all_, and tell me at once. Here, man, if you
need stimulant to your indignation and cannot speak without it, read
this. I found it, open, among the rose-bushes in the garden, where she
must have dropped it when out there with you. Read it. Tell me what it
means; for, God knows, I can't believe such a thing of her."
He handed Chester a sheet of note-paper. It was moist and blurred on
the first page, but the inner pages, though damp, were in good
condition. The first, second, and third pages were closely covered in a
bold, nervous hand that Chester knew well. It was Jerrold's writing,
beyond a doubt, and Chester's face grew hot as he read, and his heart
turned cold as stone when he finished the last hurried line.
"MY DARLING,--
"I _must_ see you, if only for a moment, before you leave. Do not let
this alarm you, for the more I think the more I am convinced it is only
a bluff, but Captain Chester discovered my absence early this morning
when spying around as usual, and now he claims to have knowledge of our
secret. Even if he was on the terrace when I got back, it was too dark
for him to recognize me, and it seems impossible that he can have got
any real clue. He suspects, perhaps, and thinks to force me to
confession; but I would guard your name with my life. Be wary. Act as
though there were nothing on earth between us, and if we cannot meet
until then I will be at the dépôt with the others to see you off, and
will then have a letter ready with full particulars and instructions. It
will be in the first thing I hand to you. Hide it until you can safely
read it. Your mother must not be allowed a glimmer of suspicion, and
then you are safe. As for me, even Chester cannot make the colonel turn
against me now. My jealous one, my fiery sweetheart, do you not realize
now that I was wise in showing her so much attention? A thousand kisses.
Come what may, they cannot rob us of the past. HOWARD.
"I fear you heard and were alarmed by the shots just after I left you.
All was quiet when I got home."
It was some seconds before Chester could control himself sufficiently to
speak. "I wish to God the bullet had gone through his heart!" he said.
"It has gone through mine,--through mine! This will kill her mother.
Chester," cried the colonel, springing suddenly to his feet, "she must
not know it. She must not dream of it. I tell you it would stretch her
in the dust, _dead_, for she loves that child with all her strength,
with all her being, I believe, for it is two mother-loves in one. She
had a son, older than Alice by several years, her first-born,--her
glory, he was,--but the boy inherited the father's passionate and
impulsive nature. He loved a girl utterly beneath him, and would have
married her when he was only twenty. There is no question that he loved
her well, for he refused to give her up, no matter what his father
threatened. They tried to buy her off, and she scorned them. Then they
had a letter written, while he was sent abroad under pretence that he
should have his will if he came back in a year unchanged. By Jove, it
seems she was as much in love as he, and it broke her heart. She went
off and died somewhere, and he came back ahead of time because her
letters had ceased, and found it all out. There was an awful scene. He
cursed them both,--father and mother,--and left her senseless at his
feet; and from that day to this they never heard of him, never could get
the faintest report. It broke Renwick,--killed him, I guess, for he died
in two years; and as for the mother, you would not think that a woman so
apparently full of life and health was in desperate danger. She had some
organic trouble with the heart years ago, they tell her, and this
experience has developed it so that now any great emotion or sudden
shock is perilous. Do you not see how doubly fearful this comes to us?
Chester, I have weathered one awful storm, but I'm old and broken now.
This--this beats me. Tell me what to do."
The captain was silent a few moments. He was thinking intently.
"Does she know you have that letter?" he asked.
Maynard shook his head: "I looked back as I came away. She was in the
parlor, singing softly to herself, at the very moment I picked it up,
lying open as it was right there among the roses, the first words
staring me in the face. I meant not to read it,--never dreamed it was
for her,--and had turned over the page to look for the superscription.
There was none, but there I saw the signature and that postscript about
the shots. That startled me, and I read it here just before you came,
and then could account for your conduct,--something I could not do
before. God of heaven! would any man believe it of her? It is
incredible! Chester, tell me everything you know now,--even everything
you suspect. I must see my way clear."
And then the captain, with halting and reluctant tongue, told his story:
how he had stumbled on the ladder back of the colonel's quarters and
learned from Number Five that some one had been prowling back of
Bachelors' Row; how he returned there afterwards, found the ladder at
the side-wall, and saw the tall form issue from her window; how he had
given chase and been knocked breathless, and of his suspicions, and
Leary's, as to the identity of the stranger.
The colonel bowed his head still deeper, and groaned aloud. But he had
still other questions to ask.
"Did you see--any one else at the window?"
"Not while he was there."
"At any time, then,--before or after?" And the colonel's eyes would take
no denial.
"I saw," faltered Chester, "nobody. The shade was pulled up while I was
standing there, after I had tripped on the ladder. I supposed the noise
of my stumble had awakened her."
"And was that all? Did you see nothing more?"
"Colonel, I _did_ see, afterwards, a woman's hand and arm closing the
shade."
"My God! And she told me she slept the night through,--never waked or
heard a sound!"
"Did you hear nothing yourself, colonel?"
"Nothing. When she came home from the party she stopped a moment, saying
something to him at the door, then came into the library and kissed me
good-night. I shut up the house and went to bed about half-past twelve,
and her door was closed when I went to our room."
"So there were two closed doors, yours and hers, and the broad hall
between you?"
"Certainly. We have the doors open all night that lead into the rear
rooms, and their windows. This gives us abundant air. Alice always has
the hall door closed at night."
"And Mrs. Maynard,--was she asleep?"
"No. Mrs. Maynard was lying awake, and seemed a little restless and
disturbed. Some of the women had been giving her some hints about
Jerrold and fretting her. You know she took a strange fancy to him at
the start. It was simply because he reminded her so strongly of the boy
she had lost. She told me so. But after a little she began to discover
traits in him she did not like, and then his growing intimacy with Alice
worried her. She would have put a stop to the doctor's party,--to her
going with him, I mean,--but the engagement was made some days ago. Two
or three days since, she warned Alice not to trust him, she says; and it
is really as much on this as any other account that we decided to get
her away, off to see her aunt Grace. Oh, God! how blind we are! how
blind we are!" And poor old Maynard bowed his head and almost groaned
aloud.
Chester rose, and, in his characteristic way, began tramping nervously
up and down. There was a knock at the door. "The adjutant's compliments,
and 'twas time for guard-mount. Would the colonel wish to see him before
he went out?" asked the orderly.
"I ought to go, sir," said Chester. "I am old officer of the day, and
there will be just time for me to get into full uniform."
"Let them go on without you," said Maynard. "I cannot spare you now.
Send word to that effect. Now,--now about this man,--this Jerrold. What
is the best thing we can do?--of course I know what he most
deserves;--but what is the _best_ thing under all the circumstances? Of
course my wife and Alice will leave to-day. She was still sleeping when
I left, and, pray God, is not dreaming of this. It was nearly two before
she closed her eyes last night; and I, too, slept badly. You have seen
him. What does he say?"
"Denies everything,--anything,--challenges me to prove that he was
absent from his house more than five minutes,--indeed, I could not, for
he may have come in just after I left,--and pretended utter ignorance of
my meaning when I accused him of striking me before I ordered the sentry
to fire. Of course it is all useless now. When I confront him with this
letter he _must_ give in. Then let him resign and get away as quietly as
possible before the end of the week. No one need know the causes. Of
course shooting is what he deserves; but shooting demands explanation.
It is better for your name, hers, and all, that he should be allowed to
live than that the truth were suspected, as it would be if he were
killed. Indeed, sir, if I were you I would take them to Sablon, keep
them away for a fortnight, and leave him to me. It may be even judicious
to let him go on with all his duties as though nothing had happened, as
though he had simply been absent from reveille, and let the whole matter
drop like that until all remark and curiosity is lulled; then you can
send her back to Europe or the East,--time enough to decide on that; but
I will privately tell him he must quit the service in six months, and
show him why. It isn't the way it ought to be settled; it probably isn't
the way Armitage would do it; but it is the best thing that occurs to
me. One thing is certain: you and they ought to get away at once, and he
should not be permitted to see her again. I can run the post a few days
and explain matters after you go."
The colonel sat in wretched silence a few moments; then he arose:
"If it were not for _her_ danger,--her heart,--I would never drop the
matter here,--never! I would see it through to the bitter end. But you
are probably right as to the prudent course to take. I'll get them away
on the noon train: he thinks they do not start until later. Now I must
go and face it. My God, Chester! could you look at that child and
realize it? Even now, even now, sir, I believe--I believe,
someway--somehow--she is innocent."
"God grant it, sir!"
And then the colonel left the office, avoiding, as has been told, a word
with any man. Chester buttoned the tell-tale letter in an inner pocket,
after having first folded the sheet lengthwise and then enclosed it in a
long official envelope. The officers, wondering at the colonel's
distraught appearance, had come thronging in, hoping for information,
and then had gone, unsatisfied and disgusted, practically turned out by
their crabbed senior captain. The ladies, after chatting aimlessly about
the quadrangle for half an hour, had decided that Mrs. Maynard must be
ill, and, while most of them awaited the result, two of their number
went to the colonel's house and rang at the bell. A servant appeared:
"Mrs. Maynard wasn't very well this morning, and was breakfasting in her
room, and Miss Alice was with her, if the ladies would please excuse
them." And so the emissaries returned unsuccessful. Then, too, as we
have seen, despite his good intention of keeping matters hushed as much
as possible, Chester's nervous irritability had got the better of him,
and he had made damaging admissions to Wilton of the existence of a
cause of worriment and perplexity, and this Wilton told without
compunction. And then there was another excitement, that set all tongues
wagging. Every man had heard what Chester said, that Mr. Jerrold must
not quit the garrison until he had first come and seen the temporary
commanding officer, and Hall had speedily carried the news to his
friend.
"Are _you_ ready to go?" asked Mr. Jerrold, who was lacing his boots in
the rear room.
"No. I've got to go and get into 'cits' first."
"All right. Go, and be lively! I'll wait for you at Murphy's, beyond the
bridge, provided you say nothing about it."
"You don't mean you are going against orders?"
"Going? Of course I am. I've got old Maynard's permission, and if
Chester means to revoke it he's got to get his adjutant here inside of
ten seconds. What you tell me isn't official. I'm off _now_!"
And when the adjutant returned to Captain Chester it was with the
information that he was too late: Mr. Jerrold's dog-cart had crossed
the bridge five minutes earlier.
Perhaps an hour later the colonel sent for Chester, and the captain went
to his house. The old soldier was pacing slowly up and down the parlor
floor.
"I wanted you a moment. A singular thing has happened. You know that
'Directoire' cabinet photo of Alice? My wife always kept it on her
dressing-table, and this morning it's gone. That frame--the silver
filigree thing--was found behind a sofa-pillow in Alice's room, and she
declares she has no idea how it got there. Chester, is there any new
significance in this?"
The captain bowed assent.
"What is it?"
"That photograph was seen by Major Sloat in Jerrold's bureau-drawer at
reveille this morning."
And such was the situation at Sibley the August day the colonel took his
wife and her lovely daughter to visit Aunt Grace at Lake Sablon.