"Then I can tell you. It was a few minutes after eleven, and he took the
path to the footbridge. When he came back his clothes were muddy."
Tony sat still a moment, horribly conscious that Godfrey Palliser was
watching him. Then he broke out: "It's wholly impossible, sir,
unutterably absurd! Nobody would kill a man without the least motive."
Godfrey Palliser's face grew a trifle grimmer. "There may have been a
motive. Lucy Davidson was pretty, and, I understand, vain and flighty,
while she disappeared, I think, a little too suddenly. You will remember
when Bernard was last here."
Tony stood up, with a dampness on his face and his hands trembling.
"Good Lord, sir, you can't believe that!" he said. "Bernard never had
any failings of the kind. It must"--and Tony gasped and stared round the
room--"have been poachers. You will remember Evans said Davidson had gone
out to look for somebody who had been laying snares."
To his vast relief he saw that Palliser clutched at the suggestion. It
would perhaps not have appeared very conclusive to another man, but
Palliser was anxious as well as willing to be convinced, which makes a
difference.
"Yes," he said. "That is the most sensible thing you have said for a
long while, and I sincerely hope events will prove you right. I am
getting an old man, and if a connection of the family and a guest in my
house had been guilty of such an intrigue and crime, I think I could
scarcely have held up my head again. No breath of scandal has touched
our name, and I could not forgive the man who brought a shadow of ill-
repute upon it."
The speech had its effect, for Tony was aware that he had nothing to
expect if he forfeited Godfrey Palliser's good opinion. He also quite
realized the fact that he was singularly devoid of the qualities
essential to the man who finds it necessary to make his own way in the
world, and very much in love with Violet Wayne. These considerations
made for silence. Tony, however, did not discover until later that the
next person Palliser sent for was the girl. It was with reluctance he
did so, and he stood up leaning against the mantel when he had drawn her
out a chair.
"I understand that you saw Bernard Appleby immediately before he left
the house the night before last," he said.
The girl appeared perplexed. "I do not know how you came to hear of it,
but as a matter of fact I did," she said.
"Then "--and Palliser made a little deprecatory gesture--"I feel sure,
when I tell you that they are necessary, you will excuse me asking you a
question or two. You met him in the corridor, I think with intent. What
had he to say to you?"
A little flush crept into the girl's face. "He asked me to give him ten
pounds. This will no doubt astonish you!"
It certainly did, and had Godfrey Palliser been a little less
punctilious he might have betrayed it. As it was, he said in a perfectly
level voice, "May I ask you for what purpose?"
There was no hesitation about the answer, and as he met Violet Wayne's
eyes the unpleasant thoughts which momentarily obtruded themselves upon
the man vanished again, and left him with a faint sense of shame.
"I had asked him to do me a favor which would entail some little
expenditure," she said. "It was, in fact, to do a kindness to somebody I
wanted to benefit, and could not have any bearing on your object in
making this inquiry. I know you will take my word for that."
Godfrey Palliser was not gifted with much penetration, but the girl's
composure had its effect on him, and he made her a little respectful
inclination. "It would go a long way with me, my dear, even if the
testimony of my eyes were against it; and Tony never did a thing that
pleased me more than when he told me he had succeeded in inducing you to
marry him," he said. "It is quite evident that you can throw no light on
the affair."
Violet Wayne left him, a little perplexed, but relieved. As he believed
what she had told him implicitly, his thoughts fixed themselves upon
Tony's suggestion, and he commenced to sift what he had heard for
anything that would confirm the poacher theory. He meant to do his duty
as a magistrate, but he had made a fetish of the family honor, and the
man who knows exactly what he is looking for has the better chance of
finding it. Accordingly he almost convinced himself, and proceeded to
another conference with Sergeant Stitt, who was a little more obtuse
than superior.
Violet Wayne was, however, not relieved at all. Only one hypothesis
suggested itself to her, and that was that the unfortunate keeper had
had some hold upon Appleby, but she promptly dismissed it as wholly
untenable. She felt convinced that the man who had been Tony's loyal
friend could have done nothing that he need blush for, and the fact that
he had been willing to take ten pounds from her was an additional proof
of his innocence rather than evidence against it. She felt absolutely
convinced that he would never have abused her confidence by asking her
for the money had he desired it for his own purposes. This conclusion
naturally led to the supposition that he had involved himself on Tony's
behalf, but she would not harbor that thought for a moment; while
Appleby, whom she believed implicitly, had told her that Tony had done
nothing wrong.
Still, it was evident that Tony was in trouble, and as he did not go
shooting with the rest she found him idling in an empty room when dusk
was closing down. He was standing by the hearth looking down into the
flickering flame; but the fashion in which he started when she gently
touched his shoulder was significant.
"You might have something upon your conscience, Tony," she said, with a
little smile. "Sit down and talk to me. I have scarcely seen you to-
day."
She sank into a low chair, and the uncertain firelight forced up her
face and gleaming hair against the shadowy background. The pose, wholly
unstudied as it was, also suited her, and she smiled as she saw the
appreciation in the eyes of her companion. Tony's regard for her was
respectfully deferential, but he was a man, and she did not disdain at
times to profit by the advantages nature had endowed her with.
"I never saw you look better than you do just now," he said, and laughed
as he found a place on the stool he placed at her feet.
"Turn your head a little, Tony; I want to see you," the girl said
softly. "Now, what has made you so quiet today?"
Tony looked at her, and the effect was unfortunate. He saw the calm eyes
shining with unusual tenderness, and felt the full influence of her
beauty, even while he remembered that Appleby had said she would find
out the story sooner or later and then it would be bad for him. He also
determined, foolishly, that if the revelation must come at all it
should, at least, be delayed as long as possible.
"I have my little worries, but they vanish when you appear," he said.
Violet Wayne shook her head. "That was pretty, but not quite sincere,"
she said. "In some respects I am older than you--and you are in trouble,
dear. Perhaps if you told me everything I could help you."
Tony turned his head away, and checked a groan as he stared at the fire.
"I have been a little thoughtless, and one must pay for that kind of
thing," he said. "Still, it would be most unfitting to trouble you with
my trifling difficulties." He felt a little constraining touch on his
shoulder, and a low voice said, "Is it money? You must not be proud,
dear, for I have plenty, and it could buy me no greater pleasure than to
see your cares melt away."
Tony flushed a little. "That is out of the question, Violet, and you
exaggerate," he said. "I haven't any real cares, you know."
The girl smiled at him. "Only very good imitations, Tony; but perhaps
you are right. I should dearly like to give you whatever you have need
of, but it would not please me to see you willing to take it. Still, why
did Appleby go out at eleven o'clock that night?"
It was a chance shot, but it told, and had results Violet Wayne could
not have anticipated. Tony started a little.
"Why should you ask me?" he said.
Violet Wayne was not as a rule demonstrative. Indeed, her behavior that
evening would have astonished those who thought they knew her best, but
the touch of her hand on the man's shoulder was caressing, and as she
leaned forward nearer him there was a curious softness in her eyes.
"I want you to listen, Tony, and I am not going to find fault with you,"
she said. "When you showed your preference for me people who I know are
wise talked to me of you. They had very little to urge against you
except one thing, which I think is true. They said you were a trifle too
fond of shirking a difficulty."
"I hope you thanked them for their kindness," said Tony dryly.
The girl pressed his shoulder. "Tony," she said, "shall I tell you why I
liked you? Well, it was because I fancied the respect you showed me was
genuine, and you were open and generous. That, at least, was one of the
reasons, for I detest a cunning man. I am ready to give you everything,
but I shall expect a good deal from you; and now you see why I am not
pleased with your answer to my question."
It was an unexpected opportunity, and, though the man aid not know this,
the last he would have. The girl, as she had said, was willing to give
him all she had to offer, of which her faith in him was not the least,
but he had not the courage to put it to the test. Had he done so she
would have taken his word, and believed in it against all other
testimony; but the story he had to tell was not a pleasant one, and he
dreaded her incredulity, in which he wronged her past forgiveness.
Meanwhile, looking up at her he saw, not the love and strength which
would have saved him from his weaknesses, but the calm, proud face which
was tender, too, just then, the gleaming red-gold hair, and the
beautifully moulded form. In place of speaking he gazed at her a moment
with passion in his eyes.
"I can never understand how you came to think of me at all," he said. "I
am not fit to dust your shoes; but if I lost you now I think it would
kill me."
The girl checked him with a little quiet gesture, and laid the hand she
raised from his shoulder on his forehead. "I like to hear you tell me
so, but there are times when the man who is willing to lose everything
gains the most. I wonder if you understand that, Tony? There are men who
do."
"No," said Tony in honest bewilderment, "I'm afraid I can't."
"Still," said the girl softly, "it is true; but perhaps it isn't seemly
that I should preach to you. Am I to conclude that if any odium follows
your friend because he went out that night you could not dispel it?"
This left a loophole, which was unfortunate, because the man reflected
that he could offer no convincing testimony as to what had really
happened at the fir spinny.
"No," he said a trifle hoarsely, "I could not."
Violet Wayne looked at him steadily, and Tony, who saw the gravity in
her eyes, felt his heart thumping furiously. Then she said very slowly:
"Since you have given me your word we will never mention this again."
Tony drew in his breath as he turned his head away. The crisis had
passed, and he knew that Violet Wayne believed him; but a little shiver
ran through him, for he felt that he was committed to a course of
deception now, and that if exposure came he could not face her scorn.
She was a proud woman, who seldom unbent even to him as she had done
that evening, and his one impulse was to lead her thoughts as far from
the question she had asked him as he conveniently could.
"You hinted that you had met men who would give up everything for--a
fancy," he said. "Do I know them?"
"You know one. I think Bernard Appleby would sacrifice a good deal for a
friend--or a woman he respected."
"He could not help it in your case. You could compel most men to do
almost anything for you."
The girl shook her head. "Even if that is true it would not gratify me
much," she said. "It is only those nearest and dearest to me I expect
the most from, and that I am not worthy of it does not affect the case.
Still, I think we have talked sufficiently in this strain."
Tony rose and stooped over her chair, but the girl made a little
restraining gesture, and he straightened himself again.
"No," she said quietly. "Not now, Tony. We are strange creatures; but I
think if you had made me a confession a little while ago I could have
forgiven you anything and kissed you afterwards."
Tony said nothing, and a maid came in with a light; but he spent a very
unpleasant half-hour when Violet Wayne left him. Now it had slipped away
unprofited by, he saw what that opportunity would have meant for him.
Tony was not clever, but he realized that fate does not give men such
chances frequently.