NEARING A CRISIS
“Mr. Herriard, you are not satisfied?”
“No, Countess; not altogether.”
“What better result could you have hoped for?”
“None, so far as the trial went. But, for your sake, I shall never rest
satisfied till the mystery of this case has been incontestably solved.”
They were sitting together in the drawing-room; Count Prosper and an
Austrian girl, who was on a visit to England and had completed the
_partie carrée_, were at the piano in the room beyond.
“The obvious solution,” Alexia said, “is the man whom that poor fellow,
Campion, saw getting out of the window.”
“Undoubtedly. But we must find him.”
“Ah! That will be difficult?”
“Probably. The police are more or less at sea in a case like this where
the man wanted is of high social standing, high enough, that is, to
be a guest at Vaux House. I appreciate their difficulties, but do not
mean to let them drop the search. I saw Sir Henry Ferrars about it
yesterday.”
“How good you are,” she said, “to take all this trouble for me.”
“For you?” He bent forward. “Could I do otherwise? Have I not the best
of reasons?”
“I don’t know,” she replied, perhaps because she had to say something.
“You might know if you cared, Countess,” he said in a low voice. “And
you might tell me. I have been happy in the thought of your promise.”
“My promise? How well Fräulein von Hochstadt plays.”
“I cannot hear her,” he replied, in a passionate whisper, “when I have
your voice to listen to.”
Alexia laughed. Her implied promise and her own happiness disarmed her.
She could but temporize with the surrender which was not to be refused.
“My voice? You will shame me into silence if it prevents your listening
to the loveliest thing Tchaikovsky ever wrote.”
“There are,” he returned, “times when even the genius of music must go
unheeded.”
“In competition with the human voice?”
“Not the voice alone, but the words we long for the voice to speak.
Alexia,” he took her hand, and to his joy she let it rest in his, “has
the time come?”
“The golden day, when the cloud should have passed over and I be a free
woman? Yes; thanks to you, it has come.”
“And for me?”
Her silence was of consent, not doubt; at its end she softly raised
her eyes till they met his, and in that glance, a beam that seemed to
hold an eternity of happiness, he saw that he was loved. The enchaining
melody of the great Russian master rose and thrilled under the
passionate touch of the girl at the piano; it mingled with the perfume
of Alexia’s hair, as Herriard bent over her and pressed his lips to her
cheek. It was but a snatched kiss, for they were half in sight of the
other two, but it was not to be resisted.
Alexia put up her hand in half-earnest warning. “Mr. Herriard!
Geoffrey! You will be seen. Will you never learn to be opportune?”
“Never with you, darling,” he answered.
“I think you will,” she rejoined, with a look and a smile which tempted
him to throw prudence to the winds. “I must teach you.”
So he sat by her more circumspectly, engrossed in lovers’ talk.
Sometimes the thought of his shame, of his false position, would
seem to force itself between him and his love, there, where no shame
should exist, but the delight of the present hour stifled each pang of
self-reproach as soon as it was born within him. In the intoxication
of his love what mind could he have for sober scruples? In that hour
of joy it was the delight of the present and future that held him; his
past life with its frown could but be disregarded. Looking at the rare
woman by his side, enthralled by the spell of her beauty, above all,
by the charm of her irresistibly fascinating personality, he was not
likely to allow the chilling spectre of his deceit to stand between
them. All he could do was to look at his love and marvel at his good
fortune.
“I cannot understand,” he said, with more candour than tact, following
out the thought that was uppermost in his mind, “how this good fortune
has been reserved for me.”
She glanced at him with a little smiling criticism of his remark.
“Is it worth while enquiring too curiously into that?” she returned.
“Perhaps the good fortune--I take your expression--has been reserved
for the man who should deserve it.”
“I can never,” he replied deprecatingly, “do more than try to be worthy
of it. But,” he continued, “I was thinking, not of myself, but of the
many men who must have been in love with you.”
She laughed. “A very complimentary way, sir, of alluding to the
delicate subject of my age.”
“No, no,” he protested. “Alexia, we are neither of us children----”
“And our ages are quite suitable,” she bantered.
“Dearest,” he laid his hand on her arm with a caressing clasp of
restraint, “you know I am not alluding to age.”
“I suppose,” she went on, still fencing, “you have now a right to know
mine; honestly, eight-and-twenty.”
“That gives,” he said, “at least eight years of admirers.”
She gave a little sigh, and he thought he understood why she had
trifled with his question. “Ah, yes.”
“And, tell me, Alexia, you have never returned the love of one of
them--till now?”
She gave a little shrug. “Never, I suppose, till now.”
The last two words were almost whispered, but he caught their thrill.
“My dear Geoffrey,” she continued, changing her tone, “you know the
world, and that there are no exact rules for judging men, let alone
women. With some of us love is a very ordinary and regularly recurring
episode; a love affair is like a new gown, an agreeable anticipation
in the progress of its making, a shallow joy when it is new and novel,
a waning interest as it wears out, and at last just kept on till its
successor is ready. To others,” she sank her voice, “love is fate.”
He took her hand. “Ours has come at last. May it be a happy one. But I
should have thought that love, if not fate, had come to you before.”
Alexia smiled. “Why should you think so? Is it inconceivable that a
woman should not fall in love before she is--twenty-eight?”
“With you,” he answered, “it is almost incredible. Still I did not draw
my conclusions from that, but rather from your manner when I asked the
question.”
“My manner? Was it betraying?”
“It seemed to suggest an _arrière pensée_.”
She laughed, “Of earlier blighted affections. Hardly complimentary to
you. No,” she added, more seriously, “I have never been in love--till
now.”
“Then your sigh was the outcome of another regret; not, I hope, that
love--and fate--had overtaken you at last?”
“No, Geoffrey, not that. You pay us both a poor compliment.” She was
speaking half dreamily, and her voice seemed to take its tone from and
blend with the subdued melody of the andantino that came from the inner
room. “What there may be to regret comes from others, from outside.”
“From men who have loved you?”
She made an inclination of assent.
“A man little thinks how painful, how hateful his persistence is to a
woman who cannot care for him.”
“Men are most selfish in love,” Herriard said.
“Selfish and unreasonable,” she supplemented; “some, at least. They
look upon a woman as a besieged town, which, refusing to surrender,
must be taken by assault or battered to destruction.”
She spoke so feelingly that the indignant blood surged in Herriard’s
veins. “Alexia, you have been persecuted? Tell me: you must.”
“It is needless,” she replied, “since it is all over now.”
“Ah, you mean that man, Martindale? He----”
She shook her head. “No; not poor Captain Martindale. He was tiresome,
and, perhaps, something worse. But women had spoilt him and made him
what I knew him.”
“Alexia,” he urged, in the ardor of his new relationship. “Tell me. I
hate to think that you have suffered at a man’s hands; I must know.”
“It is not worth while,” she replied, with a little reminiscent
shudder. “It is nothing more than the persecution of a man who had more
determination than chivalry. But he is dead.”
“Lately dead?”
“No; some years ago.”
“Tell me his name.”
“You would know it. He was a distinguished member of your profession.”
She paused, as though debating with herself whether she should tell
more.
“Did you ever know,” she asked at length, “did you ever know Paul
Gastineau?”
Simultaneously with the pronouncing of the name, by a curious, but
not uncommon prescience, the image of Gastineau had started up in
Herriard’s mind, and he had known intuitively that no other name would
be spoken.
Paul Gastineau! He! That he of all men should have been in love with
her. And he had persecuted her, evidently with such determination as to
leave a very bitter memory, enough to compel a shudder when it came
to her mind. It was all plain now. Gastineau’s spite was still keenly
alive; love had turned to hate. It was hate. Herriard knew it now,
that had gleamed in Gastineau’s eyes when they had spoken of Alexia.
In the same instant a great feeling of relief, of joy almost, came to
Herriard in the knowledge that the other man’s judgment of the case had
been wilfully false. Not another doubt of Alexia’s innocence could ever
cross his mind now that he had found the opinion of the acuter brain
was warped and worthless, a mere slander.
But what of the man who, for his own vindictive purpose, had tried
to poison his mind against the woman he loved? Even across that dark
thought there streamed a ray of light. Their connection, the equivocal
nature of which had of late galled him, must now be severed. The
reason, the excuse was apt: and he, Geoffrey Herriard, would be a free
man again, to stand or fall by his own abilities. That his marriage
would make imperative; after this disclosure the break would be less
painful; by it he would be absolved from ingratitude towards the man
who had chosen to exploit his fortunes.
“He is dead,” Alexia had said, with a suggestion of relief; and Paul
Gastineau was indeed dead to all the world save himself and Geoffrey
Herriard. Could he come to life again--Herriard did not care to imagine
the contingency except on its impossible side. It seemed heartlessly,
cruelly ungrateful, but he could not help a feeling of subdued
satisfaction at the thought that Dr. Hallamar the one man in Europe who
might have cured him, had declared his case hopeless.
All this passed swiftly through Herriard’s mind as he sat startled
into the silence of intense, almost bewildering thought.
“Geoffrey, what are you thinking of?”
The words, spoken with laughing concern, roused him to see Alexia’s
grey eyes fixed on him with perhaps a suspicion of anxiety beneath the
look of enquiry.
“I was wondering,” he answered, “what manner of man it could be who had
the spite to persecute you, dearest.”
The animation seemed to fade from her face again. “You may wonder,”
she replied. “The man was well known, although, I dare say, few who
knew him guessed what lay beneath the surface of his character. I would
rather you asked some one else than me to describe him, if you are
curious to revive a memory which were better left to rest.”
The words seemed to stab Herriard. Who in the world knew Gastineau
better than he? Like accusing spirits there now rose to his mind the
quasi dead fighter’s vindictive attacks on men he had hated and envied,
of which he, Geoffrey Herriard, poor tool, had been the mouthpiece;
the venomous stinging thrusts he had been taught to deliver so deftly;
the terrible, transcendent irony and sarcasm into which he had been
coached with such untiring pains. Why should a man who had, by a
strange combination of accident and choice, taken leave of the world,
why should he retain and revel in all this eager vindictiveness, except
that his soul was black as sin? Gastineau was a very Iago; a malicious
spirit that could not rest under the idea of denial or disappointment,
but must work for the compensating delight of other men’s discomfiture.
It was terrible; more terrible still, it seemed, in that atmosphere
of love and nobleness, where vice looked by contrast the more hideous;
and he, Geoffrey Herriard, sitting there, with that pure hand in his,
breathing the very air of love and chivalrous devotion, had been, and,
indeed, was still, the partner, the abettor of this son of evil. The
very idea maddened him. He recalled the look of Gastineau’s face as
he had last seen it that evening; grey, set with hate and, so far,
impotent vindictiveness. He did not like to contemplate the picture,
and, to veil it, he turned to Alexia with the eagerness of a man
escaping from a disquieting thought.
But she was the first to break the silence. “Does your fate sadden
you?” she asked, with a little uncertain smile.
“My fate? No; certainly not my future,” he answered.
“At least it makes you silent. You need not say you were listening to
the music,” she added banteringly, “for I don’t believe you heard a
note of it.”
Her woman’s instinct was right; happily, he thought, there were limits
to it. What if she could have divined all his thoughts just then!
“Forgive me, darling,” he replied. “What you told me led my thoughts to
ramble among dark ways. It is as well to explore, and then have done
with them for ever. Now I am in the sunshine again.”
The music had come to an end. Count Prosper and the player joined them.
“I can honestly say I never enjoyed music so much before,” Herriard
said, in the midst of their thanks. “Did you, Countess?” he asked
meaningly, and Alexia was forced to say, “Never.”
Soon the Austrian girl took her leave. When Count Prosper returned
from seeing her to her carriage, he was full of enthusiasm over her
performance. “I never heard playing that gave me as much delight,” he
said, with a touch of foreign exuberance.
“I never shall,” Herriard observed quietly.
Prosper gave him an enquiring glance; Herriard looked at Alexia and
laughed. “May I explain?” he asked.
Prosper laughed too, a little mystified. “Please do.”
“Fräulein von Hochstadt’s playing had an added delight for me,”
Herriard said, his laugh giving way to a little tremor of feeling,
“since under cover of the music Countess Alexia did me the honour to
promise to be my wife.”
“Ah!” It seemed not altogether unexpected by her brother, and
Herriard was glad to see no opposition in his eyes. “So!” He bowed in
acknowledgment of the news with Austrian courtliness.
“My sister’s happiness is mine. Alix,” he took her hands in his, then
kissed her on both cheeks, “I wish you joy.” He turned to Geoffrey.
“Herriard, you have my warmest wishes, and as the best of sisters
should be the best of wives, I give them with all confidence.” He shook
his hands warmly, and so it was settled.
As the hour was yet early, Herriard stayed for a while longer, and
Alexia kept them company in the smoking-room. There they talked
happily, laughing over plans for the future. Alexia told her brother he
would have to find a wife now that she would be leaving him.
“Ah,” he objected, “I have some work to do first. I must rise a little
higher in my profession before that comes to pass.”
“You are not likely to make an unfortunate choice, Count,” Herriard
said, “and therefore need not pay women a bad compliment. With a wife
such as my good fortune has given me I anticipate no drawback in my
profession.”
Prosper smiled. “When I have risen as high in my service as you have in
yours, my dear fellow, it will be time for me to think about matrimony.”
Herriard gave a deprecating head-shake. “I have much to do yet,”
he said, with more conviction than they gave him credit for, as he
thought how he had now to work and fight alone. “To an ambitious man,
everything.”
Prosper laughed again. “I am glad to see that you are modest as well
as ambitious. All the same, my dear Herriard, it is generally admitted
that you have won for yourself a most enviable and honourable position.”
The word honourable grated on Herriard’s sense of the fitting. “No!
no!” he protested, with the impulsive vehemence of awakened shame.
But the Count set himself to maintain the point. “A man,” he argued,
“can hardly gauge his own position. I go about much, my dear Geoffrey,
and hear what is said of your success. Why, only this afternoon at
the Travellers, Josselyn, who you will allow knows something of his
profession and yours, was saying that you had now quite taken the
place, vacant since his death, of one of the most successful advocates
of our generation, Paul Gastineau.”
At the name, Herriard and Alexia’s eyes met with such significance that
Prosper could not but notice it.
“Why, what is it? What have I said?” he demanded, glancing from one to
the other.
“Nothing,” his sister answered quickly. “It is curious that we happened
to mention Mr. Gastineau’s name a little while ago.”
“You are supposed to be like him in Court, Herriard,” Prosper went on.
“But with more scrupulousness and less venom.” He laughed. “That’s
what the critics say. I don’t know how far it is a compliment. I never
heard Gastineau in Court; but I dare say you know better than I, his
reputation was not quite such as a very honourable man would envy. He
went in to win at any price, didn’t he? and not always to fight fair,
either in law or politics, so they say.”
“I have heard that,” Herriard said, thinking of what Alexia had told
him.
“But he was successful,” Count Prosper continued in the lazy discussion
of a fact which a cigar induces; “the world is dazzled by success, and
in its eagerness to applaud does not stop to ask how the success has
been won.”
“Only a few men do that,” Alexia observed, “and their criticism goes
for little.”
“Yes,” Herriard agreed, “in the judgment of men’s characters, of
successful men, at any rate, it is the few who are right, the mob who
are wrong. But the mob counts.”
“Talking of that man Gastineau,” Count Prosper said casually, “have you
heard the weird story that he has been seen about town?”
“Paul Gastineau?” Herriard exclaimed. “Impossible!” He glanced
at Alexia. Her eyes were on her brother with a look of mingled
apprehension and incredulity.
“Yes,” Prosper went on, as he blew out a long puff of smoke, “it
is rather startling, considering that the fellow was killed in that
railway accident near Cordova some years ago. But the man--I have
heard, but forget who, anyhow a man who knew him well--swears he saw
him one evening lately.”
There was a silence; for a few moments neither of the other two could
speak.
“Or his ghost,” Prosper added presently, puffing lazily at his cigar.
“Or some one very like him,” Alexia suggested, her eyes full of an
uneasy speculation.
“That,” said Prosper easily, unconscious of the feeling his
announcement had excited, “is probably the explanation. I was once
absolutely deceived myself in that way. Stopped my own cousin in the
street to find after a few words that it was not he at all, but a total
stranger. And the curious part of it was that the man told me I was
exactly like some one he knew. So we were both deceived.”
“It shows,” Herriard spoke mechanically, “that these personal
resemblances are common enough.”
“Oh, yes,” Prosper laughed, “there are only a certain number of human
moulds, and we are turned out of one or another of them with slight
variations in the setting and the finish.”
“Yes,” Alexia said with an effort, speaking more to herself than to the
others, “that can be the only explanation of a man who was killed years
ago in Spain, being seen walking the London streets to-day.”
If her tone seemed to dismiss the strange report as easily accounted
for, there was in her face a look which Herriard did not like to see.