A STRANGE FATHER CONFESSOR.
"He's gone away--given it up! Be glad, madame!"
Father Rogier so speaks on entering the drawing-room of Llangorren
Court, where Mrs. Murdock is seated.
"What, Gregoire?" (Were her husband present, it would be "Pere"; but she
is alone.) "Who's gone away? And why am I to rejoice?"
"_Le Capitaine._"
"Ha!" she ejaculates, with a pleased look, showing that the two words
have answered all her questions in one.
"Are you sure of it? The news seems too good for truth."
"It's true, nevertheless; so far as his having gone away. Whether to
stay away is another matter. We must hope he will."
"I hope it with all my heart."
"And well you may, madame; as I myself. We had more to fear from that
_chien de chasse_ than all the rest of the pack--ay, have still, unless
he's found the scent too cold, and in despair abandoned the pursuit;
which I fancy he has, thrown off by that little rock slide. A lucky
chance my having caught him at his reconnaisance; and rather a clever
bit of strategy so to baffle him! Wasn't it, _cherie_?"
"Superb! The whole thing from beginning to end! You've proved yourself a
wonderful man, Gregoire Rogier."
"And I hope worthy of Olympe Renault?"
"You have."
"_Merci!_ So far that's satisfactory; and your slave feels he has not
been toiling in vain. But there's a good deal more to be done before we
can take our ship safe into port. And it must be done quickly, too. I
pine to cast off this priestly garb--in which I've been so long
miserably masquerading--and enter into the real enjoyments of life. But
there's another, and more potent reason, for using despatch; breakers
around us, on which we may be wrecked, ruined any day, any hour. Le
Capitaine Ryecroft was not, or is not, the only one."
"Richard--_le braconnier_--you're thinking of?"
"No, no, no! Of him we needn't have the slightest fear. I hold his lips
sealed, by a rope around his neck; whose noose I can draw tight at the
shortest notice. I am far more apprehensive of Monsieur, _votre mari_!"
"In what way?"
"More than one; but for one, his tongue. There's no knowing what a
drunken man may do or say in his cups; and Monsieur Murdock is hardly
ever out of them. Suppose he gets to babbling, and lets drop something
about--well, I needn't say what. There's still suspicion abroad--plenty
of it,--and, like a spark applied to tinder, a word would set it
ablaze."
"_C'est vrai!_"
"Fortunately, Mademoiselle had no very near relatives of the male sex,
nor any one much interested in her fate, save the _fiance_ and the other
lover--the rustic and rejected one--Shenstone _fils_. Of him we need
take no account. Even if suspicious, he hasn't the craft to unravel a
clue so cunningly rolled as ours; and for the _ancien hussard_, let us
hope he has yielded to despair, and gone back whence he came. Luck, too,
in his having no intimacies here, or, I believe, anywhere in the shire
of Hereford. Had it been otherwise, we might not so easily have got
disembarrassed of him."
"And you do think he has gone for good?"
"I do; at least, it would seem so. On his second return to the hotel--in
haste as it was--he had little luggage; and that he has all taken away
with him. So I learnt from one of the hotel people, who professes our
faith. Further, at the railway station, that he took ticket for London.
Of course that means nothing. He may be _en route_ for anywhere
beyond--round the globe, if he feel inclined for circumnavigation. And I
shall be delighted if he do."
He would not be much delighted had he heard at the railway station of
what actually occurred--that in getting his ticket Captain Ryecroft had
inquired whether he could not be booked through for Boulogne. Still less
might Father Rogier have felt gratification to know, that there were two
tickets taken for London; a first-class for the Captain himself, and a
second for the waterman Wingate--travelling together, though in separate
carriages, as befitted their different rank in life.
Having heard nothing of this, the sham priest--as he has now
acknowledged himself--is jubilant at the thought that another hostile
pawn in the game he has been so skilfully playing has disappeared from
the chess-board. In short, all have been knocked over, queen, bishops,
knights, and castles. Alone the king stands, he tottering; for Lewin
Murdock is fast drinking himself to death. It is of him the priest
speaks as king,--
"Has he signed the will?"
"_Oui._"
"When?"
"This morning, before he went out. The lawyer who drew it up came, with
his clerk to witness----"
"I know all that," interrupts the priest, "as I should, having sent
them. Let me have a look at the document. You have it in the house, I
hope?"
"In my hand," she answers, diving into a drawer of the table by which
she sits, and drawing forth a folded sheet of parchment: "_Le voila!_"
She spreads it out, not to read what is written upon it--only to look at
the signatures, and see they are right. Well knows he every word of that
will, he himself having dictated it. A testament made by Lewin Murdock,
which, at his death, leaves the Llangorren estate--as sole owner and
last in tail he having the right so to dispose of it--to his wife
Olympe--_nee_ Renault--for her life; then to his children, should there
be any surviving; failing such, to Gregoire Rogier, Priest of the Roman
Catholic Church; and in the event of his demise preceding that of the
other heirs hereinbefore mentioned, the estate, or what remains of it,
to become the property of the Convent of----, Boulogne-sur-mer, France.
"For that last clause, which is yours, Gregoire, the nuns of Boulogne
should be grateful to you; or at all events, the abbess, Lady Superior,
or whatever she's called."
"So she will," he rejoins, with a dry laugh, "when she gets the property
so conveyed. Unfortunately for her, the reversion is rather distant, and
having to pass through so many hands, there may be no great deal left of
it, on coming into hers. Nay!" he adds, in exclamation, his jocular tone
suddenly changing to the serious, "if some step be not taken to put a
stop to what's going on, there won't be much of the Llangorren estate
left for any one--not even for yourself, madame. Under the fingers of
Monsieur, with the cards in them, it's being melted down as snow on the
sunny side of a hill. Even at this self-same moment it may be going off
in large slices--avalanches!"
"_Mon Dieu!_" she exclaims, with an alarmed air, quite comprehending the
danger thus figuratively portrayed.
"I wouldn't be surprised," he continues, "if to-day he were made a
thousand pounds the poorer. When I left the ferry, he was in the Welsh
Harp, as I was told, tossing sovereigns upon its bar counter, 'Heads and
tails, who wins?' Not he, you may be sure. No doubt he's now at a
gaming-table inside, engaged with that gang of sharpers who have lately
got around him, staking large sums on every turn of the cards--Jews'
eyes, ponies, and monkeys, as these _chevaliers d'industrie_ facetiously
term their money. If we don't bring all this to a termination, that you
will have in your hand won't be worth the price of the parchment it's
written upon. _Comprenez-vous, cherie?_"
"_Parfaitement!_ But how is it to be brought to a termination. For
myself, I haven't an idea. Has any occurred to you, Gregoire?"
As the ex-courtesan asks the question, she leans across the little
table, and looks the false priest straight in the face. He knows the
bent of her inquiry, told it by the tone and manner in which it has been
put--both significant of something more than the words might otherwise
convey. Still, he does not answer it directly. Even between these two
fiends in human form, despite their mutual understanding of each other's
wickedness, and the little reason either has for concealing it, there is
a sort of intuitive reticence upon the matter which is in the minds of
both. For it is murder--the murder of Lewin Murdock!
"_Le pauvre homme!_" ejaculates the man, with a pretence at
compassionating, under the circumstances ludicrous. "The cognac is
killin' him, not by inches, but ells; and I don't believe he can last
much longer. It seems but a question of weeks; may be only days. Thanks
to the school in which I was trained, I have sufficient medical
knowledge to prognosticate that."
A gleam as of delight passes over the face of the woman--an expression
almost demoniacal; for it is a wife hearing this about her husband!
"You think only _days_?" she asks, with an eagerness as if apprehensive
about that husband's health. But the tone tells different, as the hungry
look in her eye while awaiting the answer. Both proclaim she wishes it
in the affirmative; as it is.
"Only days!" he says, as if his voice were an echo. "Still, days count
in a thing of this kind--ay, even hours. Who knows but that in a fit of
drunken bravado he may stake the whole estate on a single turn of cards
or cast of dice? Others have done the like before now--gentlemen grander
than he, with titles to their names-rich in one hour, beggars in the
next. I can remember more than one."
"Ah! so can I."
"Englishmen, too, who usually wind up such matters by putting a pistol
to their heads, and blowing out their brains. True, Monsieur hasn't very
much to blow out; but that isn't a question which affects us--myself as
well as you. I've risked everything--reputation, which I care least
about, if the affair can be brought to a proper conclusion; but should
it fail, then--I need not tell you. What we've done, if known, would
soon make us acquainted with the inside of an English gaol. Monsieur,
throwing away his money in this reckless fashion, must be restrained, or
he'll bring ruin to all of us. Therefore some steps must be taken to
restrain him, and promptly."
"_Vraiment!_ I ask you again--have you thought of anything, Gregoire?"
He does not make immediate answer, but seems to ponder over, or hang
back upon it. When at length given, it is itself an interrogation,
apparently unconnected with what they have been speaking about.
"Would it greatly surprise you if to-night your husband didn't come home
to you?"
"Certainly not--in the least. Why should it? It wouldn't be the first
time by scores--hundreds--for him to stay all night away from me. Ay,
and at that same Welsh Harp, too--many's the night."
"To your great annoyance, no doubt, if it did not make you dreadfully
jealous?"
She breaks out into a laugh, hollow and heartless as was ever heard in
an _allee_ of the Jardin Mabille. When it is ended, she adds gravely,--
"The time was when he might have made me so; I may as well admit that;
not now, as you know, Gregoire. Now, instead of feeling annoyed by it,
I'd only be too glad to think I should never see his face again. _Le
brute ivrogne!_"
To this monstrous declaration, Rogier laconically rejoins,--
"You may not." Then, placing his lips close to her ear, he adds in a
whisper, "If all prosper, as planned, _you will not_!"
She neither starts, nor seeks to inquire further. She knows he has
conceived some scheme to disembarrass her of a husband she no longer
cares for--to both become inconvenient. And from what has gone before,
she can rely on Rogier with its execution.