The manservant, with his plain black clothes and black tie, had
entered the room with a deferential little gesture.
"You will pardon me, sir," he said in a subdued tone, "but I think
that you have forgotten to look at your engagement book. There is Lady
Arlingford's reception to-night, ten till twelve, and the Hatton House
ball, marked with a cross, sir, important. I put your clothes out an
hour ago."
Nigel Ennison looked up with a little start.
"All right, Dunster," he said. "I may go to Hatton House later, but
you needn't wait. I can get into my clothes."
The man hesitated.
"Can I bring you anything, sir--a whisky and soda, or a liqueur?
You'll excuse me, sir, but you haven't touched your coffee."
"Bring me a whisky and soda, and a box of cigarettes," Ennison
answered, "and then leave me alone, there's a good fellow. I'm a
little tired."
The man obeyed his orders noiselessly and then left the room.
Ennison roused himself with an effort, took a long drink from his
whisky and soda, and lit a cigarette.
"What a fool I am!" he muttered, standing up on the hearthrug, and
leaning his elbows upon the broad mantelpiece. "And yet I wonder
whether the world ever held such another enigma in her sex. Paris
looms behind--a tragedy of strange recollections--here she emerges
Phoenix-like, subtly developed, a flawless woman, beautiful,
self-reliant, witty, a woman with the strange gift of making all
others beside her seem plain or vulgar. And then--this sudden thrust.
God only knows what I have done, or left undone. Something
unpardonable is laid to my charge. Only last night she saw me, and
there was horror in her eyes.... I have written, called--of what avail
is anything--against that look.... What the devil is the matter,
Dunster?"
"I beg your pardon, sir," the man answered, "there is a lady here to
see you."
Ennison turned round sharply.
"A lady, Dunster. Who is it?"
The man came a little further into the room.
"Lady Ferringhall, sir."
"Lady Ferringhall--alone?" Ennison exclaimed.
"Quite alone, sir."
Ennison was dismayed.
"For Heaven's sake, Dunster, don't let her out of the carriage, or
hansom, or whatever she came in. Say I'm out, away, anything!"
"I am sorry, sir," the man answered, "but she had sent away her hansom
before I answered the bell. She is in the hall now. I----"
The door was thrown open. Annabel entered.
"Forgive my coming in," she said to Ennison. "I heard your voices, and
the hall is draughty. What is the matter with you?"
Dunster had withdrawn discreetly. Ennison's manner was certainly not
one of a willing host.
"I cannot pretend that I am glad to see you, Lady Ferringhall," he
said quietly. "For your own sake, let me beg of you not to stay for a
moment. Dunster shall fetch you a cab. I----"
She threw herself into an easy chair. She was unusually pale, and her
eyes were brilliant. Never had she seemed to him so much like Anna.
"You needn't be worried," she said quietly. "The conventions do not
matter one little bit. You will agree with me when you have heard what
I have to say. For me that is all over and done with."
"Lady Ferringhall! Anna!" he exclaimed.
She fixed her brilliant eyes upon him.
"Suppose you call me by my proper name," she said quietly. "Call me
Annabel."
He started back as though he had been shot.
"Annabel?" he exclaimed. "That is your sister's name."
"No, mine."
It came upon him like a flash. Innumerable little puzzles were
instantly solved. He could only wonder that this amazing thing had
remained so long a secret to him. He remembered little whispered
speeches of hers, so like the Annabel of Paris, so unlike the woman he
loved, a hundred little things should have told him long ago.
Nevertheless it was overwhelming.
"But your hair," he gasped.
"Dyed!"
"And your figure?"
"One's _corsetiere_ arranges that. My friend, I am only grieved that
you of all others should have been so deceived. I have seen you with
Anna, and I have not known whether to be glad or sorry. I have been in
torment all the while to know whether it was to Anna or to Annabel
that you were making love so charmingly. Nigel, do you know that I
have been very jealous?"
He avoided the invitation of her eyes. He was indeed still in the
throes of his bewilderment.
"But Sir John?" he exclaimed. "What made you marry him? What made you
leave Paris without a word to any one? What made you and your sister
exchange identities?"
"There is one answer to all those questions, Nigel," she said, with a
nervous little shudder. "It is a hateful story. Come close to me, and
let me hold your hand, dear. I am a little afraid."
There was a strange look in her face, the look of a frightened child.
Ennison seemed to feel already the shadow of tragedy approaching. He
stood by her side, and he suffered her hands to rest in his.
"You remember the man in Paris who used to follow me about--Meysey
Hill they called him?"
He nodded.
"Miserable bounder," he murmured. "Turned out to be an impostor, too."
"He imposed on me," Annabel continued. "I believed that he was the
great multi-millionaire. He worried me to marry him. I let him take me
to the English Embassy, and we went through some sort of a ceremony. I
thought it would be magnificent to have a great house in Paris, and
more money than any other woman. Afterwards we started for _dejeuner_
in a motor. On the way he confessed. He was not Meysey Hill, but an
Englishman of business, and he had only a small income. Every one took
him for the millionaire, and he had lost his head about me. I--well, I
lost my temper. I struck him across the face, twisted the steering
wheel of the motor, sprang out myself, and left him for dead on the
road with the motor on top of him. This is the first act."
"Served the beast right," Ennison declared. "I think I can tell you
something which may be very good news for you presently. But go on."
"Act two," she continued. "Enter Sir John, very honest, very much in
love with me. I thought that Hill was dead, but I was frightened, and
I wanted to get away from Paris. Sir John heard gossip about us--about
Anna the recluse, a paragon of virtue, and Annabel alias 'Alcide' a
dancer at the _cafes chantants_, and concerning whom there were many
stories which were false, and a few--which were true. I--well, I
borrowed Anna's name. I made her my unwilling confederate. Sir John
followed me to London and married me. To this day he and every one
else thinks that he married Anna.
"Act three. Anna comes to London. She is poor, and she will take
nothing from my husband, the man she had deceived for my sake, and he,
on his part, gravely disapproves of her as 'Alcide.' She tries every
way of earning a living and fails. Then she goes to a dramatic agent.
Curiously enough nothing will persuade him that she is not 'Alcide.'
He believes that she denies it simply because owing to my marriage
with Sir John, whom they call the 'Puritan Knight,' she wants to keep
her identity secret. He forces an engagement upon her. She never calls
herself 'Alcide.' It is the Press who find her out. She is the image
of what I was like, and she has a better voice. Then enter Mr. Hill
again--alive. He meets Anna, and claims her as his wife. It is Anna
again who stands between me and ruin."
"I cannot let you go on," Ennison interrupted. "I believe that I can
give you great news. Tell me where the fellow Hill took you for this
marriage ceremony."
"It was behind the Place de Vendome, on the other side from the Ritz."
"I knew it," Ennison exclaimed. "Cheer up, Annabel. You were never
married at all. That place was closed by the police last month. It was
a bogus affair altogether, kept by some blackguard or other of an
Englishman. Everything was done in the most legal and imposing way,
but the whole thing was a fraud."
"Then I was never married to him at all?" Annabel said.
"Never--but, by Jove, you had a narrow escape," Ennison exclaimed.
"Annabel, I begin to see why you are here. Think! Had you not better
hurry back before Sir John discovers? You are his wife right enough.
You can tell me the rest another time."
She smiled faintly.
"The rest," she said, holding tightly to his hands, "is the most
important of all. You came to me, you wished me to speak to Anna. I
went to her rooms to-night. There was no one at home, and I was coming
away when I saw that the door was open. I decided to go in and wait.
In her sitting-room I found Montague Hill. He had gained admission
somehow, and he too was waiting for Anna. But--he was cleverer than
any of you. He knew me, Nigel. 'At last,' he cried, 'I have found
you!' He would listen to nothing. He swore that I was his wife, and--I
shot him, Nigel, as his arms were closing around me. Shot him, do you
hear?"
"Good God!" he exclaimed, looking at her curiously. "Is this true,
Annabel? Is he dead?"
She nodded.
"I shot him. I saw the blood come as he rolled over. I tore the
marriage certificate from his pocket and burnt it. And then I came
here."
"You came--here!" he repeated, vaguely.
"Nigel, Nigel," she cried. "Don't you understand? It is I whom you
cared for in Paris, not Anna. She is a stranger to you. You cannot
care for her. Think of those days in Paris. Do you remember when we
went right away, Nigel, and forgot everything? We went down the river
past Veraz, and the larks were singing all over those deep brown
fields, and the river further on wound its way like a coil of silver
across the rich meadowland, and along the hillside vineyards. Oh, the
scent of the flowers that day, the delicious quiet, the swallows that
dived before us in the river. Nigel! You have not forgotten. It was
the first day you kissed me, under the willows, coming into Veraz.
Nigel, you have not forgotten!"
"No," he said, with a little bitter smile. "I have never forgotten."
She suddenly caught hold of his shoulders and drew him down towards
her.
"Nigel, don't you understand. I must leave England to-night. I must go
somewhere into hiding, a long, long way off. I killed him, Nigel. They
will say that it was murder. But if only you will come I do not care."
He shook her hands off almost roughly. He stood away from her. She
listened with dumb fear in her eyes.
"Listen, Annabel," he said hoarsely. "We played at love-making in
Paris. It was very pretty and very dainty while it lasted, but we
played it with our eyes open, and we perfectly understood the
game--both of us. Other things came. We went our ways. There was no
broken faith--not even any question of anything of the sort. I met you
here as Lady Ferringhall. We have played at a little mild love-making
again. It has been only the sort of nonsense which passes lightly
enough between half the men and women in London. You shall know the
truth. I do not love you. I have never loved you. I call myself a man
of the world, a man of many experiences, but I never knew what love
meant--until I met your sister."
"You love--Anna?" she exclaimed.
"I do," he answered. "I always shall. Now if you are ready to go with
me, I too am ready. We will go to Ostend by the early morning boat and
choose a hiding place from there. I will marry you when Sir John gets
his divorce, and I will do all I can to keep you out of harm. But you
had better know the truth to start with. I will do all this not
because I love you, but--because you are Anna's sister."
Annabel rose to her feet.
"You are magnificent," she said, "but the steel of your truth is a
little oversharpened. It cuts. Will you let your servant call me a
hansom," she continued, opening the door before he could reach her
side. "I had no idea that it was so abominably late."
He scarcely saw her face again. She pulled her veil down, and he knew
that silence was best.
"Where to?" he asked, as the hansom drove up.
"Home, of course," she answered. "Eight, Cavendish Square."
_Chapter XXVI_