GEORGE STRICKLAND'S QUEST.
The strange story told by Sister Agnes in her confession, when
combined with her hinted suspicion that the account of Mr. Fairfax's
death had no foundation in fact, opened up a series of questions
which, under any circumstances, Janet would have felt herself
incompetent to deal with alone. Major Strickland was the person of all
others to whom she would have gone for counsel and assistance, even
had no injunction been laid on her to that effect. That with him
should be associated Father Spiridion, could only be another source of
gratulation to Janet. She had learned to love and reverence the kindly
old man before, but now that she knew him to have been her mother's
constant friend and adviser through many years of trouble, he seemed
to have a thousand more claims on her affection. Into his hands and
those of Major Strickland she committed her cause without reservation,
feeling and knowing that they would do the same by her as if she were
a child of their own.
It was in her relations towards Lady Pollexfen that Janet felt most
the burden of the secret that had been laid upon her. To know that she
was the granddaughter of that imperious old woman, and yet to be
supposed not to be aware of the fact; to be able to walk down the
long, dim picture gallery at Dupley-Walls, and say with a proud
swelling of the heart, "These were my ancestors;" to look up from the
garden at the gray old pile, and then away across the wide-stretching
park, and hear the unbidden whisper at her heart, "This is my rightful
home:"--in all this there was for Janet a strange sort of fascination
which she could not overcome. But even had she not been bound by her
promise to Sister Agnes not to reveal to Lady Pollexfen what had been
told her, there was a sufficiency of stubborn pride in her composition
to keep her from ever acquainting the mistress of Dupley Walls with
her knowledge of a fact which that lady had persistently ignored for
so many years. As simple Janet Holme she would go on till the end of
the chapter, unless Lady Pollexfen should herself break the seal of
silence and acknowledge her as the daughter of the woman she had so
cruelly wronged.
One of Major Strickland's first acts in his capacity of adviser to
Miss Holme, was to ask permission to make a confidant of his nephew,
Captain George, in all that related to his young ward's affairs. The
request was granted as a matter of course. Had it been made in behalf
of any other than George Strickland, it would have been at once
acceded to, but with how much greater pleasure in his case, Janet
herself could alone have told. Between Janet and Captain Strickland
there had not been the remotest attempt at love-making in the common
acceptation of the phrase; and yet, by one of Love's subtle
intuitions, each read the other's heart, and knew of the sweet secret
that lay hidden there. Any intentions that Captain George might have
formed in his own mind as to the propriety, or necessity, of making
mention of his love to her whom it most concerned, were put aside for
the time being in consequence of the death of Sister Agnes. He only
laid them aside for a little while, because, as far as he then knew,
there was no relationship between Sister Agnes and Janet. But when he
came to learn from his uncle, as he was not long in doing, that Miss
Holme was the daughter of Sister Agnes and the granddaughter of Lady
Pollexfen, he was obliged to thrust his intentions very far into the
background, and it seemed doubtful to him whether they would not have
to remain there for ever. The granddaughter of Lady Pollexfen was a
very different person from Miss Janet Holme, with no prospects to
speak of, and not a penny, beyond her quarter's salary, to call her
own. To have wedded the Miss Holme he had supposed Janet to be, would
have made the happiness of his life; but to propose to Miss Holme as
he now knew her was a very different affair. Captain Strickland was a
poor man, but his pride was equal to his poverty; and to marry Lady
Pollexfen's granddaughter without Lady Pollexfen's consent was more
than that pride would allow him to do. Happily, the future might
reveal to him some plan, by means of which his love and his pride
might be reconciled, and walk together hand in hand. Till that time
should come, if come it ever did, his love should remain hidden and
dumb.
It was not till nearly a fortnight after the reading of Sister Agnes's
Confession that any decision was arrived at by Major Strickland and
Father Spiridion as to what steps, if any, should be taken with the
view of unravelling the mystery in which the antecedents and fate of
Mr. Fairfax were involved. The old soldier and the older priest, with
Captain George to strengthen their consultations, met again and again,
and discussed the question, as far as the data they had to go upon
would allow of it, from every possible point of view. They all felt
that underneath the veil which they longed and yet were half afraid to
lift, might be hidden some disgraceful story, some dark mystery, which
it were better that neither they nor any one should become acquainted
with. For Janet never to know who her father really was, and to remain
in doubt as to whether he were alive or dead, might be painful to her
feelings as a daughter, but for her to learn the truth might be more
painful still. From Janet no positive expression of opinion could be
elicited. She would be guided, she said, entirely by the wishes of
those to whom the affair had been submitted. If they decided that no
action whatever had better be taken in the matter, she was quite
content to let it rest where it did. If, on the other hand, an
investigation were decided upon, she would not shrink from an
exposition of the truth, however painful it might be.
At length a definite course of action was resolved upon by the three
gentlemen, and Major Strickland wrote to Janet by post:--
"Meet me at the King's Oak to-morrow afternoon at three.
"Bring with you the certificate and the miniature."
Janet was there at the time appointed, and there she found the major
and Captain George.
"I have asked you to meet me here," said the major after the usual
greetings were over, "to inform you that Father Spiridion and myself
have decided that, with your permission, an investigation ought to be
made into the circumstances connected with your mother's marriage, and
the supposed death of your father. We think that it would be in
accordance with your mother's secret wishes that such an investigation
should be entered upon after her death, and we think that, in justice
to yourself, the mystery, if mystery there be, should be cleared up
and set at rest for ever."
"You have my full and entire sanction to whatever plan of proceeding
you may think most advisable," said Janet.
"In that case," resumed the major, "George here shall start for
Cumberland to-morrow morning, for it is there that our investigation
must begin. Father Spiridion and I are both old men. George is young,
active, and energetic, and imbued with a thorough zeal for the
furtherance of your interests. Have you sufficient confidence in him
to entrust your cause into his hands?"
"My cause could not be in safer keeping," said Janet with a blush and
a smile. "I already owe my life to Captain Strickland. To that
obligation he is now about to add another. How shall I ever be able to
repay him, and you, and dear Father Spiridion, the thousand kindnesses
I have received at your hands? Indeed, and indeed, I never can repay
you!"
Janet's eyes as she ceased speaking went up shyly to those of Captain
George. In the deep, earnest gaze of the young soldier she read
something that caused her to tremble and blush for the second time,
something that seemed to say, "There is one way, and one only, by
which you can repay me."
"Tut! tut! poverina mia," said the major, with a flourish of his
malacca, "we are all three your bounden slaves, and never so happy as
when we are fulfilling your behests. We will go back a part of the way
with you, only we must not let her ladyship's lynx eyes see us
together, or she will suspect that we are hatching some conspiracy.
Last time you were at my house I had some difficulty in gaining her
permission to allow you to come."
Captain George offered Janet his arm. The major walked beside them,
flourishing his cane, and talking on a score of different topics. So
they went slowly through the sunlit park, back towards gray old Dupley
Walls. George and Janet were mostly silent. What little they did say
was nearly all addressed to the major: they scarcely spoke a word
directly to each other. Still, strange to relate, they both afterwards
declared to themselves that they had never had a more delightful walk
in their lives.
Early next morning Captain Strickland started for Cumberland. There
was an unwonted feeling of sadness at his heart which he could not
overcome. He knew that if his quest were successful in the way his
uncle and Father Spiridion hoped it would be, he and Janet would in
all probability be farther divided than they were now. That is to say,
if Miss Holme's father should prove to have been a man of family, or
simply a very rich man, it was not improbable that his relatives might
wish to claim her, in which case she would be lost to him for ever;
and even the consolation of seeing her occasionally, on which he could
count so long as she remained at Dupley Walls, would be his no longer.
Such thoughts as these, however, would have no deterrent effect on his
actions. He was fully determined to do all that lay in his power to
bring the task that had been laid upon him to a successful issue. It
had been decided that should Captain Strickland's investigation bring
to light any facts in connexion with her father, which it would be
better for Janet's happiness and peace of mind that she should never
know, such facts should be carefully withheld from her. Major
Strickland and Father Spiridion reserved to themselves a certain
discretionary power as to what should be told her, and what had better
remain unsaid.
Before Captain Strickland had been two hours in Whitehaven he had
hunted out the little church where the marriage of Edmund Fairfax and
Helena Holme Pollexfen had been solemnized twenty years before. He
compared the certificate he had brought with him with the original
entry in the register, and he found them to tally in every particular.
He inquired here and there till he had ferreted out the daughter of
the woman who had been pew-opener at the church a quarter of a century
before, and had been one of the witnesses to the marriage; but the
woman herself had been dead a dozen years.
When he had got so far, Captain Strickland went back to his hotel and
ordered a bed for the night. Whitehaven could furnish him with no
further information. On the morrow he must go to Beckley. One
important point had been proved: that the certificate in his
possession was a bona fide copy of the register.
As soon as breakfast was over next morning he took a post-chaise and
was driven to Beckley. It was eleven miles away, but there was no
difficulty in finding the place. Since the date of Miss Pollexfen's
residence there, quite a little hamlet had sprung up close by in
connexion with some extensive iron-ore works which had now been in
operation for several years. Beckley Grange was now tenanted by the
manager of these works. Miss Bellenden, the aunt with whom Miss
Pollexfen had lived for so long a time, and from whose house she had
run away to get married, had been dead these eighteen years. Captain
Strickland was shown her tombstone in the village church.
He had not expected to pick up much information that would be of use
to him at Beckley; it can hardly therefore be said that he was
disappointed at finding every trace, except the epitaph, of a past
state of things so entirely swept away. There was not even an old
servant to be found, with a memory that would stretch back for a
quarter of a century, from whom he might have gathered some
reminiscences of Miss Pollexfen's life at Beckley, such as would have
had a special interest for Janet, although they might have had no
bearing whatever on the case he, Captain George, had in hand.
Sister Agnes, in her Confession, had made no mention by name of the
particular village or place at which Mr. Fairfax was staying at the
time he made her acquaintance. Consequently for Captain Strickland to
have gone inquiring among all the villages in the district respecting
a certain Mr. Fairfax who might or who might not have lived there for
a few weeks some twenty years ago, would have been an almost hopeless
task, and one that need not be resorted to till every other chance
should have failed. The person called Captain Laut in the Confession,
and he alone, if he were still alive, could clear up the mystery in a
few words.
The first point was, where to find Captain Laut. The second, whether,
when found, he would tell all that he was wanted to tell.
Captain Strickland left Whitehaven next day by express train for
Loudon. The first thing he did after reaching town was to deposit his
portmanteau at the station hotel and then take a Hansom to his old
club, the Janus, where he was sure to meet several brothers in the
profession of arms to whom he was well known. After dining he went to
consult some files of Army Lists. In a List twenty years old he found
the name of a Captain Laut as belonging to the two-hundred-and-fourth
regiment, at that time in garrison at Portsmouth.
Captain Strickland belonged to a younger generation of military men
than that which had been in vogue at the Janus twenty years
previously. But the father of one of his most particular friends was
not only an old military man, but an old club man and bon vivant into
the bargain--a man who knew something good or bad--generally the
latter--about everybody of note for the last quarter of a century. To
this gentleman went Captain George. After explaining that he wanted to
find out whether Captain Laut, who, twenty years previously, had
belonged to the two-hundred-and-fourth Foot, were still alive, and if
so where he could be found--he asked the favour of the old soldier's
advice and assistance.
After turning the matter over in his mind for two or three minutes,
the old gentleman said: "Put down on a slip of paper the particulars
of what you want to know, and leave the case in my hands. You shall
hear from me, one way or another, in the course of a few days."
Three days passed away without bringing any news, but on the morning
of the fourth Captain George found the following note at his club:
"Major Gregson presents his compliments to Captain Strickland, and
begs to inform him that Captain (afterwards Colonel) Lant, formerly of
the two-hundred-and-fourth Foot, is still living. Colonel Lant's
present residence is Higham Lodge, near Richmond, Surrey."
Captain George suffered no grass to grow under his feet. That very
afternoon he set out in quest of Higham Lodge. It was about two miles
from Richmond, and he found it without difficulty. The footman who
answered his ring told him that Colonel Lant was at home, but was only
just recovering from a dangerous attack of gastric fever, and would
hardly see any stranger at present. All the same, he would take
Captain Strickland's card to his master.
Presently he returned. Colonel Lant would see Captain Strickland. So
George followed the footman across the hall and up the wide shallow
staircase, and was ushered into the sick man's room.
"Good morning, sir," said Colonel Lant--a white-haired sharp-featured
man, with a brick-dust complexion that was somewhat toned down at
present by illness--"a brother in arms is always welcome. Had you
belonged to any other profession I had not seen you."
"I must apologize for my intrusion," said Captain Strickland. "Had I
been aware that you were ill I would have put off my visit till a
future date. My errand, in fact, is entirely of a private nature, and
is not so pressing but that it will stand over till another time. With
your permission, I will call upon you again this day week or
fortnight."
"Not a bit of it, my boy, not a bit of it," said the colonel. "Now
that you are here, we may as well cook your goose and have done with
you. May I inquire as to the particular object which has brought you
so far from town?"
"My object was to ask you whether, once upon a time--say twenty years
ago--you were acquainted with a gentleman of the name of Fairfax--Mr.
Edmund Fairfax, to be precise?"
The sick man coughed uneasily, raised himself on one elbow, and stared
fixedly at his visitor. "And pray, sir, what may be your object in
asking such a question?" he said at length.
"That I will tell you presently," answered Captain George. "May I
assume that you were acquainted with Mr. Edmund Fairfax?"
"You may assume what the deuce you like, sir," answered the peppery
colonel. "It seems to me that there is a great deal too much
assumption about you. But go on. What are you driving at next?"
"The Mr. Edmund Fairfax to whom I allude, was married at Whitehaven to
a certain young lady, Miss Pollexfen by name. If I am rightly
informed, you were a witness to that marriage. Mr. Fairfax and his
wife went abroad. A year later, Mr. Fairfax was unfortunately drowned
in one of the Swiss lakes. You were the bearer of the news of his
death to his widow, who shortly after that event returned to England.
I hope, sir, that you follow me thus far?"
"Oh, I follow you easily enough, never fear!" replied the irascible
old soldier. "You tell your tale as glibly as if you had learnt it by
heart beforehand. But you have not done yet. When you have come to an
end, I may, perhaps, question the truth of your statements in toto."
"From the date of her arrival in England up to the time of her death,
which event happened a few weeks ago, Mrs. Fairfax lived in the utmost
seclusion--in fact, she lived under an assumed name. But, sir, she had
a daughter. That daughter is now grown up, and is acquainted with her
mother's story. It is as her advocate that I am here to-day."
"A youthful Daniel come to judgment!" sneered the colonel. "Well, sir,
granting for the sake of argument that there may be some slight
residuum of truth in what you have just told me--what then? You have
something still in the background."
"Simply this, Colonel Lant. Mrs. Fairfax never knew, nor beyond a few
questions put to you on a certain occasion did she ever seek to know,
anything concerning the antecedents and social position of her
husband. When once her husband was lost to her, all minor
considerations were regarded with perfect indifference. But as
respects Miss Fairfax, the case is very different. Those who have her
interests most at heart--that is to say, my uncle, Major Strickland,
and another old friend of Mrs. Fairfax, who is associated with him in
this matter--are naturally anxious that Miss Fairfax should no longer
be left in doubt as to her parentage and proper position in the world.
I am their envoy to you. You alone can tell them where and how to look
for that which they want to find."
"And so pretty Mrs. Fairfax is dead," said the colonel after a pause.
"Ay! ay! each of us must go in turn. I had a narrow squeak myself a
few days ago, I can tell you. Sweet Mrs. Fairfax! and dead, you say?
Twenty years have gone by since I saw her last; but I have often
thought about her, and always as being young and pretty. I never could
think of her as touched by Time's finger: as having grey hair, and
wrinkles, and all that, you know. For ever sweet and young. I was half
in love with her myself, and should have been wholly so had not
Fairfax been beforehand with me. But she was far away too good for
him, and for me too, for that matter. And now, dead!"
Colonel Lant had wandered so far back into the past that he was near
forgetting the presence of Captain Strickland. The latter sat without
speaking. The sick man's half-conscious revelations were sufficient to
prove that he was on the right track. At length the colonel came back
with a sigh and a start to the practical present.
"A daughter, did you not say--a grown-up daughter? Dear me! And in the
interests of this daughter you want to know something about the
antecedents and history of Ned Fairfax. Well! well! it was a bad piece
of business, and some reparation is certainly due."
"I tell you, sir, that some reparation is certainly due," re-asserted
the colonel, in his most peppery style. "And I'll e'en make a clean
breast of it while I've a chance of doing so--though, mind you,
whether Ned Fairfax would approve of such a step on my part, is more
than I can say. Probably he wouldn't. But that don't matter. If he
knew I lay dying, he would not trouble himself to come twenty miles to
see me. Then why should I study his interests so particularly? I may
tell you, Captain What's-your-name, in confidence, mind, that when I
lay here a few days ago, so ill that I was doubtful whether I should
ever get round again, this very business of which we have been
talking, and of which as yet you don't know all the particulars, stood
out very black in my memory, and troubled my mind not a little. Now,
I'm not going to die this time, but while I've the chance I'll rub out
that little score, so that when my Black Monday really does come, it
may not crop up against me for the second time, and stare me in the
face with the ugly look of an unrepented wrong."
Captain George sat without speaking. It was quite evident to him that
Colonel Lant was one of those people who love to hear themselves talk,
but who pay small regard to the wishes or opinions of others. Left to
himself, the colonel would probably let fall more valuable information
of his own accord than could be elicited from him by the keenest
cross-examination.
"An ugly piece of business!" resumed the colonel. "Many a time since
then have I felt sorry that I allowed myself to be talked into doing
what I did by Ned Fairfax's plausible tongue. For one thing, I owed
him money at that time, and he might have made it hot for me had I
refused to comply with his wishes. The marriage itself was all right
and proper, but the story of the drowning in one of the Swiss lakes
was a pure forgery. You may well look surprised. Ned Fairfax was no
more drowned than I was: in fact, to my certain knowledge he was alive
only three months ago."
The colonel paused to refresh himself with a pinch of snuff, and then
went on again. "When Edmund Fairfax married Miss Pollexfen, the fact
of such a ceremony having taken place was most jealously guarded from
all his people. His expectations at that juncture might be said to
depend upon his remaining a bachelor. But he saw Miss Pollexfen and
fell in love with her, and he was not a man to let anything thwart him
in the gratification of his likes or dislikes. He married Miss
Pollexfen and risked the future. All went well with the young couple
for a year or more. They lived a quiet, secluded life, and were
tolerably happy: not that Fairfax was a man who would have been happy
for any length of time in the quiet trammels of domestic life. But he
had not had time to get thoroughly tired before the thunder-cloud
burst. He was summoned back to England by his uncle, to marry the
young lady, a great heiress, who had been set down for him in the
family programme. The predicament was an awkward one, but Fairfax was
equal to the occasion. At that time he was close upon five-and-twenty
years of age. He had spent one fortune already, and he was booked to
come into another on his twenty-fifth birthday. He would come into
another, that is, provided he were willing to change his name from
Fairfax to that of the old lady, a distant relation, by whom the
fortune was bequeathed. Fairfax had no foolish predilection for one
name over another when there was money to be got by the change. His
plan was to come to England, leaving his first wife abroad; to wait
for the birthday which would at once give him a fortune and allow him
to change his name; after that to marry the heiress with all
convenient speed. The story of his death was cleverly concocted, and,
with my assistance, as cleverly carried out. Mrs. Fairfax believed the
story, and Ned knew her gentle nature too well to fear that she would
ever make any inquiry as to his history or family, they being topics
on which he had declined to enlighten her when he was supposed to be
alive. The result of the plot as regards Mrs. Fairfax, you probably
know better than I do. She accepted her fate, and disappeared from her
husband's path, which was precisely what he wanted. The result as
regarded Fairfax himself was something different from his
expectations. He changed his name, and he came into his fortune, but
his bride that was to have been, died two months before the day fixed
for the wedding. Fairfax bore his loss with great equanimity. He
smoked more cigars than before, and bought a commission in a marching
regiment. A few months later he was ordered out to India. Before
leaving Europe he set on foot a private inquiry, having for its object
the discovery of the whereabouts of Mrs. Fairfax. But the inquiry
elicited nothing beyond its own heavy expenses, and it is possible
that Fairfax was quite as well pleased that it did not.
"Well, sir, my friend Edmund proceeded to India, and there he remained
for several years. He worked himself up to a captaincy, and he might
have done exceedingly well had not the cursed spirit of gambling eaten
into his very soul. But he was and is a born gambler, and will be so
till the end of the chapter. He would gamble for the nails in his own
coffin if he had nothing else to play for. His second fortune went as
his first had gone. Just as he was on the verge of ruin some
unpleasantness in connexion with a gambling transaction induced him to
sell out and return to England. Since that time how he has contrived
to live and appear like a gentleman is a problem best known to
himself. And now, sir, I think I have told you all that it concerns
you to know respecting my friend Mr. Edmund Fairfax."
"All but one thing, Colonel Lant, and that a most essential one."
"What is it?"
"You state that Mr. Fairfax changed his name some time after his
marriage with Miss Pollexfen. By what name is he now known?"
"He is known as Captain Edmund Ducie, and his London address when I
last heard from him was 2A, Tremaine-street, Piccadilly."
These particulars were duly taken down by Captain Strickland in his
pocket-book. It must be borne in mind that the name of Ducie sounded
quite strange in his ears. He had never heard mention of the Great
Mogul Diamond.
"As I said before, I don't know whether my friend Fairfax, or rather
Ducie, would altogether approve of my telling you so much of his
history and private affairs," said the colonel; "but I don't care
greatly whether he approves or does the other thing. I've eased my
mind of a burden, the weight of which I have felt several times of
late; and since there is a child, it is only right that she should
know her father."
After some further conversation, in the course of which he elicited
from the old soldier sundry minor particulars having reference to his
errand, Captain Strickland took his leave and returned to town.
The day was still early, and George drove direct from the terminus to
2A, Tremaine-street, Piccadilly. But Captain Ducie had removed from
Tremaine-street nearly two years ago, and George was directed to a
much humbler locality but no great distance away. Here the rooms were
still held in Captain Ducie's name, so George was told, but the
captain himself had not been seen there for nearly six months. The
gentleman had better go down to the Piebalds, which used to be Captain
Ducie's club, and there he might perhaps learn where the latter was
now living. So spake the janitress, and to the Piebalds Captain
Strickland repaired.
Here Here he got what he wanted when the porter had "taken stock" of
him, and had satisfied himself that he could not possibly be a dun.
Captain Ducie's present address, he was told, was the Royal George
Hotel, St. Helier, Jersey.
That night's post took a long letter addressed to Major Strickland.
George waited in London for an answer to it. One came sooner than he
expected. It was in the shape of a telegram:--
"Start for Jersey at once. I will write to you there by next post."