A FACE AT THE WINDOW.
Colonel Dacre waited for half an hour, hoping Lady Gwendolyn would
return; but when the time passed, and there was still no sign of her,
he concluded that she did not want to see him again that morning,
and went back to his hotel. All day long he expected that she would
send him a little note, telling him when he might call again; but his
patience was not rewarded. The hours dragged wearily, but they passed,
bringing the cool, sweet eventide, when the tired flowers went to sleep
under their sheltering leaves, and even the busy bees were abed.
“She will send or come now,” he said to himself, believing that
the lady of his love had too much independence of spirit to regard
conventionalities; he sat at the open window, waiting still, and still
in vain.
When the clock struck eight he decided that she intended him to seek
her, and went over to the Grange. Old Hannah answered his impatient
knock, and, in reply to his question, said, quietly, that Lady
Gwendolyn was gone.
“Gone!” echoed Colonel Dacre. “I am sure she could not have left
without my seeing her.”
“I don’t know whether you saw her or not, sir,” continued the woman,
with perfect civility. “But she really is gone.”
“She did not leave any letter for me, then?”
“Not as I know, sir; but perhaps you would like to step into the
drawing-room and see?”
Colonel Dacre accepted this offer eagerly.
Old Hannah stood at the door, and watched him as he turned over the
books, and even looked into the vases on the mantelpiece, coming back
to her, at last, with a very disappointed air.
“Perhaps Lady Gwendolyn has written by the post,” he said. “I hardly
think she would have left Turoy without giving me notice.”
“Why?” said the woman calmly.
This was a straightforward question, undoubtedly, and only required
a straightforward answer; but the Sphinx’s riddle could hardly have
puzzled Colonel Dacre more.
He had to ponder a long time before he answered.
“Well,” he said, at last, “I have had the honor of knowing her ladyship
for some time.”
“Oh!”
“And I am one of her brother’s best friends.”
“Humph!”
“And--and----”
Here he stopped short. Old Hannah’s responses were so short and
unsympathetic that they checked his fluency.
“Is there anything more you want, sir?” inquired old Hannah, with
exasperating tranquillity; “because, if not, me and my husband would be
glad to go to bed. We aren’t accustomed to late hours, like fashionable
folks.”
Colonel Dacre slipped a couple of half-crown pieces into her hand.
“Put those under your pillow, to make you sleep,” he said.
Old Hannah turned them over two or three times, and then handed them
back, resolutely and reluctantly.
“I don’t care for money I haven’t earned,” she said. “When people seek
to bribe you, you’re an idiot if you don’t guess what they mean. You
want to know where my mistress is gone, and you fancy I can tell you;
but I can’t, and, if I could, I wouldn’t. I don’t need instructing just
when to hold my tongue.”
Colonel Dacre looked baffled and annoyed, although he felt that the
woman was right.
“It’s a pity you make so much mystery about Lady Gwendolyn’s
movements,” he said. “Secrecy always excites suspicion.”
“I have never knew the person yet who ever dared to suspect my
mistress,” she answered proudly. “Anyhow, nobody can tell what they
don’t know. Her ladyship left about five o’clock this evening, and it
warn’t my place to ask where she was going. If it had been necessary
for me to know, she would have told me, of course.”
“What orders did she give about forwarding her letters, then?”
“None, sir. My husband did venture to ask her that question, but she
told him she did not expect any.”
Colonel Dacre began to understand, at last, that Lady Gwendolyn was
fleeing from a temptation she could not resist, and an expression of
triumph darkened his handsome eyes. When he found her he would command
rather than plead, for she belonged to him by right of their mutual
love.
He was so absorbed in this thought that he quite forgot where he was,
until old Hannah inquired, tartly, if he was going to stay all night,
when he apologized with a pleasant laugh and said, as he proffered the
two half-crowns again:
“You may accept them with a clear conscience now, for you have fairly
earned them. I would give twenty pounds myself gladly for an hour of
good, honest, tranquil sleep, such as I have deprived you of.”
“La! sir,” said old Hannah; “then why don’t you go home and go to bed
at once?”
“Because it would be of no use. I should only turn and toss about until
morning.”
“How funny! I never turn until I turn out of bed. Perhaps you’ve got
something on your mind, sir. There was Joshua Billing, in our village,
who murdered his wife; he was that miserable he couldn’t lay of nights,
and got up and hanged hisself at last, leaving a letter to say that his
wife haunted him, so he couldn’t abide his life.”
“Anyhow, I haven’t murdered my wife,” said Colonel Dacre, in spite of
himself. “The fact is, I haven’t a wife to murder.”
“Ah! poor gentleman, that accounts for your looking so bad!” returned
Hannah, who had the fullest faith in matrimony. “My husband would be a
dreadful poor creature without me.”
“I see, I must get married at once,” observed Colonel Dacre, as he
stepped out into the twilight, feeling, as old Hannah expressed it, a
very poor creature, indeed, without this woman who had grown to be the
light and savor of his life.
He asked discreet questions at the railway station, but the one
solitary porter declared that no lady had come there that day.
“In fact, sir,” he said, pocketing Colonel Dacre’s half-crown, as if
such munificence staggered him, “we have no ladies, as a rule. Our
station was made principally for market fellows and farmers. When we
haven’t no passengers we signal, and the train doesn’t stop.”
“How often have they stopped here to-day?”
“Twice, sir.”
“And were there many passengers on these two occasions?”
“There was one lady for the twelve-o’clock express, and that was all.”
“What was this lady like?”
“Rather stout, sir. Judging by the flour on her face, I should say she
was a miller’s daughter; judging by her dress, I should say she was a
duchess.”
“How did she come?”
“In Lady Lenox’s wagonette.”
“Oh!” said Colonel Dacre, and took a ticket for the next station.
“It’s the late parliamentary, sir,” observed the porter; “but perhaps
you don’t mind.”
“Not at all. I am not going far.”
“You’ll find Bearstead a very out-of-the-way place, sir,” pursued the
porter warningly. “There’s only one hotel, and that’s not at all the
style of thing for a gentleman like you.”
“You need not be anxious about me, I sha’n’t remain all night. Is that
the train now?”
“Yes, sir.”
Just as it drew up along the platform, a lady in black, deeply veiled,
stepped hurriedly into the station, and said something to the porter in
a low voice, no doubt slipping a small coin into his hand at the same
time, for he began to bestir himself at once.
Colonel Dacre was standing close to him when he labeled the lady’s
boxes, and found that she was going to Preston, like himself.
As he was not in the mood for conversation, and knew no woman could
possibly keep quiet for three mortal hours, he decided to get into a
smoking-carriage.
He thought he had taken his precautions, and was congratulating himself
upon his forethought, when the porter threw open the door of the very
carriage in which he had ensconced himself, saying, civilly:
“Now, ma’am, if you please.”
“But this is a smoking-carriage, porter,” interrupted Colonel Dacre.
“All right, sir; that’s what the lady wants,” he answered, somewhat
disenchanted, but still deferential, as he handed her in, and put her
bag and dressing-case in the seat beside her.
“I hope I don’t inconvenience you,” the lady began, then stopped short,
and held out her hand. “Why, Lawrence, it is actually you! What an
unmitigated piece of good luck!”
And she threw up her veil, and showed the handsome but bold features of
Mrs. O’Hara.
Colonel Dacre had always felt kindly toward Mrs. O’Hara, in spite of
her many faults and indiscretions, and, indeed, during her married life
she had been exceedingly popular in the regiment, on account of her
unaffected good nature. Colonel Dacre remembered what she had been, and
forgot what she was, so that he always found a cordial greeting for her
when they came together. Their hands met in a warm grasp.
“You can’t think how glad I am to have some one to talk to,” she said,
her eyes suddenly clouding with tears. “You have heard of my poor
brother’s sad death?”
“To tell you the truth, Norah, I never knew you had a brother.”
“No; well, it was no use telling everybody,” she answered, with some
embarrassment. “He did not go on quite as one could have wished, and of
course it would have annoyed Jack to have George talked about as his
brother-in-law.”
“But after your husband’s death?”
“Then it would have looked odd, surely, to have suddenly announced that
I had a brother, as nobody had ever heard of him before.”
“You know, Norah, I always think honesty the best policy.”
“I started with the same notion, but I found out it did not do,”
returned Mrs. O’Hara sadly. “All the women are against me now, because
they say I am so gushing that I talk about the first thing that comes
into my head, and so lead men away from their wives.”
“Yes; I have heard you accused of that, certainly,” interrupted Colonel
Dacre, remembering the accusation Lady Gwendolyn had made. “There was
Percy Gray, for instance.”
Mrs. O’Hara blushed vividly.
“As you say that honesty is the best policy, I will admit I did behave
rather unwisely there. The fact was, Lady Maria brought what happened
entirely on herself. Percy Gray hadn’t the faintest idea of falling in
love with me, until she put it into his head; but--would you believe
it?--when he was going to Norway fishing, she accused him of intending
to elope with me. The consequence was that he couldn’t bear Lady Maria
to tell a falsehood, and he came off at once and asked me to put her in
the right.”
“And what did you do?”
“Ask Percy,” she returned dryly. “You know they used to say in the
regiment that Norah O’Hara liked a piece of fun as well as anybody; but
she’d make you remember it if you went an inch too far. And, to do them
justice, our boys were all gentlemen.”
“Nevertheless, you weren’t always wise, Norah. I used to wonder often
that Jack stood it.”
“We understood each other so well,” she answered, her eyes clouding
again. “I can honestly declare that I never had even a thought that
wasn’t true to him from the first to the last day of our married life.”
There was a minute’s silence, and then she added tearfully:
“I wish you would tell me how it really happened, Lawrence. Lady Lenox
was so very ambiguous and mysterious, and though she means to save
me pain, I dare say, I always prefer to know the truth. She hinted
something about Lady Gwendolyn St. Maur, and another gentleman being
jealous of poor George; but I could not make anything of her story, and
she would not explain.”
“Look here, Norah,” he answered, with grave impressiveness. “Your
brother is dead, and nothing can call him back now. Take my advice,
and do not seek to know anything more, since it would only add to your
distress.”
“Not if I could avenge him?”
“That would be a terrible task for a woman.”
“Not at all. I should like it. Indeed, if I could find out that my
brother had met with foul play, I would hunt his murderer down, even if
he were the best friend I had ever had.”
“The game is not worth the candle, Norah.”
“I think so, at any rate, and am going to Preston on purpose to consult
a very clever lawyer there, whom Lady Lenox recommended to me. Poor
George left me all he had, so that I shall be able to pursue the
matter, if Mr. Barnard advises me to do so.”
“And supposing you were to help destroy an innocent person?”
“No fear of that. I am not quite a stupid, Lawrence. And to show you I
am not, I may just say that I don’t believe Lady Gwendolyn St. Maur had
anything whatever to do with my poor brother’s death.”
Colonel Dacre could hardly restrain himself from seizing her hand,
and covering it with kisses, by way of showing his gratitude for this
speech.
“I don’t fancy he even knew her,” pursued Mrs. O’Hara decidedly. “But
listen to me, Lawrence, beware always of a cold-blooded coquette.
You have been lecturing me for my bad behavior, but I can assure you
that I am as harmless as a dove in comparison with a woman like that.
A cold-blooded coquette only cares for herself, and after having
encouraged a man for her amusement, dismisses him with a sneer the
moment his passion becomes dangerous, inconvenient, or stands in the
way of a new conquest. Whereas, I am such a poor, foolish thing, that I
always grow quite fond of a man who has been spooning me a week or two,
and cry when I bid him good-by.”
“I honestly believe you are not half as bad as you seem,” returned
Colonel Dacre, with a faint smile. “But tell me, Norah--you know it
will not go any further--have you the least reason for suspecting any
one of having caused your brother’s death?”
“If so, I have no right to speak of my suspicion,” she replied, with
a reticence that surprised him; it was so entirely foreign to her
character. “Come and see me at the ‘Langham’ a week hence, and I may be
able to tell you something. But here we are at Preston.”
He helped her down, and they were standing rather close together, her
hand in his as he bade her good-by, and expressed his hope that she
would apply to him if she required any assistance, when a veiled face
bent eagerly out of the window in the full light of a lamp. A gust of
wind lifted the gauze just as the train began to move, and the woman
drew back hastily; but not before Colonel Dacre had recognized Lady
Gwendolyn.