The young man himself was resigned, quiet, dignified. Only the
trembling of his lip as he turned to speak to his wife betrayed the
terrible strain.
Audrey was flushed, bright of eye, strangely composed of manner.
“I’m going,” she said in a low voice, “straight to Victoria Street.
I’ve been thinking it all over--all night I was thinking--thinking--of
what there was to be done--and I know that you will want some one
to--to----”
“I see. To be bail for me?”
“Yes. I’ll go to Mr. Candover.”
“But he was going to Paris!” objected Gerard, with a frown. He did not
like his wife to go on this errand. “He will have started by this
time.”
“It’s early yet,” retorted Audrey. “At any rate I must try.”
The energy and spirit she displayed put some heart into her husband,
and their parting was very quiet, very composed. Within half an hour
Audrey was at Mr. Candover’s flat, only to find, however, that he was
already on his way to Paris. His secretary, Durley Diggs, a little
keen-eyed American with green and gold teeth, asked if he could do
anything for her.
“Yes,” said Audrey promptly. “My husband has been arrested on a charge
of fraud. Mr. Candover knows all about it, and told me to come to you
if I wanted help. Now I suppose they will want bail, and I want you to
find it.”
Mr. Diggs was very courteous, very business-like, very anxious to be
of use. But Audrey was keen enough to see that he did not want to do
this thing. But she insisted so steadily, refused so persistently to
listen to his various excuses, that finally he said suddenly: “I’ll
see if the duchess will do it,” and, seizing his hat, was going to
rush out, when she insisted upon accompanying him.
“I’ve got to go out to Epsom. Madame de Vicenza lives at ‘The Briars,’
a big house out there,” objected Diggs, disconcerted by her
persistency.
“Well, I’ll go with you. I can explain better than you, can’t I?”
He was overpowered by her determination, and together they went down
to Epsom, drove to “The Briars,” which was a large, stately old house
standing secluded in its own grounds, where Audrey waited downstairs
while Durley Diggs was escorted into the presence of the duchess, as
she supposed.
He came down again in the company of a tall, shambling man with round
shoulders and a protruding jaw, whom he introduced as Mr. Johnson, the
duchess’s steward. And this gentleman having stated that he was
prepared to give any undertaking on the part of the duchess which
might be necessary, to serve any friend of Mr. Candover’s, they all
three went back to town, and to the Guildhall, where they found, as
Audrey had expected, that bail for Gerard was wanted to the amount of
two hundred pounds.
Her two companions having satisfied the magistrate, the necessary
formalities were entered into, and Gerard and his wife were free to
leave the court together.
Audrey was struck by the terrible change which a few hours had made in
her husband. That morning he had been anxious indeed, worried,
puzzled, distressed beyond measure by the situation in which he found
himself. But now she saw at once that his position must be worse than
she had supposed.
For in place of anxiety, she saw in his eyes despair, instead of being
worried and irritable, he was bowed down by a terrible weight of
depression which no tender words, no gentle caresses, no loving looks
could remove.
“Gerard, Gerard,” whispered she in a passionate outburst of misery and
longing to help, when they were in the close cab he insisted on
taking, “what is it, dear? What have you heard that makes you so
wretched?”
He turned his heavy eyes towards her; he was oppressed, stupefied by
the weight of the calamity which had fallen upon him.
“I’ve found out,” said he hoarsely, “that there’s something more in
all this than we thought. This is no ordinary theft. There’s a
conspiracy to ruin me--Heaven knows why. A man has sworn that I gave
him one of the cheques to get cashed, and that he gave me the money.”
Audrey stared incredulously.
“But you can disprove that, can’t you?” she said.
“I can deny it; I have denied it, I shall go on denying it. But as for
disproving it, there’s only my word against his, and the question is
which of us will be believed.”
“And who is the wretch who says this awful thing?”
“A man whom I’ve known by sight and to speak to, for a long time I
never heard his name or knew who he was till to-day. It appears his
name is Gossett, and he’s a solicitor’s clerk. What it all means or
how it has all come about, I don’t know. But I feel as if a net had
been spread for my feet, that it’s tightening, and that there is no
escape.”
Audrey’s brave heart quailed. She, too, had vague suspicions that they
must have unseen enemies, to find themselves so suddenly in such a sea
of difficulties. But she would not let her fears appear. She affected
to laugh at his despair, to feel sure that all that was needed was a
good solicitor and a clever counsel to find out the truth and to set
everything right. But it was excitement and not hope that kept her
spirits so high, and that dried up the tears that it would have done
her good to let flow.
The horrible fear was stealing into her heart too that all their
efforts might not be enough to save her darling husband from the fate
that threatened him.
It was the mystery which hung over every step of the great crime which
had been committed which paralysed their brains and stupefied them.
Who was the culprit who had stolen the cheques? When had the theft
been committed? Was this man Gossett the thief and forger?
Audrey, however, recognised at once that their own brains were not
clever enough to solve the puzzle, and she would be content with
nothing less than the very best legal advice.
“If it costs every shilling we have in the world, Gerard,” said she,
“we can afford nothing less than the best brains in England.”
She had not exaggerated the difficulties they had to contend with. Not
only the eminent firm of solicitors they consulted, but the counsel
whom they employed, admitted the amazing nature of the case. Nay, the
poor young couple both felt vaguely, though they would scarcely
acknowledge it to each other, that the questions Gerard had to answer
pointed to the fact that even his own lawyers suspected him of having
been concerned in the theft and in the forgery.
Gerard had received a large number of letters from Sir Richmond, so
that he was well acquainted with his handwriting and signature. While
the most searching inquiries failed to elicit the fact of any person’s
having had access to the cheque-book with the exception of Gerard and
Sir Richmond himself.
Moreover, the man Gossett, who was prepared to swear that Gerard had
asked him to take one of the cheques to be cashed, was proved to be a
man against whom nothing was known except that he occasionally drank
to excess; he lived simply in lodgings off the Tottenham Court Road,
and had not been known to indulge in any expense since the date of the
cashing of the cheque.
His story was that he had long known Gerard Angmering by sight but not
by name, through frequenting the same luncheon-bar. He had often
spoken to him, though he had no idea that he belonged to the Bank of
the Old Country and Colonies. When the young man had asked him to cash
a cheque for him at that bank, Gossett asserted that he agreed to do
so, without any thought of harm; that he brought the money in gold and
notes to Gerard, who was waiting for him outside Stott’s, the
luncheon-bar in question. He further alleged that he had received
nothing for his trouble, and that he had thought nothing further of it
until he was challenged by one of the senior clerks in the bank, who
happened to meet him in the street in that neighbourhood, as the man
who had cashed the cheque.
That was the whole sum and substance of the information at the
disposal of both sides. The cheque had been made payable to Joseph
Partridge, “to order,” and the amount was seven hundred and sixty-five
pounds. This had been paid in gold and notes, but not one of the notes
had been traced.
Gerard denied the whole story of the man Gossett as a fabrication from
beginning to end. But there was this fact against him, that, whereas
there was no sign whatever that Gossett had been spending money freely
or that he betted or was addicted to suspicious company, Gerard and
his wife, on the other hand, had undoubtedly been living somewhat
beyond their means, that they had got into debt, and that they were
being harassed by creditors.
While a more condemnatory fact still came out in the fact that the
young clerk and his wife had been at the Epsom Spring Meeting with
some friends, and that Gerard, while denying that he had had any but
trifling bets, admitted that he had lost money there.
Moreover, no such person as “Joseph Partridge” was to be found or
heard of; and the other two cheques, details of the cashing of which
were not so complete, were both made out in names equally impossible
to trace to any actual person.
It was a foregone conclusion that the case would have to go to trial,
and when the eve of the fateful day arrived, the depression and
certainty of his conviction grew so strongly upon poor Gerard that
Audrey, who remained outwardly calm and brave by a great effort,
followed him about from room to room, with an appalling fear at her
heart that he would never face the ordeal.
At last he turned suddenly to face her, and his haggard eyes, with all
the boyish light gone out of them, looked dismally into her anxious,
loving face.
“Why do you follow me?” he asked abruptly.
She tried to answer.
“Because--because----”
Then at last she broke down, and for the very first time in all those
dreadful days she let herself go in a violent passion of weeping.
Gerard sat down in a low arm-chair, and strained her to him.
“My girl, my own darling,” he whispered hoarsely, “I know what is in
your mind. But you’re wrong, Audrey, you’re wrong, my dear. I shall go
through with it, and listen, it’s all up with me. We don’t know how or
why, but we’re marked, and hunted down, and done for. I shall have to
go to prison, and you--Oh, Audrey, that’s what breaks my heart--you,
_you_! I’ve got to leave you, and I don’t in the least know what I’m
leaving you exposed to. For since this awful thing has happened, how
can we feel safe for a minute? How can I know what will happen to you,
when you haven’t got me to take care of you? Oh, Audrey, Audrey, I
wish we could both die to-night!”
And he broke down into violent sobs upon his wife’s breast.
As he broke down, however, she regained command of herself. The fears
which possessed him, indeed, were present to her mind also. The very
mystery which surrounded the crime which had been committed against
Gerard filled her with dread of what might be in store. But this,
after all, was but a small matter compared with that terrible parting
which seemed to the young husband and wife, lovers still, like the
very wrenching of body and soul asunder.
She laid her hand over his mouth to stop him.
“Don’t,” she whispered. “It’s wicked to say that. We must go through
with it, even if the worst comes.”
“The worst! Audrey, I’ll tell you what the worst is: it’s the thought
of your being left alone. Will you be true to me? Will you, will you?
You’re so beautiful that you will be tempted to forget me. Oh, I know!
Other men will make love to you, and it will be hard, harder than you
think, to stand out.”
Audrey made no indignant answer. She only pressed his curly head
against her breast and just whispered, “Trust me, dear.”
The trial was a short one. Accused of forging Sir Richmond’s signature
to a cheque, and of fraudulently obtaining the sum of seven hundred
and sixty-five pounds, Gerard pleaded “Not guilty” in vain. No
evidence of any value could be produced in support of his plea, and in
spite of the eloquence of his counsel, who seemed indeed to plead
rather for his youth than for his innocence, he was sentenced to a
term which was looked upon in the circumstances as a light one, three
years’ penal servitude.
As the sentence was pronounced a cry, not loud but piercing, rang
through the court. And Gerard, recognising the voice of his wife,
turned, clutching the rail in front of him, and cast one agonised look
around.
He saw Audrey, and his face, which had been deadly pale, grew livid
and ghastly, while his eyes seemed to start out of his head with a
sudden access of suspicion and rage.
For the half-fainting Audrey was supported by the arms of a handsome,
well-dressed man, who hung over her solicitously, tenderly.
And the man was Reginald Candover, Gerard’s best friend.