In the first moment of this unexpected meeting, Audrey, still with
nerves strung up by the recent interview with Sir Barnaby and the
unpleasant associations called up by his words, could find nothing but
relief and comfort and joy in her husband’s presence.
He, on his side, kissed her tenderly, whispered to her to hold up her
head and pull herself together, and tried to make her realise how
inopportune this weakness was.
She struggled to regain the self-command she had lost, and looking
eagerly, pitifully into his face, whispered:--
“You’re not angry with me? I thought--I was afraid--you would be.”
“I’m angry, very angry, at being kept out on the stairs,” replied
Gerard, with a touch of the old boyish humour which went to her heart
like a stab.
She tried to smile, but her face quivered.
“I can’t take you in there--among all those giggling, whispering
girls,” she said, under her breath. “Come in here.”
And very quietly, almost on tiptoe, she led him down to the second
landing and into her own room.
There she gave way again, and throwing herself face downwards on the
sofa by the small fire, she burst into a passion of tears.
It was in vain he scolded her, tried to comfort her.
“Are you sorry I’ve come?” asked he at last, as, kneeling beside her,
he put his head against her shoulder and tried to look into her
tear-blurred face. “Don’t you feel glad to think you’ve got me back
again to take care of you, to save you from scenes like that, and from
having to be civil to a lot of gouty old idiots like the one I saw
hobbling downstairs?”
Audrey sprang up, and peered into his face. Then she drew a long,
sobbing breath of relief.
“Oh,” she cried, “thank Heaven, thank Heaven you take it like that!
That you’re not angry! I--I was so afraid you wouldn’t understand!”
Gerard, whose own eyes were moist, looked into her face.
“My poor girl,” he said, “I’ve never had a thought--since I first
heard--three hours ago--of what you’ve gone through, but to thank
Heaven that I can take care of you again!”
“What have you heard?” asked Audrey quickly.
“Everything, I fancy. Of the infamous way in which that rascal
Candover----”
“Sh--sh!” Audrey put her hand on her husband’s mouth. And she
whispered in his ear: “If you know so much, you _do_ know everything!
Or everything that matters! But to find you taking my part--when I was
afraid--when I was dreading what you’d say, what you’d think--oh,
Gerard, Gerard, I can scarcely believe it!”
She was sobbing hysterically, feeling the relief of this great and
unlooked-for comfort, this joy which she had not dared to hope for.
Gerard, Gerard whose passionate anger she had been dreading, had only
one thought, one idea, that he could take care of her again.
Presently she grew calmer, and nestling close to him on the sofa,
whispered to him to tell her exactly what he knew, and how he had
found her. He told her how his two cousins had arrived at Lord
Clanfield’s that morning and what they had said; how they had given
their account of the scene in which she accused her gambling guests,
and how Lord Clanfield had recorded his first interview with her, and
how he, Gerard, had listened quietly, and simply made up his mind to
go to her without delay.
“I found out this address from Geoffrey,” he went on, “without telling
him I meant to come to you. And then I set out at once, not saying a
word to anybody, and I caught the first train I could and came
straight here. And now you have to put me up, for I don’t mean to
leave you again. You dear little goose, you can’t keep out of mischief
without me!”
But though he spoke as lightly as possible, and tried in every way to
soothe and calm her, she saw by the frown on his face, by his uneasy
glances at the door, that all the while he was no more at ease than
she was. And Audrey clasped his hand tightly in hers and whispered:--
“Did you ever have any doubts about him, about Mr. Candover, Gerard?”
“Yes,” answered he in the same tone. “Often. When I was alone--such
awful loneliness, Audrey, I can’t talk about it yet!--I used to wonder
whether this selfish man of pleasure would really be a safe,
trustworthy friend. And I used to go very nearly mad with jealousy,
wondering whether he would--would--Tell me, Audrey, did he make love
to you?”
She nodded, shuddering.
“The scoundrel!” said Gerard between his clenched teeth.
She drew closer to him.
“There’s something more to tell you about him than that!”
“I know! He encouraged you to take this house at Epsom and let people
think that you kept a sort of gambling club.”
“Oh, Gerard, there’s worse to be told than that.” His grasp tightened
upon her hand, and a look so piteous came into his eyes that she
hurried on: “They cheated there, they cheated at cards, Gerard,
and--I’m sure--I _know_--that Mr. Candover was concerned in it.”
This speech, in spite of all that he had feared, had guessed, came
upon the young man with a great shock. That the rich, prosperous,
easy-going, fascinating Mr. Candover should make love to his beautiful
wife, was no surprise; it was what he had feared. But that he should
be involved in such a nefarious business as card-sharping seemed too
preposterous. He looked at Audrey as if he doubted her perfect sanity.
“Oh, I knew what you’d say, what you’d think,” whispered she, putting
one arm round his neck, and lowering her voice still more, as if the
very walls might have ears. “And I knew you wouldn’t believe. But when
you hear all I have to tell you, I think you’ll say I’m right.”
Then, still in the same subdued tones, still clinging to him, she
told--incoherently enough, but yet intelligibly to his sympathetic
ears--the whole story of her being induced to take the business and to
pay for it, and to assume the trade name of Rocada. She told the
ghastly story of the lady in white, and of her mysterious
disappearance without leaving even a trace for the doctor’s eye to
discover. She told of her being induced to take “The Briars,” of her
uneasiness there, of the episodes of Diggs and of Johnson, and then of
her flight to town.
“Now,” she said impressively, “they--he and the woman who I am sure is
his sister--this Mademoiselle Laure--want to force me to give up this
place without any compensation. She pretends that it is the property
of Madame Rocada, and that, as I am not Madame Rocada, it is not mine.
And when I told her I would go to a solicitor, she said she would
consult Mr. Candover and see what he would say.”
“That part of the business is soon disposed of,” said Gerard, with
decision. “They’re acting ‘on the bounce,’ and we’ve only got to go to
a lawyer for them to sing small directly.”
He seemed quite confident, but Audrey, who had more recent and more
alarming experiences of the precious pair than Gerard, was not so easy
in her mind as he.
She shook her head warningly.
“If you begin by thinking it will be easy to show them up,” she said
solemnly, “you will do no good at all. What I’m quite sure of is that
they are the cleverest and wickedest pair that ever lived. And that
they have means to hand for working all kinds of villainy, means that
we don’t dream of. Oh, you can’t understand the consciousness I’ve had
lately, always--always--that there has been a net about my feet,
drawing me tighter and tighter, so that I could not get away.”
She was shivering, and Gerard tried to laugh, comforting her.
“You don’t feel that now, surely, surely! Now you’ve got me back.”
But she hung round his neck, and with wild eyes whispered:--
“Shall I tell you the truth? What I feel now is that they have got not
me only but _you_ in the net as well. I can’t get rid of the feeling,
I can’t, I can’t!”
He rallied her on her cowardice in vain. But presently she noticed
that he looked deadly pale and tired, that his voice had become hoarse
and his eyes dull. And she jumped up from the sofa, and taking out
from a cupboard a little store of provisions, put her kettle on the
fire, and prepared to make him some tea.
Then she looked at her watch and found that it was seven o’clock.
“I must leave you in here,” she said, “and go and see whether
Mademoiselle Laure has come back. If she has not, it is I who must
dismiss the girls, and see that everything is safe for the night. One
of us always does that. Stay here. I don’t suppose anybody has seen
you, and they never come into this room. I’ll be back when they’ve all
gone.”
She made him lie down on the sofa, covered him with a rug, and
returned to the showrooms, where the girls were waiting to be
dismissed.
Mademoiselle Laure had not returned, and this made Audrey uneasy.
However, she attended to the duties of the evening, saw that the hats
and dresses had been properly covered up and put away, and bidding the
assistants good-night, waited till they had all gone down the stairs
before returning to Gerard.
Then she made the usual final tour of the suite of rooms, and was
about to turn down the electric light, when she heard the slight sound
of heavy tread on the soft carpet outside, and looking round, saw that
two men, respectably but not exactly well dressed, were standing in
the room.
A foreboding of evil came upon her at once. One of the men, she
thought, was a policeman in plain clothes. She looked at his boots,
and was confirmed in this uncomfortable impression.
“Who are you? And what do you want?” she asked sharply.
And as she spoke she made a step in the direction of the door, feeling
that Gerard ought to be present.
But the man with the policeman’s boots stepped quietly in her way and
said respectfully enough:--
“I beg pardon, ma’am. Madame Rocada, I believe?”
Audrey hesitated. What ought she to say?
“What do you want with Madame Rocada?” asked she.
There was a moment’s hesitancy on the part of the man, and then his
companion nodded to him to go on:--
“Well, ma’am, it appears that Madame Rocada was a lady that lived in
Paris, and that came over here. And her friends have set to work to
trace her.”
Audrey’s breath came fast. The lady in white! The White Countess!
“Well!” said she.
The man went on:--
“She has been traced, ma’am, to London, and to this house--this very
floor--but no farther.”
There was another ominous pause. Audrey merely bowed her head. She
dared not speak.
Then the man went on:--
“So we’ve been sent--among other things--to make inquiries, ma’am.”
“Yes. Well.”
“We understand, ma’am, that you are now Madame Rocada? That you call
yourself by that name?”
“It is a trade name only. I am not the woman of whom you are in
search.”
“So I understand, ma’am. But--h’m--we are led to believe that _you are
the last person who saw her alive_!”
Audrey uttered a low cry.
“No, no,” she cried hoarsely. “I saw her alive, it’s true, but I was
not the last person to see her.”
The men looked at each other.
“You admit you did see her, ma’am.”
“Yes, but oh--let me----”
She wanted to run to Gerard, to ask him to help her, to disentangle,
if he could, the awful thoughts that crossed and recrossed each other
in her poor distracted mind. But the men gravely, not rudely or
aggressively, intervened.
“I’m sorry, ma’am. You will have proper advice presently, no doubt.
But we must ask you to come with us now. We have a warrant.”
“A warrant! What for?” gasped Audrey.
“For your arrest. On suspicion of causing the death of Madame Rocada.”