Part 22 (1/2)
”Then what I have to reply is the reverse of complimentary. If you had been a man I should have told you to your face that you were a liar.”
”You may disbelieve me as you will,” she responded still unruffled.
”But I merely tell you that I have no further desire to stand here and be insulted,” and although she tried to pa.s.s him he again clutched her wrist fiercely and prevented her.
”You shall answer me!” he whispered angrily. ”You are Marigold Gordon, now Countess of Stanchester; you are the woman I am here to meet, to speak with calmly, and to come to an amicable settlement--if possible.
You know, as well as I do, that Lolita's future in is your hands, just as it is in mine. A word from either of us can ruin her. It would mean for her arrest, disgrace, condemnation. Now, do you intend to speak and to save her; or will you still deny previous acquaintance with me and consequently all knowledge of the affair? Lolita is in peril. If you will you can save her, although she is your enemy--although I know how you hate her.”
I stood aghast at this fresh development of the mystery. I had actually urged this woman to disclaim all that the man Keene might allege, yet in utter ignorance that, by so doing, she was bringing ruin upon my love!
My ears were open to catch every word. The Countess was Lolita's enemy!
Could that be the actual truth? Did this woman whose beauty was so remarkable so mask her real feelings towards her husband's sister that, while outwardly showing great affection for her, she had secretly plotted her ruin and disgrace?
”I know nothing,” was her persistent reply.
”Then you prefer that Lolita shall suffer,” he said in a calm hard voice. ”Remember that her enemies are unscrupulous, relentless. The word once spoken can never be recalled. Do you intend that her life shall actually be sacrificed?”
”How?”
”She intends to take it by her own hand the instant the truth is known.
I have been up to Scotland.”
”And you have, I suppose, threatened her, as you have me?” sneered her ladys.h.i.+p.
”I have no necessity to threaten her,” was his answer. ”She knows quite well enough the peril in which she is placed by those who have sought her downfall.”
”Well, and what does her future concern me, pray?” asked the woman coldly.
”Only that you can save her,” he argued. ”Think if, in a moment of despair, she took her life, what a burden of remorse would be yours.”
”There is no such word as remorse in my vocabulary,” she laughed. ”If there were I should have entered a convent long ago.”
”Yes,” he said. ”You speak the truth, Marigold. You are one of those few women who are, perhaps fortunately, untroubled by conscience. The past is to you a closed book, would that it were also to me! Would that I could forget completely that affair at which you and I exercised such dastardly cunning and scandalous duplicity. But I cannot, and it is for that reason I am here to beg--to beseech of you to at least save poor Lolita, who is being driven to extremity by despair!”
Lolita! I thought of her, desperate and unprotected, the victim of a vile and yet mysterious conspiracy--the victim of this woman who was, after all, her secret enemy. Heaven formed me as I was, a creature of affection, and I bowed to its decree in living but for love of her.
Upon the tablet of my heart was graven Lolita, and death alone could efface it. I was no sensualist; thank heaven I had not brutalised my mind, nor contaminated the pure ray of my divinity. I loved with truth, with ardour, and with tenderest affection, from which had arisen all those ecstasies that const.i.tuted the heaven of loving. True, I was jealous--madly jealous. I was a tyrant in the pa.s.sion that consumed me, but none can truly love who would receive it when divided.
Poverty claimed wealth--ambition craved for honour--kings would have boundless sway--despots would be G.o.ds--and I merely asked for love.
Where was my crime in claiming a return for that already given? Or if it could never be mine, why should I dash at once to earth the air-drawn vision of felicity?
Fate was inscrutable; and sanctioned by its will, I determined to yield without a sign to my reward, be it love or be it misery.
Each pleasure has its pain, nor yet was ever mortal joy complete. In those days before the advent of Richard Keene in Sibberton I had been lulled by bliss so exquisite that reason should have told me it was but a dream. I had forgotten everything in the great vortex of love which had, till then, overwhelmed me. And as I stood there listening to every word that pa.s.sed, I felt that I alone had power to save the woman I adored.
There was a plot, some vile dastardly plot, the mystery of which was inscrutable. And she was to be the victim. Was it right that I should remain silent and make no effort to rescue her from the doom which this man Keene declared must be hers?
”How can I save her, when I am in ignorance?” asked the woman, still persistent in the disclaimer I had so foolishly urged upon her.
”Then you still deny all knowledge of the affair?” he said in his deep earnest voice. ”You still dare to stand there and tell me that you are not the woman who a.s.sisted Marie Lejeune--the woman for whom the police still hold a warrant, but who do not seem to recognise a common criminal in the person of the Countess of Stanchester. Think for a moment what a word from me to the police might mean to you,” he added in a threatening tone.