Volume Iii Part 6 (1/2)
”Your husband, dear lady, when he was dying, gave it in charge to me to let you see the contents of this box, which, he too truly said, would explain all. I, too, at times, had my suspicions; for remember this, I too loved your cousin long ago, and your husband was my dearest friend.”
The man buried his face in his hands and was silent for a moment; he pulled himself together with an effort. ”When I saw what the box contained, the whole ghastly secret was laid bare to me in an instant.
You remember when we were in Rome, by chance, by merest chance, I saw your husband at a masked ball with a lady; at that ball arose the quarrel between your husband and the unfortunate Frenchman who fell by his hand. The box will tell you the rest. The masked lady wore a magnificent pair of single-stone diamond earrings.” Spunyarn unlocked the box, placed it in front of his friend's widow and walked to the window.
With trembling fingers Mrs. Haggard opened it. There was a little packet of letters in Lucy Warrender's undeveloped girlish hand, the ink of which had faded; then a pair of single-stone brilliant earrings, which sparkled and s.h.i.+mmered in the firelight, as the widow took them in her trembling fingers; to one of them was still attached the duplicate of the _Mont de Piete_, dated the very day of her cousin's death. Last of all was a little purple velvet case on which was her husband's monogram with the single word ”Rome,” and a date just over twenty years ago. She opened it with difficulty; in it was a lovely miniature, not a mere photographer's likeness, of her cousin Lucy in all the pride of her girlish beauty, as a shepherdess, in powdered hair and in a Watteau costume. The face seemed to smile at her with an air of insolent triumph, that old smile of Lucy's which her cousin remembered so well in the days gone by, but which she had missed for many a long year. The painter had not forgotten to place in the ears of the shepherdess a pair of single-stone earrings; in the hand was the ordinary black silk vizard worn at masquerades, and the shepherdess was depicted in the act of unmasking. Nothing more pretty, nothing more piquant, nothing more _chic_ could be imagined. The widow placed the miniature upon the table, and as she did so a single object still remaining in the box caught her eye. It was only a little black silk mask, and from the two holes in the toy, in her disordered imagination, the eyes of her dead cousin still seemed to sparkle with a mocking light. She dropped the miniature into the box and closed the lid which shut out the horrid phantom.
As the box closed with an angry click, Lord Spunyarn turned towards the victim of her husband's perfidy.
”There is no need of explanation; my husband was right. I understand it all, but I forgave him, Lord Spunyarn, and I forgive him still. Poor Lucius!”
This was all she said.
Spunyarn resumed his seat at the fireside. Then there was a long silence, which neither seemed disposed to break.
At last with an effort he spoke. ”What is to be done, dear madam? I wish the secret had remained in the dead man's keeping; it is a dreadful responsibility. Can it be still kept?”
”It is my duty towards my dead husband, Lord Spunyarn,” she said decisively.
”But you have another duty, dear lady; a duty to your son and a duty to the old man here, who looks on Lucius as his heir.”
”My son must suffer with me, Lord Spunyarn, for his father's fault.”
Spunyarn shook his head. ”Not so, dear lady; there is but one way, one possible way, to preserve the reputation of those who are gone and to do justice, for justice must be done. Pit Town must know; for others, taking the lowest standpoint, may possess the secret, and the honour of the family must not be compromised. Lucius must efface himself, that is the only course.”
”Efface himself, Lord Spunyarn? I know the boy, the orphan boy; he was my husband's child; and with all his faults I love him; he will never consent to that; he would die first,” said Reginald Haggard's widow.
”And die he must, I mean socially. There is no other way.”
”He will never consent, Lord Spunyarn,” repeated the widow. ”He is wrapped up in the fact that he is Lord Pit Town's heir. With George it is different; he is my own son, my very son,” she added bitterly, ”and, if I wish it, he will give up everything for my sake and his father's; his father's honour is as dear to him as it is to me. Besides, my husband evidently foresaw the dilemma in which he has placed us, and made the boy his heir.”
”But justice, dear lady, justice----”
”Justice, Lord Spunyarn,” cried the indignant woman as she rose to her feet. ”G.o.d's justice, do you mean, or man's? Is it not enough that my husband should have betrayed and befooled me for twenty years, and should have robbed my boy of his very heritage, and more than that, of half the treasure of a mother's love? For I tell you, strange and unnatural as it may seem, that I love Lucius; ay, I love him, though he is poor Lucy's child and my husband's b.a.s.t.a.r.d. And who could help loving the poor helpless, friendless, neglected child? Yes, I acted the love at first, Lord Spunyarn, and it grew upon me till it became a part of myself. Is it for nothing, that when my husband was bleeding to death before my very eyes, that he bade me take care of Lucius? I have been a faithful and obedient wife, Lord Spunyarn, and I will obey my husband's last behest to the letter. I will protect his son's interests and his son's rights.”
”Alas, he has no rights, dear madam,” said Spunyarn gently.
”The secret, Lord Spunyarn, is not yours or mine; it is my husband's and hers,” she added, pointing to the box. ”When she made me swear to keep her secret, she threatened to haunt me should I betray her. How could I answer her? It was a girl's idle jest, I know; but I did swear it, G.o.d knows how unwillingly, and Heaven help me I will keep my oath. Yes, I will keep my oath,” here she sank into a chair, and covering her face with her hands, wept bitterly.
Lord Spunyarn paced the room in doubt. He was a man of principle, a religious man, a man of honour--strange combination forsooth in this nineteenth century, and he remembered that his mouth was closed. But was he, a good man, to stand idly by and see a great wrong done? Was he to see the honours and t.i.tle of a n.o.ble family descend to a b.a.s.t.a.r.d through the secret machinations of an artful woman? Heaven forbid!
”Think it over, dear madam, think it over,” he said; ”let me beg you, at least, to sleep on it, and G.o.d give you counsel,” he added in a broken voice, and then leaving the little red box and its contents upon the table where it lay, he hurriedly left the room.
While the interview which has been described was taking place, the two young men were walking briskly up and down the great avenue, which was already yellowing with commencing autumn.
It was Lucius who spoke.
”We have changed places, George, with a vengeance; it is I who am the pauper now. If my father meant to surprise me, he certainly succeeded.
You are the man of property, George, while I am rich only in expectations. Thank goodness, neither my father, the old man, nor any one else can keep me out of the t.i.tle and the entailed property; but there may be a deuce of a long time to wait. By Jove! you know these very old men don't die, they dry up. Why, look at grandfather Warrender.
It's a horrid nuisance this mourning, though I shall be heartily glad when I have to go into black next time. His lords.h.i.+p is a decided obstructionist;” so spoke the elder brother, as he blew a big cloud of smoke into the air.
”Don't pretend to be a brute, Lucius; you don't mean it, you know, old fellow,” said George.