Part 28 (1/2)

”My boy--my poor boy.”

Venetia had said nothing.

Jones had expected a scene, outcries, questions, but there was something in all this that was quite beyond him. They had asked no questions, seemed to take the whole thing for granted, Venetia especially.

The Duke of Melford shut the door.

”Your mother--I mean Lady Rochester's heart is not strong,” said he, going to the bell and touching it. ”I must send for the doctor to see her.”

Jones, more than ever astonished by the coolness of the other, sat down again.

”Look here,” said he, ”I can't make you all out--you've called me no names--you haven't let me fully explain, the old lady is the only one that seems to have taken the news in. Can't you understand what I have told you?”

”Perfectly,” said the old gentleman, ”and it's the most extraordinary thing I have ever heard--and the most interesting--I want to have a long talk about it.--James,” to the servant who had answered the bell, ”telephone for Dr. Cavendish. Her ladys.h.i.+p has had another attack.”

”Dr. Cavendish has just been telephoned for, your grace, and Dr.

Simms.”

”That will do,” said his grace.

”Yes, 'pon my soul, it's quite extraordinary,” he took a cigar case from his pocket, proffered a cigar which Jones took, and then lit one himself.

”Look here,” said Jones suddenly alarmed by a new idea, ”you aren't guying me, are you?--you haven't taken it into your heads that I've gone dotty--mad?”

”Mad!” cried the old gentleman with a start. ”Never--such an idea never entered my mind. Why--why should it?”

”Only you take this thing so quietly.”

”Quietly--well, what would you have? My dear fellow, what is the good of shouting--ever? Not a bit. It's bad form. I take everything as it comes.”

”Well, then, listen whilst I tell you how all this happened. I came over here some time ago to rope in a contract with the British Government over some steel fixtures. I was partner with a man named Aaron Stringer.

Well, I failed on the contract and found myself broke with less than ten pounds in my pocket. I was sitting in the Savoy lounge when in came a man whom I knew at once by sight, but I couldn't place his name on him.

We had drinks together in the American bar, then we went upstairs to the lounge. He would not tell me who he was. 'Look in the looking-gla.s.s behind you,' said he, 'and you will see who I am.' I looked and I saw him. I was his twin image. I must tell you first that I had been having some champagne c.o.c.ktails and a whisky and soda. I'm not used to drink.

We had a jamboree together and dinner at some place, and then he sent me home as himself--I was blind.

”When I woke up next morning I said nothing but lay low, thinking it was all a joke. I ought to have spoken at once, but didn't, one makes mistakes in life--”

”We all do that,” said the other; ”yes--go on.”

”And later that day I opened a newspaper and saw my name and that I had committed suicide. It was Rochester, of course, that had committed suicide; did it on the underground.--Then I was in a nice fix. There I was in Rochester's clothes, with not a penny in my pockets; couldn't go to the hotel, couldn't go anywhere--so I determined to be Rochester, for a while, at least.

”I found his affairs in an awful muddle. You know that business about the coal mine. Well, I've managed to right his affairs. I wasn't thinking of any profit to myself over the business, I just did it because it was the right thing to do.

”Now I want to be perfectly plain with you. I might have carried on this game always and lived in Rochester's shoes only for two things, one is his wife, the other is a feeling that has been coming on me that if I carried on any longer I might go dotty. Times I've had attacks of a feeling that I did not know who I was. It's leading this double life, you know. Now I want to get right back and be myself and cut clear of all this. You can't think what it has been, carrying on this double life, hearing the servants calling me 'your lords.h.i.+p.' I couldn't have imagined it would have acted on the brain so. I've been simply crazy to hear someone calling me by my right name--well, that's the end of the matter, I want to settle up and get back to the States--”

The door opened and a servant appeared.

”Dr. Simms has arrived, your grace.”