Part 16 (1/2)
The old nabob's heart leaped up in a welcome relief at this command. His wrinkled face was of the hue of yellowed ivory, and his cold blue eyes were weak and watery, as he heavily lurched into a chair facing his hostess. Courage and craft had not failed him, for already Douglas Fraser was speeding on to Delhi from Calcutta, the sole occupant of a special train. In the long vigil of the night, Hugh Johnstone had evolved a plan to ward off the blow of the sword of Fate! But watchfully silent he awaited his enemy's conversational attack.
”d.a.m.n her! I will outwit her yet!” he silently swore.
”Before you give me your answer, Hugh Fraser,” said the calm-voiced woman, ”I wish to tell you again what, in your mad jealousy, you would not believe. I swear to you that Pierre Troubetskoi's letter, written to my dead sister, was written in ignorance of her marriage with you. The frightful scenes of the carnage of Paris had tossed us to and fro, and the careless destruction of the envelope, addressed to my sister under her maiden name, prevented me from proving her innocence as a wife.
Pierre Troubetskoi had long known my father, who had been an attache in Russia. He was Valerie's knightly suitor. And he fell into the estates which now burden me with wealth, while absent upon the Czar's secret affairs. My gallant old father was sacrificed to the frenzy of the time; his soldier's face betrayed him, his rosette of the Legion doomed him, Troubetskoi's letter to our father demanding Valerie's hand was returned to the writer, through the Russian Legation, a year later, after the reorganization of the Paris Post-office. I do not ask you to believe this, but by the G.o.d of Heaven, it is my warrant for forcing myself to the side of my dead sister's child. She shall yet have every acre and every rouble that Pierre Troubetskoi would have given to this child whom you hide. My sister died with her empty arms stretched to Heaven, imploring G.o.d for her child. And now, what terms will you make with me.
In the one case, an armed peace; in the other, 'war to the knife!'”
”What would you have?” he stubbornly muttered. ”You seek my ruin.”
”I do not!” solemnly answered Berthe Louison. ”G.o.d has blasted your life in denying you the love of your own child. You rule her by fear. You, in your selfish pa.s.sion, once reached out your strong hand and crushed this girl's mother, a poor, fragile flower, in her girlhood. Valerie believed Pierre to be dead or false when she timidly crossed the threshold of the wedded home which you made a prison for her! You only care for this bubble Baronetcy and for your heaped-up h.o.a.rds. The tribute of the shrieking ryot! Now, here are my terms: I will go down with you to Calcutta, and deliver over to you there the receipt for the deposit of jewels which holds back your coveted honor. You may do with them as you will! A visit to the Viceroy will at once clear the path. Tell any story you will of their recovery. An underling's unfaithfulness or the loss of the paper. You may remove them and surrender them as you will. Perhaps a fanciful discovery of their hiding-place here, their surrender by Hindu thieves, frightened at last; any of these conventional lies will clear your official record of the olden stain. Long years ago I would have treated with you, but I wanted to find the child. You hid her away from me. I found you out by chance in your changed name and new official residence.”
”And your terms?” demanded Johnstone. He saw, with lightning cunning, a pathway leading him out of his troubles. The vigil of the night before had borne its fruit already.
”That I have free access to your house and home. That I shall be the honored guest at your table. That I shall be left in no dubious social standing here. That I may see your daughter, learn to know her, and you may prudently arrange the story I am to tell her later. As Madame Berthe Louison, a tourist of wealth, an art dilettante, a French woman of rank and position, your social guaranty will keep the pack of human wolves away from my retreat here. I have my papers to prove all this.”
”When must this be? Before I receive the jewels? Before my t.i.tle to the baronetcy is perfected? What guaranty have I?” he replied.
”My honor alone! I pledge you now that I will not make myself known to Nadine until you have received the jewels and the Crown has obtained its long sequestered property. We are to come back here together. The future relations can be decided upon when I have satisfied my natural affection; when your innocently besmirched record has been righted.”
Hugh Johnstone's silvered head was bowed for a long interval in his trembling hands. ”You will not betray me to the authorities, when all is done? Your lips shall be sealed as to the past?” Alixe Delavigne bowed in silence. ”Then I accept your terms upon one condition only: That until we return from Calcutta, you will only see Nadine in my presence or in that of Mademoiselle Delande, her governess. It is only fair. When you have restored to me the jewels, you can then concert with me upon a plan to enlighten Nadine, with no scandal to me, no heart-break to her.
The slightest gossip as to a family skeleton reaching the Viceroy or the home authorities would lead to my public disgrace.”
Alixe Delavigne paced the room in silence for a few moments, while Hugh Johnstone's eyes were fixed upon the opened cabinet whence Jules Victor had so fiercely sprung forth as a champion.
”Be it so!” sternly replied Alixe Delavigne. ”And may G.o.d confound and punish the one who breaks the pact.”
”When do you wish to come? When can you go to Calcutta? I would like to hasten matters,” demanded the old nabob, with his eyes averted. The beautiful woman paused, and after a moment replied:
”To-morrow, come here and bring me to your house to dine. This afternoon you may call here and drive me over Delhi in your carriage. This will set a public seal upon our acquaintance. My maid can accompany us. This done, I will go to Calcutta with my two European servants, as you wish.
You can take the train on either the preceding or the following day. It will avoid both spies and gossip.”
”I will go before you and await you!” eagerly said Hugh Johnstone, rising. ”I will ask another person to dine with us to-morrow, and this evening I will prepare my daughter for the dinner, so that your coming will be no surprise to her. Shall I bring my carriage here at four to-day?”
”I will await you,” gravely said Alixe Delavigne, as she bowed in answer to her guest's formal signal of departure.
An hour later Jules Victor reported to his mistress: ”We drove to the telegraph office, where I awaited the gentleman for some time, and then we repaired to his home.”
There was a disgruntled man whose curses upon his kinsman's changing moods were both loud and deep when Douglas Fraser received a telegram that night at Allahabad. ”Is the old man crazy?” he demanded, as he read the words: ”Wait at Allahabad for me. Keep shady. With you in three days. Telegraph your address.” The canny young Scot thought of a coming legacy and obeyed the head of his clan.
Madame Berthe Louison, as Delhi was destined to know her, lingered long over her afternoon driving toilet. There was a recurring fear which made her tremble. ”Would Hugh Johnstone divulge the facts as to the jewels to the Viceroy, and so gain his free rehabilitation-and then defy her?
No-no! He never would dare!” she answered. ”My agents are even now watching that bank. The bank would never give up the sealed packages contents unknown, save on surrender of the carefully drawn receipts.”
And then Berthe remembered her own secret work at Calcutta. The Grindlays knew of the surrept.i.tious attempts made by the plausible Hugh Fraser to withdraw the deposit long before the baronetcy episode. And Berthe laughed, in memory of her capture of the receipts in the old days at Brighton, while looking for the stolen letter.
Long before that rising star of fas.h.i.+on, Major Alan Hawke, returned from General Willoughby's delightful dinner upon the day of Hugh Johnstone's crafty surrender, he knew that Hugh Johnstone had astounded Delhi by a personal exploitation of the Lady of the Silver Bungalow.
”By Gad! Hawke!” roared old Brigadier Willoughby, with his mouth full of chutney, ”Johnstone is going the pace! First he produces a daughter, a hidden treasure, and now this wonderfully beautiful French countess.”
”I suppose, General,” lightly said the Major, ”the old nabob will marry and retire to Europe on his coming baronetcy.”
”Likely enough!” sputtered Willoughby. ”You lucky young dog. I suppose you are in the secret?”