The Lost Lady of Lone Part 40

"I will return within an hour, madam," replied the duke, as he bowed and left the room.

He went directly to the nearest police station at Church Court, Kensington.

He asked to see Detective Collinson of the force.

Fortunately, Detective Collinson was at the office, and soon made his appearance.

The duke asked for a private interview.

The detective invited him to sit down in an empty side-room.

There the duke put the case of the missing lady in his hands, giving him all the circ.u.mstances supposed to be connected with her disappearance.

The detective exhibited not the slightest surprise at the hearing of this unprecedented story, nor did he express any opinion. Detectives never are surprised at anything that may happen at any time to anybody, nor have they ever any opinions to venture in advance.

Mr. Collinson said he would take the case and give it his undivided attention, but would promise nothing else.

The Duke of Hereward, obliged to be contented with this answer, arose to leave the room. In pa.s.sing out he met the chief, who had not been present when he first entered.

"Oh, I beg your grace's pardon, but I consider this meeting very fortunate," said that officer, respectfully touching his hat.

"Upon what ground?" gravely inquired the duke.

"Your grace is wanted as a witness for the Crown, on the trial of John Potts and Rose Cameron, charged with the murder of the late Sir Lemuel Levison. The girl, who was arrested at a house in Westminster Road a few days ago, has been sent down to Scotland, and the trial will commence, on the day after to-morrow, at the a.s.sizes now open at Bannff. But, according to the newspaper report, we thought your grace to be now on your way to Paris, and we were just about to dispatch a special messenger to you. So your grace will perceive how fortunate this meeting turns out to be."

"Yes, I perceive," said the duke, dryly.

"And your grace will not be inconvenienced, I hope," said the chief, as he bowed and placed a folded paper in the duke's hand.

It was a subpoena commanding the recipient, under certain pains and penalties, to render himself at the Town Hall of Bannff as a witness for the Crown, in the approaching trial of John Potts, alias Abraham Peters, and Rose Cameron.

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE FLIGHT OF THE d.u.c.h.eSS

When the emissary of Rose Cameron had gone, the young d.u.c.h.ess of Hereward, in a whirlwind of long-repressed excitement, slammed, locked and bolted all the doors leading from her apartments into the hall, and then fled into her dressing-room and cast herself head long down upon the floor in the collapse of utter, infinite despair--despair in all its depth of darkness, without its benumbing calmness!

Her soul was shaken by a tempest of warring pa.s.sions! Amazement, indignation, grief, horror, raged through her agonized bosom!

It was well that no human eye beheld her in this deep degradation of woe!

For in the madness of her anguish, she rolled on the floor, and tore the clothing from her shoulders and the dark hair from her head! She uttered such groans and cries as are seldom heard on this earth--such as perhaps fill the murky atmosphere of h.e.l.l. She impiously called on Heaven to strike her dead as she lay! She was indeed on the very brink of raving insanity.

There was but one thought that held her reason on its throne--the necessity of immediate flight and escape--escape from the man whom she had just vowed at the altar to love, honor, and obey until death--the man whom she had wors.h.i.+ped as an archangel!

The man?--the fiend, rather!

What had she just now found him proved to be?

Yes _proved_ to be, beyond the merciful possibility of a saving doubt!--proved to be by the most overwhelming and convicting testimony, corroborated also by the evidence of her own eyes and ears, too long discredited for his sake.

Her eyes had seen him lurking stealthily in the dark hall, near her father's bedroom door, late on the night of that father's murder. She had spoken to him, and at the sound of her voice he had shrunk silently out of sight.

Yet she had discredited the evidence of her own eyes, and persuaded herself that she had been the subject of an optical illusion.

Her ears had heard a part of his midnight conversation with his female confederate under the balcony--had heard his prediction that something would happen that night to prevent the marriage that he promised her should never take place--a prediction so awfully fulfilled in the morning by the discovery of the dead body of her murdered father! She had fainted at the sound of his voice, uttering such treacherous and cruel words; yet on her return to consciousness she had disbelieved the evidence of her own ears, and convinced herself that she had been the victim of a nightmare dream!

Yes! she had disallowed the direct evidence of her own senses rather than believe such diabolical wickedness of her idol! But now the evidence of her own eyes and ears was corroborated by the most complete and convincing testimony--the conversation under the balcony, as reported by Rose Cameron's messenger, corresponded exactly with the conversation overheard by herself at the time and place it was said to have occurred, but which she dismissed from her mind as an evil dream!

This corroborating testimony proved it to be an atrocious reality! And the man to whom she had given her hand that morning was an accomplice in the murder of her father! unintentionally perhaps, for the witness testified to the horror he expressed on learning from his confederate that a murder had been committed: "The old man squealed and we had to squelch him!" How she shuddered at the memory of these horrible words!

But this man was not her husband, after all! Although a marriage ceremony had been performed between them by a bishop, he was not her husband, but the husband of Rose Cameron. She had overwhelming and convincing proof of this also!

The letters written to Rose Cameron, calling her his dear wife, and signing himself her devoted husband "Arondelle," were in the handwriting of the Duke of Hereward! She could have sworn to that handwriting, under any circ.u.mstances.

And the photograph shown as the likeness of Rose Cameron's husband, was a duplicate of one in her own possession, given her by the duke himself.

And, above all, the certificate of marriage between them, signed by the officiating clergyman and witnessed by the officers of the church, was unquestionably genuine, regular, and legal!

No! there was not one merciful doubt to found a hope of his innocence upon! It was amazing, stupefying, annihilating, but it was true. Her idol was a fiend, glorious in personal beauty, diabolical in spirit, as the fallen archangel Lucifer, Son of the Morning!

He was deeply, atrociously, insanely guilty!

Yes, insanely! for how could he have acted so recklessly, as well as so criminally, if he had not been insane? Would he not have known that swift discovery and disgrace were sure to follow the almost open commission of such base crimes? And if no feeling of honor or conscience could have deterred him, would not the fear of certain consequences have done so?

_His_ insanity was _her_ only rational theory of the case! But his supposed insanity did not vindicate him to her pure and just mind.

For he was not an insane _man_ so much as an insane devil! He had only been mad in his recklessness, not in his crimes.

Then quickly through her storm-tossed soul pa.s.sed the thought that both sacred and profane history recorded instances of crimes committed by righteous and honorable men. Amazing truth! She remembered the piety and the _sin_ of David, when he stole the wife of Uriah, and betrayed that loyal servant and brave soldier to a treacherous and b.l.o.o.d.y death!

She remembered the loyalty and the _treason_ of that chivalrous young Scottish prince who headed a fratricidal rebellion, in which his father and his king was slain, and who, as James IV., lived a life of remorse and penance, until, in his turn, he was slain on the fatal field of Flodden. She thought of these, and other instances, in which it might seem as if an angel and a devil lived together, animating one man's body.

This would, of course, produce inconsistency of conduct, insanity of mind.

But among all the harrowing thoughts that hurried through her tortured mind, one feeling was predominant--the necessity of instant flight. There was no other cause for her to pursue. The bridal train was awaiting her down stairs. Soon they would send to summon her again. How could she meet them? What could she say to them? How could she ever look upon the face of the Duke of Hereward and _live_?

She must fly at once. No, there was no time to write a note and leave it pinned on her dressing-table cus.h.i.+on. Besides, what could she say in her note? Nothing; or nothing that she would say.

She must go and make no sign. She forced herself to rise from the floor and commence hurried preparations for immediate flight.

In all the tumult of her soul, some intuition guided her through her hasty arrangements to take the most effectual means to elude pursuit and baffle discovery.

She took off her handsome mourning dress of black silk and c.r.a.pe that she had put on to travel in, and she packed it, with the black felt hat, vail, sack and gloves that belonged to the suit, in one of her trunks, which she carefully locked.

Then from some receptacle of her left-off colored dresses, she selected a dark-gray silk suit, with sack, hat, vail and gloves to match. And in that she dressed herself.

Then she reflected.

"They will think that I went away in my mourning dress, which they will miss. If they describe me, they will describe a lady in deep mourning. If any one comes in pursuit, they will look for a young woman in black, and pa.s.s me by, because I shall wear gray and keep my vail down."