The Bishop's Secret Part 47

'Oh!' Baltic looked seriously at the curate's pale face. 'Then the bishop knows that I am an inquiry agent.'

'He does, Mr Baltic. And, to tell you the truth, he is not at all pleased that you presented yourself in our city as a missionary.'

'I am a missionary,' answered the ex-sailor, quietly. 'I explained as much to Sir Harry, but it would seem that he has told the worst and kept back the best.'

'I don't understand,' said the curate, much bewildered.

'Sir, it would take too long for me to explain why I call myself a missionary, but you can rest a.s.sured that I am not sailing under false colours. As it is, you know me as an agent; and you know also my purpose in coming here.'

'Yes! I know that you are investigating the mur--'

'We are in the street, sir,' interrupted Baltic, with a glance at pa.s.sers-by; 'it is as well to be discreet. One moment.' He led Gabriel into a quiet alley, comparatively free from listeners. 'This is a rather rough sort of neighbourhood, sir.'

'Rough certainly, but not dangerous,' replied Gabriel, puzzled by the remark.

'Don't you carry a pistol, Mr Pendle?'

'No! Why should I?'

'Why indeed? If the Gospel is not a protection enough, no earthly arms will prevail. Your name is Gabriel, I think, sir.'

'Yes! Gabriel Pendle; but I don't see--'

'I'm coming to an explanation, sir. G. P.' mused Baltic--'same initials as those of your father and brother, eh, Mr Pendle?'

'Certainly. Both the bishop and my brother are named George.'

'G. P. all three,' said Baltic, with a nod, 'Do you travel abroad with a Cook's ticket, sir?'

'Usually! Why do you--'

'A through ticket to--say Nauheim--is about three pounds, I believe?'

'I paid that for mine, Mr Baltic. May I ask why you question me in this manner?' demanded Gabriel, irritably.

Baltic tapped Gabriel's chest three times with his forefinger. 'For your own safety, Mr Pendle. Good-day, sir!'

CHAPTER x.x.xII

THE INITIALS

As has before been stated, Dr Graham had another conversation with his persecuted friend, in which he advised him to tolerate the presence of Cargrim until Baltic captured the actual criminal. It was also at this second interview that the bishop asked Graham if he should tell George the truth. This question the little doctor answered promptly in the negative.

'For what is the use of telling him?' said he, argumentatively; 'doing so will make you uncomfortable and George very unhappy.'

'But George must learn the truth sooner or later.'

'I don't see that it is necessary to inform him of it at all,' retorted Graham, obstinately, 'and at all events you need not explain until forced to do so. One thing at a time, bishop. At present your task is to baffle Cargrim and kick the scoundrel out of the house when the murderer is found. Then we can discuss the matter of the marriage with Mrs Pendle.'

'Graham!'--the bishop's utterance of the name was like a cry of pain--'I cannot--I dare not tell Amy!'

'You must, Pendle, since she is the princ.i.p.al person concerned in the matter. You know how Gabriel learned the truth from her casual description of her first husband. Well, when Mrs Pendle returns to Beorminster, she may--I don't say that she will, mind you--but she may speak of Krant again, since, so far as she is concerned, there is no need for her to keep the fact of her first marriage secret.'

'Except that she may not wish to recall unhappy days,' put in the bishop, softly. 'Indeed, I wonder that Amy could bring herself to speak of Krant to her son and mine.'

'Women, my friend, do and say things at which they wonder themselves,'

said the misogynist, cynically; 'probably Mrs Pendle acted on the impulse of the moment and regretted it immediately the words were out of her mouth. Still, she may describe Krant again when she comes back, and her listener may be as clever as Gabriel was in putting two and two together, and connecting your wife's first husband with Krant. Should such a thing occur--and it might occur--your secret would become the common property of this scandalmongering place, and your last condition would be worse than your first. Also,' continued Graham, with the air of a person clinching an argument, 'if you and Mrs Pendle are to part, my poor friend, she must be told the reason for such separation.'

'Part!' echoed the bishop, indignantly. 'My dear Amy and I shall never part, doctor. I wonder that you can suggest such a thing. Now that Krant is dead beyond all doubt, I shall marry his widow at once.'

'Quite so, and quite right,' a.s.sented Graham, emphatically; 'but in that case, as you can see for yourself, you must tell her that the first marriage is null and void, so as to account for the necessity of the second ceremony.' The doctor paused and reflected. 'Old scatterbrain that I am,' said he, with a shrug, 'I quite forgot that way out of the difficulty. A second marriage! Of course! and there is your riddle solved.'

'No doubt, so far as Amy and I are concerned,' said Pendle, gloomily, 'but so late a ceremony will not make my children legitimate. In England, marriage is not a retrospective act.'

'They manage these things better in France,' opined Graham, in the manner of Sterne; 'there a man can legitimise his children born out of wedlock if he so chooses. There was a talk of modifying the English Act in the same way; but, of course, the very nice people with nasty ideas shrieked out in their usual pig-headed style about legalised immorality.

However,' pursued the doctor, in a more cheerful tone, 'I do not see that you need worry yourself on that point, bishop. You can depend upon Gabriel and me holding our tongues; you need not tell Lucy or George, and when you marry your wife for the second time, all things can go on as before. "What the eye does not see, the heart does not grieve at,"

you know.'

'But my eye sees, and my heart grieves,' groaned the bishop.

'Pis.h.!.+ don't make an inquisition of your conscience, Pendle. You have done no wrong; like greatness, evil has been thrust upon you.'

'I am certainly an innocent sinner, Graham.'

'Of course you are; but now that we have found the remedy, that is all over and done with. Wait till Jentham's murderer is found, then turn Cargrim out of doors, marry Mrs Krant in some out-of-the-way parish, and make a fresh will in favour of your children. There you are, bishop!

Don't worry any more about the matter.'

'You don't think that I should tell Brace that--?'

'I certainly don't think that you should disgrace your daughter in the eyes of her future husband,' retorted the doctor, hotly; 'marry your wife and hold your tongue. Even the Recording Angel can take no note of so obviously just a course.'

'I think you are right, Graham,' said the bishop, shaking his friend's hand with an expression of relief. 'In justice to my children, I must be silent. I shall act as you suggest.'

'Then that being so, you are a man again,' said Graham, jocularly, 'and now you can send for George to pay you a visit.'

'Do you think there is any necessity, Graham? The sight of him--'

'Will do you good, Pendle. Don't martyrise yourself and look on your children as so many visible evidences of sin. Bos.h.!.+ I tell you, bos.h.!.+'

cried the doctor, vigorously if ungallantly. 'Send for George, send for Mrs Pendle and Lucy, and throw all these morbid ideas to the wind. If you do not,' added Graham, raising a threatening finger, 'I shall write out a certificate for the transfer of the cleverest bishop in England to a lunatic asylum.'

'Well, well, I won't risk that,' said the bishop, smiling. 'George shall come back at once.'

'And all will be gas and gaiters, to quote the immortal Boz. Good-day, bishop! I have prescribed your medicine; see that you take it.'

'You are a tonic in yourself, Graham.'