If Sinners Entice Thee Part 8

"What caused you to suspect Zertho, father?"

"Suspect him. I never suspected him!"

"Do not deny the truth," she answered, in a tone of mild reproach. "I know that before you went to London you sent him a message which, had he been guilty, would have allowed him time to escape."

"But he was entirely unaware of the tragedy," her father answered, rolling a cigarette with infinite care. "Zertho could have had no object in murdering Nelly. Besides, it had already been proved by the station-master that he had left by the train he saw him enter."

"Then why did you take the trouble to go to London?" she inquired.

"My motive was a secret one," he replied.

"One that even I must not know?" she inquired, in genuine surprise.

"Yes, even you must not know, Liane," he answered. "Women are apt to grow confidential towards their lovers, and if the secret were once out, then my plans would be thwarted."

"You suspect someone?" she asked, in a low, harsh voice.

"Well," he answered, regarding his unlit cigarette intently, "I will not say that I actually suspect someone, but I have a theory, strange though it may be, which I believe will turn out to be the correct one."

Liane started. Father and daughter again exchanged quick glances. She fancied she saw suspicion in his eyes.

"May I not a.s.sist you?" she asked. "You know that in the past I've many times brought you luck at the tables."

"No," he said, shaking his head. "In this I must act entirely alone.

George Stratfield no doubt occupies all your thoughts." She thought she detected a touch of sarcasm in his tone.

The girl blushed deeply, but did not answer. Her father, inveterate smoker that he was, lit his cigarette and sat silent and self-absorbed for a long time. He was thinking of the bright happy girl who, cold and dead in her tiny room upstairs, was the victim of a foul, terrible, and mysterious crime.

"How long have you known this man?" the Captain inquired at last.

"Three months."

"And has he proposed to you?"

"He has," she faltered, blus.h.i.+ng more deeply.

He drew a long breath, rose slowly, and pulling aside the white blind, looked out as if in search of something. In truth, he was hesitating whether he should speak to her at once, or wait for some other opportunity. Turning to her at last, however, he said briefly, in a low, pained tone,--

"You must break off the engagement, Liane. You cannot marry him."

"Cannot!" she gasped, her face turning pale. "Why?"

"Listen," he continued huskily, coming closer to her, laying his big hand upon her shoulder, and looking down upon her tenderly. "Through all these years of prosperity and adversity you alone have been the one bright joy of my life. Your existence has kept me from going to the bad altogether; your influence has prevented me from sinking lower in degradation than I have already sunk. For me the facile pleasures of a stray man have ceased, because, for your sake, Liane, I gave up the old life and returned here to settle and become respectable. I admit that our life in England is a trifle tame after what we've been used to, but it will not, perhaps, be always so. At present my luck's against me and we must wait in patience; therefore do not accept the first man's offer of marriage. Life's merely a game of _rouge-et-noir_. Sometimes you may win by waiting. Reflect well upon all the chances before you stake the maximum."

"But George loves me, dad, and his family are wealthy," she protested, meeting her father's earnest gaze with her large grey eyes, in which stood unshed tears.

"I don't doubt it, my girl," he answered huskily. "I was young once.

I, too, thought I loved a woman--your mother. I foolishly believed that she loved me better than anyone on earth. Ah! You wring from me my confession, because--because it should serve you as a lesson." And he paused with bent head, while Liane held his strong but trembling hand.

"It is a wretched story," he went on in a low, harsh voice, "yet you should know it, you who would bind yourself to this man irrevocably. At the time this woman came into my life I was on leave down in the South of France, with wealth, happiness and bright prospects. I loved her and made her my wife. Then I went with my regiment to India, but already my future was blasted, for within a year of my marriage the glamour fell from my eyes and I knew that I had been duped. A fault committed by her threw such opprobrium upon me that I was compelled to throw up my commission, leave her and go back to England. I could not return to my friends in London, because she would discover and annoy me; therefore I have drifted hither and thither, falling lower and lower in the social scale, until, ruined and without means, I became a common blackleg and swindler. But it belongs to the past. It is dead, gone--gone for ever.

Those years have gone and my youth has gone. I've lived like other men since then. Heaven knows it has not been a life to boast of, Liane.

There have been days and years in it when I dared not trust myself to remember what had been--days of madness and folly, and months of useless apathy. Ah!" he sighed, "I was straight enough before my marriage, but my life was wrecked solely by that woman."

His daughter listened intently, and when he had finished she echoed his deep sigh. Her father had never before told her the tragic story. She had always believed that her mother died of fever in India a year after marriage.

"Then my mother is not dead?" she observed reflectively.

"I do not know. To me she has been dead these eighteen years," he answered, with a stern look upon his hard-set features. A lump rose in his throat, and in his eye there was a suspicion of a tear.

"Was she like me?" Liane asked softly, still holding her father's hand and looking up at him.

"Yes, darling," he replied. "Sometimes when you look at me I shrink from you because your eyes are so like hers. She was just your age when I married her."

There was a long and painful silence. The hearts of father and daughter were too full for words. They were indeed an incongruous pair. He was a reckless gamester, a cunning adventurer, whose career had more than once brought him within an ace of arrest, while she, although prematurely versed in the evil ways of a polyglot world, where the laws of rect.i.tude and morality were lax, was nevertheless pure, honest and good.

"But, dear old dad, why may I not marry George?" she asked when, after thinking deeply over the truth regarding her parentage, her mind reverted to thoughts of the man she loved.

"I cannot sufficiently explain the reason now," he answered vaguely.

"Some day, when I am aware of all the facts, you shall know."

"But I can love no other man," she exclaimed decisively, with eyes downcast.

"You know my wish, Liane," her father answered rather coldly. "I feel sure you will endeavour to respect it."

"I cannot, father! I really cannot!" she cried starting up. "Besides, you give me no reason why I should not marry."

"I am unable to explain facts of which I am as yet unaware," he said, withdrawing his hand.

"We love each other, therefore I cannot see why you should object."

"I do not doubt that there is affection between you, but my objection is well based, I a.s.sure you, as some day you will be convinced."

"Have you any antipathy against George personally?"

"None whatever; I rather like him," he said. "I only tell you in plain, straightforward terms that your marriage with him is impossible, therefore the sooner you part the better;" and opening the door, he slowly left the room.

Deep in thought, Liane stood leaning against the table, in the same position as Zertho had stood when he had asked the captain for her hand.

Evidently her father entertained some deep-rooted prejudice against the Stratfields; nevertheless, after calm reflection, she felt confident that sooner or later she could over-rule his objection, and persuade him to adopt her view, as she had done on previous occasions without number.

On the following afternoon a double funeral attracted hundreds of persons to the churchyard of Stratfield Mortimer, where Nelly Bridson was laid to rest in a plain grave, beneath a drooping willow, and the body of Sir John Stratfield, fourteenth baronet, was placed in the family vault, among his ancestors. When the interments were over, George met Liane and managed to whisper a few words to her. It was an appointment, and in accordance with his request, she went at sundown along the chestnut avenue to the Court, and was at once shown to the library, where her lover awaited her.

Her mourning became her well. His quick eyes detected that her black dress, though not new, bore the unmistakable cut of the fas.h.i.+onable dressmaker. Her figure, perfect in symmetry, was shown to advantage by her short, French corset, and the narrow band of black satin that begirt her slim waist.

"I have to offer my apologies to you, dearest," he said, when the servant had closed the door. "At the inquest I was bound to openly confess that we had met clandestinely."

"What apology is needed?" she asked, smiling. "We love each other, and care nothing for what the world may think."

"That is true," he answered, deep in thought. "But I--I have an announcement to make to you, which I fear must cause you pain."