A Butterfly on the Wheel Part 35

"Madame, you were gay, happy--like sunbeams. Your old aunt lived in the shadows. She is a dour old maid."

"I don't see what she has to do with it," Peggy answered. "The letter was written by some one who knew that we were going to stay in Paris, and even where we were going to stay."

Lady Attwill went up to the fireplace and sank down upon the sofa of blue linen.

In her smart afternoon costume of grey silk, and a large straw hat upon which the flowers were amethyst and purple, she made a perfect colour-harmony as she sat.

"Why was it sent to her?" Lady Attwill asked.

Peggy sighed. "I don't know, except that she was the one to poison George's mind. Without her he would probably have ignored it. But who was it who _knew_ that we should be in Paris that night? No one imagines that I knew or--Pauline. Then there's d.i.c.ky--that's absurd."

Peggy's face seemed to have grown older. The terrible ordeal that she had undergone had left vivid traces upon it. It was not a frightened face--it was the face of one who had been agonised, but it was also a face of great perplexity.

Pauline interposed. "Madame," she said, "if you did not know that you would be staying at Paris that night, the writer of that letter must be some one who did know, and who planned this trick to compromise you.

There are only two who could have known. Madame--I do not like...."

In the maid's voice the old, harsh Breton determination had flashed out.

She turned towards Lady Attwill, and her whole voice and bearing were a challenge.

Her head was pushed a little forward, moving from side to side like a snake about to strike; unconsciously her arms were set akimbo.

Lady Attwill looked languidly at the angry woman. "You need have no delicacy, Pauline," she said. "Ca fait rien, expliquez-vous. Tiens! What you want to say is that the letter was written by Mr. Collingwood or by myself--or by somebody or other procured by us to do it. C'est votre idee, n'est-ce pas?"

The woman, in her way--in her languid way--was defiant as the old Breton bonne herself.

Peggy rose and began to walk up and down the room. She had been sitting almost opposite Lady Attwill, but now there seemed to be hesitation and perplexity, not only in her voice, but in her whole att.i.tude.

"But you could not have done it, Alice," she said. "The luggage, don't you know--it was Colling who saw that it was not registered."

"That is only what the porter says," Alice Attwill answered grimly.

"Oh, my dear," Peggy replied, "it is only too obviously true. Pauline saw through it the same night. Didn't you think it was very funny?"

Lady Attwill fell immediately into the suggestion.

"Well, dear," she said, "d.i.c.ky and I were a little bit suspicious, since you put it to me; but I hardly liked to suggest----"

Peggy turned from both of them and went up to the piano, standing by it and drumming upon it with her gloved fingers. "Colling!" she muttered.

"It's impossible! And yet just now when I left the court I could not think how else it could have been done."

She wheeled round. "Alice," she said, "do you think it _could_ have been Colling? Do you? What reason could he have had?"

Alice Attwill's hands were clasped upon her knee. She was bending forward, nodding her head slightly from time to time, and had an almost judicial pose.

She appeared to be thinking. "My dear Peggy," she said at length, "I can see plenty of reasons. After all, we know that Colling won't be sorry if Admaston gets his divorce."

"I beg miladi's pardon," Pauline broke in, "but I do not think that is so."

"C'est bien possible," Lady Attwill replied to the maid. And then, looking at Peggy, "I am sure I can't imagine Mr. Collingwood doing such a thing. I am the last person to make mischief."

She rose as she spoke and walked towards the door. "Come along, Peggy,"

she said; "you must get your things off--you've had such a horrible day."

Peggy looked at her wildly. She hardly seemed to hear what she was saying.

"No--no--let me think--I must think!" she cried, and there was a rising note of hysteria in her voice.

"Well," Lady Attwill said calmly, "I must get out of my things, at anyrate." Then she spoke with something which sounded like affection in her voice.

"Peggy," she said, "you really must lie down and rest--I shall be down in a few minutes."

With a bright smile she took her parasol and left the room.

Then Peggy let herself go.

"Oh! How cruel it is!" she cried, raging up and down the drawing-room.

"They have taken all the joy out of my life! I feel as if they had burnt the d.a.m.ning letter in scarlet upon my breast--branded by law, divorce-court law! Oh, the ignominy, the shame of it all--the shame! It is barbarous! To hold a woman up and torture her before a pruriently minded crowd whether she is guilty or not! Am I guilty because I can't prove that I am innocent?"

The old maid ran up to Peggy and caught her firmly by the arms, pressing her down into a chair.

"Rest! rest!" she said, with the tears rolling down her cheeks. "Mignon, you will break my heart if you go on like this. You are innocent; I stake my soul on that. Wait--wait till to-morrow when I am witness. I will tell them!"

Peggy's arms went round the old maid's neck and she drew the gnarled face to hers. "Pauline," she said, "dear Pauline! They will torture you as they did me. It is useless. Sir Robert Fyffe will make you say just what he wants. It is not justice that triumphs in the end--it is intellect that d.a.m.ns. Pauline, do you think that Mr. Collingwood knew that we should be in Paris that night, and that he wrote the letter?"

Pauline kissed her. "I think, madame," she said, "that M. Collingwood knew that we should be in Paris. But I am certain he did not write that letter. M. Collingwood might have done a very foolish thing, thinking that you loved him--but he is a gentleman."

"But if he did not write it--then you think that Lady Attwill?..."

"Comme vous voulez? If it is not M. Collingwood, madame, it must be Lady Attwill."

"But why should she have done such a fiendish thing?"

"She has never forgiven you for marrying Mr. Admaston. Did I not tell you, madame? Did I not say that to you in Paris?"

Peggy nodded. "Yes, Pauline," she replied; "but I can't believe you.

She has seen my misery. No, Pauline, it is impossible!"

"Madame, it is not impossible. She can only conquer by your misery."

Peggy jumped up from the sofa, her whole body shaking, her face aflame with righteous anger. "Pauline!" she said in a shrill voice, "I _must_ find out who wrote that letter."

"Yes, madame," the old maid replied, with a despairing gesture of her hands; "but how will you do it?"

"I shall employ the same weapons to find out that as they have brought against me. The law, the officers, the craft and cunning of the whole machine. I am very rich, Pauline, quite apart from my husband--as you know very well; but, if it cost me every penny I had, I would spend it all, if necessary, to find out who wrote that letter."

The door opened and two footmen came in with the tea equipage. Peggy looked up at them, annoyed at the interruption; then her eye fell upon the windows at the end of the room which led upon a long, secluded terrace outside the drawing-room. It was called the "terrace lounge."

"Not here," she said impatiently; "on the terrace."