A Perilous Secret Part 39

Monckton affected not to see that she was declining to communicate with him. He walked on quietly, and said:

"And I have not seen you since you were a child, but I had the honor of knowing your mother."

"You knew my mother, sir?"

"Knew her and respected her."

"What was she like, sir?"

"She was tall and rather dark, not like you."

"So I have heard," said Mary. "Well, sir," said she, for his voice was ingratiating, and had modified the effect of his criminal countenance, "as you knew my mother, you are welcome to me."

The artist in deceit gave a little sigh, and said, "That's more than I dare hope. For I am here upon a most unpleasant commission; but for my respect for your mother I would not have undertaken it, for really my acquaintance with the other lady is but slight."

Mary looked a little surprised at this rigmarole, and said, "But this commission, what is it?"

"Miss Bartley," said he, solemnly, yet gravely, "I have been requested to warn you against a gentleman who is deceiving you."

"Who is that?" said Mary, on her guard directly.

"It is a Mr. Walter Clifford."

"Walter Clifford!" said Mary. "You are a slanderer; he is incapable of deceit."

The rogue pretended to brighten up.

"Well, I hope so," said he, "and I told the lady as much; he comes from a most honorable stock. So then he has _told_ you about Lucy Monckton?"

"Lucy Monckton!" cried Mary. "No; who is she?"

"Miss Bartley," said the villain, very gravely and solemnly, "she is his wife."

"His wife, sir?" cried Mary, contemptuously--"his wife? You must be mad.

I'll hear no more against him behind his back." Then, threatening her tormentor: "He will be home again this evening; he has only ridden to the Lake Hotel; you shall repeat this to his face, if you dare."

"It will be my painful duty," said the serpent, meekly.

"His wife!" said Mary, scornfully, but her lips trembled.

"His wife," replied Monckton, calmly; "a respectable woman whom, it seems, he has deserted these fourteen years. My acquaintance with her is slight, but she is in a good position, and, indeed, wealthy, and has never troubled him. However, she heard somehow he was courting you, and as I often visit Derby upon business, she requested me to come over here and warn you in time."

"And do you think," said Mary, scornfully, "I shall believe this from a stranger?"

"Hardly," said Monckton, with every appearance of candor. "Mrs. Walter Clifford directed me to show you his marriage certificate and hers."

"The marriage certificate!" cried Mary, turning pale.

"Yes," said Monckton; "they were married at the Registry Office on the 11th June, 1868," and he put his hand in his breast pocket to search for the certificate. He took this opportunity to say, "You must not fancy that there is any jealousy or ill feeling after fourteen years'

desertion, but she felt it her duty as a woman--"

"The certificate!" said Mary--"the certificate!"

He showed her the certificate; she read the fatal words, "Walter Clifford." The rest swam before her eyes, and to her the world seemed at an end. She heard, as in a dream, the smooth voice of the false accuser, saying, with a world of fict.i.tious sympathy, "I wish I had never undertaken this business. Mrs. Walter Clifford doesn't want to distress you; she only felt it her duty to save you. Don't give way. There is no great harm done, unless you were to be deluded into marrying him."

"And what then?" inquired Mary, trembling.

Monckton appeared to be agitated at this question.

"Oh, don't speak of it," said he. "You would be ruined for life, and he would get seven years' penal servitude; and that is a sentence few gentlemen survive in the present day when prisons are slaughter-houses.

There, I have discharged the most disagreeable office I ever undertook in my life; but at all events you are warned in time."

Then he bowed most respectfully to her, and retired, exhaling his pent-up venom in a diabolical grin.

She, poor victim, stood there stupefied, pierced with a poisoned arrow, and almost in a state of collapse; then she lifted her hands and eyes for help, and saw Hope's study in front of her. Everything swam confusedly before her; she did not know for certain whether he was there or not; she cried to that true friend for help.

"Mr. Hope--I am lost--I am in the deep waters of despair--save me _once more_, save me!" Thus speaking she tottered into the office, and sank all limp and powerless into a chair, unable to move or speak, but still not insensible, and soon her brow sank upon the table, and her hands spread themselves feebly out before her.

It was all villainous spite on Monckton's part. He did not for a moment suppose that his lie could long outlive Walter Clifford's return; but he was getting desperate, and longing to stab them all. Unfortunately fate befriended the villain's malice, and the husband and wife did not meet again till that diabolical poison had done its work.

Monckton retired, put off his old man's disguise behind the fir-trees, and went toward another of his hiding-places, an enormous oak-tree which stood in the hedge of Hope's cottage garden. The subtle villain had made this hollow tree an observatory, and a sort of sally-port, whence he could play the fiend.

The people at the hotel were, as Mary told Julia Clifford, very honest people.

They showed Percy Fitzroy's bracelet to one or two persons, and found it was of great value. This made them uneasy, lest something should happen to it under their charge; so the woman sent her husband to the neighborhood of Clifford Hall to try and find out if there was a lady of that name who had left it. The husband was a simple fellow, very unfit to discharge so delicate a commission. He went at first, as a matter of course, to the public-house; they directed him to the Hall, but he missed it, and encountered a gentleman, whose quick eye fell upon the bracelet, for the foolish man had shown it to so many people that now he was carrying it in his hand, and it blazed in the meridian sun. This gentleman said, "What have you got there?"

"Well, sir," said the man, "it was left at our hotel by a young couple from these parts. Handsome couple they were, sir, and spending their honey-moon."

"Let me see it," said Mr. Bartley, for he was the gentleman. He had come back in some anxiety to see whether Hope had pacified Mary, or whether he must exert himself to make matters smooth with her again. Whilst he was examining the bracelet, who should appear but Percy Fitzroy, the owner. Not that he came after the bracelet; on the contrary, that impetuous young gentleman had discovered during the last two hours that he valued Miss Clifford's love a great deal more than all the bracelets in the world, for all that he was delighted at the unexpected sight of his property.

"Why, that's mine," said he. "It's an heirloom. I lent it to Miss Julia Clifford, and when I asked her for it to-day she could not produce it."

"Oho!" said Mr. Bartley. "What, do the ladies of the house of Clifford go in for clandestine marriages?"

"Certainly not, sir," said Fitzroy. "Don't you know the difference between a wedding ring and a bracelet?" Then he turned to the man, "Here is a sovereign for your trouble, my man. Now give me my bracelet."

To his surprise the hotel-keeper put it behind his back instead of giving it to him.

"Nay," said he, shaking his head knowingly, "you are not the gentleman that spent the honey-moon with the lady as owns it. My mistress said I was not to give it into no hands but hers."

This staggered Percy dreadfully, and he looked from one to another to a.s.sist him in solving the mystery.

Bartley came to the a.s.sistance of his understanding, but with no regard to the feelings of his heart. "It's clear enough what it means, sir; your sweetheart is playing you false."

That went through the true-lover's heart like a knife, and poor little Percy leaned in despair against Hope's workshop window transfixed by the poisoned arrow of jealousy.

At this moment the voice of Colonel Clifford was heard, loud and ringing as usual. Julia Clifford had decoyed him there in hopes of falling in with Percy and making it up; and to deceive the good Colonel as to her intentions she had been running him down all the way; so the Colonel was heard to say, in a voice for all the village to hear, "Jealous is he, and suspicious? Then you take my advice and give him up at once. You will easily find a better man and a bigger." After delivering this, like the word of command upon parade, the Colonel was crossing the turf, a yard or two higher up than Hope's workshop, when the spirit of revenge moved Bartley to retort upon his insulter.

"Hy, Colonel Clifford!"