Of High Descent Part 109

Volume 3, Chapter XIV.

A HARD TEST.

"Harry, dear Harry!" said Louise, as they stood together in a shabbily-furnished room in one of the streets off Tottenham Court Road, "I feel at times as if it would drive me mad. Pray, pray let me write!"

"Not yet, I tell you; not yet," he said angrily. "Wait till we are across the Channel, and then you shall."

"But--"

"Louie!" he half shouted at her, "have some patience."

"Patience, dear? Think of our father's agony of mind. He loves us."

"Then the joy of finding we are both alive and well must compensate for what he suffers now."

"But you do not realise what must be thought of me."

"Oh, yes, I do," he said bitterly; "but you do not realise what would be thought of me, if it were known that I was alive. I s.h.i.+ver every time I meet a policeman. Can't you see how I am placed?"

"Yes--yes," said Louise wearily; "but at times I can only think of our father--of Madelaine--of Uncle Luke."

"Hus.h.!.+" he cried with an irritable stamp of the foot. "Have patience.

Once we are on the Continent I shall feel as if I could breathe; but this wretched dilatory way of getting money worries me to death."

"Then why not sell the jewels, and let us go?"

"That's talking like a woman again. It's very easy to talk about selling the jewels, and it is easy to sell them if you go to some blackguard who will take advantage of your needs and give you next to nothing for them. But, as Pradelle says--"

"Pradelle!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Louise, with a look of dislike crossing her face.

"Yes, Pradelle. That's right, speak ill of the only friend we have.

Why, we owe everything to him. What could we have done? Where could we have gone if it had not been for him, and my finding out where he was through asking at the old meeting-place?"

"I do not like Mr Pradelle," said Louise firmly.

"Then you ought to," said Harry, as he walked up and down the room like some caged animal. "As he says, if you go to sell the things at a respectable place they'll ask all manner of questions that it is not convenient to answer, and we must not risk detection by doing that."

"Risk detection?" said Louise, clasping her hands about one knee as she gazed straight before her.

"The people here are as suspicious of us as can be, and the landlady seems ready to ask questions every time we meet on the stairs."

"Yes," said Louise in a sad, weary way; "she is always asking questions."

"But you do not answer them?"

"I--I hardly know what I have said, Harry. She is so pertinacious."

"We must leave here," said the young man excitedly. "Why don't Pradelle come?"

"Do you expect him to-night?"

"Expect him? Yes. I have only half-a-crown left, and he has your gold chain to pledge. He is to bring the money to-night. I expected him before."

"Harry, dear."

"Well?"

"Do you think Mr Pradelle is trustworthy?"

"As trustworthy as most people," said the young man carelessly. "Yes, of course. He is obliged to be."

"But could you not pledge the things yourself instead of trusting him?"

"No," he cried, with an impatient stamp. "You know how I tried and how the a.s.sistant began to question and stare at me, till I s.n.a.t.c.hed the thing out of his hands and hurried out of the shop. I'd sooner beg than try to do it again."

Louise was silent for a few moments, and sat gazing thoughtfully before her.

"Let me write Harry, telling everything, and asking my father to send us money."

"Send for the police at once. There, open the windows, and call the first one up that you see pa.s.s. It will be the shortest way."

"But I am sure, dear--"

"Once more, so am I. At the present moment I am free. Let me have my liberty to begin life over again honestly, repentantly, and with the earnest desire to redeem the past. Will you let me have that?"

"Of course--of course, dear."

"Then say no more to me about communicating with home."

Louise was silent again, beaten once more by her brother's arguments in her desire to see him redeem the past.

"Harry," she said at last, after her brother had been standing with his cheek pressed against the window-pane, looking down the street in search of the expected visitor.

"Well?"

"Has it ever occurred to you that Mr Pradelle is trying to keep us here?"

"Absurd!"

"No: I feel sure it is so, and that he does not want us to go away. Let me take my bracelets and necklet to one of those places where they buy jewellery or lend money."

"You?"

"Yes. Why not?"

"Are you mad?"

"No. Why should I not sell what is my own?"