Brooke's Daughter Part 48

At last they slept in each other's arms; but at seven o'clock Ethel was skimming about the room like a busy fairy, and it was Lesley, sleeping heavily after two or three wakeful nights, who had to be aroused by the little bride-elect, and Ethel laughed merrily to see her friend's start of surprise.

"Ethel! Ethel! People should be waiting on you and here you are bringing me tea and bread and b.u.t.ter. This is too bad!"

"It's a new departure," Ethel laughed. "There is no law against a bride's making herself useful as well as ornamental, is there? You will have to hurry up, all the same, Lesley: we are dreadfully late already.

And it is the loveliest morning you ever saw--and the bouquets have just come from the florist--and everything is charming! I feel as if I could dance."

But Ethel's mirth did not communicate itself to Lesley. There was nothing forced or unnatural in the young bride's happiness, but Lesley felt as if some cloud, some shadow, were in the air. Perhaps she had had bad dreams. She would not damp Ethel's spirits by a word of warning, but the old aunt from the country who came to inspect her niece as soon as she was dressed for church was not so considerate.

"You are letting your spirits run away with you, my dear," she said, reprovingly. "Even on a wedding-day there should not be too much laughter. Tears before night, when there has been laughter before breakfast, remember the proverb says."

"Oh, what a cheerful old lady!" said Ethel, br.i.m.m.i.n.g over with saucy laughter once more, as soon as the old dame's back was turned. "I don't care: I don't mean to be anything but a smiling bride--Oliver says that he hates tears at a wedding, and I don't mean him to see any."

Maurice arrived just in time to dress and to escort his sister to the church. It was not he, but Mrs. Durant, the companion and house-keeper, who first received a word of warning that things were not altogether as they should be. Others beside Lesley were scenting calamity in the air.

Mrs. Romaine was to form one of the wedding-party. She made her appearance at a quarter to ten, beautifully dressed, but white to the very lips, and with a haggard look about her eyes. As soon as she entered the house she drew Mrs. Durant aside.

"Has Oliver been sleeping here?" she asked.

"_Here!_" Mrs. Durant's indignant accent was sufficient answer.

"He has not been home all night," Mrs. Romaine whispered.

"Not at home!"

"I suppose he is sleeping at his club and will come on from there," Mrs.

Romaine answered, trying to rea.s.sure herself now that she had given the alarm to another. "Everything has been ordered--my bouquet came from him, at least from the florist's this morning--and I suppose we shall find him at the church. But I have been dreadfully anxious about him--quite foolishly, I daresay. Don't say anything to any body else."

Mrs. Durant did not mean to say anything, but--without exactly stating facts--she had managed in about three minutes to convey her own and Mrs.

Romaine's feeling of discomfort, to the whole party. The only exceptions were Maurice and Ethel, who, of course, heard nothing. A gloom fell upon the guests even while the carriages were standing at the door.

Lesley and Mrs. Romaine happened to be placed in the same carriage, facing one another. They looked at one another in silence, but with a mutual understanding that they had never felt before. Each read her own fear in the other's face. But the fear came from different sources.

Lesley was afraid that Oliver had felt himself unable to fulfil his engagement to Ethel, and had therefore severed his connection with her by flight: Rosalind feared that he had been taken ill or met with some untoward accident. Only in Rosalind's mind there was always another fear in the background where her brothers were concerned--that one or other of them would be bringing himself and her to disaster and disgrace. She had no faith in them, and not much faith in herself.

There was no bridegroom in waiting at St. Pancras' Church. Mrs. Romaine held a hurried consultation with a friend, and a messenger was despatched to Oliver's club, where he sometimes slept, and also to the rooms which he called his "chambers" in the city. A little silence overspread the group of guests from the Kenyons' house. Other visitors, of whom there were not many, looked blithe enough; but gloom was plainly visible on the faces of the bride's friends. And a little whisper soon ran from group to group--"The bridegroom has not come."

If only he would appear before the bride! There was yet time. The carriage containing Ethel and her brother had not started from the door.

But the distance was short, and speedily traversed: still Oliver did not come. And there at last was the wedding-chariot with its white silk linings and the white favors on the horses--and there was the pretty, smiling bride herself upon her brother's arm. How sweet she looked as she mounted the broad grey steps, with cheeks a little rosy, eyes downcast, and her smiles half concealed by the costly lace in which she had veiled herself! There was never a prettier bride than Ethel Kenyon, although she had not attired herself in all the bridal finery that many women covet.

Something in the expression of the faces that met her at the church door startled her a little when she first looked up: she changed color, and glanced wonderingly from one to another. Some one spoke in Maurice Kenyon's ear.

"What is it?" she asked, quickly. "Is anything wrong?"

"Oliver is late, dear, that is all. Just wait a minute--here by the door: he will be here presently."

"Late!" re-echoed the girl, turning suddenly pale. "Oh Maurice, what do you mean? _We_ were late too--it is a quarter past ten."

"Hush, my darling, he will be here directly, and more distressed than any of us, no doubt."

"I should think so," said Ethel, trying to laugh. "Poor Oliver! what a state he will be in!"

But the hand with which she had suddenly clutched Lesley's arm trembled, and her lips were very white.

For a minute, for five, for ten minutes, the bridal party waited, but Oliver did not come. A messenger came back to say that he had not been at the club since the previous day. And then Maurice's hot temper blazed up. He left his sister and spoke to his old friend, Miss Brooke.

"Do not let Ethel make herself a laughing-stock," he said. "The man insults us by being late, and shall account to me for it, but she must be got out of this somehow. Can't you take her away?"

"Let her go to the vestry," said Miss Brooke. "You had better not take her away just yet--look at the crowd outside. I will get Lesley to persuade her."

Ethel made no opposition. She went quietly into the vestry and sat down on a seat that was offered to her, waiting in silence, asking no questions. Then there was a short period of whispered consultation, of terrible suspense. She herself did not know whether the time was short or long. She could not bear even Lesley's arm about her, or the support of Maurice's brotherly hand. Harry d.u.c.h.esne's dark face in the background seemed in some inexplicable sort of way the worst of all. For she knew that he loved and admired her, and she was shamed by a recreant lover before his very eyes.

After a time Maurice was called out. A policeman in plain clothes wanted to speak to him. They had five minutes' conversation together, and then the young doctor returned to the room where Ethel was still sitting. His face was as white as that of his sister now, and she was the first to remark the change.

"You have heard something," she said, springing to her feet and fixing her great dark eyes upon his face.

"Yes, Ethel, my poor darling, yes. Come home with me."

"Not till you tell me the truth."

"Not here, my darling--wait till we get home. Come at once."

"I must know, Maurice: I cannot bear to wait. Is he--is he--_dead_?"

He would gladly have refused to answer, but his pallid lips spoke for him. And from another group a shriek rang out from the lips of Rosalind Romaine--a shriek that told her all.

"Dead? Murdered? Oh, no, no--it cannot be?" cried Oliver's sister. "Not dead! not dead!"

She fell back in violent hysterics, but Ethel neither wept nor cried aloud. She stood erect, her head a little higher than usual, a smile that might almost be called proud curving her soft lips.

"You see," she said, unsteadily, but very clearly; "you see--it was not his fault. He _would_ have come--if he had been--alive."

And, then, still smiling, she gave her hand to her brother and let him lead her away. But before she had crossed the threshold of the room, he was obliged to take her in his arms to save her from falling, and it was in his arms that she was carried back to the carriage which she had left so smilingly.

But for those who were left behind there was more bad news to hear. In London no secret can be kept even from the ears of those whose heart it breaks to hear it. Before noon the newsboys were crying in the streets--

"Brutal murder of a gentleman on his wedding-day. Arrest of a well-known journalist."

And everywhere the name bandied from pillar to post was that of Mr.

Caspar Brooke, who had been arrested on suspicion of having caused the death of Oliver Trent.

CHAPTER x.x.xIII.

IN ETHEL'S ROOM.

To those who knew Caspar Brooke best, it seemed ridiculously impossible that he should have been accused of any act of violence. But the accusation was made with so much circ.u.mstantial detail that no course seemed open to the police but to arrest him with as little delay as possible. And before the ill-fated wedding party had been dispersed, before Miss Brooke could hurry home, and long before Lesley suspected the blow that was in store for her, he had been taken by two policemen in plain clothes to the Bow Street Police station.

The full extent of the misfortune did not burst upon Doctor Sophy all at once. When she left the church the accusation was not publicly known, and as she walked home she reflected on the account that she must give to her brother of the extraordinary events of the day. She wished he had been present, and wondered why he had s.h.i.+rked the invitation which had been sent him by Ethel. He was not usually out of bed at this hour, but she resolved to go to his room and tell him the story at once, for, though he had never cared much for poor Oliver Trent, he had always been fond of Ethel. Lesley had gone to the Kenyons' house at Maurice's earnest request, and might not be back for some time.